| Program Notes | Dedicated to and premiered by Christina Jennings *** and the UW Chamber Symphony, James Smith, Director. Also performed by Mary Boodell with the Richmond Symphony Orchestra 2016, on the Altria Masterworks series -and Mary Stolper with the Chicago Composers Orchestra; Lindsey Goodman with the Charleston Chamber Orchestra, Scott Woodard, conducting. On Albany Records CD: 3 Works for Solo Instruments and Orchestra. TROY1390 -Music review: Richmond Symphony with flutist Mary Boodle, By Clarke Bustard Musical modernism, the textbooks tell us, reverberates to Igor Stravinsky’s “The Rite of Spring” and the 12-tone style of Arnold Schoenberg and his disciples. Much of the art-music of the past couple of generations, sometimes called “post-modern,” sounds to have another reference point: Claude Debussy’s “Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun,” an iconic example of the color-infused, harmonically spacious impressionist style. Laura Elise Schwendinger’s “Waking Dream” for flute and orchestra, being performed this weekend by the Richmond Symphony and its principal flutist, Mary Boodell, audibly echoes the Debussy — might even be heard as an “answer song” to the prelude — and not just because the flute is the lead voice of both pieces. Some of Debussy’s trademark orchestration techniques, such as single high notes dotting a soundscape of very low tones, shimmering string figures that evoke rippling water and pregnant or resonant silences, are what make “Waking Dream” sound so dreamy. *** -Review in Records International *** Waking Dream is a single-movement poem full of shimmering, iridescent impressionistic textures and a sensuously meandering, ornamented singing line for the solo flute. Madison Sinfonietta; Nicole *** Paiement.” |
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