(++++) COMBO PLATTERS

Richard Strauss: Ein Heldenleben; Behzad Ranjbaran: Violin Concerto. Nikki Chooi, violin; Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by JoAnn Falletta. Beau Fleuve. $15.                               

Music for Marimba: Bach, Debussy, John Zorn and Miho Hazama. Mika Stoltzman, marimba; members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Boston Modern Orchestra Project conducted by Steven Lipsitt and Miho Hazama. AVIE. $19.99. 

     In the days before there were hundreds of TV channels and an additional surfeit of streaming services, television programmers trying to draw an audience to new shows developed a technique called “hammocking.” This involved placing a new program between two similar established and already popular ones, the reasoning being that people would most likely watch the first show and stay put for the second (new) one so as to be ready to watch the third. Something analogous has long been common practice in concert production: present a new work in the middle of a concert that otherwise includes pieces that the audience already knows and enjoys. More recently, a similar approach has become increasingly common in recordings, despite the relative ease with which listeners can skip little-known material or simply turn off a CD altogether. Still, this combinatorial idea has the potential to make new music more widely accessible, at least giving it a chance to find an audience – provided that the less-known work is paired with a suitable better-known one that may, in and of itself, be attractive enough to tempt listeners. The latest Beau Fleuve recording from the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra under JoAnn Falletta handles this juxtaposition of well-known and less-known quite well – and thanks to the quality of Falletta’s reading (and the orchestra’s playing) of Ein Heldenleben, the CD has real potential to attract people who might not otherwise evince much interest in the violin concerto by Behzad Ranjbaran (born 1955). The Buffalo ensemble is at its best in the grandiose (and, ok, somewhat overdone) self-aggrandizing Richard Strauss tone poem, with rich and elegant brass a standout element and strings filled with warmth and exceptionally tight-knit ensemble playing – along with very fine handling of the solo-violin sections by concertmaster Nikki Chooi. The eventual quiet withdrawal from the world at the tone poem’s end – a deliberate parallel to Strauss’s treatment of the conclusion of Don Quixote, which he considered a companion piece to such an extent that he urged that the two works be programmed together – is handled as elegantly as the many more-dramatic sections of the tone poem. And Chooi’s sweetness throughout, mixed with acerbity when called for, provides just the right contrast with the many internal and external troubles faced by the titular hero. Even listeners who already own Ein Heldenleben, as most target audiences for this CD surely will, may well find this a good enough performance to add to their collection – which of course is what Falletta and the production team hope, since Ranjbaran’s music on its own will not likely be what draws people to the CD. But those who do engage with the recording will find a great deal in the Ranjbaran concerto to like, and not just because Chooi plays it so well – although that is certainly an element of the enjoyment. The 1994 concerto, which here receives its world première recording, was first performed in 2003 by Joshua Bell, to whom the work is dedicated (with Gerard Schwarz conducting). But this late-20^th-century piece draws with clarity, intensity and sure knowledge on the orchestral norms of Strauss’s Romantic era. And Ranjbaran’s own training as a violinist shines through everywhere: the music lies very well on the solo instrument, the virtuoso elements – which are considerable – are well-thought-out and never sound arbitrary, and the elements of underlying exoticism in the music complement the work rather than sounding tacked-on. Ranjbaran, born in Iran, has said that the kamancheh, an ancient Persian bowed instrument and distant ancestor of the violin, strongly influenced his thinking when he composed this concerto, and certainly some elements of the music have sounds that evoke Persia. But Ranjbaran is so sure-handed in his use of a large Western orchestra that the concerto seems to partake far more of the Strauss sensibilities of Ein Heldenleben (1898) than of older and more geographically distant realms. The concerto is meticulously constructed along traditional three-movement lines, with themes shared among all the movements giving it a strong feeling of musical cohesion. Above all it is listenable music, clearly having a lot to say and equally clearly wanting the audience to understand just what is being said. There is nothing off-putting in its sound or structure – and Ranjbaran seems genuinely concerned with producing music that reaches out to listeners who might be less than entranced by works seeking mostly to prove how up-to-date they and their composers are. Ranjbaran’s language is primarily tonal but not slavishly so, the concerto’s solo elements are skillfully deployed against the ensemble, and there are even places here and there where the resemblance to Straussian thinking is perhaps a bit overly close (e.g., the cymbal clash midway through the expressive second movement). The pairing of this concerto with Ein Heldenleben turns out to be a most fortunate one, doing exactly what this sort of combinatorial approach is intended to do: offering listeners a very fine performance of a familiar work and an equally fine introduction to a piece that speaks in similar although scarcely identical language – and that owners of this recording will likely return to just as frequently as they come back to Falletta’s first-rate reading of Ein Heldenleben. 

