Delos Diary

Looking through the texts of old Delos Diary entries before they become outdated, I came across one I wrote August 13, 2003, in which midsummer heat must have affected my judgement … or memory at least. I detailed a long list of contemporary or near contemporary composers represented on recent Delos recordings, but failed to mention Benjamin Lees. His Passacaglia for Orchestra is the opening selection on Delos' American Contrasts (DE 3291) with James DePreist and the Oregon Symphony. Mr. Lees is certainly one of the most respected composers active on the American scene, and his Passacaglia, composed in 1976 for Antal Dorati and the National Symphony of Washington, DC, is a wonderfully rich and serious score consisting of a theme, nineteen variations, and a coda. Listening to it I was reminded of the structure of the Passacaglia last movement of Brahms' 4th Symphony. The same integrity and strength, the same wise use of orchestral resources. It's also a wonderful contrast (as the album title implies) to the other selections by Vincent Persichetti and Michael Daugherty.
Another example of the programming skills of conductor James DePreist.