Lou Harrison

I am starting a new thread, so that he is not forever recently dead. I'm sure there are also stretches about his work on some of the classical threads, but he has enough crossover appeal (exhibit a: the fact that I'm interested in him) that I think he deserves his own thread.

A new Lou Harrison CD is out soon, with previously unrecorded gamelan material:

http://www.newworldrecords.org/album.cgi?rm=view&album_id=85820

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51YtZ1DB3RL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

Cavafy-inspired gamelan works. So Lou Harrison.

I give this a spin from time to time:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61883ZCPDDL._SS500_.jpg

I enjoy the gamelan works the most, but the string quartet is interesting and stylistically varied, and the early solo percussion piece is really cool — seems like a fun piece for an amateur group to play.

I do like the gamelan stuff but actually the work of his I've played the most is Symphony on G - lovely stuff.

This is my favourite of his (not that I've heard all that much), it's really lovely:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61BnSMpmF%2BL._SL500_AA280_.jpg

corey, it looks like that may be the re-issue of one of the CRI compilations I own. Main Bersama-Sama, Threnody for Carlos Chavez, and Serenade are possibly my favorite Harrison pieces of all (though there are a couple others that are in the running). The melodies are exceptionally beautiful, and I will always associate those pieces with sunset (probably because that's mostly when I originally heard them, on a new music show that aired around that time).