This bargain CD enables listener to access some of the finest impressionisticAmerican orchestral works ever composed, which deserve a much better place in American music history and appreciation. © Audiophile Audition Read complete review

This reissued recording of Deems Taylor’s work is apparently the only one available, and it is excellent. The engineering is rich and atmospheric. © 2013 American Record Guide Read complete review on American Record Guide

Deems Taylor comes first on the program, with his half-hour suite Through the Looking Glass. There’s bubbly good cheer throughout…

Both here and in the Taylor work the performances are uniformly splendid: extremely well played, and just about perfectly conducted regarding tempo, texture, and balance. Scott Goff plays the flute solo in the Poem with finesse and lovely tone.

A great disc for collectors of turn-of-the-(20th)-century Americana. © 2012 ClassicsToday.com Read complete review

It is the Seattle Symphony under Gerard Schwarz that tackles orchestral works by Deems Taylor and Charles Tomlinson Griffes—and very well, too. The underlying Romantic sensibility of all the compositions makes them easy and pleasant to listen…with Taylor’s Through the Looking Glass a particular joy: each of its five sections portrays elements of Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland…it is nevertheless pleasant and appropriately ebullient. The five Griffes works on the disc all have Impressionistic elements and well-painted orchestral colors. There is particular richness in the Poem for Flute and Orchestra, with Scott Goff floating his notes elegantly above the ensemble. Three Tone Pictures is a set of landscapes, while The White Peacock is lyrical and poetic. Griffes offers some Oriental exoticism in The Pleasure Dome of Kublai Khan, and he combines that with propulsive intensity in the short Bacchanale, which makes a fine encore at the end of the CD. The disc…has good sound as well as fine playing, and provides yet another opportunity for today’s listeners to hear music that, if not exactly modern at this point, is certainly unfamiliar—and a welcome change from the standard repertoire that continues to dominate concert halls. © 2012 Infodad.com Read complete review