The last time I saw Mount Rushmore Eva Marie Saint
was hanging off it in
North by Northwest, and the last time
I heard the music of Michael Daugherty was in
American Spectrum
(
review).
As for the California-based Pacific Orchestra and Chorale and their
conductor Carl St Clair, they are new to me; however, the blurb speaks
glowingly of a new ensemble dedicated to promoting contemporary music
as well as playing the core classics. The works on this disc, written
between 2010 and 2012, are certainly bang up to date, so kudos to
Naxos for wasting no time in committing them to disc.
In my review of Daugherty’s musical evocation of the iconic
Sunset Strip I noted that he has a ‘penchant for celebrating
places and spaces’; well, the huge presidential portraits carved
into the Black Hills of South Dakota are about as iconic as it gets.
In his very readable liner-notes the composer explains his choice
of texts, ranging from the letter Washington wrote on his retirement
and a lover’s song for Jefferson to Roosevelt’s musings
on the great outdoors and Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. In that
sense the work is a genuine - and very affectionate - traversal of
American history.
George Washington opens with breathtaking power, and the orchestra
and organ are joined by choirs whose songs of the period are projected
with telling ardour and accuracy. Daugherty’s strong, sinewy
rhythms and his transported choral writing in
Thomas Jefferson
recall Prokofiev’s
Alexander Nevsky, the quieter passages
Britten at his most reflective and intimate. Not surprisingly the
adventurer
Theodore Roosevelt strides forth to strong orchestral
accents and horizon-stretching choral vistas; there’s even an
Orffian earthiness to the more declamatory moments. The music of
Abraham
Lincoln - noble and visionary - seems to catalyse all that’s
gone before; in the broad, slow-building finale, shot through with
jubilant bells and punctuated by trenchant rhythms, Daugherty strikes
just the right balance between grandeur and gravitas.
Mount Rushmore is a terrific piece, as much a contribution
to musical Americana as anything by Copland or Thomson. Moreover,
it’s played with tremendous verve and passion by St Clair and
his multitude of musicians, and the recording’s wide dynamics
are very well caught by the Naxos engineers. There are hints of other
ages here, but this is no clumsy, derivative pastiche; no, Daugherty
speaks with an assured and individual voice that deserves to be more
widely heard.
New York’s Radio City, the home of Arturo Toscanini and the
NBC Symphony, is the second landmark to be celebrated here. It’s
also a homage to the fiery maestro, whose first NBC concert is evoked
in the Vivaldian echoes and emphatic thrust of
O, Brave New
World. Daugherty has a lively and inventive style and the Pacific
band give this music all the crunch and punch it needs, before modulating
into the equally forthright yet sometimes dreamily nostalgic
Ode
to the Old World that follows. Happily there are no
longueurs
to speak of, and listeners of all stripes will surely respond to the
fine writing on display here and in the witty Toscanini portrait,
On the Air.
Daugherty then turns his attention to another icon, Aimee Semple McPherson,
who he calls ‘the first important religious celebrity of the
new, mass-media era of the 1930s’. Anyone remotely familiar
with the antics of modern tele-evangelists as embodied by Billy Graham
and many others since will smile - even laugh out loud - at the exaggerated
organ
glissandi and burping revivalist brass of
Knock Out
the Devil. This is a fiendishly clever piece of writing that captures
to perfection that weird blend of strained piety and outrageous theatre
that accompanies these preachers and their very public ministry. Organist
Paul Jacobs tackles his riotous part with obvious glee and the Pacific
brass have a field day too. Surely
The Gospel According to Sister
Aimee is the modern-day equivalent of Ives’s equally satirical
General William Booth Enters into Heaven; both are just too
accurately drawn to be offensive.
I enjoyed this disc so much I barely noticed the sweltering summer
heat outside. This is highly original music that avoids mawkishness
in the first two pieces and is so deftly drawn in the third as
to signal a composer of accomplishment and good judgement. Daugherty’s
chatty liner-notes are part of the whole entertainment, and the sonics
are simply awesome.
A well-chosen programme that highlights Daugherty’s prodigious
talent; great fun.
Dan Morgan
http://twitter.com/mahlerei
Track-List
Mount Rushmore (2010) [31:48]
George Washington [4:04]
Thomas Jefferson [6:17]
Theodore Roosevelt [7:51]
Abraham Lincoln [13:36]
Radio City: Symphonic Fantasy on Arturo Toscanini and the NBC Symphony
Orchestra (2011) [25:36]
O Brave New World [7:28]
Ode to the Old World [12:18]
On the Air [5:50]
The Gospel According to Sister Aimee (2012) [20:29]
Knock Out the Devil [7:30]
An Evangelist Drowns - Desert Dance [4:57]
To the Promised Land [8:02]
