Word: thompson
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...understanding of the voice is uncanny, and he learned it, as I am sure he would be the first to admit, at the knee of that greatest of English choral composers, Handel. Somehow, Thompson manages to achieve his end with tessituras that are comfortable and settings that not only express the text, but project it to the audience. I don't quite know how he does it, and neither do his imitators: no matter how much their progressions sound like his, Thompson's understanding of the voice cannot be matched. The Glee Club is often foiled...
What texts! Thompson chooses his texts with the care of a sculptor choosing his stone, a calligrapher his nib. His settings of three Horatian odes sound fresh after 41 years: one wonders how those dissonances and lush chromaticisms (which have since become less frequent in Thompson's music) struck listeners in the twenties...
Though there isn't room to go into detail on the numbers on the second half of the program, it should be noted that the addition of the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra gave Boston its first opportunity to hear Thompson's Last Words of David in its original version with orchestra, and his Frostiana with the orchestration prepared especially for this concert. He uses the winds, brass, and percussion effectively, and treats the strings not only as a body, but as tow choirs that can be separated or combined to produce a rich sound used so rarely in contemporary music...
...singers were in fine voice Friday night. Don't let anyone fool you-it isn't easy music. Have you ever heard a bad chorus sing Thompson? Each of the four parts lies exposed. If one voice sticks out, or one section wanders off pitch by that much, even the Great Tin Ear couldn't miss it. It was a joy to hear Thompson conducting his own music, for he does it well. The Glee Club an Choral Society are to be commended on their blend, tone, and expression, and on their endurance as well (they stood throughout the entire...
...played attentively. They thundered when the occasion demanded, or played under the chorus's pianissimo, which was very soft, Randall Thompson's orchestrations are more or less routine work for instrumentalists; the strings played what they had well, the wind solos were good, but not always exactly in tune...