Fall River Legend

Morton Gould is most famous for his colorful light music and arrangements, always attractive, tuneful and marvelously scored, and often drawing on popular music and folk music in original and unexpected ways. But he also wrote more serious concert music, and the disc at hand really gives the full gamut of Gould's compositional interests. The Jekyll and Hyde Variations is a rarity. Commissioned by Mitropoulos, it was one of Gould's chances to try his hand at more serious music, and the results are telling. The variations are written in dodecaphonic, serial style, though you may not be able to tell on first listening - much of the music sounds modal, and in the Jekyll variations sometimes almost hymn-like. It is based on a series of gestures that are permuted, rearranged and re-colored, often ingenious, and very deftly crafted.