Thea Musgrave: An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge & Green

Listen on Presto Music. Free thirty day trial. Find out more.

As the victim, Jake Gardner is heroic and ardent, if not ideally lyrical; the London Sinfonietta, under Musgrave herself, plays with razor-sharp precision. The original 1981 studio broadcast... — BBC Music Magazine, June 2011, 4 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 4th Apr 2011
Catalogue No: NMCD167
Label: NMC
Length: 64 minutes

Usually despatched in 3 - 4 working days

Musgrave: An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

Work length36:43

$8.05

$10.40

Gayle Hunnicutt, David Healy, Ed Bishop, Jake Gardner
London Sinfonietta
Thea Musgrave

It Happened During the Civil War

Track length13:40

$2.05

$1.30

Company Halt!

Track length5:18

$1.00

$1.30

Sergeant, Is Everything Ready?

Track length4:06

$1.00

$1.30

Sergeant! Are You Ready?

Track length4:19

$1.00

$1.30

Water Is in My Ears

Track length4:34

$1.00

$1.30

I Can Feel the Sand, Like Diamonds

Track length2:15

$1.00

$1.30

No, No! I Must Get Away

Track length2:31

$1.00

$2.60

Musgrave: Green

Work length8:20

$1.50

$3.85

Scottish Ensemble
Jonathan Morton

Musgrave: Wild Winter I

Work length19:19

$8.00

$10.40

Red Byrd, Fretwork

Prologue. War Broke, and Now the Winter of the World

Track length1:29

$1.00

$1.30

Lament I. He cerrado mi balcón

Track length3:23

$1.00

$1.30

Lament II. Do Not Weep, Maiden, for War Is Kind

Track length2:50

$1.00

$1.30

Lament III. Guerre, ô guerre occupée au choc des escadrons

Track length2:30

$1.00

$1.30

Interlude. Ворон к ворону летит

Track length1:49

$1.00

$1.30

Lament IV. Le donne lagrimose, e'l vulgo inerme

Track length2:36

$1.00

$1.30

Lament V. Den wilden Orgeln des Wintersturms

Track length1:33

$1.00

$1.30

Coda. (Wild) Winter Closes In

Track length3:09

$1.00

$1.30

About
Reviews
Explore

About

2011 is the 150th Anniversary of the American Civil.

War Wild Winter I was commissioned to commemorate the siege of Lichfield, 1643 British Civil War.

Produced in association with BBC Radio 3.

Rich, powerful musical language and a strong sense of drama have made Thea Musgrave one of the most respected and exciting of living composers. Born in Edinburgh in 1928, she studied at the University of Edinburgh then in Paris, where she spent four years as a pupil of Nadia Boulanger, before establishing herself in London with her orchestral, choral, operatic and chamber works. She has lived in the US since 1970. Musgrave’s ‘opera for radio’ sets a dreamlike tale of the American Civil War based on An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, a short story written in the late 19th century by Ambrose Bierce. Thea Musgrave says .... These three works, though all very different and written decades apart, nevertheless share a common subject: conflict. An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (1981), a heart-breaking story from the American Civil war; Wild Winter I (1993), a setting of poems from many different countries and in several different languages about the inevitable losses and cruelties of war; and Green (2007), an abstract conflict of a life-giving force against its suffocating nemesis.

Reviews

June 2011

As the victim, Jake Gardner is heroic and ardent, if not ideally lyrical; the London Sinfonietta, under Musgrave herself, plays with razor-sharp precision. The original 1981 studio broadcast (produced by Veronica Slater, who shoudl ahve been credited in the booklet) experty balances singing, speech, orchestra and sound effects, creating a genuine musical drama for the ear.

July 2011

the ear for instrumental colour [in Owl Creek Bridge] really is remarkable, the more so since it is generally discreet...Musgrave sets [the texts in Wild Winter I] in what one might call an animated ritual, as if the human voies are caught up in something much bigger than them, something they can't control...the atmospheric music on this disc deserves your attention.

31st March 2011

Musgrave claims it was conceived as a fully fledged opera and not as "a play with incidental music". But that isn't how it comes across in this recording, taken from the original BBC tapes...Musgrave's accomplished music is much better served by the other two works here, which link to the opera through their connections with conflict in its widest sense.

Thea Musgrave: An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge & Green

CD

Downloads

Contents

Download queue