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"LarryBell's music is superbly crafted, always well written for the instruments, straightforward, and utterly communicative." -Hubert Culot-MusicWeb-international.com |
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"Bell 's piano playing was commendable--not flashy, but brimming with musicality, intelligence, and desire to communicate. Tone quality was fetching and finger technique clean." --David Cleary-New Music Connoisseur
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| "[Larry
Bell,] the versatile Boston composer, whose music mixes modern European
elements with the twang of his Southern heritage."
The New Yorker
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"A beautiful and distinctive American voice." Peter Burwasser-Fanfare
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"A formidable force on the tonal side of the contemporary divide." Jack Sullivan- American Record Guide |
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" Bell, who similarly revealed the beatific nature of his creative beast playing the first Persichetti parable, XIX. This man has a mystic keyboard touch, eliciting tone from the piano like a therimin player who never actually fingers his instrument. The evocative grace in his execution illuminates affinity beyond respect for his mentor, reflecting a bond of kindred spirits." -Kitty Montgomery- Kingston Freeman, NY (Woodstock-Fringe American Song/Fest)
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Music for Strings (recording) String Quartet No. 3 (Homage to Beethoven)- Borromeo String Quartet Celestial Refrain- John Muratore, guitar Tarab, Tarab Cello Ensemble
Carson Cooman (The Journal of the Living Music Foundation) |
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Chorale Preludes (recording) "Chorale preludes composed in 2002; what's going on here? If anyone tells you they know what 21st-century music is, don't listen. Instead, listen to these evocative and poignant neo-Ivesian ruminations for solo piano that are my favorite recording to date among Larry Bell's numerous recordings. Frank J. Oteri- NewMusicBox.org |
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The
Black Cat Michael
Kimmelman - The New York Times |
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| Celestial Refrain "Larry Bell's 'Celestial Refrain' consists of eleven pages of great music. Bell has come up with a composition that is folk-like, at times almost primitive, yet always incredibly rich in ideas and inventiveness... invigorating, fascinating... [It] will haunt both your mind and your heart." John
Minahan - Guitar Review |
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Songs of Innoncence and Experience (recording) "The music is supremely crafted for young performers yet with enough to challenge their performing skills and make it worth the effort. The two solo items Infant Joy and The Sick Rose are sung with considerable aplomb. This is a very attractive work and makes for a most rewarding experience for players and listeners alike" . –Hubert Culot- musicweb-international.com
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"The orchestra under Benjamin Zander and the choruses under Jean Meltaus have a bright, vibrant sound admirably suited for the child-like Songs of Innocence and Experience" . Jack Sullivan- The American Record Guide |
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| Concerto
for Oboe and Five Instruments "[Bell's] postmodernly structure compositional style, in which diverse elementslink with one another, orient it to Arnold Schoenberg and Charles Ives, as well as to Pop,Rock, and Neoclassicism." Salzburger
Volkzeitung |
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| Fantasia
on an Imaginary Hymn "For all the ferocity of some of the work's lines, it ends lyrically. No hymns are actually used, but the composer uses serial harmony to suggest the flavor of such hymns - an attractive new twist on the Charles Ives esthetic."
Lon
Tuck - The Washington Post |
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Four Pieces in Familiar Style, recording "Four Pieces in Familiar Style is a short suite of four two duos for two violins (played here by the same player) that may be compared to Bartok's own Duos, i.e. as didactic works for younger players. I hope that they may be as popular as Bartok's work.". -Hubert Culot-MusicWeb-international.com |
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| The
Idea of Order at Key West "[The music] takes on a decisive and individual life of its own. Bell's writing is hightly evocative of nature... It's really quite impressively beautiful." Bill
Zakariasen - The New York Daily News |
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In Memory of Roger Sessions, recording It is a short suite for violin solo in three movements: Elegy (a rhapsodic fantasy based on a theme from Sessions' opera Montezuma), Parody (a scherzo of some sort and a real compositional tour de force quoting from nine of Sessions' works, and all over in less than three minutes!) and Dialogue (and imagined conversation between Sessions and Bell, whose names are spelled as musical themes, and one in which Sessions has the last word! -Hubert Culot-MusicWeb-international.com |
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| Mahler in Blue Light,
recording "Mahler in Blue Light . . . is moody, intense, extremely moving, and in its own way quite beautiful. It is also a tour de force for the saxophone with the inclusion of a cello as as well as the piano." Paul Wagner - Saxophone
Journal |
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| Mahler
in Blue Light, recording Hubert Culot
- Classical Music web. UK |
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| Miniature
Diversions "Bell is a skilled craftsman who defty blends serial techniques with more conventional methods of expression. He has a gift for melody, a sense of wit and a feeling for continuity. All were evident in four 'Miniature Diversions' for piano and in a 'Fantasia on an Imaginary Hymn' for viola and cello."
Arthur
Hepner - The Boston Globe |
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| Piano
Concerto "...an amiable, light-spirited work... And the finale is enlivened by interesting chordal modulations in the piano part, deft wind writing, and hints of rock influence struggling to shine through the work's Neo-Romantic surface."
