Since 2018, The Merian Ensemble has garnered accolades in Atlanta for evocative thematic programming centering music by women composers. Comprised of Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Musicians Christina Smith (flute), Emily Brebach (oboe/English Horn), Marci Gurnow (clarinets), Jessica Oudin (viola), and Elisabeth Remy Johnson (harp), the ensemble’s past seasons have blended works by historical composers from Mel Bonis to Florence Price with contemporary luminaries, including Allison Loggins-Hull and Jessie Montgomery. Their debut album, The Book of Spells (Navona, 2024) features world-premiere recordings of pieces commissioned or arranged by the ensemble. Delivering exceptional chamber performances, the album is a strong representation of Merian’s compelling musicianship and curatorial approach.
Several novel commissions from luminaries in the orchestral world anchor the album. On Clarice Assad’s The Book of Spells, The Merian Ensemble creates scintillating textures that spin compelling narratives. The first movement, “Love and Relationships,” recasts the siren’s stereotypically gendered call as otherworldly bass clarinet and viola tremolos. Gurnow and Oudin render these as an alluring challenge to the ominous rhythms and eerie melodies from the rest of the ensemble. In “Wealth and Prosperity: Spell of Summon Greed,” Johnson conjures a menacing harp solo encircled by breathy exhales and metallic scraping sounds.
The inclusion of Assad’s harp solo Solais later on the album gives space for the full breadth of her writing and Johnson’s harp playing, which sensitively handles styles ranging from lyrical to experimental across the album. The first two chapters of The Book of Spells find tension in gender and greed, but the final chapter, “Health and Well-Being: A Spell for Global Healing,” resolves these ambivalences through a full ensemble texture where vast, deep long tones complement spritely melodies.
Clarice Assad–Photo by Marcelo Macaue
Commissioned by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, works by Jennifer Higdon and Soon Hee Newbold offer chamber pieces that extend each composer’s distinct orchestral style. Higdon’s The Sound of Light refines her approach to tone color, and Merian’s timbral and melodic subtly is on full display in the captivating impressionistic writing, particularly Brebach’s sensitive oboe playing. Newbold’s Alis Volat Propriis (“She Flies with her Own Wings”) offers a short series of musical studies on Shakespeare’s female characters, and Merian is again at home in this piece – creating depth in soaring melodies passed across the ensemble, and finding playfulness in madrigals and rhythmic dance melodies.
Many of the album’s interesting character pieces emerge from relationships with instrument organizations and special commissioning projects. Commissioned with funds from PRS Foundation and the American Harp Association (which also commissioned Assad’s Book of Spells), Lynne Plowman’s Small World renders cardinal directions as unique instrumental characters. Just Another Climb, part of Kimberly R. Osborg’s early Covid pandemic Project 12 series, dramatizes the first group of women to ascend the Grand Tetons in 1939. Well known to the National Flute Association, Nicole Chamberlain’s Atalanta shifts in and out of tango idioms to find the connection between the adventurous Greek heroine and Atlanta’s annual Peachtree 10k. Smith’s use of flute extended techniques stands out here, especially when the ensemble creates pointillistic, timbrally-varied melodies as exhaustion sets in and the tango breaks apart.
Leilehua Lanzilotti — Photo by Laura Banchi, courtesy of the Bogliasco Foundation
In addition to Assad’s work, Merian excels in other pieces that push outside of traditional orchestral and instrumental conventions into novel forms and experimental sounds. Johnson’s arrangement of Mary Kouyoumdjian’s A Boy and a Makeshift Toy for harp and viola hauntingly recasts the Albanian folk traditions Kouyoumdjian uses to evoke the experience of refugees during the 1999 Kosovo War. On the otherwise melodically driven album, Leilehua Lanzilotti’s meridian offers a quiet, rare, but utterly arresting atmospheric and timbral meditation on transformation. Oudin shines on both of these pieces, deftly shifting from wistful melodies to whispy harmonics and expansive arpeggios.
The Book of Spells is a strong debut from an outstanding group of soloists with a distinct collaborative spirit that translates into excellent chamber playing. What lingers in listening to the album is the reason why the ensemble began in the first place. In their words, they aspire to “offer a finely drawn portrait of 21st century chamber music” while also “highlighting the still-under-represented voices of women.” The range of styles and commissioning partners demonstrate a robust approach that feels rare within orchestral contemporary classical music. In this sense, the Merian Ensemble offers more than music: they provide an example of a sorely needed model that orchestras can scale up for regular season symphonic programming to equitably support the people who make music.
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