The unique instrumentation of the three works in this album was pioneered by the innovative Lou Harrison, whose 1959 Violin Concerto encapsulates his culturally wide-ranging aesthetic. More conventional instruments work alongside calibrated extras such as wash tubs and flowerpots in a work of colour, languorous elegance and kinetic energy. The companion works were composed in its honour: Robert Xavier Rodríguez’s Xochiquetzal evokes the ancient Mayan world in imaginary folk music to form a synthesis of time periods and cultures, while the economical serenity of Kati Agócs’s Concerto also includes bitonal effects and zesty syncopation. © Naxos