Last week, the Washington Square Contemporary Music Society gave a commanding premiere performance of Aura, a new concerto for alto saxophone and ensemble. Louis Karchin conducted at the Tenri Cultural Institute in New York. Aura was written for the Serge Koussevitzky Music Foundation in the Library of Congress. Thanks for all involved: an amazing ensemble, and a fabulous soloist, Mary Joy Patchett.
You can listen to the premiere performance here:
I was honored when Perspectives of New Music asked me to compose a work for a special edition celebrating the life and work of Milton Babbitt. I chose to compose a work based on Babbitt’s Whirled Series. My new work, also for alto saxophone and piano, was recorded this past September by Mary Joy Patchett and John McDonald. The title, Compulsive Loves, comes from a beautiful quote by Italo Calvino describing the relationship of gods and humans in Ovid’s Metamorphoses.
John Aylward 