Denyce Graves - American Anthem - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Leontyne Price - God Bless America [COMPACT DISCS] date 11/20/2001

Denyce Graves - Lost Days Music in the Latin Style [COMPACT DISCS] date 01/21/2003

Composer Monica Houghton has a musical and academic resume that is made even more exceptional by her experiences as a true citizen of the world. Her travels around the globe have led her to incorporate non-Western instruments and musical practices into several of her compositions as well as to find inspiration trekking through Peru, or by exploring the remote and desolate areas of the American West. On Chamber Works, her debut on Navona Records, Houghton incorporates these influences along with many others to deliver eight stunning performances showcased in a variety of musical configurations. Chamber Works opens with InchAndean Suite,Inch a four-movement piece, that gleans it's inspiration from Houghton's journey on foot through the mountains of Peru. The sense of freedom exhibited by the opening movement, InchWith the Condors,Inch is buoyed by the closing movement, InchDance,Inch which employs folk music idioms of the Andes to express pure joy. InchThe Twelve Causes from the Circle of BecomingInch reflects the essence of Tibetan Buddhist Wheel of Life paintings. In the spirit of those paintings pianist James Winn delivers an intricate and powerful performance. The Argenta Trio brings the three movements of InchWilderness Portraits Three Places in Nevada,Inch capturing Houghton's quiet sense of awe at the beauty of the natural world. Three of the album's pieces, InchThree Songs without Words,Inch and InchStay Shadow,Inch and InchCorpo Sonoro,Inch gather inspiration from poets as disparate in place and time as New Spain's Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz, who worked in the mid-17th century and the Tang Dynasty poet Tu Fu. The four poetic pieces in InchCorpo SonoroInch are here performed by pianist Halida Danova, for whom it was composed, and are based on poems by the Brazilian poet Maria Davico. Turning her creative gaze on Beethoven, Houghton composed InchEpigram,Inch perf