This CD contains contributions in honor of the 50th birthday of conductor and composer Oliver Knussen. Besides that, this CD also offers a nice overview of the material with which composers are involved in the beginning of the 21st century. Our national sense of understatement is not lacking, such as his Very Sharp Trumpet Sonata by Louis Andriessen and I suppose a Fugue is out of the Question by
… Robert Zuidam (with the in-depth explanation: Festive tunes to celebrate the Commander's 50th Birthday). The (American) serialism of Schönberg and the late Stravinski can also be heard here, as in Charles Wuorinen's Fifty Fifty and Elliott Carter's Au Quai. Brilliant traditionalist Hans Werner Henze congratulated Knussen on Olly on the Shore (based on Grainger's Molly on the Shore). And in Olicantus from the conductor of this CD, George Benjamin, we hear the lush exoticism of Messiaen, Dutilleux and Saariaho resonate in a sober way. (HJ)more