     Even when well-played, though, recordings mixing familiar and unfamiliar material are not always as successful as Falletta’s, any more than TV “hammocks” invariably conferred popularity on the new shows they were designed to highlight. For example, although Mika Stoltzman gives a series of top-notch performances on the marimba on a new AVIE disc consisting entirely of world première recordings, the material she plays does not quite stand up to repeated hearings – and this short CD seems longer than the 48 minutes it actually runs. The disc is bracketed by two extended works: an arrangement for marimba and strings of Bach’s Chaconne in D minor from Partita No. 2 by Stoltzman and Steven Lipsitt opens the recording, and a concerto written in 2021 by Miho Hazama (born 1986) closes it. It proves to be a bit too long a journey from one of these pieces to the other. The hollow echoing that opens the Bach introduces a sound world that is interesting enough but rather enigmatic, made more so when the ensemble enters. The marimba is front-and-center throughout, and while Bach’s music is certainly performable on instruments of all sorts, it sits less than comfortably on the marimba, whose comparatively hollow and echo-y sound is at odds with Bach’s clarity of line and, for that matter, with the clarity of the strings heard here. The mixture is odd enough to be intriguing for a time, but is ultimately less than convincing despite the skill with which it is presented. The Bach is followed on the disc by a brand-new (2025) work called Breathturn: Part I by John Zorn (born 1953) that gives Stoltzman – here abetted by husband Richard Stoltzman on clarinet and Fred Sherry on cello – a chance to display the marimba in very different guise. Here the clarinet dominates the sound and the marimba produces an underlying undercurrent against which the clarinet – and, to a lesser extent, the cello – can be heard in long, largely lyrical passages. Zorn’s piece is followed by an arrangement for marimba and strings, by Takeshi Fuse, of Debussy’s Rêverie. This proves considerably more successful than the Bach adaptation, and not solely because it is much shorter. The gentle swells and warm lyricism of Debussy work with the inherent sound of the marimba in ways that Bach’s music does not: the marimba enhances the basic string lines and expands their expressiveness, resulting in a piece that occasionally sounds as if it is in an echo chamber but otherwise comes across with considerable sensitivity. And then comes Hazama’s concerto, featuring not only the marimba but also clarinet (Richard Stoltzman again), jazz bass (Eddie Gómez), and drums (Steve Gadd). The three-movement work quickly establishes itself as a blend of classical form with jazz sensibilities, with the marimba seeming quickly to come into its own in this context. The propulsive first movement gives way to a more-disconnected-sounding second one that opens with an extended marimba solo but becomes more interesting only when the clarinet and other instruments appear. Elements of the blues flicker in and out here, with the underlying pulse being that of nightclub material. And then the concluding third movement begins with brightness that is rather Gershwinesque, an initial pairing of marimba with brush-played drums giving way to perky material whose multiple rhythmic changes lend the movement some additional interest while confirming its jazz bona fides. Some marimba-and-clarinet material offers a change of pace and soundworld before things pick up again and the ensemble produces a pleasantly upbeat conclusion. The concerto as a whole is pleasant enough, if rather superficial, and will be enjoyable for listeners who are particularly enamored of the marimba and are interested in hearing some new material (or old, arranged material) for it. But although the (+++) disc is certainly engaging enough for marimba fans and fans of Mika Stoltzman, it is hard to imagine it having much attraction or staying power for a wider audience.

(+++) WITH WORDS AND WITHOUT

Hearth: Music for Winter Holidays. Miró Quartet (Daniel Ching and William Fedkenheuer, violins; John Largess, viola; Joshua Gindele, cello). Pentatone. $17.99. 

Michael Hersch: Medea. Sarah Maria Sun, soprano; Schola Heidelberg and Ensemble Musikfabrik conducted by Bas Wiegers. New Focus Recordings. $18.99. 

