Classical Score: Ensemble Keeps 'drumming' Up Interest

The brilliant young ensemble So Percussion—Douglas Perkins, Adam Sliwinski, Jason Treuting and Lawson White—established itself as an important voice in new music a year ago with the release of its first, self-titled disc for Cantaloupe Records. The record featured two recent works by David Lang, "The So-Called Laws of Nature" (written for the group) and "Evan Ziporyn (Melody Competition)."

The group's commitment to brand-new works is so strong, in fact, that it received the Chamber Music America/ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming.

For its sophomore release, however, the New York-based ensemble turned to Steve Reich's groundbreaking 1971 piece "Drumming," which was inspired by the drumming traditions of Ghana.

Since "Drumming" calls for nine percussionists, So's approach varies between live performances—for which it brings in a number of colleagues—and recording, in which each player dubbed parts.

Spinning a single rhythmic figure into an epic experience, "Drumming" was absolutely revolutionary when it premiered. It is still regarded as a major piece, not just within the modern percussion canon, but as a touchstone for 20th-century classical music.

Why "Drumming" now for So Percussion, especially considering that Reich himself has made two recordings of it with his own ensemble?

"Our main focus is new music, and specifically music being written for us," Treuting says. "But Steve Reich's piece 'Drumming' is such a big dog; a lot of what we do today was either inspired by or [part of] a continuing dialogue with 'Drumming.' "

The result is a mesmerizing, buoyant performance that highlights the group's first-rate technical dexterity and deep understanding of Reich's music. Indeed, the So musicians say that "Drumming" has been a cornerstone for their ensemble. "We've been playing 'Drumming' since we began together as graduate students at Yale," Perkins says. "It was on the first concert we ever played. So we have very specific ideas about how we want to play it."

Sliwinski adds, " 'Drumming' is absolutely at the core of our collective conception of what this group is." He notes that the cultural context of the piece and the ensuing conversation about it differ dramatically from when Reich wrote it.

"Teenagers and people in their 20s or 30s relate to 'Drumming' in a very different way than people who were on the scene while the stylistic battle lines were being drawn in the 1970s," Sliwinski says.

White agrees. "We've grown up with this Reich piece," he says. "We're the middle ground, generationally, in that we can meet with Reich, talk to him about how he performs his piece and about what we're doing. But we're also young, so we and many of the people listening to us play it are coming to the piece for different reasons.

"The piece means as much to us working in our Brooklyn loft as it did to Reich in his loft 30 years ago, but the vibe is totally different."

NEW & NOTEWORTHY: The next volume of cross-cultural explorations from Yo-Yo Ma & the Silk Road Ensemble, "Silk Road Journeys: Beyond the Horizon" (Sony Classical, April 5).

From the Milken Archive of American Jewish Music, four Judaically inspired works by composer Lukas Foss (including the world premiere of his cantata "Song of Anguish"), in time for the 60th anniversary of the Allied liberation of the World War II concentration camps (Naxos, April 12).

"Renaissance: Music for Inner Peace," featuring established vocal ensemble the Sixteen, conducted by Harry Christophers, in its first recording for Universal Classics (Decca, April 12).

Composer Nigel Hess' score for the Judi Dench/Maggie Smith movie "Ladies in Lavender," featuring chart-topping violinist Joshua Bell (Sony Classical, April 26).

The world premiere of Miklos Rozsa's Three Choral Suites (based on Rozsa's iconic scores to the films "Ben Hur," "Quo Vadis" and "King of Kings") in a performance featuring the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra, conducted by Erich Kunzel (Telarc, April 26).