Orchestral Works Vol 2 (Incls 'Ameriques' & 'Ionisation')

"This is an excellent disc, which serves as a welcome introduction to the work of this largely under-valued composer. Varèse's music divulges a creative genius who was undoubtedly a long way ahead of his time, and one can only listen in awe at his work. The performances here are entirely convincing and manage to encapsulate the raw humanistic elements in the music. At the price of a Naxos disc, this is unmissable."
(MusicWeb Nov 2008)

The works on this recording span Varèse's entire career, containing his sole surviving early composition, Un grand Sommeil noir, and his last, unfinished work, Nocturnal, brilliantly and seamlessly completed by the composer's disciple and assistant during the last seventeen years of his life, the composer Chou Wen-Chung. Chiefly, though, the recording features the original version of Amériques, for a massive orchestra of 155 players, recorded immediately following a rare public performance at the Warsaw Philharmonic (only its second since the 1920s) as part of the 2005 Warsaw Autumn Festival.