<\/p>\n
By Jonathan Blumhofer<\/strong><\/p>\n With Carlos Simon\u2019s <\/em>Four Black American Dances, the Pittsburgh Symphony offers a thoughtful and resonant recontextualization of Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s Ninth.<\/em><\/p>\n During his residency in the United States in the 1890s, Antonin Dvorak famously found much to admire in the music of Black Americans. \u201cI am now convinced,\u201d he told the New York Herald<\/em> in 1892, \u201cthat the future music of this country must be founded on what are called Negro melodies.\u201d<\/p>\n Dvorak was correct, as jazz, the blues, rock, hip-hop, and countless varieties of pop music have demonstrated. Regrettably, not many of his classical contemporaries, American or otherwise, took the Czech master at his word\u2014at least not so thoroughly as they might have. Perhaps unsurprisingly then, precious few recordings (let alone orchestral programs) have since seen fit to pair anything of his with the music of Black American composers. That makes the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra\u2019s new album featuring the \u201cNew World\u201d Symphony and Carlos Simon\u2019s Four Black American Dances<\/em> commendable for the originality of its concept alone.<\/p>\n But there\u2019s much more to it than just that.<\/p>\n Premiered by Andris Nelsons and the Boston Symphony in 2023, Simon\u2019s curtain-raiser is at once a lot of fun to listen to and very well written. Its four movements offer what the composer calls a \u201crepresentation of the wide range of cultural and social differences within\u2026Black American communities,\u201d and touch on some deeply personal ties: the finale, in particular, nods to his experience in the Black Pentecostal church.<\/p>\n That section, \u201cHoly Dance,\u201d is the work\u2019s most Ivesian, with swirling, amorphous textures coalescing into a striding, exuberant main body. Simon\u2019s writing in this part is riff-heavy\u2014but there are enough contrasts of color and rhythm to hold the attention and, besides, his sense of pacing is unerring. The same is true of the opening \u201cRing Shout,\u201d with its swaggering, earthy syncopations and inviting plays of color. In between comes an elegant, silky \u201cWaltz\u201d and an energetic homage to tap dancing.<\/p>\n The PSO has a thoroughgoing grasp of all of it, with their performance, led by music director Manfred Honeck, demonstrating a deep familiarity with Simon\u2019s idiom and syntax. The \u201cWaltz,\u201d in particular, becomes something quite alluring, while \u201cRing Shout\u2019s\u201d vigorous rhythms possess all the bite and flash one might desire.<\/p>\n Indeed, the orchestra\u2019s reading underlines one of the composer\u2019s most impressive accomplishments in these Dances<\/em>: it is no easy trick to spin out fifteen minutes of music that are at once so agreeable, inviting, and yet substantive. Or, for that matter, to write something that stands toe-to-toe with Dvorak\u2019s Symphony No. 9 and emerges holding its own. Simon, though, has done just that.<\/p>\n And that says something, given Honeck\u2019s refreshingly revisionist approach to the warhorse. The Austrian conductor has made a habit of rethinking canonical totems during his tenure in Pittsburgh and his thoughtful reconsideration of this score (spelled out in typically informative liner notes) has the benefit of underlining the music\u2019s tragic aura.<\/p>\n Part of that atmosphere is likely the result of the symphony\u2019s debt to Longfellow\u2019s Hiawatha<\/em> (Dvorak evidently contemplated a dramatic work based on the poem, parts of which found their way into the score), as well as his homesickness for Bohemia. Either way, here Honeck and the PSO mine an impressive lode from the work\u2019s reservoirs of excitement, sweep, beauty, pain, and wistfulness.<\/p>\n Everything is well-blended\u2014the framing sections of the Largo are particularly luminous\u2014and big contrasts are the rule. The first movement\u2019s introduction is conspicuously explosive, its coda feisty. There\u2019s a brawny rusticity to parts of the finale and the big climaxes near the end sound almost like screams.<\/p>\n Throughout, too, there\u2019s a becoming sense of space, both in fast tempos and slow. The Largo is enchantingly unhurried but never drags, while the Scherzo\u2019s lilting Trio comes across like a vision from afar: its nuanced dynamics and taut rhythms craft an atmosphere of beguiling nostalgia.<\/p>\n Taken together, Honeck\u2019s is an interpretation that allows one to hear\u2014or at least think of\u2014this music afresh. There are myriad ways to approach it, of course, but, given the context of the symphony\u2019s proximity to Simon\u2019s Dances<\/em>, the larger album suggests a vision of shared humanity across eras, styles, ethnicities, and genres that our times, so fraught with division and strife, might do well to learn from.<\/p>\n Jonathan Blumhofer<\/strong> is a composer and violist who has been active in the greater Boston area since 2004. His music has received numerous awards and been performed by various ensembles, including the American Composers Orchestra, Kiev Philharmonic, Camerata Chicago, Xanthos Ensemble, and Juventas New Music Group. Since receiving his doctorate from Boston University in 2010, Jon has taught at Clark University, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and online for the University of Phoenix, in addition to writing music criticism for the Worcester Telegram & Gazette<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source artsfuse.org \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Jonathan Blumhofer With Carlos Simon\u2019s Four Black American Dances, the Pittsburgh Symphony offers a thoughtful and resonant recontextualization of Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s Ninth. During his residency in the United States in the 1890s, Antonin Dvorak famously found much to admire in the music of Black Americans. \u201cI am now convinced,\u201d he told the New York Herald […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2484793,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2484792","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Classical-Music-Album-Review-A-New-World-Reconsidered.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2484792","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2484792"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2484792\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2484794,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2484792\/revisions\/2484794"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2484793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2484792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2484792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2484792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}