Search
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
Browse by Category
 
Classical Music
        Ballet
        Chamber Music
        Choral
        Concertos
        Film Music
        Folk Legends
        Instrumental
        Musicals
        Opera / Operetta
        Orchestral
        Vocal

Recently Released
Upcoming Releases
Special Offers
NaxosDirect Audio

Other Genres:
Audio Books
        Anthologies / Collections
        Classic Fiction, Modern Classics & Contemporary Fiction
        Classical Music Audio Books
        Drama
        Junior Classics and Children's Favourites
        Non-Fiction
        Poetry
        Samplers
        Shakespeare
Blues Legends
        Blues Legends
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
        BSO on NaxosDirect
DVD
        Ballet DVD
        Classical Concert
        Classical Documentary
        Opera DVD
        Pop/Rock Concert
        Pop/Rock Documentary
Gospel Legends
        Gospel Legends
Jazz
        Jazz Contemporary
        Jazz Icons
Naxos Label
        Naxos American Classics
        Naxos Best Of...
        Naxos Books
        Naxos Box Sets
        Naxos Cinema Classics
        Naxos Classics
        Naxos DVD
        Naxos DVD-Audio
        Naxos Instrumental
        Naxos International
        Naxos Jazz
        Naxos Limited Edition
        Naxos Milken Archives
        Naxos Night Music
        Naxos Opera
        Naxos Orchestral
        Naxos Samplers
        Naxos Special Release
        Naxos Wind Band Classics
        Naxos World
Nostalgia
        Nostalgia
Other Genres
        Other Genres
SACD
        SACD
We Recommend….
        Essential listening
World
        Ballad
        Bhuddist
        Chinese Music
        Classical (World)
        Early Music (World)
        Folk
        Gamelan
        Gypsy
        Hindustani
        Jazz (World)
        Klezmer
        Vocal (World)
        World

 
 
 
 
Browse Music by
 
Labels
Composer/ Authors
Conductors
Ensembles
Orchestras
Choirs
Artists
Instruments
Producers
 
 
 
 
SecurityMetrics for PCI Compliance, QSA, IDS, Penetration Testing, Forensics, and Vulnerability Assessment
 

 

ADAMS, John: Complete Piano Music




Total playing time: 00:27:24

£6.99
£4.99 (CD)


Quantity:



In Stock - Usually ships within 48 hours.






John Adams (b. 1947)


Phrygian Gates • American Berserk • China Gates • Hallelujah Junction



 



"A minimalist bored with minimalism", remarked a writer describing the work of John Adams. This outlines the composer's compositional output very well, although one can hardly describe his vast and very differentiated works in one sentence. In Adams' musical world, the pure and repetitive minimalistic language of the early works by composers such as Terry Riley or Steve Reich rubs shoulders with the sounds of jazz, the long passionate lines of nineteenth-century Romantic music and the direct emotional appeal of pop styles. This has made John Adams one of the most versatile composers of today's music, embracing a wide type of audience which has hardly been achieved before in the history of contemporary classical music.



Learning about Adams's musical environment as a youngster, his open-minded use of diverse stylistic resources nowadays does not come as a surprise. Father Adams being a jazz sax player, mother a jazz singer, he grew up in a family "where Benny Goodman and Mozart were not separated". Playing clarinet in his father's marching band as a teenager, and playing in, composing for and conducting a local community orchestra not much later, he learnt hands-on about the emotional power of music, as some of the people in local audiences burst into tears at even the most banal sounds. At the time John Adams decided to study composition at the prestigious Harvard University, he listened to rock music and free jazz, as opposed to the "serious" music by serialists such as Schoenberg and Webern, which the institution expected him to study. After obtaining his master's degree in 1971, Adams left for San Francisco to explore alternatives to modernism, which he thought of as uncommunicative. From 1972 to 1983 he became head of the new music programme at the San Francisco Conservatory, hearing and seeing a myriad of compositions.



At first experimenting with different unconventional sound resources and electronics, it was not until 1974, at a Steve Reich concert, that he found the solution to realising an individual compositional language incorporating traditional harmony and making the return of direct emotional appeal possible: through minimal music. Inspired mainly by non-Western music, this meditative style was characterized by a strongly pulsating and tonal-based texture of repeating patterns which gradually changed over relatively long stretches of time. This would offer Adams the possiblities to realise his musical goals, but he knew he had to expand the language in his own way to make it speak as he wished.



China Gates (1977) and Phrygian Gates (1977-78) could be regarded as his first works in this language. In both pieces, minimalistic (apparent) repetition plays an important and striking rôle. In both pieces it is also the exclusive return to tonal (modal) writing that makes these works stand apart from modernistic works by other composers of that time. In general, one could compare listening to this music as viewing the earth from a spaceship. Although the earth seems hardly to move, the closer one gets to it, the busier the place gets: first clouds that slowly move, then contours of cities that bustle with energy and eventually the fast vibrations of molecules.



