MORTEN LAURIDSEN--A LYRIC APPROACH

A reluctant urbanite, Morten Lauridsen is a composer who escapes the city whenever possible and retreats to “my shack” on Waldron Island, one of the 150 San Juan Islands just inside the United States border in the Strait of Georgia, and off the northernmost coast of Washington.

There, says Lauridsen, he chooses his projects and prepares to compose. The actual composition is done when the writer returns to California.

Five years ago, Lauridsen’s project was a commission from USC, where he teaches, for a work intended for the USC Chamber Singers, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the university.

“I took all kinds of poetry to the island that summer,” recalls the 42-year-old composer, who grew up in Oregon, and who says, “I have the Northwest in my blood.”

A volume by Robert Graves captured his attention, Lauridsen recalls, and soon he was reading Graves’ collected works.

“He deals a lot with winter, and some of his themes--of love, nature and winter--appealed to me particularly. I chose six poems for my ‘Mid-Winter Songs.’ ”

“Mid-Winter Songs,” conducted by Rodney Eichenberger, was given its premiere performance at USC in 1981; attending that performance was Robert Duerr, who immediately commissioned an orchestral version of the piano part.

Duerr then introduced that version of the work at a concert by his Pasadena Chamber Orchestra and Chorus in April, 1983. Attending that performance were members of the board of the Los Angeles Master Chorale, who recommended the work to Roger Wagner.

Saturday night at 8, in the Pavilion of the Music Center, Wagner will conduct Lauridsen’s “Mid-Winter Songs” on the concert opening the 22nd season of the Master Chorale.

“My aims in writing the work,” says Lauridsen, “were to create something flattering for the Chamber Singers, and something they would enjoy singing again and again. Also, that listeners would respond to. So I used a more direct style of writing, a style that actually fits Graves’ poetry, which is itself so direct.

“Written for an excellent chorus, the piece is quite challenging, especially in the rhythmic sense. I have used a lot of major seconds and ninths, intervals I regard as ‘warm.’ But all my musical materials come out of a response to the poetry and its style.”

Returning to the city after three months on his island, the composer says, “I hit the ground running, and usually turn out one extended piece before January.” This year he is writing a song-cycle (on poems of Edna St. Vincent Millay) for USC alumna Juliana Gondek. The American soprano will give the world premiere of the cycle at Ambassador Auditorium, in April, 1986.

NEW MUSIC AMERICA, PART II: In weekday matinees scheduled in the Arnold Schoenberg Institute at USC at the civilized hour of five o’clock, pianist David Burge, double bassist Bertram Turetzky and clarinetist David Ocker offer recitals of new works on the continuing festival called New Music America.

Burge will play works by Corniun Aharonian, William Albright, George Crumb, Alfred Fisher, Kamran Ince and Graciela Paraskevaidis , Monday afternoon. Tuesday, Turetzky offers an agenda devoted to pieces by Barney Childs, Ornette Coleman, Jon Deak, Julio Estrada, Turetzky and Christian Wolff.

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Philharmonic New Music Group opens its fifth season with a non-subscription but festival-related concert Monday night in Japan America Theatre.

Its program, titled “FutureTrends ,” lists three world premieres and a first West coast performances. With CalArts composer-conductor Stephen Mosko on the podium, the ensemble will present first performances of Rand Steiger’s “Fanfare/erafnaF ,” Ivan Tcherepnin’s “The New Rhythmantics” and L. Subramaniam’s Concerto for Indian violin and orchestra.”

More highlights of the week: An appearance by Scott Johnson and Ensemble, on the “Explorations” series at Japan America Theatre, Wednesday night at 8. Three short operas by Carla Bley, Philip Glass and Paul Dresher, Friday night at 8 in the Mark Taper Forum at the Music Center.

MUSICIANS: Composer Philip Glass, whose “A Madrigal Opera” will receive a concert performance at the Mark Taper Forum on Friday night (see above), will lecture on “The Making of an Opera,” at noon on Wednesday in Bovard Auditorium at USC. . . . Jesus Lopez-Cobos has been named music director of the Cincinnati Symphony, effective in September; the Spanish conductor, currently holding posts at the Deutsche Oper of West Berlin, the Spanish National Orchestra and the London Philharmonic, has signed a four-year contract with the Ohio ensemble. . . . Franco (formerly Frank) Collura, formerly music director of the Santa Barbara Symphony, has been named resident guest conductor of the Phoenix Symphony for the 1985-86 season.