Atlanta Symphony Archive

“Far in the Heavens” = Choral works of STEPHEN PAULUS – True Concord Voices & Orch./ Eric Holtan – Reference Rec./Fresh!

by Audiophile Audition | Feb 19, 2016 | Classical CD Reviews

An essential recording of a much-missed artist. I’ll just leave it at that. “Far in the Heavens” = STEPHEN PAULUS: Prayers and Remembrances; Nunc dimittis; The Incomprehensible; I Have Called You By Name; Little Elegy; When Music Sounds – True Concord Voices & Orch./ Eric Holtan – Reference Recordings/Fresh! FR-716, 66:14 [Distr. by Naxos] *****: I had just finished reviewing this disc when the news came that Stephen Paulus had garnered a 2016 Grammy Award, for Best Classical Composition (Prayers and Remembrances). Often the Grammys, and certainly the Pulitzers, get things horribly wrong, but I must say that this recording, possessing a virginal freshness and utter simplicity of concept, is as worthy a winner as we have had in any number of years. Stephen Paulus, whom I first became acquainted during his 1980s stint as Composer-in-Residence for the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (and with whom he recorded a magnificent disc of orchestral music in 1990 on New World Records) has been a mainstay on the classical scene for years now, a catalog of 600 works, 50 recordings, and a host of awards and accolades as deserving as any other contemporary composer. He gave classical music a good name. I say “gave” because […]