“Instruments of Revelation”
A CD of recent chamber music by Victoria Bond
World-class performers: Chicago Pro Musica, pianist Jenny Lin, tenor Rufus Müller, and pianist Olga Vinokur
Release date: April 12, 2019
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Victoria Bond's passion for chamber music is evident in each of the more than 100 works she has composed for the genre. Released on April 12, 2019, the NAXOS American Classics CD "Instruments of Revelation" includes world premiere recordings of Ms. Bond's most recent chamber works.
Drawing on Bond's chamber music of the last 15 years, "Instruments of Revelation" features performances by the Grammy award winning ensemble Chicago Pro Musica, "dynamic pianist" (NYTimes) Jenny Lin, and "dramatic tenor" (Toronto Star) Rufus Müller among others.
Lending its title to the album, Instruments of Revelation is a three movement work with each movement based on a different tarot card: "The Magician", represents ambiguity with music shifting suddenly from the mysterious and solemn to the cunning and dexterous; "The High Priestess", possesses wisdom, passion and secrets of the law, her music is calm but slowly ignites into throbbing desire; and "The Fool", considered both the holy mystic and the intoxicated lunatic, embodies music of both comedy and chaos.
Frescoes and Ash was commissioned by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and is based on seven images from Pompeii. Opening with a raucous band wandering the streets, dancing and playing a tarantella, the pieces continues with a mosaic of swimming fish, a mysterious fortune teller, a comedic group of actors and a bizarre skull symbolizing the Romans’ acceptance of death.
As a composer who is often inspired by literature and imagery, Leopold Bloom's Homecoming is Victoria Bond's account of one section of James Joyce's Ulysses. As Ms. Bond reflects, "I have been drawn to Ulysses ever since I was in high school. I think this is because the writing resembles the way I think - not in complete sentences, but in fleeting images and allusions, in a stream of consciousness." Rounding out the CD, Binary is a fast-paced and rhythmically complex set of variations on the number two.
TRACKS
1-3. Instruments of Revelation (2010)
Chicago Pro Musica
4-10. Frescoes and Ash (2009)
Chicago Pro Musica
11. Leopold Bloom's Homecoming (2011)
Rufus Müller, Tenor | Jenny Lin, Piano
12. Binary (2005)
Olga Vinokur, Piano
A major force in 21st century music, composer Victoria Bond is known for her melodic gift and dramatic flair. Her works for orchestra, chamber ensemble and opera have been lauded by the New York Times as "powerful, stylistically varied and technically demanding."
In addition to "Instruments of Revelation", the chamber works on the Naxos label, highlights of Ms. Bond's catalog include the operas Mrs. President, Clara and The Miracle of Light; ballets Equinox and Other Selves; orchestral works Thinking like a Mountain, Bridges and Urban Bird, among many others. Her compositions have been performed by the New York City Opera, Shanghai, Dallas and Houston Symphonies, members of the Chicago Symphony and New York Philharmonic, American Ballet Theater and the Cassatt and Audubon Quartets.
Ms. Bond is Artistic Director of Cutting Edge Concerts New Music Festival in New York, which she founded in 1998, and is a frequent lecturer at the Metropolitan Opera and has lectured for the New York Philharmonic. The Wall Street Journal, NBC's Today Show, the New York Times and other national publications have profiled Ms. Bond. For more information about Victoria Bond and her upcoming projects, visit VictoriaBond.com