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Rands has been pursuing an aesthetic ideal that has made him one of the foremost composers of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Rands's compositions are elegant yet meticulously structured, bringing tonal and nontonal elements into a fusion that is firmly enough based in musical tradition to be inviting, yet unpredictable enough...to convey a sense of modernity
The Boston Globe

 

Adieu
brass quintet and orchestra

The program had begun with the latest in the series of Gund/Simonyi Farewell Commissions being presented in honor of the music director's final season. Aptly titled "Adieu," Bernard Rands' six-minute contribution is one of the best to have emerged thus far from the project, combining genuine musical development with a zestful rhythmic urge that is intensified rather than dissipated by the occasional change of meter.
The Seattle Times

 

apókryphos
Soprano solo, SATB chorus, and orchestra

For all its large forces, apókryphos was a surprisingly tender, intimate work...Rands' vocal lines had great lyrical flow...this is a masterful work, one whose images and sounds linger in the mind.
Chicago Tribune

This often powerfully dramatic music nevertheless pierces the heart with a dark, disturbing intimacy...the precise and lively instrumental craftsmanship, highly personal lyricism and vivid intensity of expression that mark the best of Rands' mature works are fully evident in apókryphos...the emotional tension that builds to the uneasy consolation of the final section is overwhelming.
Chicago Sun Times

 

Canti dell'Eclisse
Bass and orchestra

Wandering in the labyrinth is one of the Canti Trilogy's pleasures: Rands unspools a shining thread to guide us and keep us safe. Still another is the alluring sensuousness of surface Rands stretches over troubling depths. The composer has an extraordinary ear; the sonorities and ideas are deep, dark and magical.
The Boston Globe

 

Canti dell'Eclisse
Bass and ensemble

This is a set that promises to reveal new subtleties with each hearing...snap this up while you can.
American Record Guide

What Rands has created is a 90-minute work that is forceful, compelling, dynamic, luminous and revelatory.
Desert Morning News

 

Canti del Sole
Tenor and orchestra

Pulitzer Prize-winning Canti del Sole is a noble and exultant paean to the physical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual states of man.
The San Francisco Chronicle

Canti del Sole is a magnificent accomplishment. Rands' sensitivity to texts and their various heritages is stunning.
The Baltimore Sun

 

Canti del Sole
Tenor and chamber ensemble

In Canti del Sole Rands has created an arresting, demanding work that shimmers, blazes, and startles.
The Cleveland Plain Dealer

 

Canti Lunatici
Soprano and orchestra

Canti Lunatici is a distinctive score of remarkable dramatic power and poetic invention.
The New Yorker

 

Ceremonial
wind ensemble

Ceremonial made the strongest impression, an example of minimalism at its most emotionally resonant and generous minded. Its atmosphere is strong and dark and its orchestration shows the hand of a master.
The Boston Globe

 

"chains like the sea"
two movements for orchestra

Mr. Rands creates pieces filled with technical demands that make them gratifying to the performer, as well as sufficient sensual beauty to appeal to listeners. Rands has an unerring knack for lucid orchestration; here, scintillating details regularly pricked through an overall melancholy tone....and seemed to leave behind a humid, bluesy wilt in their wake. The orchestra's polish and commitment earned a warm reception from the audience.
The New York Times

 

Concerto for Piano and Orchestra

When one speaks of the concerto as a genre, composers of the 20th and 21st centuries have felt more free to completely reinvent the terms of the discussion. Bernard Rands does so at once with a boldness and a marvelously organic quality in his striking new Concerto for Piano & Orchestra. In this concerto, neither party is subservient to the other. In fact our interlocutors are engaged in a constant empathic exchange of mood and information, audibly influencing the other's lines as they shape their own. The Piece, a Boston Symphony Orchestra commission, follows what is an outwardly familiar three-movement flight path, but the subtlety of color and the sophistication of Rands's compositional craft, not to mention the protean interplay between soloist and ensemble, make this score feel refreshingly free of formulas.
The Boston Globe

 

Danza Petrificada
orchestra

The main point of interest was the world premiere of Danza Petrificada by Bernard Rands. The CSO commission was rescheduled from last October due to Muti's illness and interrupted fall residency.

