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A TAV Curator's Pick.

Three Worlds: Music From Woolf Works, as the name suggests, draws from Richter's score for Wolf Works, a critically acclaimed three-act Royal Ballet production from Wayne McGregor inspired by the works of the influential English writer Virginia Woolf. Described as featuring "a vast palette of sounds—from solo instrumental and orchestral episodes, to electronic textures and music for wordless soprano," the score makes use of themes from three of Woolf's novels, Mrs Dalloway, Orlando and The Waves. It also employs a rare 1937 BBC recording of Woolf reading an essay called "Craftsmanship," reportedly the only surviving recording of Woolf's voice, along with the farewell note she left her husband before committing suicide in 1941, which is read by Gillian Anderson. – Resident Advisor

“Three Worlds is morose and cryptic, like the best Richter. It begins with “Words” containing a beautiful church bell and a sample of Woolf reading. It is tragic, mostly because it’s difficult to hear outside of her painful suicide letter. The calm piano on “In the Garden” which follows contrasts completely, as if to comfort those who know the end of Woolf’s story. The violin accompaniment is simple, but flowering, the passages build and blend and crescendo with ardent movement…

Three Worlds is rewarding as a background record as well as cognitive listening. Richter’s sound is best served without real pictures but paired with your dreams” – Popmatters

“You could easily apply Woolf’s musings on words to music, as after centuries of music-making instruments, notes, chords, styles, genres and sounds are loaded with meaning and memory. But to his credit, Max Richter has crafted something that feels like a timeless nod to the past, and yet an inventive ode to Woolf’s modernism. He has followed up the exceptional Sleep with yet another dazzling work that is “full of echoes, of memories, of associations” that celebrate and reflect this towering writer.” – Drowned In Sound

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