Allan
Kozinn - The New York Times |
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| Piano
Sonata "... Bell himself played his Piano Sonata, whose diverse stylistic ingredients were assimilated and very well mixed together in his rendering." Salzburger
Volkzeitung |
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| Piano
Sonata, recording "The most substantial, and by far the most compelling, work on this program... A broad, passionate composition, Bell's music has something of the anxious, highly embroidered density of Rachmaninov... a result of the youthful exuberance of an exceptionally talented composer. I would expect fine things yet to come from this fresh and exciting voice." Peter
Burwasser - Fanfare |
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Piano Sonata No. 2 "Tala" "It's a pleasure to report that Sonata No. 2 " Tala ," Op. 61 (2002) was a slice of sheer joy. The piece's harmonic language and rhythmic material show a strong affinity for Messiaen's piano oeuvre, but Bell effortlessly pushes the music from here into Art Tatum-like jazz figuration, deftly outlining the similarities between these seemingly disparate idioms. And despite being a one-movement selection, this is truly a sonata in the Lisztian sense, with clear analogues to exposition/development/recapitulation procedures, expressed here in an inimitable way."
-David Cleary-New Music Connoisseur |
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River
of Ponds -Hubert Culot - Classical Music web. UK |
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| River
of Ponds "... most appealing... a solid old-fashioned piece of writing." -Arthur
Hepner - The Boston Globe |
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| River
of Ponds, recording "The longest and most enjoyable piece is River of Ponds, a three-movement sonata evoking fishing trips taken by the composer and his father in North Carolina. For some reason this work manages to evoke the images that other works only hint at: it is really quite beautiful, humorous in places, and basically a positive experience." David
W. Moore - American Record Guide |
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River of Ponds, recording
"......downright beautiful. Bell has a Southern tone to his writing,
touching on American folk tunes and hymns, even quoting "The Old
Rugged Cross" in the third movement of his River of Ponds , the
title selection on this North/South recording. Throughout, Bartlett
and Bell perform blazingly. And the solo cello Caprice and duet Fantasia
on an Imaginary Hymn (where the cellist is nicely joined by violist
Sarah Clarke) come off very fine as well." |
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| A Sacred
Harp "[It] conjured up images of urban America in the 1980s and created an expectancy. Something's coming, the music seems to say, and unequivocal joy was prefigured... strong, vivacious and independent." Valerie
Barna - Mesquite News (TX) |
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| Sacred
Symphonies, recording "... a bittersweet, sophisticated, and half-ghostly simulacrum - the depth and simplicity of homespun religious sentiment." American Record
Guide |
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| String
Quartet No. 1 "[Bell] speaks concisely as well as authoritatively. Each of his thematic units possesses the emotional force and precision control of a major talent." Thomas
Willis - The Chicago Tribune |
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Quartet No. 2 "It's elegantly and thoroughly composed, and dramatic in its progress." Andrew Porter - The New Yorker
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| "In the eight annual Kennedy Center Friedheim Awards program... special mention was made of Larry Bell's String Quartet No. 2, which [was] deemed 'persuasive and of very high musical merit' by the jury."
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The
Book of Moonlight, recording |
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Short Symphony for Band, recording "The Short Symphony for Band was written in 1999 for the Jordan Winds, who perform it here. They do a handsome job on a piece that deserves a wide audience. It is by turns dark and mysterious, then bright and lively. (Bell's) music is tonal, tuneful, and enjoyable. The sound in all four works is very good, never distracting one from the music. The presentation is attractive, notes (by the composer and his wife) are excellent."
-Thomas McClain-The American Record Guide |
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The
Sentimental Muse, recording he is a
composer who wants to communicate in direct terms, regardless of any
current trends and fashions. Though |
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Reminiscences and Reflections (recording) " Fascinating and exhuberant music well worth getting to know." -John Sunier-Audiophile Audition
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" It would be idle to go through each Prelude and Fugue in detail. Suffice to say that the whole cycle is a very attractive and nicely contrasted set of miniatures, all superbly crafted and cast in a colourful, accessible idiom. Bell’s Reminiscences and Reflections Op.46 is a welcome addition to the already long series of Preludes and Fugues. It should be avidly picked up by any pianist willing to add a less familiar, but rewarding and enjoyable set to his/her repertoire." -Hubert Culot--Classical Music Web(www.musicweb.uk.net) |
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David Salvage-Sequenza21.com |
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Reminiscences and Reflections (performance) "The three preludes and fugues selected from the Well Tempered Klavier -inspired piano collection Reminiscences and Reflections, Op. 46 (1993-98) are extraordinarily fine, casting this older approach into fluid structures brimming with imagination. There's not an ounce of textbook dryness here; rather, there's plenty of contrast in texture, color, and emotion." -David Cleary- New Music Connoisseur |
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The
Triple CD Release: The Book of Moonlight, The Sentimental Muse, and Reminiscences and Reflections His essential impulse in this violin music, as in most (if not all) of what he writes, seems to be ingenuous communication. It is possible to listen to this material with attention to Bell's precise and fascinating adjustments of harmonic elements, or simply bathe in the wholeness of the sound. That he can write on both levels is an impressive achievement. -Peter Burwasser--Fanfare |
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