Sentinels Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra & Jiří Petrdlík

• Timothy Kramer: Symphony "B-A-C-H":
• 1Symphony "B-A-C-H": I. Bach Meets Escher08:52
• 2Symphony "B-A-C-H": II. Schizo Scherzo04:44
• 3Symphony "B-A-C-H": III. Meditation Chorale05:31
• 4Symphony "B-A-C-H": IV. Party Favors08:22
• A Fivescore Festival:
• 5A Fivescore Festival: I. Expansive, with Growing Intensity03:17
• 6A Fivescore Festival: II. Precise, Crisp & Playful03:07
• 7A Fivescore Festival: III. Tranquil, but with Motion02:13
• 8A Fivescore Festival: IV. Noble, with Strength03:03
• 9A Fivescore Festival: V. Lively, with Energy06:39
• Sentinels of the Dance:
• 10Sentinels of the Dance: I. Sharp and Sudden, with Caustic Angularity01:58
• 11Sentinels of the Dance: II. Calm, Serene, Hypnotic06:22
• 12Sentinels of the Dance: III. With Elastic Tensity02:09
• Timothy Kramer:
• 13All in Golden Measure10:30
• Total Runtime01:06:47

Info for Sentinels

Timothy Kramer has recorded and released a full album of his orchestral works with Navona Records. The result: SENTINELS, an evocative representation of Kramer’s compositions that span several decades, with influences ranging from Baroque to rock.

The title SENTINELS refers to the standing stones found in Stonehenge, featured in the album art. The bold, prominent horn introduction of BACH meets EsCHeR opens the album with a sense of mystery. This is the first movement of Symphony B-A-C-H, the largest work on the recording. Drawing from his training as a music scholar and theorist as well as a composer, Kramer chose to base each movement of this symphony on an overarching musical texture: the first focuses on polyphony, then monophony, homophony, and finally, cacophony. Everything is a deliberate choice: even the individual notes chosen by Kramer in certain sections can be “decoded” to reveal the names “Bach” and “Escher.”

Next comes A Fivescore Festival, a work commissioned by the City of Kent WA for their Centennial celebration. The piece, a series of four preludes and a rondo, has a spirit of resoluteness which imagines the city marching through successive generations toward the promise of the future. Sentinels of the Dance breaks from the traditionalism of the preceding piece, with the timpani and other instrument sections snarling and biting at each other with spontaneous, syncopated rhythms. Finally comes All in Golden Measure, another commissioned piece—this time for the Jacksonville Symphony Society celebrating the 50th anniversary of their Symphony Orchestra. Appropriately, Kramer chose to integrate the golden ratio into the fabric of this composition. Here, Kramer’s sensitivity to rhythm and timbre allows him to conjure up images of the train whistling through Jacksonville, the hissing of cicadas, and the electric excitement resonating through the summer air from the racetrack.

In SENTINELS, Timothy Kramer demonstrates both his mastery of traditional orchestral composition and his willingness to deviate boldly from those traditions. The album offers an impressive breadth of music that all may still, somehow, be rightly classified together as “orchestral.” Like a great novel or film, this collection invites the listener to listen again, and perhaps pick up a few more compositional gems hidden by Kramer that they had missed the first time.

Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra
Jiří Petrdlík, conductor

Marek Štilec
was born into a Prague musical family on 18 July, 1985. After studying the violin at Prague Conservatoryin the violin class of Dana Vlachová, he became a student of conducting at the Prague Academy of Performing Arts, where his professors were Oliver Dohnányi and Leoš Svárovský.

In March 2010 he was invited by Michael Tilson Thomas to study under the auspices of the San Francisco Symphony. In January 2014 conducted New World Symphony under mentorship of Michael Tilson Thomas. He has attended several masterclasses, including those of Jac van Steen in Belfast (Emerging conductors series) Vladimir Kiradijev in Reichenau, Jorma Panula in Weimar, Achim Holub in Graz and London, Gerd Albrecht in Ahrenshoop, and a Leonid Grin masterclass at the Neeme Järvi Winter Academy. He was assistant to Ch. Zimmerman with the Prague Symphony Orchestra in a project featuring Thomas Hampson. As a respected Czech conductor, he has signed an 8-album contract with NAXOS to record the complete orchestral works of Zdeněk Fibich with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra. The project was first launched in February 2012. He has made recordings for Czech Radio and Czech Television and has recorded three albums on the ArcoDiva label and another album on the Radioservis label with Czech Radio Symphony Orchestra. He has also been recording for Digital Records (Italy). His recordings are broadcast by Czech Radio, BBC and EBU. Marek Štilec made his conducting debut at the age of 18 in a concert broadcast live by Czech Radio.

This album contains no booklet.