Tina Davidson’s music is rhythmically driving, with fascinatingly simple yet lovely harmonic changes. The composer makes music satisfying by carefully managing tension and release; it’s being able to bring a sense of beauty and emotion to a strict organizational structure, a rarity in any age.

Each of the five works [on the Barefoot album] inhabits a single intense emotion, which Davidson pursues with her own energy, like a life force, barely concealed beneath the surface. Wēpan … is the recording’s highlight track; and while it is strangely, relentlessly sad, with the strings making eerie wailing sounds, it stills exults in the power that music has, transmits and confers.

When it comes to beautifully crafted works that speak freshly through fundamentally familiar idioms, Tina Davidson is as persuasive as they come. The Hymn of the Universe is instantly appealing. Davidson subtly sets all the material to music that flows with a lyrical gracefulness. The choral writing is clean, clear and immediately communicative. In the closing passages, the choral writing reaches a radiant height so that the last sounds resonated in a suggestion of cosmic darkness.

The freshest piece here was They Come Dancing, a 15 minute toccata written by Tina Davidson. Ms Davidson has a vivid ear for harmony and orchestral colors. Over sustained pedal tones and quietly pulsating bass patterns, diffuse harmonies – like out-of-focus Copland chords – sound forth and dance.