For those unaware, creative collaboration is central to American composer Joel Puckett’s career, a spirit that unites the three works on this recording. Each work represents a partnership between Puckett’s vibrant creative imagination and a particular musician, or group of musicians.

Puckett’s new Trumpet Concerto (2024), his second for the instrument, was written for the distinguished jazz trumpeter Sean Jones. It’s a homage of sorts to another American classic conceived for a great jazz musician, Aaron Copland’s Clarinet Concerto, which was commissioned and premiered by Benny Goodman. The work is a personal response to Jones’s artistry, showcasing his dazzling high register and individual articulations and inflections that are unique to his playing.

The orchestral song cycle There Was a Child Went Forth was created for Grammy Award winning tenor Nicholas Phan. The music is accessible and inward, much like the verses by Walt Whitman. It’s a work of celebration, composed in 2023 for the 225th anniversary of the United States President’s Own Marine Band. Inspiration came from Phan’s love of Whitman, and synergy from Whitman’s written reviews of the Marine Band.

’ The album’s title track Short Stories is a string quartet concerto, which has been widely performed since its 2013 premiere. Principal players of the London Symphony Orchestra shine as the soloists, at times playing as individuals, at others as a unit with their orchestral colleagues providing a resplendent accompaniment.

There Was a Child Went Forth (2023)
for tenor & chamber orchestra · text: Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1892), adapt. J. Puckett
1. I. There was a child [3.36]
2. II. The early lilacs [4.39]
3. III. And his parents [7.00]
4. IV. The village on the highland [4.23]

Nicholas Phan, tenor
London Symphony Orchestra
Joseph Young, conductor

Trumpet Concerto (2024)
5. I. Slow and expressively [4.27]
6. II. Simple, like remembering an old song [5.57]
7. III. Cadenzas [2.20]
8. IV. Finale, with an air of mystery [4.51]

Sean Jones, trumpet
London Symphony Orchestra
Joseph Young, conductor

Short Stories (2013)
concerto grosso for string quartet & orchestra
Part I
9. I. Somewhere near the end [1.26]
10. II. Introit [2.20]
11. III. The Priests [4.36]
Part II
12. IV. Recitative [3.15]
13. V. mother and child [5.34]
Part III
14. VI. sonno agitato [1.46]
15. VII. The Bridge (cadenza) [1.03]
16. VIII. Ma Fin [2.52]

Benjamin Marquise Gilmore, violin I · Julián Gil Rodríguez, violin II
Gillianne Haddow, viola · David Cohen, cello
London Symphony Orchestra
Joseph Young, conductor

This magnificently hued, and wholly impassioned new recording begins with the work There Was a Child Went Forth, which opens on the sonically stoic There was a child and then we get the flourishing The early lilacs, the all-embracing dalliances within And his parents, rounding out on the etherally-imbibed The village on the highland.

Up next is the work Trumpet Concerto, which opens on the cultured Slow and expressively and then comes the lamenting Simple, like remembering an old song, the emboldened Cadenzas, ending with the delicately flowing Finale, with an air of mystery.

Lastly we are gifted the piece Short Stories, which opens on the startlingly furtive nature of Somewhere near the end, the expressive Introit and the formative The Priests and then brings us the delicate Recitative, the playfully delightful mother and child, the dutifully layered masterpiece sonno agitato, the work, and the set coming to a close on the rallying cries formulated within the expedient The Bridge (cadenza) and the veritably cinematic Ma Fin.

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