Douglas Lilburn (1915-2001)
Salutes to Seven Poets

George Enescu (1881-1955)
Sonate dans le caractère populaire roumain

Boris Pigovat (1953-)
Sonate pour alto et piano

Donald Maurice, alto
Rochard Mapp, piano

Each of these three works has a sense of cultural identity and belonging to a physical location. Douglas Lilburn translates into music the sentiments of seven New Zealand poets, each expressing the pioneering experiences of European settlers in the colony. George Enescu portrays the plight of the Lautari of Romania and their endless search for stability in their adopted homeland. Ukrainian-born, Boris Pigovat emigrated to Israel in 1990 and while this sonata doesn’t make specific reference to the Jewish homeland, its music language leaves the listener in little doubt about the composer’s Russian origins and Jewish heritage. In the hands of these three master composers the essence of cultural heritage is raised to something higher than nationhood, into a kind of Nirvana, accessible and uplifting to all human consciousness.