# Foss, Lukas (1922-2009)



## science

Another composer we haven't discussed yet is Lukas Foss. He was a friend of Leonard Bernstein, and the only recording of his music that I know is Bernstein's:

View attachment 43669


Anyone a fan of this composer? Any favorite recordings?


----------



## DrKilroy

I really like his Capriccio for cello and piano:






I have checked out some of his other pieces, but they make no impression on me so far.

Best regards, Dr


----------



## Bruce

I really enjoy some of Foss's music. Particularly his first piano concerto. (The second I don't find quite so interesting.) Phorion, listed as one of the works on the CD cover originally posted, is quite nice--a pastiche of Bach's melodies in a modern idiom. I love to hear composers play around with music composed by others.


----------



## randy woolf

my wife, kathleen supové, made an excellent recording of his "Solo". you can get it on iTunes, on her Figure 88 album. i studied with him at tanglewood, and stayed friends after that. he was such a nice man, and very light hearted and humorous, sometimes unintentionally so. once in class, a student had said composing was about oneself [the composer] and the listener. lukas exclaimed 'no, composing is like f***ing....you do it all by yourself!'


----------



## randy woolf

his most beloved pieces are echoi, time cycle, and the baroque variations.


----------



## PetrB

.....








Foss was another of the Boston Six, as mentioned in your thread on Harold Shapero.

I rate Foss very high, and that only knowing of a handful of varied works

Foss was an incredibly fine musician, a fine artist / craftsman, composer, conductor, teacher, a fine enough pianist, an indefatigable advocate and promoter of contemporary music, including that of other composers -- a very rare _all-rounder_. With all his teaching and conducting duties, he managed to remain fairly prolific:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_compositions_by_Lukas_Foss
He truly composed in about 'any way he cared to,' and was not afraid to write a work as 'experimental' and not worry too much about posterity. One of those artists who is constantly pursuing a new direction much to the despair of their manager -- though he never had one that I know of -- who would rather they make works in a similar vein once what sells was determined (not unlike the wonderful American writer Evan S. Connell, who skipped around genres and whose works have very different concerns and points one to the next.)

Foss' _Time Cycle,_ in its original full orchestra version as on that recording, is I think a great work, and I would urge anyone to run out and buy that CD. The piece is his first venture into serialist technique, for Soprano and orchestra -- the vocal style very much in the tradition of Lied. The work is lyric, dramatic hear and there, and imo, lovely.

The _Song of Songs_ is an earlier neoclassical work, also with a lot of allure.

The _Phorion_ on that album is I believe the last movement of his _Baroque Variations,_ (III. On a Bach Prelude (1967). _Baroque Variations_[/I] is another piece by this composer of which I am a keen advocate. I heard this live way back then, and recall on of the instruments of the orchestra was a plastic-body inflatable guitar




There is a later version of _Phorion_ from the late 1990's, and knowing Foss, I am certain it was someplace between a moderate to fuller reworking.

His earlier neoclassical _Three American Pieces_ for Violin and Piano, along with his already-mentioned _Cappricio_ for 'Cello and Piano, are also from his more distinctly neoclassical period. I like them just fine.
Three American Pieces












... later cast into a three movement work for violin solo and orchestra




_Capriccio_





[ADD: His pretty cool _Symphony (#2) of Chorales_ (1958)



END ADD]

Foss reworked a number of his pieces, often beyond a revision more into another take on the same piece, ex. His _Orpheus_ for cello _or_ viola _or_ violin and chamber orchestra (1972); but there is also a second-take later version titled Orpheus and Euridice. (1983) I recall hearing the 1972 version, with a viola soloist, and found it quite beautiful.

The _Night Music for John Lennon_ (Prelude, Fugue and Chorale) for brass quintet and orchestra (with a piano part) is an in memoriam, somewhat illustrative of what could be like a stroll through a city, yet it also has a dramatic quality of an imminent menace within it, and is not afraid to conjure up what just might be a view of a crazed mind, if not the horror and panic of being shot by a stranger....