Composed at Muti's request to mark the centennial and bicentennial of Mexico's independence and revolution, Danza Petrificada takes its title from a stanza of Octavio Paz: “. . . a banquet of forms, a petrified dance under the clouds that make and unmake and never stop making themselves always in transit toward their future forms.”

To his credit, the English-born American composer avoids the usual Mexican dance rhythms and tourist-trap musical tropes. Yes, Danza Petrificada calls for a large percussion battery for four players and opens with a rustle of maracas and muted trumpet. But Rands' piece is more edgy and impressionistic than sunny homage, a moody tone poem with passing Mexican elements, glimpsed as if through a refracted lens.

Danza Petrificada is that rare work that manages to be both intelligent and individual, while also serving its functional purpose as a lively, audience-friendly, nine-minute curtain-raiser—even with the abrupt coda.
—Chicago Classical Review

 

British-born American Bernard Rands was Muti's choice for the first new work in his Chicago directorship. Rands, now a youthful 77, was composer in residence for three years of Muti's time leading the Philadelphia Orchestra, and through conductor emeritus Pierre Boulez, also has strong connections to the CSO and his adopted hometown. He is a composer of unique technical gifts and abilities who makes music that, unlike works by many in the field of orchestral composition, does not sound like anyone else's.

As with the haunting orchestral interludes in his long-awaited van Gogh opera, “Vincent,” which had its world premiere at Indiana University in Bloomington last month, Rands has a way of creating the aural equivalent of a visual scrim so that sounds and layers of sound move in and out of the foreground, often as in a kind of haze. For his 11-minute “Danza Petrificada” (“Petrified Dance,” the title coming from a poem by the great Mexican writer Octavio Paz), Rands incorporated rhythms and percussive sounds from many parts of that country — cicadas seemingly everywhere! — into a rich and highly crafted score for large virtuoso orchestra, rather than making yet another suite of “Mexican folk tunes” (Rands does not do hackneyed). Muti had devoted his recent break at his Italian home to learning this work and conducted it as if he had known it for years. He will take it with the CSO on its late summer European tour. While it could benefit from a fuller and lengthier ending, I look forward to repeated hearings.
Chicago Sun Times

 

Cinco de Mayo also gave the CSO a relevant peg on which to hang a world premiere — Bernard Rands' "Danza Petrificada" ("Petrified Dance"), a piece inspired by Mexico and Mexican culture. The CSO commission was to have received its first performance at these concerts in October but had to be postponed because Muti cancelled several weeks of Chicago appearances because of exhaustion.

The Chicago-based Rands took his title, and the work's larger associations, from a poem by the Mexican poet Octavio Paz. The composer then extracted the essence of sounds and rhythms common to Mexican music, filtered them through his sophisticated orchestral imagination and came up with a nine-minute gem of magical musical realism.

Rands' scoring is laced with all manner of scraped and rattled percussion that give the ear a vivid feeling of place without his having to resort to picture-postcard quotation. I love the kaleidoscopic subtleties of this music, the sure sense of craft with which its colors and textures cohere, the insistent energy with which it carries one to its riotous close. Muti and the orchestra sounded fully invested in it, and Rands was present to share in the warm reception given it by audience and CSO members alike.
Chicago Tribune

 

In Danza Petrificada by naturalized American composer Bernard Rands,the percussion becomes enthused in the Mexican design, among fossils of sun and moon, with handfuls of Aztec mystery.......the contribution of the brasses and other winds is by no means secondary.
—Il Messaggero, Rome

The reception to Bernard Rands' Danza Petrificada was enthusiastic.
—Chicago Tribune

This Danza Petrificada, the product of meticulous writing, charmed the public, who warmly acknowledged it.
—Tageblatt, Luxembourg

 

Memo 3
harp

...the same control, the same inspiration is present in [Memo 3]. It is a very rich piece, admirably exploiting the traditional and new resources of the instrument...the work's career will be most successful and rewarding in the hands of such a virtuoso.
French Journal of Music

