Within Earth sees Houston string quartet Apollo Chamber Players present an album that demonstrates the contemporary possibilities in string music, continuing Apollo's innovative 20x2020 project. The album contains three new multicultural commissions, as well as a contemporary work by Alexandra Du Bois...

Within Earth opens with Leo Brouwer's 'Nostalgia de las Montañas', which is reflective of his affection for Brazil's lush mountains and landscapes as well as combining his love of Afro-Cuban and Brazilian dances and rhythms. The three-movement work incorporates irregular metric patterns, distantly reminiscent of Brazil's varied dance music.

Christopher Walczak's 'Four Dreams', is a four-part work that does exactly what it says on the tin. Each movement is dreamlike in its execution. Although, if the feelings conjured up by the music are truly reflective of the subject matter... these are far from pleasant dreams, as each piece is eerie and a little unsettling.

'Mây [Cloud]' by Vũ Nhât Tân and Vanessa Võ is scored for string quartet and the Đàn bầu, a Vietnamese monochord zither. It's slightly ethereal, and sounds like the incidental music to SpongeBob SquarePants. It certainly draws you in.

Finally we come to the titular 'Within Earth, Wood Grows' by Alexandra du Bois is the musical interpretation of a line in the I-Ching. Once again the Đàn bầu is incorporated.

This is a worthy follow up to their 2017 Ancestral Voices release.

Track listing:

Leo Brouwer
String Quartet No. 6
Nostalgia de las Montañas (2018)
20x2020 No. 15
Anabel Ramirez Detrick (violin I), Matthew J. Detrick (violin II), Whitney Bullock (viola), Matthew Dudzik (cello)
01 - I. Introduction – II. Preámbulo (6:18)
02 - III. Sonata (6:03)

Christopher Walczak
Four Dreams (2016)
20x2020 No. 9
Anabel Ramirez Detrick (violin I), Matthew J. Detrick (violin II), Whitney Bullock (viola), Matthew Dudzik (cello)
03 - I. The Dream of the Sun, Moon, and Stars (4:26)
04 - II. The Dreams of the Statue and the Tree (4:19)
05 - III. The Dream of the Ladder (5:36)

Vũ Nhât Tân & Vân-Ánh Võ
06 - Mây [Cloud] (18:11)
For Đàn bầu & string quartet (2018)
20x2020 No. 14
Matthew J. Detrick (violin I), Anabel Ramirez Detrick (violin II), Whitney Bullock (viola), Matthew Dudzik (cello), Vân-Ánh Võ (đàn bầu)

Alexandra du Bois
07 - Within Earth, Wood Grows (2010) (14:33)
Matthew J. Detrick (violin I), Anabel Ramirez Detrick (violin II), Whitney Bullock (viola), Matthew Dudzik (cello), Vân-Ánh Võ (đàn bầu).
WindSync and members of KINETIC and Loop38
Matthew Carrington (viola), Jerry Hou (conductor)

8

Darren Rea