Search - Randall Woolf, Julian Allen, Kitty Brazelton :: Randall Woolf: Where the Wild Things Are - Ballet (based on Maurice Sendak's book)

Maurice Sendak's influential children's book Where the Wild Things Are is given its second classical music treatment on this disc (an opera by Oliver Knussen is also available). Composer Randall Woolf's score for the American Repertory Ballet is filled with oddball touches and hints of jazz and funk. Voices heard through synthesizers add to the sonic strangeness, typically ending a track with the distorted sounds of a scolding parent. But for all the genre-fusing going on here, there are also gorgeous passages; the minimalism found in the electric-violin passage during "Max gets homesick and departs" is convincing, as is the nervous energy on track two ("Max misbehaves"). Images from the children's book and the ballet production grace the liner notes. This may be a far cry from Swan Lake, but fans of Sendak or modern ballet should check out this fun music. --Jason Verlinde