December 2000
21st Century Music's Brian Bice's review of Bowling Green State University's 21st Annual New Music and Art Festival writes:
"Two Bryant Songs, by Joe L. Alexander, are based on the poetry of William Cullen Bryant and set for soprano, clarinet and piano. As many, Alexander attempts to imitate the imagery presented in the text through the music. Here, when the text referred to a bird, the clarinet warbled a light, flittering theme. As with more traditional vocal music, the melodic ideas are often exchanged between voice and instruments. Both songs have textural, color and timbral similarities. The second song ("November") utilizes a much wider range that the first ("These Prairies Glow with Flowers"), and was the more engaging. The two songs, however, are both quite charming and the performers (Deborah Norin-Kuehn, Kevin Shempf and Jane Solose) did a wonderful job."
April 19, 2000
Nancy Raabe of The Birmingham News review of the Birmingham Art Music Alliance's April 18, 2000 concert writes:
"Impressive as well on Tuesday's program were Joe Alexander's Beat! Beat! Drums,! an imaginative realization of a Whitman text for the unlikely combination of soprano, cello and tuba (Monica Zerbe, Craig Hultgren and Richard Perry, all outstanding),.....
January 21, 1998
Nancy Raabe of The Birmingham News review of the Birmingham Art Music Alliance's January 20, 1998 concert writes:
"Elsewhere on the program,
Joe L. Alexander's Two Bryant Songs displayed a nicely controlled
tonal palette, with judicious use of dissonance..."
October 8, 1997
Nancy Raabe of The Birmingham News review of the Birmingham Art Music Alliance's October 7, 1997 concert writes:
"Opinions will differ, but
for this writer Tuesday's program offered one perfect 10 in the form of
Joe L. Alexander's Infamy... for tuba and tape.
Premiered last December in Tuscaloosa, the piece is based on a startlingly
percussive computer generated manipulation of Franklin D. Roosevelt's Dec.
8, 1941, radio speech. This is overlaid with a mournful line intoned
with just the right shadings of vibrato by UA faculty tubist Michael Dunn."
November 9, 1995
Beaumont Enterprise staff writer's review of the November 8, 1995, Lamarissimo Concert:
"Ellis also performed Joe
L. Alexander's intriguing and difficult Epigrams on the clarinet.
Played with brilliance, the number added a touch of sobriety and reflection."
November 4, 1994
Lela Davis of the Beaumont Enterprise writes in her review of the November 3, 1994, Lamarissimo Concert:
"A
highlight was the premiere of November by faculty member Joe L.
Alexander. Alexander teaches composition, music theory and tuba at
Lamar. His piece, along with Song (These prairies glow with flowers),
honors the great American poet, William Cullen Bryant.
Soprano Barbara Mathis gave the lyrics strength while Kim Ellis on
clarinet and Melanie Foster Taylor on the piano set the ethereal mood with
startling musical effects."
April 6, 1994
Alex Ross of The New York Times, April 4, 1994, review of the Bronx Arts Ensemble performance in the New Music for Young Ensembles' concert in Weill Recital Hall:
"Joe L. Alexander's Sonarequasta, for flute, clarinet, viola and
piano, was a sturdy neoclassical construction (divided into a Sonatina
and Fugue) with strong echoes of Hindemith."