KAREL HUSA (b.1921): Apotheosis of this Earth, DAVID MASLANKA (b.1943): Traveler, DWAYNE S. MILBURN (b.1963): Emerald Suite, MARTIN ELLERBY (b.1957): New World Dances, YO GOTO (b.1958): Songs, ROBERTO SIERRA (b.1953): Alegria (transcr. Mark Scatterday).

Description: Maslanka's Traveler is a raucously optimistic projection of the future in honor of a friend's retirement, with the bold colors, uplifting chorale material and persistent ostinato/minimalist drive that are the composer's trademarks. The brash, energetic Ellerby Dances, with their irresistible big-band inflections pay tribute to the pioneer spirit and wide-open landscape of America's foundation. The Husa is a different matter altogether, a serious, even pessimistic exploration of mankind's potential to destroy our world, presented in a harsher, much more dissonant idiom and a darker tonal palette, sonorous and original, though with an underlying sense of tonality. Goto's Songs superimposes 24 independent lines of simple melody in a richly textured fabric of folk-like melody. The Milburn and Sierra continue the tuneful, tonal idiom, the first in straightforward arrangements of school songs, the second an ebullient, dancing folk-influenced celebration of happiness and high spirits. North Texas Wind Symphony; Eugene Migliaro Corporon.