Except for the enduring fame of his Symphony No. 3 and several of his American ballads, Roy Harris' music has become obscure, though it has likewise become something of a cause célèbre for discriminating musicians. The
Third Angle New Music Ensemble is devoted to promoting the works of American composers and has taken a particular interest in playing and recording Harris' neglected chamber works. The most ambitious of the pieces on this ensemble's 2005 release on Koch is the Quintet for piano and strings (1940), a rigorous exploration of passacaglia and fugue that impresses with its earnestly wrought counterpoint and expansive length, but also appeals through its quaint, late Romantic lyricism. Somewhat less weighty and almost relaxed in approach is the Sonata for violin and piano (1945), where Harris' long, expressive violin lines feel rather like an extended vocalise, and the harmonies of the piano accompaniment evoke the rich textures of fin de siècle art songs. But Harris' gravitas returns in the String Quartet No. 3 (1948), where the conventional movements of the Classical form are sidestepped and four pairs of preludes and fugues are offered instead. A string quartet may seem like a natural medium for four-part fugues, but the constant cycling of subjects diminishes the independence of the string parts, and the resultant gluey textures make this work resemble a student's clumsy exercise, not a fully fledged masterpiece on the level of
Bartók's or
Shostakovich's imaginative achievements. Even so,
Third Angle does its best to draw out the deeply expressive qualities inherent in Harris' music, even in the labored string quartet, and Koch's sound quality is warm and vibrant.