Symphony Vigil
This nearly 50-minute-long symphony forms the third part of a larger work calledTridium--a triptych inspired by the Easter holiday.  The first two panels--The World's Ransomingand theCello Concerto--are also available from the same forces, and it's typical of BIS's commitment to good contemporary music that they would present the entire project complete to interested listeners.  MacMillan's general program in all of these works is an increasingly urgent confrontation between "darkness" and "light," and musically speaking he accomplishes this with an often naive musical symbolism (dark low instruments versus bright high ones, with brass fanfares well to the fore) that for some listeners may wear thin well before the symphony finally ends.  There's no denying, however, the music's urgency or the sophistication of MacMillan's compositional technique, and this disc will certainly reward anyone who admires the composer, or who enjoyed the first two parts of this ambitious Easter meditation.--David Hurwitz