Music From Brown University
New Focus, 2025
9/10
Listen to Music From Brown University
The 21st-Century Orchestra celebrate the evolution of symphonic writing of modern times via the lens of the work of 4 composers on faculty at Brown University with these 5 detailed selections.
Wang Lu’s “Surge” opens with the dense percussive sounds and the tense strings that make for an animated climate, and Lu’s “Voices Of The Orchard” follows with both cautiousness and exploration, where the winds get quite frisky.
Joseph Butch Rovans’ “Scattering” lands in the middle and offers a booming presence that’s cinematic in nature and isn’t short on rich horns and even recruits electronics, while “Volta”, by Anthony Cheung, emits busy textures and occasionally softer bouts thanks to the collage of ideas and cathartic sensibilities.
Eric Nathan’s “In Between II” exits, and it often mimics that sounds of nature alongside the ambience and harmonic swells of a highly meticulous finish.
A really precise exercise in modern classical sounds, each composer brings a distinct vision to a superb performance by The 21st-Century Orchestra.
Travels well with: Steven Ricks- Mythological Fragments; Daniel Strong Godfrey- Toward Light