Sono Luminus, together with the Baton Rouge Symphony Chamber Players, brings together the works of three contemporary composers in this latest release.

The son of a cantor, Kurt Weill was born in Dessau into a family that took in operatic performances as a main form of entertainment. When Weill was in his teens, the director of the Dessau Hoftheater, Albert Bing, encouraged him in the study of music. Weill briefly studied composition with Engelbert Humperdinck and was already working professionally as a conductor when he attended composer Ferruccio Busoni’s master classes in Berlin. Delighted to see the positive responses of an audience to his first collaboration with playwright Georg Kaiser, Der Protagonist (1926), he thereafter resolved to work toward accessibility in his music.

French composer Jacques Ibert was born in Paris August 15, 1890. His father was a financier, his mother an accomplished pianist. She began his musical training when he was four years old, and despite his father’s objection, continued to encourage his ambition to become a musician. Upon returning from his wartime duties in the French Navy during World War I, he resumed his conservatory training, and in 1919 won the Prix de Rome for his cantata Le Poete et la Fee. His navy service in the Mediterranean gave rise to his arguably most famous composition, the 1924 symphonic suite Ports of Call (Escales). He continued to compose for virtually every genre, including seven operas, six symphonic works and five ballets, three choral works, plus scores of incidental pieces, songs, concertos and scores for films.

Alban Berg is one of the central figures of twentieth century musical composition. As one of the triumvirate of the Second Viennese School, Berg produced a rather small body of work that is nonetheless distinguished by a strongly Romantic aesthetic and a distinctive dramatic sense.

The Baton Rouge Symphony Chamber Players is a collection of talented artists taken from the larger parent group, the Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra. Celebrating its 63rd year, the Baton Rouge Symphony Orchestra has become an ambassador for the arts in the greater Baton Rouge region and neighbouring communities. The BRSO currently offers over 40 concerts a year, bringing in internationally-known guest artists and offering a broad range of programs to the people of the area.