Stephen Albert

Stephen Albert’s music is at once traditional and contemporary, lyrical yet powerful and dynamic. He drew inspiration from the rich orchestral palettes of composers such as Stravinsky and Bartók, but his musical language is very much his own. At the time of his tragic and unexpected death in 1992, Albert had completed the first draft of his lush, evocative Symphony No. 2, which here receives its world première recording. Asked by Albert’s publishers to complete the work, his colleague and friend Sebastian Currier was pleased to find it almost finished, with only the addition of expressive markings and some orchestration to undertake. It is coupled here with Albert’s Pulitzer Prize-winning first symphony, RiverRun, one of many of his works inspired by the writings of James Joyce. As Currier writes in his booklet note,“Although one could endlessly wonder what his Third Symphony might be like, in the end it is great to have these two thoughtful, finely crafted and expressive pieces.”
From Naxos

Stephen Albert is counted as one of the most accomplished pioneers of ‘The New Romanticism’: a generation of composers seeking to reclaim some of the emotional expression lost through the rigors of intellectual Modernism in music. Inspired by James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake, TreeStone is a moving exploration of the tragic legend of Tristan and Iseult. In Concordiam reveals the range and complexity of Albert’s style in uniting angular dissonance with mellifluous harmonies. Albert worked closely with the Seattle Symphony on this work, revising it during his three year tenure as composer-in-residence.
From Naxos

Unquestionably Stephen Stills is one of the prolific creator of the legendary country-rock quartet C, S, N & Y.

Richard Hickox more than any rival brings out the fun of Britten's comic chamber opera, lifting rhythms in an infectious way. The result is warm and welcoming…James Gilchrist is outstanding, with a tenor light enough to sound wimpish in the first half of the opera, and then to convey the anger of the character in the monologue that marks his change of heart.

Focusing solely on American composers (New Yorkers, for that matter), Yo-yo Ma recorded an album with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra that reprises works from Stephen Albert, Bela Bartok, and Ernest Bloch. After being pampered by his cross-genre releases (Hush, Soul of the Tango, etc), some listeners might not actually care to hear a straightforward classical album, considering the skill with which Ma can play the cello and transform it into an instrument suitable for whatever style he's performing on a given date.

As the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) had done a year earlier, Super Session (1968) initially ushered in several new phases in rock & roll's concurrent transformation. In the space of months, the soundscape of rock shifted radically from short, danceable pop songs to comparatively longer works with more attention to technical and musical subtleties. Enter the unlikely all-star triumvirate of Al Kooper (piano/organ/ondioline/vocals/guitars), Mike Bloomfield (guitar), and Stephen Stills (guitar) – all of whom were concurrently "on hiatus" from their most recent engagements. Kooper had just split after masterminding the groundbreaking Child Is Father to the Man (1968) version of Blood, Sweat & Tears. Bloomfield was fresh from a stint with the likewise brass-driven Electric Flag, while Stills was late of Buffalo Springfield and still a few weeks away from a full-time commitment to David Crosby and Graham Nash. Although the trio never actually performed together, the long-player was notable for idiosyncratically featuring one side led by the team of Kooper/Bloomfield and the other by Kooper/Stills.

Status Quo are one of Britain's longest-lived bands, staying together for over six decades. During much of that time, the band was only successful in the U.K., where it racked up a string of Top Ten singles across the decades. In America, the Quo were ignored after they abandoned psychedelia for heavy boogie rock in the early '70s. Before that, the band managed to reach number 12 in the U.S. with the psychedelic classic "Pictures of Matchstick Men" (a Top Ten hit in the U.K.). Following that single, the band suffered a lean period for the next few years, before the bandmembers decided to refashion themselves as a hard rock boogie band in 1970 with their Ma Kelly's Greasy Spoon album. The Quo have basically recycled the same simple boogie on each successive album and single, yet their popularity has never waned in Britain. If anything, their very predictability has ensured the group a large following.