Towers of Power = DANIEL MCCARTHY: Towers of Power: Chamber Sym. No. 4; ANTHONY PLOG: Flute Concerto; PHILIP GLASS: Concerto Fantasy – Timothy McAllister, saxs/ Brian Luce, flute/ Jonathan Haas, Gary Cook, timpani/ U. of Arizona Winds – Gregg Hanson

by | Sep 23, 2009 | Classical CD Reviews | 0 comments

Towers of Power = DANIEL MCCARTHY: Towers of Power: Chamber Symphony No. 4; ANTHONY PLOG: Flute Concerto; PHILIP GLASS: Concerto Fantasy – Timothy McAllister, saxophones/ Brian Luce, flute/ Jonathan Haas, Gary Cook, timpani/ University of Arizona Wind Ensemble/ Gregg I. Hanson, conductor – Albany TROY1108, 58:48 ***1/2:

This is a concerto disc with wind ensemble played by the estimable students of the University of Arizona. The McCarthy work is for alto (1), soprano (2) and tenor (3) saxophones in a piece that takes tunes from the original Tower of Power band in order to fashion them into a chamber symphony with saxophone obbligato—actually much more than that, though I am not sure it technically meets “concerto” standards. It is extraordinarily jazz-inspired–perhaps even jazz-based—and sounds to me more of a loosely constructed fantasia around these tunes. If you like pieces like this you will no doubt like this one; personally I get tired of every saxophone work having this sort of basis to it, as the saxhorn played in Tannhauser long before Coleman Hawkins ever picked up a tenor. So it may be a personality quirk on my part, but I also don’t feel that there is a lot of melodic interest in this piece, though there are lots of melodic motives; the piece is loud, boisterous, and declamatory without being memorable, but very well-played by Mr. McAllister.

The Plog piece is a real stunner. You don’t hear a lot of works for flute and wind bands as the sonorities are often competing and overwhelming. Plog is a trumpet player and founding member of both the Fine Arts Brass Quintet and the Summit Brass, teaching at a number of universities and possessing an extensive discographical career. But his brass instincts do not impede his understanding of the weaker woodwind cousin, creating a piece of virtuosic tendencies and lithe, long lines that are perfectly superimposed over the winds, sometimes assisting in their melodic struggles and other times going counterclockwise. This is a super piece of great potential, and I hope others will take it up. Brian Luce certainly seems to feel that way about it, and gives as fine a reading as one could hope for.

Philip Glass is of course hit or miss; revered or hated, one always gets at least one characteristic attribute from him: consistency. There are all of the typically brash and expected Glassisms here, multiple and conflicting meters, repeated rhythmic motives (incessantly) and those small and yet always-effective chord progressions ostensibly borrowed from the pop world. Here the twist is that this is an arrangement (and a very effective one by Mark Lortz) for winds, a concerto of monumental proportions in that anything with 14 timpani must be considered at least fairly substantial. However there are only two players, and Glass takes advantage of just about every permutation you can think of to present the impossible—a two-timpani concerto. At 26 minutes it just stretches out long enough to be tolerable before the usual Glass irritations set in, and the third movement cadenza (at 6:25 in length) is a wonderful break before launching into the last and finest movement. I had no idea this piece existed, and am grateful to the Arizonans for bringing it to light.

The sound is crystal clear and the playing as sparkling and open-aired as the great state itself. With a better first selection this might have been an even more desirable disc for me.

— Steven Ritter

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