A Young Composer's Music Speaks Volumes

Speaks Volumes. Works by Nico Muhly. (Bedroom Community/Bad Taste HVALURI)

Since graduating from Juilliard in 2004 with a master's degree in composition, Nico Muhly has sported several hats: orchestrating film scores for Philip Glass and Rachel Portman, collaborating with Bjork on her album Medulla, and performing with Antony, leader of the avant-rock band Antony and the Johnsons. This month his music will be the subject of an all-Muhly concert at Zankel Hall at Carnegie on March 16, just a week after he appears with Antony in a concert with the Brooklyn Philharmonic at BAM on March 9. The former program will feature works from his first album of original music, Speaks Volumes, released on the Icelandic label Bedroom Community.

As the disc's liner notes point out, Muhly, 25, was born after Glass and Steve Reich wrote some of their landmark works and many of its pieces suggest a more sensuous and eclectic version of the minimalism they pioneered. All are for small ensemble, and in one case solo piano, but much of their effect is generated through studio production. Working with Bjork producer Valgeir Sigurosson, Muhly layers sounds and emphasizes the "silent" elements normally concealed beneath music—a bow scraping a violin, the woody clicks of clarinet keys, or the sounds of the pedals on a harmonium.

The effect is often haunting and mesmerizing. The wistful Honest Music features long, low drones topped by an alternately brooding and frenzied violin solo (played beautifully by Juilliard graduate Lisa Liu). Clear Music contains a dialogue between celesta, cello, and harp loosely built on a Renaissance motet. The piano solo A Hudson Cycle was written as a wedding gift for two friends and features restless polyrythms and minimalist figurations performed by Muhly himself. Keep in Touch is the album's exquisite climax, combining the androgynous vocalizations of Antony with viola, trombone, and percussive samples in a chaconne that veers off in strange and unexpected directions.



Warhorse Meets Newcomer

Tchaikovsky and Assad Concertos in D Major. Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg and the Colorado Symphony Orchestra, Marin Alsop, conductor. (NSS Music)

Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg launched her own record label in 2005 after finding one of her early recordings—by happenstance and not with particular delight—re-released on a compilation CD titled The Most Relaxing Violin Album in the World. Since taking ownership of her recording career, she has released albums of her own music as well as an all-Bach disc by pianist Anne-Marie McDermott and John Cerminaro: A Life of Music, featuring the Seattle Symphony principal hornist and former Juilliard faculty member.

Although the Tchaikovsky Concerto has been a staple of Salerno-Sonnenberg's repertoire from the time she was a student in Juilliard's Professional Studies program in the early 1980s, she never recorded it until now. This exuberant disc with Marin Alsop (another Juilliard alum) and the Colorado Symphony was well worth the wait. It was an inspired decision to make the recording live, which perhaps more directly captures Salerno-Sonnenberg's air of fiery abandon, with fewer of the rough edges smoothed over (note the finale's gritty second theme). Also on the CD is a new concerto by Clarice Assad, which grew out of the long association between the violinist and guitarists Sergio Assad (Clarice's father) and his brother Odair. At Salerno-Sonnenberg's suggestion, Clarice wrote this concerto as her master's degree thesis from the University of Michigan. With its lush, dreamy passages, the piece is well tailored to the violinist's strengths, particularly the furious finale (marked con fuoco).

Other installments on the NSS label worth seeking out include a live duo recording with McDermott and a thoroughly enjoyable Christmas album (Merry) that includes jazz, folk, and choral renditions of holiday favorites.

Brian Wise is a producer at WNYC radio and writes about music for The New York Times, Time Out New York, Opera News, and other publications.