Linda Kouvaras: Instrumental Music, Chamber Works and Songs, Volume One
As with many other Australian composers, the music of Linda Kouvaras (b. 1960) has a strong sense of wide-open spaces, expressed in lyrical, elegiac melodic lines that soar over freewheeling Lisztian piano textures and atmospheric echoes of French Impressionism. In this first album of a series presenting all of her instrumental works, chamber music and songs written since 1991, she also addresses two major contemporary issues, with a duo for saxophone and piano exploring the human response to the COVID-19 pandemic and a song-cycle confronting domestic violence from a woman’s viewpoint.
Justin Kenealy, saxophone
Linda Barcan, mezzo-soprano
Coady Green, piano
Listen To This Recording:
Three St Kilda Sketches for solo piano (1994/1997)*
- No. 1, Andante (5:02)
- No. 2, Dark, manic, turbulent (2:52)
- No. 3, Animato (4:18)
Night Pieces: Reflections after COVID-19 for soprano saxophone and piano (2020) (25:28)
- I. Shelter in Place (4:45)
- II. Isolation (6:04)
- III. Reach-Out (4:42)
- IV. Elegy (4:27)
- V. Hope
Art and Life: Song-Cycle for mezzo-soprano and piano (1999) (20:32)
- I. Sleeping Girl (4:09)
- II. Lullaby for Kyle* (2:32)
- III. Woman’s Predicament (6:37)
- IV. Party Lines and Deaf Ears (1:44)
- V. Art and Life* (6:53)
- VI. Distant Lullaby* (1:59)
- Shoalhaven Nightpainters for solo piano (2001-2) (12:35)
Linda Kouvaras :
https://limelight-arts.com.au/reviews/linda-kouvaras-chamber-works-and-songs-volume-1-justin-kenealy-linda-barcan-coady-green/
Steve Moffatt :
‘this album should be considered definitive. It is certainly beautifully performed by Green, who is joined by saxophonist Justin Kenealy for Night Pieces: Reflections after COVID-19, five diverse, short pieces written during Melbourne’s multiple lockdowns and for me the highlight of the album. […]
[Art and Life song cycle] features the excellent mezzo Linda Barcam who brings these powerful and moving settings very much to life.’
—Steve Moffatt, limelight-art.com
Linda Kouvaras :
https://classicmelbourne.com.au/linda-kouvaras-instrumental-music-chamber-works-and-songs-vol-1/