Rhonda Abrams

The Louisville Orchestra will release its first album in nearly 30 years next month. The album, called "All In," will be released on the Decca Gold label Sept. 22. It will include "United Field," a new composition by Teddy Abrams, the orchestra's conductor and music director, and Aaron Copland’s Clarinet Concerto, with Abrams as soloist.

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Pianist Yuja Wang and composer/conductor Teddy Abrams were classmates at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia and had long wanted to work together. The sympathy shows in this 2023 Deutsche Grammophon release, which perhaps turned out even better than the performers had hoped. Abrams' 11-movement Piano Concerto is a standout among the jazz-flavored works that crowd American concert programs (and increasingly those beyond) every year. The work is neither simply swing jazz transferred to an orchestral medium nor a classical piece that uses jazz as a flavoring.