Excerpts

‘A rare opportunity to hear several of the major symphonic works of a true American original. Hyla happily mingles expressionistic, complex contemporary atonal idioms with elements of avant-garde jazz, and rock and garage band with results that cannot be anticipated. His honking, strongly articulated rhythms mask an inner beauty that almost always seems ready to burst into radiant sunshine.’

‘Lee Hyla writes in a tremendously compressed style in which shape and gesture stand in for conventional melody despite an often clear tonal orientation. Rhythm also plays an important role in activating his musical textures and maintaining linear transparency, and it’s clear from a cursory listen to any of these three works that Hyla writes with a great deal of talent and confidence…….Gil Rose and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project rise bravely to the occasion, and no matter how disjointed the music becomes, they never make an ugly sound or lose sight of where the music is going- and make no mistake, Hyla both knows where he wants to go and how to get there. Excellently detailed, well-balanced sonics round out a most welcome portrait of a fascinating composer who could well become a major voice in contemporary music.’

‘The music of Boston-based composer Lee Hyla is a riveting, bejeweled enigma, one in which disorder and confusion crash into pristine, balanced beauty. A fascinating study in contrasts, Hyla’s scores pit blunt noise against placidity, and lushly scored masses vie with percussive, rocking grooves. Hyla’s is a wholly original voice, and at long last, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project has committed three of his major works to disc via New World, one of the few American labels still concerned with preserving an promoting contemporary music.’

‘The music of Lee Hyla….takes its place amongst the best of modernist visions, from Olivier Messiaen to Magnus Lindberg, alongside fellow Americans Elliott Carter and Roger Reynolds….This fine disc should be heard by all those devoted to contemporary music.’

‘New World Records deserves credit for releasing ‘Trans’, an exciting new recording of three orchestral works of Mr. Hyla, in dynamic performances by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, an ensemble that champions living composers. These pieces offer arresting evidence that a gifted composer can find common ground among Wolpe, Cecil Taylor, and the Sex Pistols, and create music of vibrant originality and elegance.’ – Anthony Tommasini, New York Times 6/13/04

‘What comes through most in Trans (1996), a three movement work of less than twenty minutes, is Mr. Hyla’s ability to find thematic threads and structural integrity in music that seems mercurial and volatile. His pungent harmonic language, containing tonal and atonal elements, eludes description. All you can say in the end is that he pieces his pitches according to what sounds right to his keen ears, not according to some system or notion. The counterpoint is ingenious: pumped-up polyphonic lines fight it out in high registers atop a protective mat of sustained, stable chords.’ – Anthony Tommasini, New York Times 6/13/04

‘Hyla put together one of the most unpleasant series of snorts and squalls I’ve heard in a long time. (There is just no polite way to say this)…..Frankly it was trash and should be appropriately disposed of.’

‘The Bass Clarinet Concerto features the great bass clarinetist Tim Smith. It pushes Tim Smith’s bass clarinet all over, bravely swirling, sailing, floating on top of the slowly evolving, elegantly exciting orchestral terrain.’

‘The eventful Concerto for bass clarinet dates from 1988. Just over ten minutes long, it is dense enough to fill a work twice its length. The soloist quacks and rasps like an ugly duckling, but the possibility of a more beautiful ‘swanhood’ is not far away. While Hyla’s idiom is Classical, he uses musical gestures and phrases in a jazz-like manner; the repeated use of the word ‘riffs’ in Ted Mook’s ‘insider-y’ booklet notes is very appropriate. It’s impossible to suck the juice from this work in one or two sittings, and hardly more possible to do so in a dozen- there’s just so much going on. Something about Hyla’s music makes one want to try, however.’

‘During this fitful and teeming work, the bass clarinet wails like a caterwauling jazz saxophone one moment, only to sing with cantorial plaintiveness the next.’  Anthony Tommasini, New York Times, 6/13/04

‘This is a serious, sprawling one movement drama, a searching and involving experience.’

‘The one movement Violin Concerto is more relaxed and some of its Schoenbergian textures are frankly gorgeous.’