CLASSICAL

• Alvin Singleton

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"After Fallen Crumbs" and other works. Atlanta Symphony Orchestra. First Edition Music. 46 minutes.

Grade: B+

Brooklyn-born Alvin Singleton came to Atlanta in 1985, after Robert Shaw tapped him as the ASO's composer in residence. The gig lasted three years; he's lived in Midtown ever since and remains the city's most esteemed classical composer. In 1989 the ASO released an excellent disc of Singleton's orchestral music, on Nonesuch. Long out of print, the CD is now reissued on First Editions, a label devoted to forgotten American music.

At 22 minutes, "Shadows" is the big work in time and substance. The opening is quiet and brooding, a mist of imprecise images. It's hard to tell if it's heading for joy or despair. Slowly, patterns emerge that are distinct but nicely layered, one on top of the next as a sort of passacaglia. Once these small tunes are deeply etched into our ears, the composer cranks it up. What starts as a meditation explodes into a funky, emotion-laden kind of dance. Audience-friendly yet raw, it's a small masterpiece.

"After Fallen Crumbs," dedicated to the memory of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., starts with big, bleating brass, then gets smaller. There's a curious twist in this six-minute score: insistent timpani strokes compete with the main story line, as if someone were urgently knocking on the door and the dinner guests inside ignored it, as if Death himself were trying to enter. "A Yellow Rose Petal," Singleton's first large orchestra work, contrasts fragile phrases with the bullying power of the full orchestra — exhilarating at its best moments.

— Pierre Ruhe