Reference Recordings is proud to release this album, with 100% of proceeds benefitting Ukrainian people affected by the war through the Razom organization. If you would like to donate above the cost of the recording, you may do so here. NativeDSD is joining the call by also pledging 100% of the profits from this album to the Ukrainian effort.
As she watched in horror her home city of Kharkiv (and the rest of Ukraine) being destroyed and civilians being murdered every day, Nadia Shpachenko tried to come up with ways to express her feelings of utter despair and anger, as well as hope and resilience, through her music making.
In addition to performing fundraising concerts featuring music by Ukrainian composers, she decided to put together a new album to support Ukraine humanitarian aid. Reference Recordings is proud to release this album, with 100% of proceeds benefitting Ukrainian people affected by the war.
Shpachenko commissioned Ukrainian artists to create paintings and artworks to use in the album booklet, online and in-person galleries, and the accompanying music videos, as their responses to the music. Also featured are artworks made by children in Kharkiv, as their responses to the war.
The key piece on the album, titled Invasion (for piano, alto saxophone, horn, trombone, timpani, snare drum, and mandolin), is Shpachenko’s longtime collaborator Lewis Spratlan’s response to this tragic war. It was composed for Shpachenko during the period of February 24-March 13, 2022.
The rest of the album features World Premiere recordings of solo piano music also by Spratlan. These pieces reflect on the human experience, often finding solace and inspiration in nature and music of the past. Wonderer, a major piece that closes the album, connects in its character to the current experience of many Ukrainian people, especially those displaced by the war. The hero, searching through the unknown, overcoming pain, and reminiscing about things past, triumphs at the end.
Nadia Shpachenko – Piano
Pat Posey – Saxophone
Aija Mattson‐Jovel – Horn
Phil Keen – Trombone
Yuri Inoo – Percussion
Joti Rockwell – Mandolin
Anthony Parnther – Conductor
Tracklist
Please note that the below previews are loaded as 44.1 kHz / 16 bit.Total time: 01:16:00
Additional information
| Label | |
|---|---|
| SKU | FR749 |
| Qualities | DSD 512 fs, DSD 256 fs, DSD 128 fs, DSD 64 fs, DXD 24 Bit, WAV 192 kHz, WAV 96 kHz |
| Channels | |
| Artists | Aija Mattson‐Jovel, Anthony Parnther, Joti Rockwell, Nadia Shpachenko, Pat Posey, Phil Keen, Yuri Inoo |
| Composers | |
| Genres | |
| Instruments | |
| Original Recording Format | |
| Release Date | August 25, 2023 |
Press reviews
AllMusic
Only one work by Lewis Spratlan on this release by pianist Nadia Shpachenko directly touches on the Russian invasion of Ukraine – Invasion, for piano, saxophone, horn, trombone, percussion, and mandolin, was written in 2022, but that is not nearly the end of the album’s relevance to the topic.
For one thing, Shpachenko commissioned Ukrainian artists to respond to Spratlan’s music, and some of the resulting works reproduced in the booklet grow from the wartime situation. For another, Shpachenko and Spratlan have worked together in the past, and she had an idea of what to expect.
The piece titled Invasion is not a wartime dirge but a mix of elements overturned by the war, “a counterpoint of moods — between ominous undercurrents, folkloric touchstones, and a modernist ‘authorial’ commentary,” in the words of annotator Peter Yates.
This work is echoed in the Six Rags for solo piano, which are not classical piano rags but juxtapose ragtime rhythms with modernist passages in various ways, and in the final Wonderer for solo piano, a work likewise depicting a journey through a trauma-strewn landscape.
The artists’ “reflections” included suggest other resonances the program may have in time of war. This is certainly one of the first releases to reflect the war in Ukraine; it may go down ultimately as one of the richest and best, and it serves also as a reference for the remarkable late-life creativity of Spratlan, in his ninth decade when he composed Invasion.
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