John Adams - Hallelujah Junction (2008)

The two-disc Hallelujah Junction serves as a compelling soundtrack and companion piece to composer John Adam’s forthcoming memoir of the same name, to be published this October in the UK by Faber and Faber. The 2003 Pulitzer Prize-winning composer proves to be equally gifted as an author, candidly recounting the wanderlust-fuelled story of his life to date and charting the evolution of his extraordinary career, often with more humility than gravity and an ample supply of humour. Adams also examines the work of the artists who have inspired and/or influenced him, or whom he has simply admired, from Duke Ellington to John Cage to Terry Riley to Brian Wilson. A young man of modest means but immense talent, unrelenting drive and more than a little anti-establishment attitude, Adams searched, and at times struggled, for years to find his unique voice as a composer. The early chapters of his story unfold against a colourful backdrop of social, cultural and political upheaval during the late sixties and early seventies, from the lecture halls of Harvard to the streets of San Francisco. For Adams, the hypnotically minimalist approach of the Northern Californian Riley’s In C was “marvellously provocative,” but minimalism became more jumping-off point for Adams than destination, as the wide-ranging material assembled on this collection illustrates.

The Hallelujah Junction compilation also functions as an eloquent, stand-alone survey of Adams’ more than twenty-year affiliation with Nonesuch Records, opening with Part One of his 1986 label debut, Harmonielehre. Included are excerpts from his groundbreaking and controversial “docu-operas,” Nixon In China and The Death of Klinghoffer, as well as a piece from his latest Nonesuch release, the fairy tale-inspired opera, The Flowering Tree. Also featured are portions of his Los Angeles-themed musical theatre work, I Was Looking At the Ceiling And Then I Saw the Sky and his holiday oratorio, El Niño, which many forward-thinking regional symphonies have turned into a perennial holiday offering. Readers of Adams’ memoir will particularly appreciate the inclusion of the first movement from Shaker Loops; Adams describes the initial debut of this now-classic piece in near-slapstick fashion as he battles a hangover, confronts a nest of bees, and lands in the emergency room all before he can make it to a dress rehearsal of the still-in-gestation work. Concluding the CD set is Dharma At Big Sur, Part One, a “heartbreakingly beautiful work” (The Wall Street Journal) that Adams regards as a kind of purely musical autobiography.

Adam’s memoir and this CD set, taken together, offer the most comprehensive look at Adams’ process as a composer – his breakthroughs, his triumphs, his failures -- conveyed in a fashion that will be engrossing both to the casual reader/listener and the serious music student. As the New Yorker’s Alex Ross has put it, Adams “has won his eminence fair and square; he has addressed life as it is lived now, and he has found a language that makes sense to a wide audience.”