Cindy McTee (b. 1953) is married to Leonard Slatkin, a fact that no doubt helps to explain the existence of this very well conducted and played disc. McTee is a lucky lady, and hopefully Slatkin feels that he is a lucky guy. You can only wish them well. From a compositional standpoint, however, this music is about as derivative as it gets—indeed, proudly so. The notes by the composer mention borrowings from Penderecki, Barber, Ravel, Stravinsky, and Ives, not to mention jazz and ballet more generally. The music is mostly tonal, sometimes not, and consists largely of percussive outbursts alternating with quasi-melodic motives over rhythmic ostinatos.
Einstein’s Dream contains computer music, and represents a tribute to the “miracle year” of 1905 where, McTee tells us, Einstein wrote “three important papers on quantum theory.” Actually, it was four important papers, and only one of them had anything to do with quantum theory (the paper on the photoelectric effect), but I guess it’s the thought that counts. I also don’t understand what Einstein’s efforts to unravel the laws of nature have to do with computer-generated sound effects. Never mind.
In keeping with so much contemporary music, most of the pieces have cute titles. Indeed, even the titles have titles. For example, “Light Fantastic” is the scherzo of the First Symphony, which is also subtitled “Ballet for Orchestra”; “Unquestioned Answer” and “Tempus Fugit” feature in Double Play, and there are many more of these titles in both the symphony and the other works, some of them quite pretentious and silly (“The Frantic Dance of Subatomic Particles”). The best piece, clearly, is Circuits, which is also the shortest.
The real question is where, in all of this verbal byplay and referential gesticulation, is McTee’s own music. Frankly, I have no idea. There isn’t a shred of distinctive or really compelling compositional work anywhere on this disc. This is purely my personal reaction, but like so many contemporary musicians, McTee seems to spend far too much time on the ephemera of music—what to call it, who it sounds like, placing herself in history—and not nearly enough on simply writing a compelling piece when taken on its own terms. This may be for you, but it’s not for me.
