In Sunday’s (5/3) Anchorage Daily News (Alaska), Mike Dunham writes, “Alaska lost a musical treasure when band man Curtiss Blake died with his wife and daughter in July 2004, in a small plane crash that also killed the pilot. … But he never got around to orchestrating an early sonata for horn, probably written while he was a student at the University of Minnesota. That task fell to his friend Dan Heynen. Heynen discovered the piece while helping sort through Blake’s office after the fatal crash. The finished product, with Heynen as soloist, will debut as a horn concerto at Saturday’s concert by the Anchorage Civic Orchestra. Heynen describes the work as tonal, if a bit scholarly. … The program will also feature a timely overture by Hong Kong composer Daniel Law, inspired by the late SARS outbreak in Asia and the heroic efforts of medical personnel to bring it under control.” Dvorak’s “New World” Symphony wraps up the program.
Posted May 7, 2009
