Without Borders

“The latter works, …from 1986-87 are lovely. These include the piano sonata (played by Anthony de Mare) that is both expansive and concentrated, and a richly detailed percussion piece (“Shattered Glass,” performed by Michael Pugliese). The capper is “Telepathy” an engaging, three-movement “poetry/music suite” done in collaboration with writer Thulani Davis, who declaims her poems with exquisite cool.”
—San Francisco Chronicle, May 28, 1989

“These first recordings by New York composer Bernadette Speach are, as the title suggests, not easily classified. Firmly in the academic tradition, several are spare, elegant studies (the three “Pensées” for guitar, “Trajet” for trombone and percussion), others more active but essentially closed in their compositional limits. In remarkable contrast to the reflective solo pieces, “Telepathy” bristles with wit and loose-jointed, almost-jazz scenes from a quintet.”
—Dan Mayron, Option Magazine

“Speach, a Morton Feldman protégé, often captures the suspended dynamism and coloristic vision of her mentor, but the work is further infused with her own considerable musical personality. Particularly notable are the sensitive performances of Pensées by guitarist Jeffrey Schanzer (Speach’s husband), percussionist Michael Pugliese’s adept reading of “Shattered Glass” and the Bowery Ensemble’s focused rendition of “Moto”; this latter work is outstanding among the pieces collected here.”
—Jeff Talman, Ear Magazine

“At forty-one, Speach is one of the movers and shakers of the New York music world. She was a student of the late Morton Feldman; her music tends to be made up of soft repeated gestures and simple contrasts of sonorities. On the other hand, her rhythm is very unFeldmanish, precise in its pulsations, yet with a tendency to pause before changing directions. The performers are among New York’s and Buffalo’s best new music specialists. Good variety here within an introspective yet active personality we hadn’t heard from before, and highly recommended.”
—Kyle Gann, Fanfare