Classical Concert Reviews Cinci

@uc_ccm concluded its week-long residency with l composer Jennifer Higdon with a concert featuring some of her most unique and innovative chamber and choral works.
Members of CCM’s contemporary music ensemble Musica Nova led by student conductor Angelo Anton, opened with an invigorating reading of the sextet Zaka, a 2003 score which recalled the sound worlds of Alban Berg, Krzysztof Penderecki and Tōru Takemitsu. Two solo members, bassoonist Cedric Quinn and pianist Zicong Su continued with Higdon’s 2020 score The Space Within, among the most distinctly romantic work on this evening’s program and a welcome addition to what is otherwise a small repertoire of solo bassoon works.
CCM’s Chamber Choir followed with two works demonstrating Higdon’s skill at writing for mixed voices: a movement from the suite Southern Grace and a setting of the John Newton text Amazing Grace. While her choral writing sounded surprisingly more accessible than anticipated, it does demonstrate that she more than holds her own in writing across multiple genres, perhaps a rarity for most other contemporary composers.
A student brass quintet opened the second half with the 2021 score Book of Brass, a work which melded the virtuosic writing of composers like Paul Dukas with the lush harmonic subtleties of Dvořák and Verdi. Flutists Kayla Gage, Valentina Arango Sanchez and Briana Vidal, joined by harpist Madeline Arney, followed with a more sentimental score from 2009 titled Music Box of Light, a work whose harmonic textures recalled the Stephen Ahrens-Lynn Flaherty song Once Upon a December through its simplistic yet distinctive solo harp writing and comforting flute harmonies.
CCM’s Chorale concluded with two more of Higdon’s approachable, unique choral works: A Quiet Moment and the 2000 score somewhere i have never traveled, gladly beyond, setting a poem by E.E. Cummings (joined by pianist Therese Sutula).
Many of the harmonic gestures Higdon weaves throughout both scores recall composers like John Rutter and Gwyneth Walker in their polyphonic structure, while giving instrumental parts more virtuosic moments, provided here with finesse and aplomb across the whole ensemble.
Bravi tutti!