The World of Ruth Crawford Seeger

Ruth CRAWFORD SEEGER (1901-1953)

The World of Ruth Crawford Seeger

Little Waltz

Little Lullaby

Jumping the Rope (Playtime)

Caprice

Whirligig

Mr Crow and Miss Wren Go for a Walk

Sonata

Theme and Variations

(5) Canons

Kaleidoscopic Changes on an Original Theme

(5) Preludes

(4) Preludes

Piano Study in Mixed Accents

We Dance Together

(The) Adventures of Tom Thumb

Jenny Lin (Piano)

Timothy Jones (Narrator) 

Ruth Crawford Seeger had a brief life (1901-1953) and an even briefer career as a composer. After her String Quartet of 1931, she gave up composing to concentrate on folk music studies. She wrote only brief pieces for piano, and they make a difficult listening program. As soon as you become adjusted to the comfortable idiom of her early little pieces, you are plunged into music in a more advanced style. These too are little pieces, including a bold Sonata that lasts less than six minutes and a fascinating series of 11 Preludes. This disc is a fine presentation. Jenny Lin never shies away from dissonance or aggressiveness, while playing in a musicianly manner with particularly beautiful tonal qualities. Narrator Timothy Jones is clear and dignified in the text of the delightful "The Adventures of Tom Thumb," but the recording is seriously defective, underbalancing the voice so that you need to read the booklet to understand what he is saying. Overall, this is a fascinating byway in the history of American music, highly recommended to the adventurous listener.

Leslie Gerber

"It is fascinating to hear the step-by-step development of this composer. And Jenny Lin is at the absolute peak of her power and craftsmanship as a pianist. This CD is obviously a labor of love from all involved, and it shows. The sound is 5-star, also."

_______________________________

I think that every note of Ruth Crawford Seeger’s solo piano music is on this disc‚ and it adds up to an absorbing musical autobiography. We’re used to thinking of her as a pioneer modernist‚ but most of this music was written before she met Charles Seeger and was introduced by him to the cutting edge of the avant­garde. That she was naturally gifted is demonstrated by some charming and tuneful early pieces (one of which contains ragtime syncopations and a moment of Satiesque not­quite simplicity). She then moves on‚ via a brief and Schumannesque single­movement Sonata to a set of not at all Schumannesque variations which demonstrate‚ as do the Five Canons‚ a taste for searching and unexpected harmonies. The Kaleidoscopic Changes take this further‚ hint at the source of this adventurousness (a growing admiration for Scriabin) and show her also developing a talent for striking colour contrasts; she ends this impressive piece with an accomplished‚ boldly dissonant fugue.

The Nine Preludes are often subtle in both colour and expression. The first of the second set is striking: gentle chimings in the treble over arpeggios outlining a melody‚ the whole thing then distilled into an epigrammatic coda. Yet the final Prelude of the first set (an impassioned recitative penetrating often dissonant chords) and the third of the second set (an angular‚ almost atonal toccata which nevertheless makes perfect sense even at first hearing) hint that she is capable of much bigger things‚ and the ferocious Study in Mixed Accents‚ although only a minute long‚ confirms it. But within a very few years the pressures of family life and political commitment led her to give up composing concert music until the very end of her brief life. The charming but never sentimental or childish Adventures of Tom Thumb suggest that she must have been very good at her later work in music for children‚ and a most lovable mother.

Only one of these pieces has been previously recorded‚ which makes this an important as well as a most enjoyable coupling. If that were not enough‚ Jenny Lin is an exceptionally sensitive pianist‚ and the record would be a delight on her account even if the music were less atractive than it is.