Thus, an undulating piece such as China Gates can be listened to at various levels of awareness. Harmonic progressions are relatively slow, but the inner pulse is fast, and seemingly repeating patterns actually turn out to be often slightly and slowly changed at a closer listen. There are three layers or strata of musical activity: the slow bass notes, which are the root of the modes, and two simultaneously sounding patterns in the treble register, of which one is varied, the other is literally repeated. The structure of the piece is built up of different sections each strictly adhering to one scale, and each marked by a new bass note and pedal change. All together, a highly colourful and atmospheric music is the result, comparable to a diamond which radiates different colours and moods at different angles of light, though it remains the same object. It is the sudden change of colour, or tonal mode, which is referred to by "gate", which is a term borrowed from electronics where a switch changes polarity.



In Phrygian Gates, Adams's individual new and more expressive approach to minimalism can more readily be heard. An epic piece, its intense musical tension is achieved by abrupt changes in energy, mood, speed, rhythm and colour. Dark and light are sharply juxtaposed, owing to the alternation between the sweet and light lydian mode and the more fiery and dissonant phrygian mode. Through tonal modulations, in this case by the cycle of fifths, the music seems to intensify and relax alternatingly as was usual in Romantic music. As the time spent in the lydian mode diminishes over time and the more aggressive character of the phrygian mode gradually determines the work's character, the composition conveys expressive drama previously unknown to minimalism. The slow chordal middle section ("a system of weights and measures") serves as a great musical relief, contemplating the different refractions of light on one single basic harmony, before the fast ripplings of the final section bring the composition to a breathtaking close.



During the years after these piano works, Adams's musical style crystallized even more clearly. Through highly successful orchestral and ensemble works such as Shaker Loops (1978), Grand Pianola Music (1982), Harmonium (1980-81) and Harmonielehre (1984-85), one can hear how the composer incorporated more and more elements of his youth – classical, jazz and pop – in his music, thereby achieving a unique and expressive style, of which the traditional minimalist heritage is only one way of recognising the composer.



It was not before composing two major operas, Nixon in China (1985-87) and The Death of Klinghoffer (1990-91), that Adams returned to the piano. Inspired by a truck stop near his cabin with the same name, Hallelujah Junction (1996) for two pianos seems the composer's personal history translated into music. Starting off with a minimalistic pattern of three syllables (-lle-lu-jah), echoed by the second pianist, the work becomes almost romantic-impressionistic halfway, before the four-syllabled "hallelujah" finally sounds, completely jazzed up and sliced up to atonality towards the end.



Adams's most recent piano work, American Berserk (2001), readily recalls the fractured boogie-woogie style of Conlon Nancarrow. Almost entirely built up out of triadic harmonies, the constant shifting of rhythm and unexpected juxtaposition of harmonies exemplify the composer's claim that "as an expressive tool… [minimalism] absolutely had to evolve and become more complex". Its title is owed to novelist Philip Roth, who wrote alarmingly about the disintegrating world of today. The piece could hardly be more expressive in its individual, present-day style. And that is exactly what makes John Adams so unique.



Ralph van Raat



 


Disc 1


    Phrygian Gates (more info)
    Composed by: John Adams
    Ralph van Raat, piano
    Recording date: 7-8 January 2006
    Produced by: Ponder, Michael

  1. Phrygian Gates - 13:45


    2. American Berserk (more info)
    Composed by: John Adams
    Ralph van Raat, piano
    Recording date: 7-8 January 2006
    Produced by: Ponder, Michael

  2. American Berserk - 06:04


    3. China Gates (more info)
    Composed by: John Adams
    Ralph van Raat, piano
    Recording date: 7-8 January 2006
    Produced by: Ponder, Michael

  3. China Gates - 05:15


    4. Hallelujah Junction (more info)
    Composed by: John Adams
    Ralph van Raat, piano
    Maarten van Veen, piano
    Recording date: 7-8 January 2006
    Produced by: Ponder, Michael

  4. Hallelujah Junction - 16:05

Reviews

Be the first to review this title




 
 
 
 
News
 
Sign up for our newsletter!

FREE POSTAGE AND PACKING ON ALL ITEMS

We distribute exclusively within the UK only


Subscribe to our newsletter and unlock Naxos Rewards by creating an account. Create your account here.

See all of our great site features here.
 
 
 
 
Product Details
 
Composer(s)/ Author(s):
Adams, John

Artist(s):
Raat, Ralph van; Veen, Maarten van

Label: Naxos American Classics
UPC: 636943928523
Item Number: 8559285
Release Date: Jan 29, 2007

 
 
 
 
Recently Viewed Items
 
1

2

3

4

5



 
 
 
 
Recently Viewed Items
 
Customers who bought ADAMS, John: Complete Piano Music also bought:
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
.................................................................
 
 
 

 
NOTICE: This site was unavailable for several hours on Saturday, June 25th 2011 due to some unexpected but essential maintenance work. We apologize for any inconvenience.