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Praise for Douglas J. Cuomo’s Black Diamond Express Train to Hell

Jan. 11, 2011

Douglas J. Cuomo’s Black Diamond Express Train to Hell premiered at the American Composers Orchestra last month under the direction of George Manahan with cellist Maya Beiser and the work has already earned overwhelming praise from critics.

With its richly metaphorical language (warning of a hellbound train making stops at Deceiversville and Drunkardsville), the sermon is a musical mix of speech and song. Mr. Cuomo chops up and repeats words and phrases to create a vocal part around which the orchestra plays fractured marches, bursting chords and spans of astringent harmonies.
- Anthony Tommasini, New York Times

… the big success of the program was Black Diamond Express Train to Hell, by Douglas J. Cuomo. Black Diamond... is jolting, haunting, varied, infectious. Frankly, it is ingenious. The woman near me even put down her knitting for a minute. That’s how arresting the music was. Black Diamond Express is very well crafted, and not a moment too long (or too short). I quote the late Earl Wild: “Music ought to say what it has to say, and get off the stage.” Amen. I might also note that Cuomo’s piece could easily get cute with religion, or mock it. My feeling was, it does not.
-Jay Nordlinger, newcriterion.com

Black Diamond… sees its European Premiere in the UK on May 27 by the Orchestra of the Swan who commissioned the work alongside the American Composers Orchestra.

More information can be found on Douglas J. Cuomo at www.douglasjcuomo.com and www.schott-music.com.

Douglas J. Cuomo
Black Diamond Express Train to Hell (2010)
for solo cello, keyboard and orchestra
1(pic)1.1.1-1.1.1.0-timp.2perc-hp-sampler-str
16’

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