Harmonielehre - John Adams | Mostly Modern Festival 

Thanks, Chuck! We are very proud of this recording! Please check out our other videos as well, we would be so grateful.

Thank you so much!!!

I agree. I'm just revisiting this now because I was looking up work samples for a grant app, and then was reminded of how difficult this piece of music is. I was playing third flute/third picc in this recording and I still get anxiety/nervous sweats hearing the hardest piccolo solo I've ever performed at 11:24 (high, ppp decrescendo to niente, in unison with string harmonics AND celeste). We had about three to five full rehearsals together before this performance in the span of 1 week. What Maestro Ward did was beyond expectations for having only just met this group and having only worked with us A FEW TIMES. James (below) is out of touch for sure.

@@yoshisounds Just think - Listen to Holst conducting the top orchestra/s of 1926, (the first electrical recordings of "The Planets" incidentally), and - as fine orchestras as they were - you will hear things that are not correct! I`m not going to point them out - but there were probably some features in the composition that, back in `26 were still needing a bit of getting used to. Same with these cross rhythms and time changes etc in J.A`s work! Just a thought !

Agree with all the aspects of your comment! please see my reply to Yoshi Weinberg re. early "Planets" recording with Holst conducting.

@@yoshisounds You did an outstanding job in an overall beautifully committed performance. Great energy from everyone.

This isn’t the sort of piece your average baseline music lover would be able to easily digest and appreciate. It’s a dense, very dense piece of music that, while more accessible than other contemporary music of that period, it’s still kind of mammoth. They perform this very very well. Very impressive given the average age

everyone of his pieces sounds incredibly difficult. hard to read, hard to count

@@JafuetTheSame YES!!

ditto- especially that last movement

Thanks, Diana; this was our second season, and this summer, we have many more patrons purchasing tickets and season subscriptions. I think the word is spreading fast. If you're ever in/around the area in June or would like to be, we hope we'll see you at MMF!

Well, mkaali, I am unclear as to your detailed observations - but I am confident that the cellist/s in question felt your frustration a hundred fold. These young players were working their brains and guts out to perform this with its cross rhythms and all kinds of activities in the arrangement that possibly caused a bit of confusion and distraction. Possibly the player thought a familiar passage WAS over the page - who knows? there is nobody around to ask. The music was a joy to listen to. These incidents can obviously happen, but we do not need to dwell or magnify something that is not done intentionally. I am sure there are those out there who have - and no doubt will in the future find your piece really amusing as they keenly watch and follow your every detail.

I'm a pianist/accompanist. I once had a page turner turn the page so vigorously that the entire folder of music fell down and I caught it with my forearms right there. I kept playing and she quickly put the folder back on the music and we never had to stop or anything. I'm pretty sure I leveled up in my career right then and there. LOL

@@tfpp1 What an historic clip that would have made if captured at the time!

@@darkgreenambulance HA! I wish...crazy stories from the field I tell ya. Sadly, all it makes is just quaint dinner conversation.

Nicely spotted. They could make good use of a methronome, they are out of sync most of the time. That said, I played in a lot of youth orchestras and can totally understand the chaos :). Good, bold performance for them.

Yup

Agreed - this is always a possible situation with youth orchestras - you never know, as time goes by, how many are going to be in each section! One finds many brass players sometimes - too many for an orchestra - but then, of course, you have always got brass bands to use these large numbers in! I suppose, also, in the case of string players, that as choices change as well as perceptions, less boys and girls decide that they would like to play a stringed instrument, for different reasons - the abundance of keyboards with ready made tones and rhythms etc - synthesizers - and so forth. What are your thoughts on that?

Yes, they are young though, so they gonna be experts.

We literally had three rehearsals to put this together.

@@yoshisounds Don`t listen - it was superb - the times I`ve heard this plated by other orchestras - nothing to worry about. Comments like the above do not help. Any potential shortcomings, (which I am not aware of anyway!) were amply hidden by the atmosphere of the piece - the harmonies - the complex rhythms which WERE handled well. Well Done , ORCHESTRA.

Ridiculous review, I readout think you know what you’re talking about.

@@yoshisounds Dont listen, some people live for being an edgelord

Nonsensical comment rooted in ignorance, malice, envy or all three!