 

Mésalliance
piano and orchestra

Méalliance is indeed more than a piano concerto. In this compelling and impressive work, ideas are carried through brilliantly.
Melos, Germany

Mésalliance is a sort of mad concerto. It ends on a fantastic cadenza which threatened to (and did) bring the house down.
The Guardian, London

 

Metalepsis II
Mezzo-soprano, small chorus, and ensemble

Metalepsis 2 found me reveling in Rands' magical command of the massing and contrasting of sonorities and his breathtakingly exact instinct for the moment to change mood and texture. It seemed, beyond doubt, one of the finest compositions of recent years.
Sydney Morning Herald, Australia

 

"now again" – fragments from Sappho
Mezzo-soprano with chamber ensemble

The piece has a wonderful strangeness and mystery. You longed for an instant encore. As with all great pieces, so much was implied by so little.
The Philadelphia Inquirer

The 17-minute Sappho piece shows Rands's welcome marriage of precise technique and sensuous lyricism and scoring
Chicago Sun Times

The score ["now again" – fragments from Sappho] is less a dramatic song cycle than a reflective meditation, painting a spare, melismatic evocation of the broken, elliptical texts.Yet Rands' luminous music is consistently compelling and ear-catching, lyrical yet cast with neo-Classical restraint.
Chicago Classical Review

RANDS Prelude - Sans voix parmi les voix - Scherzi - Walcott Songs - "now again" fragments from Sappho. Network for New Music. ALBANY 1194.

Here the long-term Network-Rands relationship results in definitive performances of seminal works by one of the world's great living composers.....with whom it it has worked and partnered for many years. This isn't easy stuff to play, because it requires not only virtuosic musicianship, but also contemporary-music chops.......to record these never-before-recorded but often-programmed Rands pieces.

Rands's Prelude (2004) is sublimely performed. The mystical thing about Rands's writing is that the instruments don't seem to be playing as an ensemble; rather it's as if they accidentally coincided at the same time in the same key. A gorgeous harp solo follows.

Scherzi is a playful and sensitive piece. Rands isn't difficult listening, and.....the effect is almost always disarming and transporting. Rands also invents all the time.......and produces a random, brittle sound but it always seems to make sense in the end.

Now Again - fragments from Sappho is the pièce de résistance. It is based on fragments of the ancient poet Sappho (fragments are just the sort of thing Rands loves). The configuration is wild, with three female voices, trumpet, a string trio, harp and percussion. In the modalized atmosphere that Rands creates, a montage of fragments somehow coalesces to create a portrait of Sappho and her ancient world. It's as much a dramatic piece as it is a musical one, but in this case it's a puzzle that comes together to form more puzzles. Underneath, however, there is a consistent poignancy that makes this three-dimensional quilt drip with humor and sadness mixed.
Fanfare January/February 2011

Fragments from his Sappho, sounded as if duly encased in gold. An inexpressible depth and lushness permeated the piece, and when the last notes were sounded, it was difficult to accept the finality of it, because it so engendered a desire for more. Impeccably orchestrated and lyrically powerful, it provided a satisfying closure to an unabashedly successful event.
—Justin Capps (justincapps.wordpress.com)

 

Preludes
piano

Bernard Rands's Twelve Preludes for solo piano is an impressive, emotionally draining work.....a sense of music history and lyricism pervade the Preludes. The score conjures a sound world that Debussy would have recognized. At the same time, the melancholy cast of many of Rands' pieces was Rands' own.
—Los Angeles Times

Five of the "Twelve Preludes" (2007) by Puitzer Prize winning composer confirmed that admirable, and immaculate music is still being produced.......
The Washington Post

A set of six preludes by Bernard Rands all drew on similar textural constructions and motivic material, and in that sense could be mistaken for theme and variations. The first prelude, Durezza, laid out the basic premise for the whole set: strong and stately middle-registered themes answered in ever-expanding chords above and below like a brightening halo. The fourth prelude, Notturno, dedicated to composer Donald Martino, was my favorite. Here, a simple theme built on repeated notes was surrounded by widely spaced high and low sonorities that seemed to define a sonic space of cosmic dimensions and beauty. Cheng imbued this seemingly static sound world with undercurrents of bittersweet drama.
The Boston Musical Intelligencer

