About Beyond All Walking - The music's expression ranges from declamatory to lyrical. The large gestures are big indeed, as in the opening. It's a magpie of influences, even contemporary influences, but it adds up to something personal, just as Rachmaninoff's music does. Also, like Rachmaninoff, Scurria's dramatic and lyrical interpenetrate. The singing is intense, slightly melancholy, the drama tinged with tenderness. During my first couple of hearings, I tended to listen to the work as that of a young composer and was impressed by the variety of textures, highlighting and mixing sections, nonetheless part of a real symphonic argument. Very quickly, however, I realized that, young or old, Scurria is one fine composer. Roughly two minutes from the end comes a gorgeous, elegiac chorale for strings - something awfully hard to keep up for that long - capped by a "blue note" in the solo flute for a stunning, if enigmatic conclusion.  (Classical Net) ... read more