     An intriguing way of turning the seasonal non-seasonal, or at least attempting to do so, is to rethink familiar tunes that are usually known for their vocals and to eliminate the verbiage – then reimagine the music, to a greater or lesser extent. That is essentially what 15 contemporary composers have done for a Pentatone CD called Hearth, on which the Miró Quartet performs newly composed (or re-composed) versions of mostly well-known material for Christmas, Chanukah, and other wintry celebrations. The composers warmed to their task in a variety of interesting ways. For example, In Dulci Jubilo really sounds like a composition for string quartet, complete with introduction and main thematic section, in Clarice Assad’s arrangement. The First Noël gets a straightforward and broadly conceived treatment from Kevin Puts, and Jingle Bells surprises with pervasive pizzicati in Michi Wiancko’s interpretation. Some composers use traditional material as a jumping-off point, as Reena Esmail does with the Appalachian carol, I Wonder as I Wander, into which she introduces material from her Hindustani background. And in the most extreme example of interpreting/reinterpreting seasonal offerings, Hyung-ki Joo presents an original composition called Songs of Christmas Past that is not only the longest work on the CD, running eight-and-a-half minutes, but also the one that draws on the most sources, ranging from Vivaldi, Tchaikovsky and Handel (including, seemingly inevitably, retaining vocal elements from the “Hallelujah Chorus” from Messiah, a work that is not about Christmas). Joo’s pastiche is, perhaps inevitably, overdone to the point of amusement and self-parody, which is certainly not its intent; but if it misfires, at least it does so in what may be considered the holiday spirit. Other treatments here are a touch more questionable, such as Joel Love’s handling of Silent Night, the gentlest and in many ways most beautifully simple of well-known carols, which here opens with some unseemly dissonance before settling down; and Karl Mitze’s Deck the Halls, which proffers some good-ol’-mountain-fiddlin’ that is unsettling and somewhat more high-spirited than it really needs to be (although it remains suitably good-natured throughout). Also here are Jewish contributions: Sam Lipman’s handling of the traditional hymn Ma’oz Tzur and Gabriel Kahane’s version of Halfspent (Lo How a Rose E’er Blooming), both being darker and more deeply serious than most of the rest of the material on the disc. Anna Clyne’s original composition Mother’s Lullaby is another strongly emotive offering, its dissonances redolent of sorrow. Other works here are In the Bleak Midwinter, arranged by Alex Berko, with an overall sound that is chilly indeed; Wexford Carol in a pleasantly engaging version from Jeff Scott; O Come, All Ye Faithful, given a somewhat bleak sound by Michael Begay; Dejlig er Den Himmel Blå (Oh How Beautiful the Sky), as arranged with perhaps a touch too much aural complexity by Paola Prestini; and We Three (based on We Three Kings) by Derrick Skye, also reimagined in somewhat overdone fashion. Taken as a whole, this set of 15 non-vocal rethinkings of familiar winter-holiday vocal works offers many pleasantries and, from start to finish, first-rate quartet playing – even though the whole project does not really rise above (or, more accurately, go beyond) its seasonal origins. Listeners are unlikely to trot out the disc throughout the year; it works best for audiences familiar with the underlying material and interested in something a bit out of the ordinary to hear during bleak and/or celebratory wintertime. 

     At any time of year, bleakness is paramount in the ancient tale of Medea, and words seem absolutely necessary to convey the tragedy and horror of her story. The love-and-betrayal theme seems ideally suited for opera and has in fact led to quite a few such stage works, including ones by Charpentier, Cherubini, Pacini, Milhaud and others. Michael Hersch (born 1971) created his own one-act take on the story in 2022, and it is now available as a New Focus Recordings release. The work is short – three-quarters of an hour – but packed with intensity of emotion, extreme dissonance of sound, and philosophical content of a very contemporary sort. Hersch includes a chorus as well as a single soloist in the role of Medea, but the choral material is not that of a traditional “Greek chorus.” Instead of moving the story ahead or taking an objective overview, the choral singers upbraid and judge Medea, who in her turn seeks not so much to escape judgment as to have her horrific actions be seen in the context that she chooses. Librettist Stephanie Fleischmann gives the story multiple modern psychological twists, using the tale to have Medea look inward and consider fate, vengeance and brutality (as usual in versions of the story, her murdered children have no voice, literally or figuratively, in the retelling). The vocal elements are paramount throughout Hersch’s work, but his determinedly contemporary auditory soundscape provides the setting against which Sarah Maria Sun displays Medea’s thoughts and feelings. Much of the vocalizing is difficult to separate from the instrumental material, with the words set in a typical modern fashion that uses them as much for their sound as for their meaning – and with the solo voice forced, again and again, to compete with a sonic onslaught intended to reflect the intensity and drama of the story and as a result tending to absorb Sun’s vocalizing into a greater whole. It is unsurprising, given the thoroughly modern treatment of the tale and Hersch’s equally up-to-date handling both of vocal settings and of instrumental material, that the opera’s conclusion is inconclusive – just what the audience is supposed to take from this version of the Medea story is a matter of individual interpretation. The nature of the story, the libretto, the setting, and the musical approach is such that the recording will be of strictly limited appeal – even more so than is the case with opera in general, which is a niche within the classical-music genre (itself nowadays a niche within the music world). Much of Hersch’s work is difficult to listen to because of its insistent modernity of sound, while much of Fleishmann’s libretto is so determined to be thoughtfully provocative that it becomes overly insistent on its own meaningfulness. But what this work does demonstrate, if nothing else, is that the Medea legend certainly continues to have room for contemporary relevance and resonance – and ambiguity of meaning.

