Reviewsfour

David Rakowski's ''Dances in the Dark," drawn from a ballet for children, is accessible, energetic, and dodgy. -- Richard Dyer, Boston Globe, February 1, 2006.

Clairement, le compositeur américain David Rakowsky connaît aussi bien son Haydn que son Prokofiev que son Ives ou son jazz… Les titres souvent humoristiques de ses études (des jeux de mots parfaitement intraduisibles, pour la plupart) cachent un sérieux de propos musical parfaitement maîtrisé. Et si, par exemple, Touch typing est destiné à n’être joué qu’avec deux doigts, comme le font les dactylographes débutants, le but est réellement didactique !
Rakowsky écrit une musique tout à fait belle, d’un langage nouveau (et destinée aux dix doigts du pianiste, rassurez-vous), attachante, claire et pourtant complexe, faite d’invention propre autant que d’influences parfaitement assumées: aucune avant-garde inflexible donc, mais un langage souple, fluide, mouvant, extraordinairement diversifié et coloré.
À mettre entre les mains de tous les pianistes et entre les oreilles de tous les mélomanes un tant soit peu curieux.
[Clearly the American composer David Rakowsky (sic) knows well his Haydn as well as his Prokofiev and his Ives and his jazz ... The often humorous titles of these etudes (most of them perfectly untranslatable puns) belie perfectly serious and controlled musical substance. And if, for example, "Touch Typing" is intended to be played with only two fingers, like beginning typists, the goal is really didactic.
Rakowsky (sic) writes a complexly beautiful music, in a new language (and, be assured, for the ten fingers of the pianist), attractive, clear and yet complex, made of clean invention with perfectly absorbed influences -- thus no inflexible avant-garde, rather a language which is supple, fluid, moving, extraordinarily diverse, and colorful.
So put these [etudes] between the hands of all pianists and between the ears of all music lovers who are interested in something new.] -- Abeillemusique.com, March 6, 2006.

At Zipper, too — although I keep forgetting to mention it — a charming and communicative pianist named Amy Dissanayake came on from Chicago on March 7 to fill in the wild-card position in this year’s Piano Spheres roster. With her came Chicago music: six Piano Etudes by Augusta Read Thomas attached to descriptive titles — “Cathedral Waterfall,” “Rain at Funeral,” etc. Seven etudes by David Rakowski were more specific: “Repeated-note,” “Etude on Melody and Thick Chords.” I don’t usually expect to get much from the terseness of the piano etude (unless the composer be Ligeti), but these turned out as a pair of valuable, attractive garlands, very nicely put forth. David Rakowski teaches at Brandeis; when last heard from he had run his string of etudes to 70. -- Alan Rich, L.A. Weekly, April 12, 2006.

Vocal warm-ups will never be the same again thanks to David Rakowski's delightful series of Encores, works which are as brainy yet playful with singing as his trademark Etudes are with piano playing. On Scatter, Rakowski merges scat singing with melodies derived from pitch mapping the names of the performers. -- Frank J. Oteri, New Music Box, December, 2006.

Though written in 1991, David Rakowski's "Winged Contraption" also received its premiere on Saturday. The writing suggests a kind of smoldering Mahlerian intensity, funneled through a lean and often astringent harmonic language. The piece ends precipitously, leaving the ear still hungry for more. -- Jeremy Eichler, Boston Globe, January 22, 2007.

David Rakowsky dans ces trois études résume quelques esthétiques du XXe siècle, sans rien y ajouter d’original. Absofunkinlutely qui se veut inspirée de la musique funk fait penser à du Stravinsky mélangé à du Ligeti (ah ! les fameuses « touches bloquées »), Rick’s Mood est une sorte de « pari musical » d’écrire uniquement des accords majeurs (Erik Satie l’a déjà fait ça) et NOT, avec sa récitation d’un poème minimaliste (« Happy ? not happy… Unhappy !!! ») renvoie aux happenings de John Cage dans les années 50. Pièces bien peu intéressantes malgré l’énergie qu’y donne Adam Marks.
[David Rakowsky (sic) in these three études summarizes some of the esthetics of the twentieth century, without adding anything to the originals. Absofunkinlutely, which wants to be inspired by funk music, makes one think of of Stravinsky mixed with Ligeti (ah! the famous “blocked keys”), Rick’s Mood is a kind of “musical bet” to write only major triads (Erik Satie already did that) and NOT, with his recitation of a minimalist poem (“Happy? not happy… Unhappy!!!”) returns to the happenings of John Cage in the Fifties. Pieces that aren’t very interesting in spite of the energy given them by Adam Marks.] -- Maxime Kaprielian, ResMusica.com, March 12, 2007.