 

Prelude...sans voix parmi les voix...
flute, harp, and viola

[Prelude...sans voix parmi les voix... is] wonderfully irresistible, obsessive in its way, yet sinuous and supple — rather like seeing a blue-ribbon tabby fascinated by the sight of a whirling mobile...
—21st Century Music

RANDS Prelude - Sans voix parmi les voix - Scherzi - Walcott Songs - "now again" fragments from Sappho. Network for New Music. ALBANY 1194.

Here the long-term Network-Rands relationship results in definitive performances of seminal works by one of the world's great living composers.....with whom it it has worked and partnered for many years. This isn't easy stuff to play, because it requires not only virtuosic musicianship, but also contemporary-music chops.......to record these never-before-recorded but often-programmed Rands pieces.

Rands's Prelude (2004) is sublimely performed. The mystical thing about Rands's writing is that the instruments don't seem to be playing as an ensemble; rather it's as if they accidentally coincided at the same time in the same key. A gorgeous harp solo follows.

Scherzi is a playful and sensitive piece. Rands isn't difficult listening, and.....the effect is almost always disarming and transporting. Rands also invents all the time.......and produces a random, brittle sound but it always seems to make sense in the end.

Now Again - fragments from Sappho is the pièce de résistance. It is based on fragments of the ancient poet Sappho (fragments are just the sort of thing Rands loves). The configuration is wild, with three female voices, trumpet, a string trio, harp and percussion. In the modalized atmosphere that Rands creates, a montage of fragments somehow coalesces to create a portrait of Sappho and her ancient world. It's as much a dramatic piece as it is a musical one, but in this case it's a puzzle that comes together to form more puzzles. Underneath, however, there is a consistent poignancy that makes this three-dimensional quilt drip with humor and sadness mixed.
Fanfare January/February 2011

 

Scherzi
chamber ensemble

[Scherzi is ] tight, witty, no-nonsense stuff that leaves the listener perfectly satisfied.
New Music Connoisseur

RANDS Prelude - Sans voix parmi les voix - Scherzi - Walcott Songs - "now again" fragments from Sappho. Network for New Music. ALBANY 1194.

Here the long-term Network-Rands relationship results in definitive performances of seminal works by one of the world's great living composers.....with whom it it has worked and partnered for many years. This isn't easy stuff to play, because it requires not only virtuosic musicianship, but also contemporary-music chops.......to record these never-before-recorded but often-programmed Rands pieces.

Rands's Prelude (2004) is sublimely performed. The mystical thing about Rands's writing is that the instruments don't seem to be playing as an ensemble; rather it's as if they accidentally coincided at the same time in the same key. A gorgeous harp solo follows.

Scherzi is a playful and sensitive piece. Rands isn't difficult listening, and.....the effect is almost always disarming and transporting. Rands also invents all the time.......and produces a random, brittle sound but it always seems to make sense in the end.

Now Again - fragments from Sappho is the pièce de résistance. It is based on fragments of the ancient poet Sappho (fragments are just the sort of thing Rands loves). The configuration is wild, with three female voices, trumpet, a string trio, harp and percussion. In the modalized atmosphere that Rands creates, a montage of fragments somehow coalesces to create a portrait of Sappho and her ancient world. It's as much a dramatic piece as it is a musical one, but in this case it's a puzzle that comes together to form more puzzles. Underneath, however, there is a consistent poignancy that makes this three-dimensional quilt drip with humor and sadness mixed.
Fanfare January/February 2011

 

String Quartet No. 3
string quartet

Rands' new string quartet is further evidence that the madness that fell upon a good part of 20th-century music has lifted. This strong and deeply sincere piece is cause for celebration.
The New York Times

 

