The National Arts Centre Orchestra will release Poema: 2. Terra Nova, the second volume of their Strauss recording project on November 14, 2025. The album will be released on the Analekta label, and features a series of tone poems by Richard Strauss, along with 1Q84: Sinfonietta Metamoderna, a work by Canadian composer Ian Cusson that was commissioned by the orchestra.
“Throughout this project, our composers are encouraged to reflect, critique, embrace, reject or deconstruct Strauss’s language and model. It is an exploration of the notion of the tone poem and the orchestra as a tool for storytelling,” writes Music Director Alexander Shelley in the album notes.
“1Q84 is a work of sophistication, nuance, and emotional insight, and it is a privilege to share it with the world.”
The juxtaposition of Strauss and Cusson’s new work opens up a musical dialogue between past and present.
For the Poema series of recordings, Shelley asked Canadian composers to write new works in response to Strauss’ masterworks. The first album, released in January 2025 and titled Ad Astra, examined themes of the cosmos, and the afterlife.
In contrast, Terra Nova features two works that focus on the search for meaning, and new intellectual and philosophical discoveries.
The album features Strauss’s Also sprach Zarathustra. Composed in 1896, the work was inspired by by Friedrich Nietzsche’s work of philosophy of the same name, published in a series of four volumes between 1883 and 1885. Through its protagonist, Zarathustra, also known as Zoroaster, an Iranian philosopher and religious reformer, the books discuss philosophy, morality, and metaphysics.
The opening fanfare, titled Sunrise, has become famous in pop culture through its use in the classic Kubrickfilm 2001: A Space Odyssey.
There are nine sections in total, each named after a specific chapter from Nietzsche’s novel, which trace the trajectory of the title character’s journey;
The work is a statement of Nietsche’s well known themes that begin with the premise that God is dead, and in order to survive, humanity must reach for an evolved state he called the Übermensch, or “superhuman”. Blind faith, ignorance, and superstition must be abandoned, but these elements recur in unending cycles.
“Also sprach Zarathustra remains one of the great monuments of orchestral music,” writes Shelley in his introduction. “Its thunderous opening, with its majestic sunrise, has become a cultural emblem of humanity’s striving for greatness. Yet beyond this radiant opening lies a tone poem of extraordinary complexity.”
Ian Cusson’s 1Q84: Sinfonietta Metamoderna responds to Strauss’ work in an examination of our inner worlds.
Cusson was also inspired by literature, Haruki Murakami’s philosophical novel 1Q84 that revolves around parallel worlds and the boundaries between reality and illusion. Cusson’s orchestral work loosely follows the structure of the novel in its use of thematic material.
“With its vivid textures and emotional depth, Ian’s music transforms these ideas into sound,” adds Shelley. “Ian is a gifted storyteller. His work in opera demonstrates his sensitivity to human emotion and ability to craft characters of profound depth. Both composers confront life’s great questions – Strauss through Nietzsche’s cosmic lens, Cusson through Murakami’s dreamlike and intimate narratives.”
Shelley and NACO’s Strauss project will continue, with later recordings that will focus on Till Eulenspiegel’s Merry Pranks and the Suite from Der Rosenkavalier, featuring new works by Alexina Louie and John Estacio, and Ein Heldenleben.
NACO will release each album individually, and later bring them together as a box set.
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