[About SONGS AND ENCORES, Bridge 9199] The songs of Chester Biscardi and David Rakowski show that lyricism is alive and well in the hands of a younger generation. Five stars. -- Calum McDonald, BBC Music Magazine.

[About SONGS AND ENCORES, Bridge 9199] Also striking are David Rakowski's tonally ambiguous rhapsodic vocalises "Three Encores". -- Stephen Eddins, AllMusic Guide.

[About SONGS AND ENCORES, Bridge 9199] If this review gives shorter shrift to Biscardi, Picker, and Rakowski, it's not because their songs are less fine. ... Biscardi and Rakowski are less overtly romantic than Picker, but they too find the richness of the texts and communicate them to the listener fully. -- Raymond S. Tuttle, International Record Review, March 2007.

[About SONGS AND ENCORES, Bridge 9199] Most of the songs in this collection were composed within the last fifteen years – the majority of them for New Yorker Judith Bettina. Their consistently high quality says much for the discrimination of singer and pianist; while personal links with the composers are manifold, there’s little self-indulgence in the music or music-making. The stylistic and expressive range of these songs is appreciable. .... Violinist Curtis Macomber takes part with the duo in David Rakowski’s Musician, originally scored for soprano, string orchestra, harp and celesta. Like Picker, Rakowski studied under Babbitt at Princeton. His setting of Phillis Levin’s Georgic, ‘in memory of Edward Thomas’, is very impressive in its condensed drama. Three Encores, including the jazzy Scatter, are engaging vocalises. James Goldsworthy makes much of Rakowski’s three-minute elegy Sara, for piano solo. -- Peter Palmer, Tempo, July 2007.

David Rakowski supplied “Locking Horns” (2001-2), a French-horn concerto that also charts a voyage from murkiness to clarity. Each of the work’s five movements expands on the set of short figures set forth in the introduction, with the horn solo first presented as a gentle overlay, scarcely more than another strand of counterpoint. In the central slow movement, the horn — played gracefully here by Tianxia Wu — holds forth more powerfully, and it keeps the spotlight through the rest of the work despite a strand of orchestral horn writing that briefly steals the attention..... As in the second part of the Haapanen work and the best moments of Mr. Rakowski’s score, precise, energetic scoring creates its own excitement, whatever the densities of the language. --- Allan Kozinn, New York Times, October 1, 2007.

You're sitting at the piano with pen in hand working on a large opus and have suddently hit a dry patch. So what do you do? If you're Brandeis University faculty member David Rakowski, you reach for another notebook and write one or more etudes for piano as a palate clearing exercise. this unusual tactic has in fact paid sizable dividends for both this composer and the piano literature. Numbered currently at six books of ten etudes each plus a few extra, Rakowski has created the most important collection of such pieces yet produced by an American.
This pair of CDs [Bridge 9157 & 9199] contains the complete Books I to IV of these items and over half of Book V, presenting a side of this composer hitherto unencountered. Rakowski's oeuvre commonly shows predilection for an Atlantic Seaboard ethos. But here we experience him as a scalar if non-triadic stateside eclectic, able to directly quote snippets from Ludwig van Beethoven to Hayes Biggs and filch from popular idioms ranging from boogie to bop, swing to stride. The only bows to a Northeast oriented approach are found in Rakowski's impeccable craftsmanship and Babbitt-like punning titles ("You Dirty Rag" and "A Gliss is Just a Gliss," for two).
Most of these miniatures are based on a specific sonority, gestural idea, or piano technique. All are concise, yet brimming with personality. And despite nods to composers as diverse as Debussy, Prokofiev, Berg, Nancarrow, and Messiaen, Rakowski creates a distinctive, highly varied sound world. For example, the ten or so etudes employing a perpetual motion approach carve out their own unique niches -- none copy each other in terms of harmony, texture, or dramatic unfolding. And while some of the larger entries are cast in clear palindromic forms, even those showcasing a more intuitive formal approach satisfy greatly. These splendid little gems are worthy of any keyboardist's attention.
Pianist Dissanayake's performance here is superb. A rich tone quality, impeccable finger work, scintillating voice delineation, and tasteful pedaling contribute to some of the most beautifully musical keyboard playing this critic has heard in some time. Editing and sound quality are wonderfully good. Both releases are a definite must-hear. -- David Cleary, New Music Connoisseur, Spring/Summer/Fall 2007. (edited reprint of a review appearing earlier in Living Music)

