Sounds of a Composer Given Voice by His Muse

By CD Review
PETER LIEBERSON: ‘RED GARUDA,’ RILKE SONGS, BAGATELLES,

Piano Quintet
Peter Serkin, pianist; Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, mezzo-soprano; New York Philharmonic, conducted by James Conlon; Orion String Quartet. Bridge Records 9317; CD.

THE composer Peter Lieberson was lucky to have a muse in his wife, the marvelous mezzo-soprano Lorraine Hunt Lieberson. Ms. Hunt Lieberson, who died of cancer in 2006, helped him refine his vocal writing after they met in 1997.

Mr. Lieberson, who studied with the modernists Milton Babbitt and Charles Wuorinen, wrote early works in the 12-tone idiom and was also influenced by late Stravinsky, Minimalism, jazz and musical theater. His “Rilke Songs,” written for his wife, are intensely communicative works, combining atonality and tonality in the vivid piano part, vividly rendered by Peter Serkin in a 2005 recording with Ms. Hunt Lieberson, released here for the first time.

Complete on  >>  http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/01/arts/music/01peter.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss