Soundings (Williams)

Reviewing the world premiere, Mark Swed of the Los Angeles Times wrote, "If not strong on musical ideas, Soundings, which opened the program, was strong on sound. It began in silence -- a silence broken by the whirring noise of fans from the television lights (the PBS broadcast is Wednesday). Flutes and percussion then rustled to represent the hall awakening. As he is in film scores, Williams is most successful in creating a sense of expectation." He continued:

Once wide-eyed, the hall, through Williams' score, quivered, trembled, pulsated, throbbed. There were eerie and extravagant effects I couldn't quite identify. Once it sounded as if a battery of glass harmonicas surrounded the audience. Williams cleverly created the amazing illusion of instruments traveling about this listening space. A deep electronic organ note made the ground on which we sat feel alive. (The real organ will be ready next year.)^[1]

However, Zachary Woolfe of The New York Times was considerably less enthusiastic about the piece. Reviewing a 2016 performance at David Geffen Hall, Woolfe described the music as being "thoroughly outclassed" by other works on the program (which included Alberto Ginastera's Piano Concerto No. 1 and Andrew Norman's Play), adding that it was "never less and never more than professional, without a moment of the sparkling originality that permeates the work of Ginastera and Mr. Norman."^[6]

• List of compositions by John Williams