Nominated for a Grammy Award as Best Classical Compendium in 2022, this release may or may not live up to its lofty goal of providing a new canon for the New World, but it is a delightfully offbeat release, and it is easy to hear why it caught Grammy nominators' ears. The music is all from the Americas, and much of it, although not all, is by composers of color. Countertenor Reginald L. Mobley joins with the Agave Baroque ensemble, and indeed, there are a few Baroque works. He's heard in songs by Florence B. Price, which ...
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Nominated for a Grammy Award as Best Classical Compendium in 2022, this release may or may not live up to its lofty goal of providing a new canon for the New World, but it is a delightfully offbeat release, and it is easy to hear why it caught Grammy nominators' ears. The music is all from the Americas, and much of it, although not all, is by composers of color. Countertenor Reginald L. Mobley joins with the Agave Baroque ensemble, and indeed, there are a few Baroque works. He's heard in songs by Florence B. Price, which makes up the largest single group on the program. Of course, these weren't written for a countertenor nor meant to be accompanied by strings, but Mobley also includes a pair of Price's string quartet studies on familiar folk tunes, "Shortnin' Bread" and "My Darlin' Clementine," so one may accept that she wouldn't have found the versions here too unfamiliar. Another innovation here is that Mobley juxtaposes works by Price and other African American composers (two, Justin Holland and...
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