The album takes its name from Nico Muhly’s 2017 work for solo piano, written in honor of Bob Hurwitz of Nonesuch Records. The Westerlies deconstruct the piece into intricate hockets, with each ensemble member acting with the independence of a single finger on a piano key, but with the greater cohesion of one hand. It is a feat of ensemble playing born of years on the road, performing in barns and backyards, rock clubs and concert halls, from Coachella to Carnegie.
Mason Bynes’ For Rosa, was commissioned by the Festival of New Trumpet Music in 2020, and premiered in-person at the Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery, Alabama on the 66th Anniversary of Parks’ historic protest. In what Bynes describes as a “musically expressed love letter,” she pays tribute to the radical and courageous vision of Rosa Parks, bringing her legacy into the present day.
Original music has been foundational to The Westerlies since their first notes together in a Juilliard practice room ten years ago, and Andy Clausen raises the bar with his three-movement work This is Water. Originally commissioned for full orchestra as a companion piece to Benjamin Britten’s Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes, Clausen adapts it here for The Westerlies to showcase the ensemble's full expressive range. At once “folk-like and composerly, lovely and intellectually rigorous” (NPR Music), The Westerlies set the tone for the future of American chamber music.