"Re-Inventions," the opening concert of the Boston Modern Orchestra Project's 11th season, promised "glorious and subversive music for keyboards." While none of the four pieces heard Friday night fully lived up to either adjective, they did present individual and strikingly resourceful ideas on how the concerto, a timeworn musical form, could be reimagined for the present ...
The final work, David Rakowski's Piano Concerto, was also having its world premiere, with soloist Marilyn Nonken. It was the most conventional in form -- in four separate movements -- yet also the most fully satisfying work of the evening. It begins with a single note (A) plucked on the strings of the piano, and its repetition gives the first movement its initial jolt of energy. That plucked note opens all four movements, which comprise an adagio, with some gorgeous wind playing; a rhythmically complex scherzo; and a sweeping finale that recalls the first movement. Like Colgrass, Rakowski has the soloist use a second instrument - in this case a toy piano - though much more sparingly. The orchestral writing is wonderfully varied, and the soloist's part is both virtuosic and lyrical throughout.
Each of the four soloists was superb, and Nonken was outstanding. BMOP, under Gil Rose, gave the kind of vital, secure performances we have come almost to take for granted. May they remain glorious and subversive for years to come. -- David Weininger, Boston Globe, November 6, 2007.

Let's start with the obvious: The Philadelphia Orchestra's current Leonard Bernstein Festival honors its namesake in spirit more than in fact. ... Network for New Music's Wednesday concert at the Kimmel Center ended with David Rakowski's Sex Songs, and Lenny was known to like sex. ....
... The concert ended with the first hearing of Rakowski's Sex Songs: They're accomplished, thoughtful and so ambitious they sometimes felt more like sinfoniettas than songs. But sexy? Not at all. -- David Patrick Stearns, Philadelphia Inquirer, January 19, 2008.

[review of Keys to the Future, concert 2] If there are still any shreds of doubt lingering about the wealth of compositional tools being assiduously mined by today's composers, an evening like this should dispel them entirely.....
Piano etudes are still very much in vogue, and David Rakowski is now working on his ninth book of them. (The final one listed on his website, No. 82, is "F This" in which he answers the challenge of writing an etude using a single note.) Amy Briggs Dissanayake chose four, written from 1997 to 2002, with personalities as varied as their titles. No. 40, "Strident," uses jazzy syncopations in the manner of early 20th century stride piano, whereas No. 13, "Plucking A," combines thuds and twangy work directly on the piano's strings. No. 41, "Bop It," is a flood of hyperactivity, while "Martler," No. 14, is an edgy exercise in crossing hands, with a furious ending in the lower register. Several of these were written for Ms. Dissanayake, who seemed completely unfazed by their sometimes amusingly frightful demands. -- Bruce Hodges, Seen and Heard International (music-web international), April, 2008.

Sweet is not an adjective generally associated with percussion recitals, but it's the first descriptor that comes to mind listening to this album and reading its program notes. That's not to say there isn't plenty of vitality and rhythmic energy and virtuosity on display here, but these pieces don't exploit the angst-inducing and nerve-jangling possibilities of which a modern percussion battery is easily capable. Most of the works are solos, but Michael Lipsey is joined in several by other players to create a small ensemble. ... In David Rakowski's Mr. Trampoline Man, a talking drum provides the springiness that effectively evokes a trampoline, as well as the ground for a passacaglia against which a tabla line is juxtaposed. His Framer's Intent for solo dumbek exploits the drum's timbral variety and has the sound of a genial, intelligent improvisation. -- Stephen Eddins, allmusic, May, 2008.

David Rakowski's "Imaginary Dances" were fast, dense, and vigorous. -- Jeremy Eichler, Boston Globe, September, 20, 2008.

The first four pieces of the recital showed Kirkendoll at more accessible moments. He began with a captivating take on David Rakowski's Etude No. 52, "Moody's Blues," a rousing, rhythmically driven, rock-and-roll study inspired by Jerry Lee Lewis. -- Whitney Smith, indystar/indy.com, September 23, 2008.