Catalog

PHANTASM is a digital release featuring the culmination of Missouri-based composer, saxophonist and audio engineer Eric Honour’s two-year project to blend all of his interests into one entity. Honour received these compositions for saxophone and computer and took them on tour, finally recording the program in studio. The resulting music explores the connections between old and new, ranging from rural folk sounds to experimental microtones and explorations of saxophone technique to physically triggered computer processing.

Composer and guitarist Jonathan Badger presents his newest album, PIANO QUARTETS, on Ravello Records. This EP of works for piano and saxophone trio is the artist’s first leap into the classical music world; his earlier albums have included an eclectic mix of musical styles ranging from post-rock to neo-baroque chamber music.

On her debut release on Ravello Records, PIANO SONORITIES, composer Betty R. Wishart presents a collection of her solo piano works, performed by award-winning pianist Jeri-Mae G. Astolfi, which highlights the composer’s use of distinctive harmonic structures, tension, and space. In many of Wishart’s works including Toccata II, Toccata III, Sonata, and Night Visions, the composer employs the intervals of seconds, fourths, and sevenths to create melodic and harmonic material which unifies the style of her writing while creating a variety of colors and textures throughout the album.

Ravello Records proudly presents the digital single PIECE BY PIECE, the PARMA debut of composer Beth Mehocic (ma•ho´•sick). Her work of the same name is scored for flute, bass clarinet, trumpet, bass trombone, violin, contrabass, and percussion and is performed by the Moravian Philharmonic Chamber Players. Piece by Piece was commissioned by the Erick Hawkins Dance Company of New York City in honor of their former director and composer-in-residence, Lucia Dlugoszewski. Dlugoszewski is known for her developments in avant-garde music technique and experimental music; thus, Mehocic includes a number of these techniques in the piece, including pitch bends, rapid glissandi, muting techniques, and extreme ranges.

Stuart Weber's PIECES OF ROAD is a heartfelt, profound homage to the spirit of the American West. At once traditional and original, the classical guitarist manages to capture the essence not only of his native Rocky Mountains, but of nature and comfort at large.

PIPING THE EARTH was originally released in 2003 and was lauded as “strong and original” (Fanfare) and “a major release” (New Music Connoisseur). Featuring perfectly interpreted performances by pianist Gayle Martin Henry, flutist Renee Siebert, and Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra and the Prism Chamber Orchestra, PIPING THE EARTH provides listeners with an adept sampling of Judith Shatin’s orchestral prowess.

Follow composer Richard Carr as he guides you through his world-travel experiences in his Ravello Records release PLACES I’VE WALKED. The feeling of authenticity cannot be understated in these compositions, divided into four parts.

Richard Brooks’ PLACES IN TIME travels through the acclaimed composer’s personal history with each piece representing a different period in the composer’s life. Many of these recordings were originally released by Brooks’ label, Capstone Records. Each piece gains new life as Brooks and Ravello Records team up to share this fascinating work in tonality, soundscapes, and emotional sway with a new generation of music lovers.

On their debut Ravello Records release, PLAYFUL EDGE OF THE WAVE, composers Robert J. Martin and Neely Bruce join a love of beauty with the willingness to engage in spirited, magical, even outrageously unexpected sounds and gestures. These composers, with pianist Shirley Blankenship, present a collection of image-based works whose titles and descriptions open a direction to understanding the music.

On their seventh Ravello Records release, PLOT: MUSIC FOR UNSPECIFIED INSTRUMENTATION, the McCormick Percussion Group, directed by Robert McCormick, delivers a diverse collection of works that explore and expand the bounds of the percussion ensemble, featuring the use of improvisation, taped field recordings, and computer-generated graphical scores.

Composed with integrity, mystery, and ambition, the orchestral works of Marga Richter thrive on the emotional and the visceral, conjuring vast and majestic imagery with poetic and dramatic underpinnings. POETIC IMAGES BEYOND POETRY includes three of Richter's works for orchestra, each of which present a tonal and moving representation of their various influences: Out of Shadows and Solitude, inspired by the flight of a condor over clouded mountaintops; Quantum Quirks of a Quick Quaint Quark, based on Richter's early dance music and boogie-woogie; and Spectral Chimes: Enshrouded Hills, permeated with imagery from Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles.

PRELUDES & BAGATELLES is the latest release from renowned composer Michael Matthews, featuring his dramatic 14 Preludes, selections from his collection of Bagatelles, and the epilogistic Postlude. Expertly performed by acclaimed Belgian pianist Daan Vandewalle, the pieces on this disc encapsulate Matthews’ brilliance with solo piano composition and highlight his versatile craftsmanship, which he is able to alter to accommodate a wide variety of moods, emotions, and aspects of musicality.

In celebration of her 30th anniversary of coming to America, Boston based composer Alla Cohen presents a double album of new works for chamber orchestra and chamber ensembles. A graduate of highest honors of the famed Moscow Conservatory, Cohen emigrated to the United States in 1989, first teaching at the New England Conservatory of Music, and for the last 15 years— as a Professor at Berklee College of Music. Her works have been awarded multiple prizes, are raved about in stellar reviews, and have been performed by acclaimed musicians from around the world.

Quartet at the Crossroads features performances of contemporary saxophone compositions performed by the New Hudson Saxophone Quartet. The astounding timbral range of the instrument, from the sopranino to the contrabass, is utilized to its full extent as performers push the limits of the instrument. As this disc will show, the musical voice of the saxophone is evolving, growing, and changing at an astounding rate.

Alan Beeler composer

THE MCLEAN MIX: RAINFOREST IMAGES was originally released in 1993 was lauded as "awesome" (ClassicalNet) and "one of the more convincing Fast-West syntheses since Philip Glass's music for Kundun" (Twentieth Century Music).

Violinist Mikylah Myers and flutist Francesca Arnone perform diverse electroacoustic pieces on their first collaborative album REACT, released on Ravello Records. The works on this album demonstrate well the potential range of electroacoustic music in facilitating both experimental and traditional compositional ideas. The featured composers explore new ways of creating and organizing sound, and as performed with either computer or other interactive electronics, the violin and flute help construct unique sonic landscapes.

Composer Alla Elana Cohen presents a full album of chamber works in her first Ravello Records release RED LILIES OF BELLS, GOLDEN LILIES OF BELLS, WHITE LILIES OF BELLS. Cohen is an extremely creative and evocative composer, her works are wildly imaginative. The album is rich with musical surprises that reward repeat listens.

RESONANT EDGES was originally released in 2007 and features performances by pianists Dianne Frazer Cross, Peter Henderson, Mark E. Hussung, and Denise Fillion, clarinetist Karen Dannessa, flutists Deanna R. Little and Lisa A. Jelle, soprano Dorothy Maddison, and the Seattle New Music Ensemble.

On their debut Ravello Records release, RHAPSODY ON A RIFF, New Zealand composer Michael Calvert and guitarist Matthew Marshall present original works for solo guitar that display the versatility, dynamic range, and earthy timbre of the instrument, while developing a unique musical language influenced by serialism, New Zealand culture, and the guitar's tradition in several genres, from classical and folk to rock, jazz, and pop music.