BERNARD HERRMANN (1911-1975): Echoes for String Quartet, Souvenirs de Voyage for Clarinet Quintet, Psycho Suite for String Quartet (arr. Richard Birchall [b.1984]).

Description: The 18-minute Echoes, dating from 1965, sounds as if it could have come straight from a film score; you'll immediately hear Hermann's characteristic voice. As to the much longer quintet: "Written in 1967, Souvenirs comes out of the same chest of drawers as Herrmann's score to Alfred Hitchcock's "Vertigo." (It even quotes it once or twice, or close enough.) In three slow movements and lasting thirty minutes, itcasts a moody spell not unlike those long scenes in "Vertigo" when James Stewart follows Kim Novak around the streets of San Francisco, or when the two fall into a kind of melancholy love." - Timothy Mangan, Orange County Register (and former fellow Tower employee way back down Memory Lane); couldn't put it any better than that! Birchall, a rising young cellist, provides a nine-minute potpourri from Psycho which doesn't lack much punch compared to the original which, of course, was for strings only. Julian Bliss (clarinet), Tippett Quartet.