Symphony
orchestra

Rands is a master of piquant orchestration...but one can discover plenty of method behind his lovely madness. The ideas unfold with compelling, organic logic...but he never slights lyrical expression in his quest for linear sophistication. This Symphony deserves repeated hearings. Soon!
The Los Angeles Times

 

Le Tambourin Suites 1 & 2
orchestra

Rands knows how to make an orchestra speak in wonderfully colorful tones and Le Tambourin could find a place in many an orchestra s modern repertory.
The New York Times

His orchestral suites Le Tambourin are tours de force of modernist impressionism. Impressive work; impressive composer.
The Chicago Tribune

 

Three Pieces for Piano
solo piano

Three Pieces for Piano ... are concise, brilliantly crafted, etude-like works. They provide great opportunities for pure virtuosity, as in the pointillistic flurries of the "Caprice" and the rapid, percussive repeated note motives that dart through the "Arabesque"... The lyrical side ... in the "Aubade" seems to be haunted by the harmonic turns of the Prelude to Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde."
The Baltimore Sun

...this brilliant, thirteen-minute group of pieces evoke Scriabin's restless flights, Debussy's intense tranquility and Ravel's dazzling colors.....
The New York Times

Rands writes here with clarity as a guiding ideal. Biss, who commissioned the piece (Three Pieces for Piano) found a lot of color in it......eruptive, driving rhythmic passages, almost hypnotic flurries of notes.
The Huffington Post

 

Vincent
opera in two acts

Dreamy, fragmentary, and muted in its passion, Rands' score is sensitive, evocative, and enduring, resulting in a magical experience of music, drama, spectacle, providing a glimpse of where opera is headed in the new millennium. If opera is to continue, and I have no doubt that it will, we have, in Vincent, a shining model to follow.
—muscatdaily.com

 

Walcott Songs
Mezzo-soprano and cello

[In Walcott Songs] ...the unabashedly melodic vocal writing has an immediate and lasting appeal.
The New York Times

RANDS Prelude - Sans voix parmi les voix - Scherzi - Walcott Songs - "now again" fragments from Sappho. Network for New Music. ALBANY 1194.

Here the long-term Network-Rands relationship results in definitive performances of seminal works by one of the world's great living composers.....with whom it it has worked and partnered for many years. This isn't easy stuff to play, because it requires not only virtuosic musicianship, but also contemporary-music chops.......to record these never-before-recorded but often-programmed Rands pieces.

Rands's Prelude (2004) is sublimely performed. The mystical thing about Rands's writing is that the instruments don't seem to be playing as an ensemble; rather it's as if they accidentally coincided at the same time in the same key. A gorgeous harp solo follows.

Scherzi is a playful and sensitive piece. Rands isn't difficult listening, and.....the effect is almost always disarming and transporting. Rands also invents all the time.......and produces a random, brittle sound but it always seems to make sense in the end.

Now Again - fragments from Sappho is the pièce de résistance. It is based on fragments of the ancient poet Sappho (fragments are just the sort of thing Rands loves). The configuration is wild, with three female voices, trumpet, a string trio, harp and percussion. In the modalized atmosphere that Rands creates, a montage of fragments somehow coalesces to create a portrait of Sappho and her ancient world. It's as much a dramatic piece as it is a musical one, but in this case it's a puzzle that comes together to form more puzzles. Underneath, however, there is a consistent poignancy that makes this three-dimensional quilt drip with humor and sadness mixed.
Fanfare January/February 2011

 

"...where the murmurs die..."
orchestra

You hear echoes of Debussy's "Jeux" in the delicate Impressionistic haze that surrounds this elegantly crafted piece, the refined solo writing for flutes and trumpets in particular. Listening to it is like looking at the waters of a pond that's still on the surface but teeming with life underneath. The CSO players drew its subtleties into a resonant whole and joined in the applause that greeted the composer at the end. Rands looked pleased and he had every reason to be.
Chicago Tribune

 

Wildtrack 2
Soprano and orchestra

Wildtrack 2 proved riveting: its gripping emotional power is the work of a major composer, with something major to say.
The Financial Times, London