# Harbison, John (1938)



## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

John Harbison is one of my favorite contemporary American composers. These were the discs I started out with:

















He is tonal, but tonality of an advanced variety. His vocal writing is always good. His Viola concerto and Piano concerto are also good.


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

I've heard it called "bend but don't break tonality." Symphony #2 is my favorite thing I've heard by him.

Harbison's piano sonata is coupled with Ives' Concord on Robert Shannon's recording. The Ives work is clearly the star on the disk, but Harbison's is nice as well.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

GreenMamba said:


> I've heard it called "bend but don't break tonality." Symphony #2 is my favorite thing I've heard by him.
> 
> Harbison's piano sonata is coupled with Ives' Concord on Robert Shannon's recording. The Ives work is clearly the star on the disk, but Harbison's is nice as well.


Thanks for the link, mamba. I'm always looking for versions of the Concord. It is also interesting that Harbison dedicated this piano sonata to Roger sessions. It sounds killer, I must get this.


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## tortkis (Jul 13, 2013)

His chamber works I heard are quite powerful, with modernism and romanticism fused very well. I didn't know that he is also a jazz pianist/composer. The string quartets/trio don't sound jazzy at all, but After Hours is a collection of wonderfull songs (the composer categorized the songs as pop songs, theatre songs, novelty songs, near-art songs), some of which could become great jazz standards. The soprano Mary Mackenzie sings these attractive pieces beautifuly.










Baseline Ballad


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