Description: 

The first CD devoted to Sadie Harrison's music, receiving rave reviews for the music, the performances and the recording alike.

Performed by top British musicians.

Reviews:

“Soprano Lesley-Jane Rogers gives an impressive performance, particularly in the subtle shading and colouring of her line.”  (Tempo)  (Click here to read full review.)

 “The vocal line sung with great accuracy and confidence by Lesley-Jane Rogers, but with real affection, as well…”  (MCA Music Forum)  (Click here to read full review.)

"To judge from these chamber works, the Australian-born composer Sadie Harrison has an original imagination that expresses itself in a fluent, thoughtfully poetic language. The 20-minute string quartet Taking Flight (1999), played with poise by the Kreutzer, is a delicate labyrinth of sound echoing the psychological journey, Harrison says, of Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle, though much less darkly. Indeed, there's real sensitivity to her music, for all its rigour, Traceries (1997), for violin (Peter Sheppard Skærved) and piano (Aaron Shorr), evokes the imagery of gothic architecture; Arcosolia (1999) plays on the meaning of its title, which refers to a medieval burial place; and Aster (1995), six short classical Greek texts sung by Lesley-Jane rogers with flute and Strings, makes thoughtful reference to the passing of time and the fatalistic nature of love." (The Sunday Times)

 "The British Metier label is another of those steadfast one-man independents to which I am indebted for the discovery, inter alia of this remarkable Australian's music. David Lefeber, producer, also engineer his releases... Taking Flight, a string quartet, leads off the programme. It's performed by the Kreutzer quartet, whose recordings of four Catalan string quartets I covered in La Folia 3:2, another Metier release which, again, (and to say it again) I'd not have wanted to miss. 

The title work, the string quartet Taking Flight, reveals two qualities which in less gifted hands would likely comprise an odd-fellowship wandering into incompatibility. The aural imagery sparkles. The music's mercuriality sets one adrift in a house of mirrors, and yet the tone is serious impinging on tragic - a marvel in the hearing, and thus, I think, a masterpiece. It delights to report that Taking Flight's strong performance is by the same Kreutzer Quartet that blew me away via the four Catalan string quartets abovementioned.

Traceries, for violin and piano, Impresa Amorosa, for piano, and Arcosolia, for violin and piano, confirms that avian seriousness one detects in Taking Flight, a quality that seems on early acquaintance so essential an aspect of the composer's aesthetic. Its epigrammatic texts from the Greek Anthology, the six-part Aster, for soprano, flute and string quartet, reveals in several of its moments tissue-thin textures no less likely to shred as any of these wonderfully commendable creations. Great performances all, and nicely recorded." (Grant Chu Covell, La Folia)