Bucklesweet 2018 Releases

Third Coast Percussion 
Paddle to the Sea 
Released February 9, 2018 
Cedille Records, CDR 90000 175 

Grammy Award winners for their Steve Reich Cedille Records debut, Third Coast Percussion launched listeners on an imaginative water-borne adventure with their album, Paddle to the Sea. The title track, Paddle to the Sea, is an original Third Coast ensemble composition, conceived as a live soundtrack to the charming, Oscar-nominated 1966 short film of the same name. The film, adapted from the well-known children’s book, Paddle-to-the-Sea, depicts a Native Canadian boy who lovingly carves a small wooden figure in a canoe and launches him on a dramatic, far-reaching solo journey to the ocean. 

Patrice Michaels 
Notorious RBG in Song 
Released June 8, 2018 
Cedille Records, CDR 90000 178 

Soprano Patrice Michaels and pianist Kuang-Hao Huang offered a collection of songs saluting U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on her completion of 25 years on the high court on Notorious RBG in Song, from Cedille Records. Notorious RBG in Song features works by five contemporary American composers celebrating Justice Ginsburg’s family and professional life. The album’s centerpiece is her cycle, THE LONG VIEW: A Portrait of Ruth Bader Ginsburg in Nine Songs, which reveals key aspects of Justice Ginsburg’s personal life and career through letters, remembrances, conversations, and even Court opinions.

Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra  
Le Temple de la Gloire 
Released July 13, 2018 
Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, PBP-10

In order to appease the somewhat provincially Parisian tastes of King Louis XV, composer Jean-Philippe Rameau and his librettist, Voltaire, altered the original version of?Le Temple de la Gloire,?and for centuries there it sat. Until much later, when the manuscript was discovered at the University of California, Berkeley's Jean Hargrove Music Library. And for decades Nicholas McGegan dreamed of helming the orchestra for a full staging of the original work—a dream, through a partnership between Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Cal Performances at UC Berkeley, Centre de musique de Versailles in France and New York Baroque Dance Company—realized in April of 2017. The libretto of the piece, an allegory about moral and political power, is handily explained by McGegan for our modern era as “don’t be a bully."

Drew Petersen 
Barber, Carter, Griffes, Ives, Zaimont 
Released July 20, 2018 
Steinway & Sons, STNS 30095

Early in his career, pianist Drew Petersen has demonstrated an affinity for music of 20th?and 21st?century American composers. The 2017 American Pianists Awards winner and 2018 Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient released his debut album for the Steinway & Sons label, a record which features music by Charles Ives, Samuel Barber, Elliott Carter, and Charles Tomlinson?Griffes. Petersen’s album also includes the first-ever recording of Attars by Judith Lang?Zaimont, which was originally commissioned by American Pianists Association for the 2017 Awards.

Ronn McFarlane  
The Celtic Lute 
Released July 27, 2018 
Sono Luminus, DSL-92225

For The Celtic Lute, lutenist Ronn McFarlane turned to one of his earliest musical influences, and the music of his ancestors: folk music of Scotland and Ireland. McFarlane arranged every track on the album, a massive project that began with quite a bit of research. McFarlane’s thoughtfully crafted arrangements highlight the lute’s adaptability and show how easily the instrument can be made to fit within the Celtic tradition.