American Counterpoints Receives Two GRAMMY® Nominations - Named One of NPR Music’s 50 Best Albums of 2024
American Counterpoints Receives Two GRAMMY® Nominations
Best Classical Compendium
Best Classical Instrumental Solo for Julia Perry’s Violin Concerto
Named One of NPR Music’s 50 Best Albums of 2024 and Top 10 Classical Albums of 2024
Experiential Orchestra
James Blachly, Music Director
Curtis Stewart, Violin Soloist
Available Now on Bright Shiny Things
“This important – arguably long overdue – album spotlights two versatile mid-20th century artists whose music fell into neglect.”
– NPR Music’s 50 Best Albums of 2024
"a fine example of the sober yet seething angularity of its era, leavened with warm strings and hints of Coplandesque expansiveness"
– The New York Times on Perry's Violin Concerto
“It’s not often you can claim a CD offers true revelations, but that’s the case with this fascinating release”
– The Strad
Stream the Album Now
Downloads and CDs available for press on request.
jamesblachly.com | experientialorchestra.com | curtisjstewart.com | brightshiny.ninja
American Counterpoints – the newest album and co-creation between James Blachly, GRAMMY®-winning founder and Music Director of Experiential Orchestra, and GRAMMY®-nominated violinist Curtis Stewart, whom The New York Times credits with “combining omnivory and brilliance” – celebrates the centenary of composer Julia Perry, as well as the work of fellow composer Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson.
This album, which Tom Huizenga of NPR Music writes presents “strong performances” by the Blachly-led Experiential Orchestra and a “committed performance” of Perry’s Violin Concerto by Curtis Stewart, received two GRAMMY® nominations in the categories of Best Classical Compendium and Best Classical Instrumental Solo. The 2025 GRAMMYs will take place Sunday, February 2 at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles and will broadcast live on the CBS Television Network and stream live and on demand on Paramount+. This is the first GRAMMY nomination for the music of Julia Perry.
In addition to the world premiere recording of Perry’s Concerto for Violin and Orchestra, American Counterpoints includes her Prelude for Strings, Symphony in One Movement for Violas and Basses, and Ye, Who Seek the Truth, as well as Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson’s Sinfonietta No. 1 and Louisiana Blues Strut for solo violin. Curtis Stewart’s We Who Seek complements both composers’ works, and serves as the album’s finale. The album is produced by GRAMMY-winner Blanton Alspaugh and Soundmirror.
American Counterpoints has also been named as one of NPR Music’s 50 Best Albums of 2024 across all genres, as well as one of NPR Music’s Top 10 Classical Album of 2024. NPR’s Tom Huizenga reports, “After the start of the Black Lives Matter movement, steps (albeit small ones) have been taken to better represent the work of Black American composers, past and present. This important – arguably long overdue – album spotlights two versatile mid-20th century artists whose music fell into neglect. The once-celebrated Julia Perry died in 1979, leaving her arresting violin concerto in disarray. Recently reconstructed, it receives a committed performance by Curtis Stewart, keen to the score's chromatic nuances. Her Prelude is serene, unlike the experimental Symphony in One Movement, which probes dark harmonies with the urgency of a search party. Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson, an agile pianist-composer who collaborated with Max Roach and Marvin Gaye, channels Handel in his neoclassical Sinfonietta No. 1 and conjures gritty southern styles in Louisiana Blues Strut: A Cakewalk for Violin. These strong performances by the Experiential Orchestra will hopefully spark a resurgence in the music of these exceptional composers.”
Julia Perry (1924-1979) was an African American composer, born in Lexington, Kentucky and raised in Akron, Ohio. Her early career was filled with promise: she spent two summers at the Berkshire Music Center, studied with Luigi Dallapiccola and briefly with Nadia Boulanger, won the Prix Fontainebleau and two Guggenheim Fellowships, and her Study for Orchestra was performed by the New York Philharmonic in 1965. But tragically, many of her roughly 100 compositions remain unknown. Perry suffered a paralytic stroke in 1970. As musicologist J. Michele Edwards writes, “Her letters reveal her effort to walk, talk, and conduct again. She did learn to write with her left hand and resumed composing; however, she endured tragic emotional and financial difficulties.”
Through the research work of the non-profit organization Videmus led by Dr. Louise Toppin, in partnership with Boosey & Hawkes, many of Julia Perry’s unpublished works are now being discovered and made available for performance for the first time. The core of the effort to publish Perry’s music has been the three-person Videmus editorial team of Louise Toppin; conductor Christopher Wilkins, music director of the Akron Symphony; and James Blachly. Blachly first encountered Perry’s music in 2014, and in addition to his work on the editorial team, has championed Perry’s music in performances for the past five years. With Toppin, he co-directed the Julia Perry Centenary Celebration and Festival in March 2024. The four-day Festival brought together 140 performers and scholars in New York in the largest Julia Perry celebration in the world to date. Blachly has also brought Perry’s music to new audiences through performances with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Experiential Orchestra, and Johnstown Symphony Orchestra.
Known as “Perky," Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson was said to have had a musical talent rivaled only by Leonard Bernstein. He played jazz piano with Max Roach, studied conducting at Berkshire Music Center, and was a prolific and accomplished composer. While he composed roughly 30 works in a classical idiom, the vast majority of his compositions were for film and television.
American Counterpoints aims to dramatically change the visibility and reputation of these two extraordinary African American composers, bringing their works to a much wider audience and a place of higher prestige, as well as to help inspire more frequent performances of their music throughout the world.
Of their intention in making this album, Curtis Stewart and James Blachly say:
"The title American Counterpoints refers to the compositional technique of interweaving independent melodies into a powerful whole, and the strength, integrity, and imaginative music that results. It underscores how these two masterful composers were required to create new musical paths for themselves because the mainstream of classical music did not have a place for them centerstage. Julia Perry flourished in Europe, with only limited success in the United States. Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson's boundless musical talents found most success in film and television, jazz and popular music. Yet despite being marginalized and largely ignored for many decades, both composers are essential to American classical music, and our intention with this album is to advocate for their music to claim its rightful place within the core of our American repertoire."
The juxtaposition of the two composers on the album forms its own counterpoint, adding a layer to the compositions themselves; Curtis Stewart’s final track weaves together all three compositional voices.
ALBUM TRACKLIST
American Counterpoints
James Blachly, Experiential Orchestra, Curtis Stewart
Bright Shiny Things | Release Date: March, 1, 2024
1. Louisiana Blues Strut: A Cakewalk by Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson
Curtis Stewart, violin
2. Prelude for Strings by Julia Perry, Arr. Roger Zahab
3-5. Sinfonietta No. 1 by Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson
I: Sonata Allegro
II: Song Form-Largo
III: Rondo-Allegro furioso
6. Symphony in One Movement for Violas and String Basses by Julia Perry
7. Ye, Who Seek the Truth by Julia Perry, Arr. Jannina Norpoth
8-13. Concerto for Violin and Orchestra by Julia Perry
I. Slow; Moderate; Fast; Moderate
II. Slow; Moderate; Fast
III. Moderate
IV. Fast
V. Slow; Fast
VI. Fast; Moderate; Fast
Curtis Stewart, violin
14. We Who Seek by Curtis Stewart
Curtis Stewart, violin
Album co-curated by Curtis Stewart and James Blachly
Executive Producer James Blachly
Director of Artistic Planning Pauline Kim Harris
Produced by Blanton Alspaugh (Soundmirror)
Engineering, Mixing and Mastering by Mark Donahue (Soundmirror)