This Divine Art CD contains the entirety of young British composer David Jennings’ piano music, all written between 1985 and 2010. Born in Sheffield, Yorkshire in 1972, Jennings studied composition at Durham University and again at Manchester University at the postgraduate level. The...

Inspired by paintings and photographs of the composer’s homeland, New Zealander Christopher Blake wrote the four works for string orchestra on this Atoll CD between 2000 and 2008. Performed by the Strings of the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra conducted by Kenneth Young, these works are...

One can gather quite a bit about the music of British composer John Pickard (born 1963) from the opening track of this BIS CD, the first movement of his Piano Concerto, completed in 2000. It’s apparent that rhythm plays a very important thematic role in the music; it’s rhythm...

Six Fish from the Australian guitar quartet Guitar Trek is a completely original, fresh and compelling album. It’s on the Tall Poppies record label (also Aussie), coming to us from out of left field (which is our decidedly preferred field here at Expedition Audio). Celebrating its 25th...

The Alba record label has been committed to the music of Finnish composer Seppo Pohjola for nearly a decade. This new recording of Pohjola’s Symphony No. 1 (2002) and Symphony No. 2 (2006) follows recordings by Alba of the composer’s earlier chamber music and two short operas....

This Dacapo CD contains three works by Danish composer Erik Norby (1936-2007). The Rainbow Snake (1975) is a symphonic poem inspired by an Amerindian legend that describes the origin of the rainbow. Rilke-Lieder (1985) for mezzo-soprano and orchestra is a setting of three songs based upon...

The very significant poetic side of American composer Jennifer Higdon’s music is confirmed on this new album from Bridge Records. The performances are by the Lark Quartet in An Exaltation of Larks (2005), Scenes from the Poet’s Dreams (1999) where the quartet is joined by pianist...

Composer David Wolfson studied composition at the Cleveland Institute of Music and has lived in New York City since 1986 working as a conductor, arranger, pianist and music director for a wide variety of projects, especially related to the theatre. This first CD of his music from Albany...

Frank La Rocca’s music sounds as though it is simultaneously from two vastly different periods of music history. One foot is planted in contemporary art music, and the other in the ancient world of chant and early European polyphony. This is not new, of course. Mr. La Rocca joins the...

At Expedition Audio we’ve become acquainted with a number of interesting record labels. But until now, I have not encountered a not-for-profit label. Non Profit Music’s mission is to “feature new composers of very emotive instrumental contemporary music” while at the same time...

Those of you who would not hesitate to buy an hour long CD of solo percussion music, please raise your mallets. Many of us assume that a program like this is intended for a narrow audience – percussionists to be exact. If you feel that way, Boomslang from Blue Griffin performed by...

I cannot resist listening to a CD that advertises three world premières. On this recording, the Benaud Trio performs four works for piano trio, all of which were written by composers from Australia, the home country of both the Benaud Trio and the Melba label. If you’re looking for...