Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra Paul Fetler CD

This Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra CD features the music of Paul Fetler, our Concertmaster Aaron Berofsky and Narrator Thomas H. Blaske.

Our Fetler CD is available at:

The Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra Office

Online from the A²SO  CLICK HERE

Borders Books

Barnes & Noble

iTunes

Amazon.com

Naxos.com

Aaron Berofsky, Thomas Blaske, Paul Fetler and Arie Lipsky

This recording, the first devoted entirely to the music of Paul Fetler, features Ann Arbor poet and attorney Thomas H. Blaske as narrator in the evocative Three Poems by Walt Whitman, written to commemorate the American Bicentennial in 1976. An elegant solo violin quasi-cadenza opens the remarkable third movement, after which the narrator intones the haunting line, ‘Ah, from a little child, thou knowest, Soul, how to me all sounds became music....’ The phrase is heard again, reflected near the close and carried as if by a distant music box, simulated by a toy piano. A labour of love, Fetler’s Violin Concerto No. 2 mixes spry energy and elegant orchestration with expressively flowing melody into an irresistible tour de force, a perfect example of the ‘progressive lyricism’ that characterises his musical style.

Thomas Gerdom, Maestro Arie Lipsky, Paul Fetler and Thomas Blaske discuss the score

Rehearsal for Three Poems by Walt Whitman with Thomas Blaske as narrator

ALBUM REVIEWS

Susan Isaacs Nisbett Review on AnnArbor.com

Nick Barnard Review on Music Web International.com

John J. Puccio, Classical Candor

December 2009

Who’s Paul Fetler? I hear some of you asking. It’s hard to keep up with all the modern composers who dot the musical landscape these days, even though Mr Fetler (b. 1920) has been around for quite a long time and gained a sizable following. He’s one of those contemporary composers who isn’t afraid to reach out and touch an audience rather than bludgeon them with heavy-handed, often experimental noise. As such, his music is easily accessible and highly enjoyable. Fetler, a Professor Emeritus at the University of Minnesota teaching music composition describes his compositional approach as “progressive lyricism” or expressively flowing melodies. Certainly, the three works on this 2009 Naxos disc reflect his lyrical style. The program begins with Three Poems by Walt Whitman (written to commemorate the U.S. Bicentennial in 1976), musical settings for some of the great American poet’s words, with a narration by lifelong Whitman scholar and Ann Arbor attorney, Thomas H. Blaske. The three selected pieces represent the tranquil as well as the outgoing sides of the poet, from “I am he who walks with the tender and growing night” to “Beat! Beat! Drums!” to “Ah, from a little child.” If you like Whitman, Fetler does his lines justice. Next is the single-movement but infinitely varied Capriccio (commissioned as a dedicatory work for the opening concert of the Minneapolis Chamber Symphony in 1985), a wonderfully light, playfully upbeat little set of ditties that make an appropriate contrast to the more-serious tempers of Whitman. Things conclude with the showpiece of the album, the Violin Concerto No. 2 (1980), which the composer characterizes as a “labor of love,” meaning it was not a commission and he was under no deadline to complete it. The opening movement has a vaguely dark, foreboding, Eastern-European cast to it, which quickly opens up to a sunnier, more-inviting mood. It is poetically graceful, reminiscent of the more-placid elements of Enesco. Aaron Berofsky’s violin passages dart nimbly amongst a whole bevy of attractive tunes, becoming quite dramatic by the close. In the second movement Adagio the tone turns more to Debussy in its atmospheric reverie. Then, the final movement takes the work out with a bang, Berofsky keeping his violin in constant motion. The performers seem to be enjoying themselves immensely, and it’s all quite agreeable, as is Naxos’s sound. It’s the kind of sound that my late dear friend Nate Garfinkle might surely have characterized as “sweet.” … pleasantly realistic, with a natural sense of orchestral depth and presence…the overall sonic impression is velvety smooth and pleasing.