The Basque National Orchestra and Robert Treviño present their new album ‘American Opus’, released under the Ondine label
The new album released by the Ondine label (Naxos Group) has been on sale since 1st November and is the second volume of 'Americascapes', a series of albums that aims to raise awareness of works by little-known American composers. The first volume in 2021 saw great success with international critics.
This new volume features works by George Walker, George Crumb and Silvestre Revueltas.
The Basque National Orchestra and Robert Treviño continue to explore little-known American authors in their Americascapes series, which now presents its second volume: American Opus. None of the pieces on this recording is particularly well known, not even to US and Mexican students specialising in music, which is what makes this compilation so valuable in itself..
Address for Orchestra was the first of many works written by the late composer George Walker (1922-2018), whom Robert Treviño knew personally. Walker sketched out the three movements of the work in 1958 and orchestrated them in 1959. It took until a Belgian performance in 1971, however, to hear the complete work.
In 1984, George Crumb (1929-2022) wrote A Haunted Landscape for the New York Philharmonic, which premiered it under the baton of Arthur Weisberg the following year.
Lastly, the album includes the ballet La coronela by the Mexican composer Silvestre Revueltas. Revueltas' music - he was born on the last day of the 19th century (31st December 1899) and died of alcoholism at the age of 40 - has finally become popular over the past three decades. Little has been written about his life.
Works and movements
Below are the works that make up this album, along with their movements:
GEORGE WALKER: Address for Orchestra
- Poco adagio – molto più mosso
- Molto adagio
- Dramatic
GEORGE CRUMB: A Haunted Landscape
SILVESTRE REVUELTAS: La Coronela, Ballet
- Los privilegiados
- Los desheredados
- La pesadilla de Don Ferruco
- El juicio final
Album on sale from 1st November
This album has been available on the major digital platforms such as Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, and many more, since 1st November.
The international label Ondine and the Basque National Orchestra
This is the fifth recording that the Basque National Orchestra has made under the Finnish label Ondine, part of the Naxos group. Over the past three years, the orchestra and the label have recorded two CDs dedicated to Maurice Ravel and one to little-known American composers (Americascapes), all of them conducted by Robert Treviño. It also recently released another CD with works by the Basque composer Gabriel Erkoreka, this time under the baton of Juanjo Mena. Ondine owns an important worldwide distribution network, enabling the Basque National Orchestra to position itself in a leading international market with reviews published in the most prestigious specialised media. (Gramophone, France Musique, BBC Music Magazine, Diapason, The New Yorker…).
In addition, this collaboration will soon give rise to new productions. The next new recording bears the name of Richard Strauss, a German composer whom the Basque National Orchestra had not yet recorded. And it will do so with two great, renowned scores such as Macbeth, symphonic poem and Symphonia Domestica. The recording took place in September in Miramon and will be released in 2025.
