Pavel Burda was easily the best conductor ever of my MUSIC FOR THE BOOK OF KELLS for Five Percussion And
Piano. At the Milwaukee premiere, we are now talking summer of 1990, his reading was startlingly right – a deft and
moving tempo, nimble conducting, the Early Irish argument flowing, sound-explosions properly controlled and
leashed till the exact moments of highest dramatic tension. Great power brandished and wielded with Burda’s gongs
and tam-tam and rhythmic canon with the two big drums and the timps.
Magisterial . Pavel Burda. Immensely moving. Getting on twenty six years now. But that Milwaukee percussion premiere
still sounds. Mighty.