His works which are in retrospective of an earlier style are extremely well-informed without being pedantic, i.e. what he knew of earlier music was both deeply passionate and intelligent; if working with it directly or as a point of reference, he never fell anywhere near pastiche. His _Renaissance Concerto_ for flute and orchestra, is one of these
https://www.youtube.mcom/watch?v=hp69cNvaM-I

_Measure for Measure,_ for tenor and orchestra, pairs texts of Shakespeare with the music of Renaissance composer Salomon Rossi. I think this is a wonderful work as well. He also wrote the orchestral, _Salomon Rossi Suite_ (1974)

Many of his compositions are very much investigations explorations, and even if they do not hold up to repeat listening, i think many are well worth at least one hearing.
Nu Bruit Ni Vitesse, for two pianos and two percussionists playing the interior piano harps (1970)





Other works more in this vein: 
_Elytres_ (1964)
_Paradigm_ (1968)
_Music for Six_ (1977)
_Echoi_ (1960/1963) -- [composer Charles Wuorinen, piano]


----------



## science

I'd love to find a recording available of _Night Music for John Lennon_.


----------



## joen_cph

_Phorion_, the last part of the _Baroque Variations _link given above, is probably the most immediately interesting piece I´ve come across by him (also found at 2:45 at 



), together with _"GEOD", _a large work for choir and orchestra (



) which seems to include quotations from other composers and tunes.

A quite detailed Lukas Foss NYT obituary: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/02/arts/music/02foss.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0


----------



## PetrB

science said:


> I'd love to find a recording available of _Night Music for John Lennon_.


I regret not making a note of _the other_ performance which _was_ up on Youtube. The one in the link I provided, though I am grateful for it, is less incisive and less subtle (in the first half) than that one now gone, and I much preferred that first performance.

Great piece, imo.


----------



## science

PetrB said:


> I regret not making a note of _the other_ performance which _was_ up on Youtube. The one in the link I provided, though I am grateful for it, is less incisive and less subtle (in the first half) than that one now gone, and I much preferred that first performance.
> 
> Great piece, imo.


Youtube won't do anything for me unless I can have some kind of guarantee that I'm not stealing anything. Do you know who the performers were?


----------



## PetrB

science said:


> Youtube won't do anything for me unless I can have some kind of guarantee that I'm not stealing anything. Do you know who the performers were?


Not any idea, I certainly regret it now. It may have been from an old LP, a lot of his music was aired in concerts, and recorded, some went out via radio, etc. I'm afraid a lot of his work is 'found' in recordings like that, and there are imo, far too few available older LP's or re-issued CDs of his music.


----------



## science

PetrB said:


> Not any idea, I certainly regret it now. It may have been from an old LP, a lot of his music was aired in concerts, and recorded, some went out via radio, etc. I'm afraid a lot of his work is 'found' in recordings like that, and there are imo, far too few available older LP's or re-issued CDs of his music.


Well, I'll do my best!


----------



## PetrB

Found it: Foss Conducts
_... and with 9 For Sale from $5.46 !!!_

http://www.discogs.com/Lukas-Foss-Solo-Observed/release/1877971









Recording includes _Measure for Measure_ (I mentioned this one already)

Night Music (For John Lennon)
Brooklyn Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra
French Horn - Brooks Tillotson Orchestra - Trombone - Jonathan Taylor Trumpet - Neil Balm, Wilmer Wise Tuba - Andrew Seligson

Measure For Measure
Brooklyn Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra
Tenor - Frank Hoffmeister

Solo Observed
Cello - Fred Sherry 
Organ [Electric] - Charles Wadsworth 
Piano - Lukas Foss 
Vibraphone - Richard Fitz

_P.s. there may be only one recording. My not caring for the current Youtube upload compared to a previous might be all a matter of the uploader's 'engineering' and software._


----------



## science

Why thank you, that's very nice of you!


----------



## PetrB

science said:


> Why thank you, that's very nice of you!


You are welcome!

I no longer have either a player for vinyl, or any vinyl...







But was thrilled as a neophyte vinyl searcher to find it so readily.


----------



## science

Yeah, I don't listen to vinyl at all - it's an expense I don't foresee myself paying - but I figure everything ever recorded will be on an mp3 within a few more years.


----------



## PetrB

science said:


> Yeah, I don't listen to vinyl at all - it's an expense I don't foresee myself paying - but I figure everything ever recorded will be on an mp3 within a few more years.


Pity that, the lack of frequencies in the spectrum so apparent in that format :-(


----------



## science

PetrB said:


> Pity that, the lack of frequencies in the spectrum so apparent in that format :-(


Well, whatever format is cool. I don't actually use mp3s but that was shorthand.

I am a fan of digital sound, though. Vinyl is great for those who can afford it but there'll be no romanticizing it for me.


----------



## PetrB

Lucas Foss: Symphony of Chorales (Symphony No. 2) ~ 1958
Boston Symphony Orchestra, Lucas Foss, conductor


----------

