Paul Cohen: Nightfalls and Midnight Revels
Ravello Records

In his many recordings and performances with orchestral and chamber ensembles, New York-based Paul Cohen has done much to advance the cause of the saxophone within the classical music field. His enthusiastic advocacy for new music continues on Nightfalls and Midnight Revels, which augments a work from 1932 with four composed during the last half-decade. The early one, Wolfgang Jacobi's Kleine Stucke, is in one sense new too as it was only recently discovered and is presented here as a premiere recording. Dovetailing neatly with the titular theme are Peter Lurye's Nocturnes and Richard Auldon Clark's Midsummer Suite, while John Sichel's Piano Saxophone Quintet and Steve Cohen's Fiveplay round out the set. Trio, quartet, and quintet arrangements appear, with Cohen playing Conn-O-Sax and soprano and alto saxes and joined by pianists, string players, and fellow saxophonists.

Among his accomplishments, Cohen has performed with the Metropolitan Opera, New York Philharmonic, and San Francisco Symphony and is on faculty at the Manhattan School of Music and Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University. He's published more than 100 articles about the saxophone and released many albums, including Common Ground (2018), New York Rising (2019), Heard Again for the First Time (2021), and Center Chamber (2022). He's known for rediscovering lost saxophone works and is respected as an arranger also. His partners on the new release are a distinguished bunch, with pianists Allison Brewster Franzetti and Anna Keiserman, violinists Brennan Sweet and Urara Mogi, violist Richard Auldon Clark, cellist Luke Krafka, and saxophonists Jarod Apple (soprano, alto), Yvette Sakow (tenor), and Yo yo Su (baritone, C Khylbass) taking part. Interestingly, Clark contributes to the release as both performer and composer.

Of course the album's primary discovery is Kleine Stucke by the Germany-born Jacobi (1894–1972), whose writing stylistically recalls Paul Hindemith's (interestingly, Jacobi wasn't a formal student of his, but he did receive feedback about his compositions from Hindemith). Jacobi enjoyed success in the early ‘30s; however, his Jewish background resulted in his music being banned by the Nazis and from public performance, and he also lost his position teaching at the Berlin Conservatory. After meeting the young saxophonist Sigurd Rascher in Berlin in the early '30s, he was encouraged to write for the saxophone, with a number of pieces appearing before WWII and even after (1961's Concerto for Saxophone and Orchestra). Kleine Stücke was not publicly performed until the spring of 2023 in New York City with David Baker on alto. For this rendition, Cohen's joined by Franzetti and Sweet, with the distinct contrasts between saxophone, piano, and violin making for a sonorous and mellifluous performance. The work engages from the start, especially when Cohen's alto handily evokes the mid-twentieth century European chamber music period and with Jacobi sprinkling a bit of Weill-styled playfulness into the work's four short movements—the ominous chill of the “Adagio” aside, that is.

Lurye, a classical composer as well as songwriter and composer for television, film, and music theatre (The Magic School Bus, My Life As A Teenage Robot, etc.) is represented by the three-part Nocturnes, a musical adventure that places Cohen's soprano sax, Mogi's violin, Krafka's cello, and Clark's viola within an idyllic moonlit setting. Lurye's is one of the album's most appealing works for its beguiling tone and dream-like aura; the central “Singing to the Moon” is particularly endearing for its romantic and lyrical qualities, not to mention the beauty of the quartet's absorbing performance. Sprinkles of jazz and even klezmer find their way into “Midnight Revels,” a romp that sees goblins peeking out from behind every tree.

New York-based Steve Cohen has produced a large body of symphonic, chamber, liturgical, and musical-theatre pieces plus many for saxophone. His Fiveplay was composed in 2019 as a single-movement work for oboe, alto sax, horn, bassoon, and piano, but at Paul's request a three-part version for saxophone quartet and piano was created. Fiveplay impresses as a particularly sophisticated illustration of chamber music writing, from its dignified “Andante moderato” and serenading “Lento” (note the lovely saxophone chorale that introduces it) to its infectiously rousing “Allegro agitato,” and the partnering of piano and saxophone quartet reaps tremendous rewards.

Scored for alto saxophone and string trio, Clark's Midsummer Suite celebrates the Wiccan holiday in three movements and partners Cohen on alto sax with Mogi, Krafka, and Clark. As the four work their way through the material, don't be surprised if images of late-night forest revelries involving feasting, singing, and dancing are conjured. In the twelve-minute piece, movements mercurial and festive, “Solstice” and “St. John's Fire,” frame a haunting tonal painting at the centre, “Eclipse.” Piano Saxophone Quintet by Sichel, Professor of Music at Raritan Valley Community College, concludes the release with a divertimento that's largely tonal yet based on a tone row. Scored for piano and saxophone quartet, the performance features Cohen playing Conn-O-Sax throughout. The contrasts between five saxophone types—Cohen's, plus soprano, alto, tenor, and baritone—bolster the impact of the stately “Prelude.” Whereas “Fugue” unfolds according to an elaborate plan that includes slow and fast episodes, “An Utterly Disreputable March” caps the work (and album) with a sardonic and sinuous romp inspired by a scene from Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita.

September 2025