By Allan Kozinn
The New York Times
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Surprises and Delicacies in a Year of Exciting Classical CD's

The classical music critics of The New York Times select the year's most notable CD's

'Fred'
Eighth Blackbird (Cedille).

Frederic Rzewski's musical languages cover the full range of contemporary techniques, from 12-tone and densely pounded clusters to several varieties of Minimalism, but his work virtually always draws its energy from an intense dramatic sense. The ensemble Eighth Blackbird illuminates that quality most vividly in the harrowing "Coming Together" (1971), based on a letter of Sam Melville, a prisoner killed in the rioting at Attica.

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