(++++) PURELY FOR POPULARITY

Dvořák: Slavonic Dances, Op. 46 and Op. 72 (complete). Czech Philharmonic conducted by Sir Simon Rattle. Pentatone. $17.99. 

     There is a longstanding tendency to attribute lofty motives to the creation of classical music, as if such mundane matters as financial wherewithal and audience-seeking are beneath the genre and its practitioners. This is a pleasant fantasy that flies in the face of the demonstrable realities of classical composition, including the many years in which composers were the hirelings of the aristocracy (hence all those Haydn baryton trios) and all those in which ever-more-extreme bids for audience attention were the norm (hence Liszt, Thalberg, Pixis, Czerny and the many other competing 19^th-century piano virtuosi). But it remains inescapably true that many composers, certainly the great ones, were able to transcend the quotidian need to earn a living and produce music that spoke to audiences, and continues to speak to them, in ways that go far beyond the circumstances of the works’ creation. If Wagner was motivated by a $5,000 fee to create his Grand Festival March and Beethoven by contemporary political realities to produce the cantata Der glorreiche Augenblick, the circumstances are certainly understandable and in no way detract from the impressiveness of so many of the composers’ other pieces. 

     And what, after all, is wrong with courting popular favor in addition to writing music for the ages – something that, in truth, very few composers thought they were doing? Certainly Dvořák’s Slavonic Dances have long since moved beyond the original reason for their creation to become staples of the concert hall and to inspire not only later folk-music-oriented composers but also practitioners of other art forms (radio, TV, movies and more). The fact that the dances were conceived for purely commercial purposes does nothing to diminish their beauty, elegance and staying power. After all, Brahms’ Hungarian Dances for piano four hands had proved, ever since the creation of the first set in 1869, to be highly profitable for Berlin publisher Nikolaus Simrock, and not only for Simrock’s eponymous publishing house: they became Brahms’ own most-profitable works. So Simrock’s desire for something similar from Brahms’ then-friend Dvořák, who actually ended up orchestrating some of the Brahms dances, was eminently sensible from a commercial standpoint. And sure enough, from the year 1878 – when Dvořák’s first Slavonic Dances were both composed and published – both Simrock and the composer found them very profitable indeed. 

     Dvořák was, however, quite as dedicated a composer as Brahms, and as his reputation spread – thanks in no small part to the Slavonic Dances – he started taking his already-serious music even more seriously. Thus, when Simrock asked Dvořák for a second set of dances, the composer produced music in 1886 that expanded the universe he had explored in the 1878 works. The result is that the Op. 72 dances are subtler and more complex than those from Op. 46, although no less warm and charming and no less sensitive to their region of origin. 

     Many of the best performances of the Slavonic Dances are the ones that seem most effortlessly idiomatic – those most steeped in the music and playing style of the geographical area from which the dances come. And certainly the Czech Philharmonic plays as if it has this music in its blood. That is evident even when the ensemble is led by a British conductor such as Sir Simon Rattle, who has the good sense to set appropriate tempos, ensure balance among the orchestra’s sections, and pretty much let the musicians lean into the music as is their wont. Or so it sounds – there is surely much more ongoing direction in this Pentatone release than is apparent, but the whole thing has a relaxed and almost informal atmosphere that is quite winning. What is certainly clear is that Rattle and the orchestra thoroughly understand both the elements that all the Slavonic Dances have in common and the ones in which the two sets – and, within the sets, specific dances – differ. As a result, for example, the Op. 72, No. 4 Dumka is a genuine highlight of the recording, filled with poetic expression and great lyricism as well as providing a strong contrast to the prior ebullient Skočná. Details of emphasis are well-managed throughout this recording, and it is a pleasure to hear the best-known dances – such as the Op. 46, No. 3 Polka – handled as attentively as slightly less-familiar ones. As a whole, this is an admirably played, well-balanced performance of music that continues to bring great pleasure to listeners even when used in media that did not exist in Dvořák’s time. The fact that the Slavonic Dances originated as money makers for a savvy music publisher is wholly irrelevant to the quality of the music and its ability, a century and a half after the dances were created, to continue to charm and delight audiences.

