Album Notes

Composer Ron Strauss loves to extract the greatest magnitude of music from the fewest number of musicians. Here he assembles two attractive and unusual ensembles for suites rooted in the Hispanic rhythms of Latin America.

REVIEW from The Santa Fe New Mexican Pasatiempo Magazine, Friday, May 22, 2009:

>>> This disc offers two artistically coherent, multimovement works by Santa Fe composer Ron Strauss. Both are intimate in instrumentation though big in conception: Tangos de Santa Fe for flute, English horn, and guitar lasts almost 30 minutes, while Matapolvos for soprano, English horn, viola, and cello clocks in at almost 25. Yet the musical material never seems stretched thin, in part because each work is a well-spun mix of mystic and meditative (with some accented edges) and in part because Strauss’ musical language is colorful, inventive, and accessible without being coy or simplistic.

Tangos dates from New York in the 1970s, and Matapolvos was penned here in 2004, but they clearly come from the same creative mind. This recording was made in 2008 in the Santuario de Guadalupe by members of Serenata of Santa Fe, for whom Strauss wrote Matapolvos. Serenata founder and English hornist Pamela Epple delivers lovely, dark, lyric tone in both works. Flutist Carol Redman and guitarist Roberto Capocchi are fluent, vibrant, and sensitive collaborators on Tangos, while soprano Gail Springer, violist Elena Sopoci, and cellist Dana Winograd are poised and insightful in Matapolvos. Springer delivers Eduardo Galeano’s Spanish texts clearly. David Dunn’s recording and engineering are alive and present without being overbearing, and there’s a fine sense of the space. Good music, solid performances. — Craig Smith.

REVIEW from Weekly Alibi / alibi.com
Albuquerque's alternative news weekly
V.18 No.28 | July 9 - 15, 2009
This Week's Music
Ron Strauss Tangos de Santa Fe / Matapolvos (RSM)

>>> Two extended chamber works by Santa Fe composer Ron Strauss, ably performed here by Serenata of Santa Fe, reveal a subtle but muscular musical mind with a keen ear for sonic possibilities. Accessible, melodic and expressive, the five tangos for flute, English horn and guitar capture delicate, haunting musical portraits. Particularly rewarding is the architecturally beguiling “Tango a la Puesta del Sol.” In “Matapolvos”—for voice, English horn, viola and cello, with text from Eduardo Galeano’s blazing historical trilogy Memory of Fire—Strauss captures the irony, humor and horror of Galeano’s narratives, and the listener’s complete attention. — Mel Minter.


Complete program notes on the music can be found at www.ronstraussmusic.blogspot.com (click on the "Ron Strauss" link below).