John Luther Adams

Year

Title

David Allen | The New York Times

John Luther Adams, Praying for the Earth in Music

2023

The composer has long been inspired by nature without sending an explicit political message. But his latest work takes on a newly urgent tone.

"...The Latin binomials of 192 endangered species make up the incantatory text of “Litanies of the Sixth Extinction,” the grim, dark heart of “Vespers of the Blessed Earth,” a new, 50-minute work by John Luther Adams that the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Crossing and the soprano Meigui Zhang will premiere under Yannick Nézet-Séguin in Philadelphia on Thursday, before taking it to Carnegie Hall on Friday."

Read here.

His music perfectly echoes the landscape he loves: impersonal, relentless, larger than human scale, yet gorgeous, a quiet chaos of colors, suffused with light. It’s not a climate everyone could live in. But for those who want to bathe their ears in an aural aurora borealis while staying warm inside, it’s a spiritual odyssey well worth taking. - Kyle Gann

john luther adams

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