Conductor Hugh Ross turned to the Tanglewood Choir and gave an incisive downbeat. Moderate, mezzo forte crescendo, basses and then tenors intoned the first portentous words: "Who must file." Sixty young voices joined in the first performance of a modern madrigal called Lament for April 75. Its lyrics: excerpts from the U.S. income-tax instructions.
The music followed the text with the eagerness of a revenue officer: now glorious in a joyous sunburst at the words "United States," now pinched at the mention of old age, now prattling giddily about estimated taxes and exemptions....
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