La Folia reviews Arthur Berger: Words for Music, Perhaps

BMOP expands the Berger discography with chamber music. The three Yeats poems require female voice plus trio of flute, clarinet and cello. Chamber Music and Septet make explicit their numbers. Berger’s notes reveal his struggles to forge an American serial style outside of Stravinsky’s influence. Chamber Music is one of the results of that development, an elegant combination which looks to Webern. Profoundly evident in these lucid works is Berger’s splendid handling of sonority. As befits their titles, the three Collage reassemble older works for different instruments. Collage I and II ask for flute, clarinet, violin, cello and piano; III adds percussion. They repurpose a wind quintet and four-hand piano piece respectively, discovering bright textures.