John Adams has a closer relationship with the San Francisco Symphony than any other orchestra so it's fitting that Michael Tilson Thomas's band should release superb recordings of two of Adams's finest orchestral pieces to mark its centenary. The 1985 symphony Harmonielehre is Adams's most overt attempt to reconcile his newfound American minimalism with his deep immersion in European Modernism. Tilson Thomas, himself, commnissioned the quintessential minimalist classic Short Ride in a Fast Machine a year later. Performances are supremely clear, cogent and virtuosic.

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