(++++) SYMPHONISTS

Haydn: Symphony No. 6, “Le matin”; Symphony No. 7, “Le midi”; Symphony No. 8, “Le soir.” Handel and Haydn Society conducted by Harry Christophers. CORO. $19.99. 

Poul Ruders: Symphonies Nos. 1-6. Danish National Symphony Orchestra and Odense Symphony Orchestra conducted by Leif Segerstam, Michael Schønwandt, Scott Yoo, Roberto Minczuk, Olari Elts, and Christopher Lichtenstein. Bridge Records. $50.99 (3 CDs). 

     It is about time that CORO re-released the exemplary Handel and Haydn Society recordings of Haydn’s morning-noon-and-night symphonic trilogy, which originally came out in 2017 and consist of live performances from 2013, 2015 and 2016. The rather quixotic initial presentation of these performances, all of which are carefully shaped by Harry Christophers, paired each of these symphonies with one of the six-symphony “Paris” set and a violin concerto, thereby ignoring Haydn’s intention to have Nos. 6, 7 and 8 presented in interrelated form to Prince Paul Anton Esterházy in 1761 – and, for that matter, cutting the “Paris” grouping in half for no discernible reason. Haydn was a young man, age 29, when he wrote Nos, 6, 7 and 8, not the “Papa Haydn” of later years and certainly not yet established as an eminent composer. He needed to prove himself to his new employer, and he did so in elegantly harmonious fashion with this symphonic trilogy: many members of the prince’s orchestra were Haydn’s friends from the composer’s own days as a freelance musician in Vienna, and Haydn found ways to showcase their individual talents while also demonstrating his own already finely honed skill at orchestration. Thus, Nos. 6, 7 and 8 require considerable displays of virtuosity from the entire ensemble and also feature extended solo passages for performers on the horn, winds (even bassoon), and strings (even double-bass). Add a modicum of tone painting – primarily in the first movement of No. 6 and the “storm” finale of No. 8 – and the result is music that is engagingly delightful in its own right while also showing quite clearly that Haydn was amply qualified to be an important musical member of the Esterházy household. Christophers and the Handel and Haydn Society are finely attuned to period style and the subtleties of Haydn’s compositional manner even in his comparatively early works. Thus, to cite a few examples among many, the balance of solo flute and oboe in co-presenting the first theme of the first movement of No. 6 is clear and clean, and the horn’s “intrusive” pre-announcement of the recapitulation neatly anticipates Beethoven’s similar musical joke in his “Eroica.” The extended cadenza for violin and cello in the second movement of No. 7 nicely prefigures Haydn’s later forays into opera. And the sheer grace of the second movement of No. 8, with its solo-bassoon passages, is as elegantly handled as the “lightning” from the flute in the finale. Details matter a great deal in Haydn and can all too easily be obscured when his works are played by a large orchestra. But the 30 or so members of the Handel and Haydn Society function as a kind of expanded chamber group, with the result that the lightness and delicacy of these symphonies come through as clearly as their cleverness, resulting in a CD that is a charmer from start to finish. 

