Reviews

(Journeys MSR Classics 1306)
(Additional reviews of this CD can be found on the AMAZON website)

If ever there was a CD to put on at the end of a trying day, accompanied by a glass of wine and one's favorite slippers, this is it...In today's world it is a rare treat...(Baksa's) music is tonal, or more precisely modal, with the merest hint of cool jazz harmony woven into the neoclassical procedures.  It demands the highest level of musicianship yet always sounds grateful to play. The other quiet achievement of Baksa's music is that it doesn't sound derivative...generally this composer's work is free from cliche, calculated effects, or second-hand gestures.  It has real integrity, or perhaps the word is humanity...I see that my review has turned into a rave.  Good.  An unobtrusive release like this is liable to get lost among the umpteen reissues, photoshopped Wundekinder and big showy productions, but such agreeable, intimate music-making deserves to be noticed and enjoyed.
Phillip Scott, July/August 2010 Fanfare

Robert Baksa is a 72-year-old composer who's lived in Kinderhook for about 10 years. In 2008, the Diamond Opera Theatre of Hudson performed his one-act opera "Red Carnations." He writes deceptively simple yet inherently beautiful music, as displayed in the new collection "Journeys" (MSR Classics). The performances are by Annette Heim, flute, and Bret Heim, guitar, two artists from Alabama who've taken an obvious shine to Baksa's music.

The series of three sonatas has a fluent grace in the writing and a pitch-perfect ease in the performances. In the disc's finale, "Celestials," everything comes together into something more evocative, with movements that depict scenes of weather. Even Baksa's depictions of wind and rain storms are inviting.
Joseph Dalton is a regular contributor to the Times Union. Mar,21, 2010

(Journeys MSR Classics 1306)
If you love romantic melody and the sound of wind and guitar, this is a must have recording. If you find the technical aspects of music alluring, then the unrelenting and difficult passages of the "Sonata for Flute and Guitar" will give you more than enough reason to cheer the resilience of the talented players

All in all, here is a cherishable collection of modern musical delights and it's lyrical and it's challenging and it's worth any number of hearings.  Each one brings you something new.
J.Peter Bergman, Chatham Currier, January 14, 2010

(Journeys MSR Classics 1306)
CD by composer Robert Baksa, "Journeys." Features music for solo guitar, flute/guitar duo, and flute/viola/guitar trio, performed by the Heim Duo with violist Christine Bock. This is the kind of music that I am always looking to broadcast- smart, well-written,
and accessible music. The ease, melodicism and variety of Baksa makes it sound like he has a rare natural gift for composition.
Tony Morris, Classical Guitar Alive, Dec. 28, 2009

[Walking the Dog Theater Company and Diamond Opera Company of Hudson, NY]
"...a joint production of a one act 1925 play and a one act opera with a libretto based on the play by composer Robert Baksa proved to be a big hit.

The collaboration...did something unique in the world of theater and opera, by bringing "Red Carnations" both as a play and an opera to the public. Together they made a wonderful evening's entertainment.

"Red Carnations" is Baksa's second opera. Knowing and enjoying his music for many years one wondered what his opera would be like. It is a masterful work. ....This combination production is so splendid that it should go on national tour to a wide public."
John Paul Keeler, Register-Star, Sunday, May 25, 2008

[Letters from Emily Volume I of Sixteen new songs to Poems of Emily Dickinson]
"That there seems to be no "definitive" setting of any of Dickinson's poems reveals the multiplicity of meanings in her work that allows for a fresh insight or interpretation by each individual reader. Where Copland's settings emphasize the spaciousness of Dickenson's voice, Baksa reveals her personal intimacy with her subjects.  Where Copland's songs project the emotions of the poems outward as unto a large screen, Baksa's look inward to the private stirrings of the heart--drama versus lyricism...

Baksa's compositional style in these songs is based on choosing one or two musical motifs for the piano part that reflect or represent the main idea of the poem and using them creatively and expressively throughout the song...

The voice brings the text to life in flowing vocal lines that are enhanced by the musical fabric that the piano weaves for each song...the melodic lines are expressive of the words."
Judith Carmen, Journal of Singing March/April 2008

[Romance for Viola and Piano, Duo Sonata for Violin and Viola, Occasional Variations for Violin and Piano, Violin Sonata, Viola Sonata]
On Sunday ...a gala concert of the music of Columbia County Composer Robert Baksa was held to celebrate his 70th Birthday. Baksa is a one of a kind original composer in the period of the end of the 20^th and beginning of the present Century ... Baksa is out of the loop of Academe ...[and}...remains free of all the fetters of officialdom. He is a true independent artist who dares to write real music. All the elements of the best in Western music are part of his musical palette. His music in Neo Nothing but pure Baksa.

After intermission the most impressive work of the afternoon was the masterful “Violin Sonata of 2002”The first movement was called flowing and it sure did flow with fabulous sweep and lyricism. The second movement titled “calm” impressed as a deeply touching poignant quasi reciative of the soul to the heart of the beloved. The work ended with upbeat brilliance. The concert ended with a “Viola Sonata” which was a dramatic, poetic and joyful romp. The last movement titled “Joyous” had a flamboyant Hungarian flavor......The audience loved the program and ovations abounded
John Paul Keeler REGISTER-STAR, February 15, 2008

[Dallas Opera Apprentice tour]
"If the rousing applause the [singers] have received after almost every production of (Baksa"s)  Red Carnations is any indication, the Dallas Opera doesn't have to worry about its future."
Dallas Morning News May 2, 2006

[Housman Songs, Emily Dickinson Songs]
"Soprano Mary Hack and Baritone Keith Spencer gave a recital featuring the wonderful songs of American composer Robert Baksa...One of the chief pleasures of the afternoon was the composer telling the audience how he came to write the songs and of his interest in the poetry of both Emily Dickinsons and A.E.Housman.  Baksa, in his charming way, became the star of the afternoon."
John Paul Keeler REGISTER-STAR

[Sonata da Giardino solo Guitar]
  "While the garden alluded to in the title of Robert Baksa's Sonata da Giardino is not depicted in any programmatic way, its spirit is conveyed through the emotional exuberance of this robust music...it does augment an area of repertory in which the guitar is particularly deficient--the formal, multimovement sonata. .. the vocabulary of this work is likely the most readily accessible of the scores discussed in this review..."
Calvin Elliker, Music Library_ Notes, March 2001