Michael Kurth's chamber music reveals the kind of upfront compositions for which Kurth is best known. His music is simple without being simplistic, yet sophisticated without being gratuitously complex. The music is exceptionally approachable, but there is also much musical and compositional depth. Kurth has a penchant for tango that is expressed in several works on the CD, and his arrangements of traditional tunes, Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child and Be Thou My Vision, take them musically far beyond what typical church arrangers do. Only one track asks for more than string quartet by including classical guitar, Kurth's sole arrangement on the CD of music by another living composer: Richard Clegg's Bells of the Solstice. Although it hardly includes everything he has written, this new Riverside CD is an easy one-hour exploration of Kurth's self-acknowledged populist approach to composing chamber music. It won't leave either the traditional classical sophisticate nor the average classical music fan disappointed. --Artsatl.com

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