     “Charming” is scarcely the word that comes to mind when considering the six symphonies of Danish composer Poul Ruders (born 1949). Ruders does look back to Haydn’s time and earlier in some works: his first violin concerto (1981) is a Vivaldi pastiche and his Concerto in Pieces (1985) is based on Purcell. And Ruders has a good sense of the capabilities of solo instruments, notably the guitar, having written multiple guitar works (solo and with orchestra) for David Starobin. But Ruders’ symphonies – now available as a three-CD set from the company that Starobin founded, Bridge Records – partake of sensibilities quite different from those of Haydn and other earlier composers, and are very much of Ruders’ own time period. No. 1 (1989) is called Himmelhoch jauchzend - zum Tode betrübt, which translates as "Heavenly joyful - deathly sorrowful” and clearly points to a piece of strong and dramatic contrasts. Ruders delivers those with exactly the sort of late-20^th-century intensity and harmonic approach that would be expected based on the work’s date. The second movement does showcase Ruders’ lyrical bona fides, but the overall impression is one of darkness and (to a lesser extent) light, with somewhat overdone orchestration and repetitive textures (especially in the finale) that pass for a kind of melancholic brooding. Interestingly, No. 1, although it runs not much more than half an hour, is Ruders’ longest symphony: his other five are all at lengths comparable to those of Haydn’s symphonies, for all the enormous differences of style and sound. Ruders’ one-elaborate-movement No. 2 is called “Symphony and Transformation” and dates to 1995-1996. It explores many of the same themes (experiential, not musical) as No. 1, but is more tightly organized and somewhat more interestingly orchestrated. Yet this is no Richard Strauss Tod und Verklärung despite the similarity of titles and analogous tone-poem structure: Ruders opts for orchestral monumentality without Straussian lushness, and there is an underlying harshness of sound in Ruders that makes the symphony more edgy than apocalyptic right through to its conclusion. Ruders’ No. 3, labeled “Dreamcatcher,” is a two-movement work written in 2005-2006 and revised in 2009. It is a somewhat uneasy mixture of Native American inspiration with a theme reused from Ruders’ 2004 Serenade for Accordion and Strings. The symphony is deeply unsettled and is dominated by fast tempos, from its brisk opening (succeeded by slower but darker material) to a second movement emphatically designated Scherzo prestissimo and featuring even harsher dissonances than Ruders has heretofore employed. Symphony No. 4 (2008-2009) showcases Ruders’ approach to solo instruments. Called “An Organ Symphony,” it focuses on the instrument on which Ruders himself trained, and is as interesting for what it does not do as for what it does. It is not a virtuoso showpiece for the organ but one in which the instrument is texturally incorporated into the overall soundscape: sometimes the organ and orchestra challenge each other, sometimes they complement each other, but never is there a sense of subservience of either to the other one. Comparisons with Saint-Saëns “Organ” Symphony (his No. 3) are probably inevitable but not especially useful: Saint-Saëns is mellifluous and elegant throughout, with the organ becoming assertive only in the finale, while Ruders’ tonal language is a great deal more acerbic and his manner far more proclamatory. Ruders ends each of this symphony’s four movements rather oddly, the first three abruptly (especially surprisingly in the short and scurrying third-movement Etude) and the final Chaconne with a chord that is more gestural than conclusive. No. 4 is the last Ruders symphony with a subtitle: No. 5 (2012-2013) and No. 6 (2021) stand on their own without them. No. 5, in three movements, was at one point going to be called “Ring of Fire” – reflecting the Pacific geographical region with calm in the middle surrounded by explosive volcanic activity. The title may be gone, but it does provide a clue to this work’s structure: the outer movements (the first opening with a reused fanfare from Ruders’ 2011 Sonatas) are dramatic, the central one serene almost to the point of minimalism. This symphony has Ruders’ most-refined orchestration to date, using the ensemble largely as small groups rather than as a totality producing great gouts of sound. This approach lends the work a sophistication generally missing in the four previous symphonies, which are often on the obvious side no matter how well-crafted they are. The quietude that opens the second movement of No. 5 is quite unlike anything in Ruders’ previous symphonies, and its persistence throughout a 10+-minute movement creates a stasis that, although somewhat too persistent, certainly lends additional force and piquancy to the finale’s forceful drama. This is the most successful of Ruders’ symphonies and the one that best encapsulates the many elements, original and derivative, of his style. Ruders’ single-movement No. 6 is his shortest symphony. Returning to the tone-poem-like structure of No. 2, it features some interestingly conceived orchestral touches, notably the use of two pianos with one tuned a quarter-tone off from the other. The work has a feeling of intellectual experimentation about it rather than emotive communicativeness, and is easier to admire than to react to emotionally and expressively despite a long, slow concluding fade that seems to be insisting on meaningfulness. Like all the Ruders symphonies, No. 6 is very well-made and evinces a sense of careful craftsmanship even when it – again like the other symphonies – has stretches in which it is pretty much devoid of communicative power. Ruders is a composer whose careful attentiveness to matters of orchestration fits the 21^st century much as Haydn’s fit the 18^th, but Ruders is certainly something of an acquired taste – which means this release, with first-rate playing by two orchestras led in a highly understanding manner by six different conductors, will be a (+++) niche offering for most audiences. For those already enamored of Ruders’ music and in particular his way with full-orchestra material, though, this will be a (++++) recording and, indeed, a must-have.