Bolcom: Songs of Innocence and Experience
Slatkin; soloists, chorus, orchestras, U of Michigan
Naxos 8.559216-18

5/5 stars

A Magnificent Achievement/Bolcom's Masterpiece

When William Bolcom (b.  1938) was a teenager he read and was moved by
William Blake's set of 46 poems, 'Songs of Innocence and of Experience,'
and vowed that one day he would set them all to music.  Indeed, began
the task in the mid-1950s but set it aside until he arrived at the
University of Michigan where he has been on the faculty since the early
1970s.  He had remembered the utter joy of participating in the chorus
in a performance of Bach's 'St. Matthew Passion' while a student at the
University of Washington, a performance that called on many of the
resources of that university and its community.  He says that he wanted
the same sort of experience for those who participate in his orchestral
Blake song cycle, and indeed this recording comes from just such a
production.  It uses many of the resources of the wonderful School of
Music at the University of Michigan (its orchestras and choruses) as
well as musicians from outside the School and community musicians as
well, all under the direction of conductor Leonard Slatkin.  Add to this
the use of professional soloists from all across the musical spectrum
(opera singers, a Broadway actor/musician, a folk/blues musician) and
you get a mix that includes almost everything but the kitchen sink.  This
is Bolcom's 'Symphony of (almost) a Thousand,' as it were, as it takes
upwards of 500 people to perform.  Ann Arbor's Hill Auditorium was filled
to the max when this performance took place on April 8, 2004.

There has been an buzz about this piece among music-lovers ever since
its premiere in Germany under the direction of Dennis Russell Davies in
1984.  In spite of the huge number of performers required (not to speak
of the need for a stage director) it has since been mounted a dozen
times. And those of us who had wanted badly to hear it but had not been
able to attend a performance, had had to make do with bootleg tapes of
previous performances.  And we hoped and prayed that one day it would
be recorded commercially.  Our wait is over!  And thanks to Bolcom's
wisdom, it is on the budget label, Naxos, rather than one of the high-priced
labels; thus its 3CDs will not break anyone's budget.  Bolcom notes that
in these days of the easy ripping-and-burning of CDs privately, it made
more sense to issue the performance on a budget label in hopes that more
people would simply go out and buy it, rather than ask someone to burn
it (illegally, of course) for them.  In addition, of course, one would
get the complete texts and booklet notes as well.  Smart move.

What about the music and the performance?  The diction and emotional
tone in Blake's poems, as is well known, are extremely variable, from
elegant Drydenesque verses to the down-and-dirty vernacular of 1790s
London, from songs of purest childlike innocence to poetic harangues
about the horrors of the world.  Bolcom has supplied music, using all
the resources available to a 20th century composer, that mirrors both
the diction and the emotional content of the poems.  Thus we have the
simple lullaby of 'A Cradle Song' (sung deliciously by soprano Linda
Hohenfeld) to the bewildered trusting tone of 'The Chimney Sweeper' set
to a Salvation Army band accompaniment (and narrated by Broadway actor
Nathan Lee Graham, a standout whenever he appears here); from the child's
nature poem (of a lost Ant [Emmet] having its way home lit by an obliging
glow-worm) of 'A Dream' in a lively atonal orchestral setting and sung
expertly by lyric soprano Ilana Davidson, to the corresponding, horrific
Webernian 'Little Boy Lost' (sung by soprano Carmen Pelton and the
combined choruses) whose Little Boy has no one to help him find his way;
from the percussion-accompanied choral Sprechstimme of 'Tyger, Tyger,
Burning Bright' to the ethereal 'The Fly' sung by string-accompanied
children's chorus; from the gentle guitar-accompanied 'Nurse's Song'
 ['When the voices of children are heard on the green'] sung in her
inimitable (and beloved) style by Bolcom's wife, mezzo Joan Morris to
the woozy 'The Sick Rose' [eclipsing, in my mind, Theodore Chanler' s
setting] sung with preternatural calm that nonetheless evokes horror
by contralto Marietta Simpson; from tenor Thomas Young whose opening
Introduction sets up the expectation that we are in for great things,
to soprano Measha Brueggergosman whose rich soprano (and spot-on intonation)
is assigned to 'The Lamb' and 'The Blossom,' both set atonally, and
Baritone Nmon Ford who sings the hieratic 'Hear the Voice of the Bard
(Who Present, Past & Future sees).' Well, you get the idea.  There is
something here for everyone, but more important there is a unity to both
poems and music, in spite of the disparate styles, that makes the set a
coherent whole.

Assuming Amazon, as it seems to be doing these days, decides to list all
the tracks and allows you to listen to the first minute or so of each
track, I would suggest, in addition to the songs listed above, that for
more of a taste of the delights of this set you hear snippets from:

My Pretty Rose Tree (CD 3)
Ah, Sun-Flower (3)
The Little Vagabond (2)
London (3)
The Black Boy (1)
Earth's Answer (2)

Bolcom slightly rearranged the published order of Blake's poems, but
cites a discovery--a list of the poem's titles among the papers of Blake's
widow--that supports his ordering.  He had from early on decided to put
'A Divine Image' at the very end, largely because of its summing-up of
human nature:

'Cruelty has a Human Heart
And Jealousy a Human Face;
Terror the Human Form Divine,
And Secrecy the Human Dress.

The Human Dress is forged Iron,
The Human Form a fiery Forge,
The Human Face a Furnace seal'd,
The Human Heart a hungry Gorge.'

This shattering poem is set to shattering music sung ironically as if
by a mystical Sportin' Life by Nathan Lee Graham (with the combined
choruses).  A devastating finish to a stunning achievement by Bolcom
and his musicians.

Make no mistake, this is a magnificent work in a performance whose
recording preserves the sense of occasion, almost certainly the major
piece by which Bolcom will be most remembered.  (Although I need to say
that I hope many others of his works survive, including the eagerly
awaited opera based on Robert Altman's marvelous movie, 'The Wedding,'
set for production at the Lyric Opera of Chicago later this year).  'Songs
of Innocence and of Experience' has rarely been off my CD turntable since
I received it and likely that will continue: this work contains the
world.

You cannot afford to be without this magnificent work.  Grab it; it's
not likely to be recorded again soon.

TT=2:17:11

Scott Morrison

Reviewed at
   http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000641YZK/classicalnetA/