Chrysalis
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Experimental, yet colorfully attractive orchestral music from a distinguished composer.

Brian Fennelly is Professor Emeritus in the Faculty of Arts and Science at New York University, where he taught from 1968 to 1997. Following a degree in engineering from Union College, he studied music at Yale with Mel Powell, Donald Martino, Gunther Schuller and George Perle. The five works recorded on this CD cover a 21 year period in the creative life of the composer. Among the consistent, remarkable features of Fennelly's orchestral works from these years - the elements which define his distinctive compositional voice are the abundant paradoxical tendencies: steadfast resistance to fashion, coupled with frequent signs of his awareness of contemporary compositional trends; nearly obsessive dedication to formal transparency, coupled sometimes with impressionistic, sensuous orchestral textures and the masking of structural divisions; strong goal orientation through progressions of phrases leading to powerful climaxes, coupled often with rhapsodic passages of a seemingly static nature; pitch organization clearly derived from dodecaphonic or hexachordal procedures, coupled frequently with motives and harmonies selected for their apparent non-serial associations (suggestive of, but not operating functionally in, traditional tonality or modality). This album reveals Brian Fennelly as a craftsman of sober, weighty music built to stand objectively, i.e. by the strength of its own content and architecture.
Contents:
Brian Fennelly, composer
Thoreau Fantasy No. 2 (Ambrosial Mornings)
Polish Radio National Symphony Orchestra, Joel Suben, conductor

Brian Fennelly, composer
Lunar Halos (Parasalenae) for Doublebass and Chamber Orchestra
Polish Radio National Symphony Orchestra, Joel Suben, conductor, Boguslaw Furtok, doublebass

Brian Fennelly, composer
Concert Piece for Trumpet and Orchestra
Polish Radio National Symphony Orchestra, Joel Suben, conductor, Chris Gekker, trumpet

Brian Fennelly, composer
Reflections/Metamorphoses
Polish Radio National Symphony Orchestra, Joel Suben, conductor, Roland Orlik, violin solo

Brian Fennelly, composer
Chrysalis (from A Thoreau Symphony)
Polish Radio National Symphony Orchestra, Joel Suben, conductor

Review:
Review to come.
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