"A high-flying recital which shows that the piccolo can do more than tootle"

—Gramophone Review by Laurence Vittes, January, 2005 (Take Wing, Crystal 713)

There may in theory be an unavoidable sameness about music for the piccolo, given the limitations of its range and timbre, but Lois Bliss Herbine, flautist with the new-music Philadelphia Orchestra 2001, seems to be saying in each piece, "Listen to me prove what the piccolo, and this composer, can do!"

During the course of this beguiling recital, you will encounter composers with impressively eclectic credentials (Michael Daugherty's Metropolis Symphony was recorded by the Baltimore Symphony, Willard S Elliot was principal bassoonist of the Chicago Symphony from 1964 to 1996), none of whom is content to tootle mindlessly away in the upper registers where the piccolo so often resides.

Daugherty's wonderful The High and the Mighty, for example, inspired by the elegant age of air-travel from 1945 to 1961, uses a variety of tunes and jaunty attitudes to exhilarate the imagination. David Loeb's Preludes hint at Asian mysteries. Howard J Buss's musical depiction of a flight on a jetliner (no denying the aeronautical connotations of the piccolo's sleek, stratospheric sounds) is a startling tour de force.

Not the least part of this disc's success is the outstanding quality of the artists Herbine plays with. In the concluding dance of Daniel Dorff's colourful Sonatine, Charles Abramovic shows a delightful lightness of touch. In his own fanciful Song of Spring, guitarist Allen Krantz shows off a magically limpid sound. Harpist Sophie Bruno makes a luminous contribution to an excerpt from Stephen Mager's cycle for soprano, piccolo and harp based on Middle English lyrics and courtly love poems.

Recorded at Lang Concert Hall at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, the sound is immediate and appealing. The liner notes, mostly by the composers, are authoritative.

Created on 12/21/04 ~~~~~ Updated on 9/3/06