Class Act

Last September, I reviewed a concert of the Tallahassee Symphony Orhcestra that included a performance of two movements from John Mackey's Percussion Concerto, performed by John Parks.

Through the wonders of the messaging system at Classical Lounge I received this note from Mr. Mackey (quoted with his permission):

I just realized how I recognized your name. You're the critic who once called one of my pieces "brash and empty." To be honest, I didn't wholly disagree with your assessment of that particular work, and the review made me chuckle.

We had a brief exchange in which Mr. Mackey listed some of the challenges in writing a percussion concerto, how his approach has changed since he wrote the piece in question, and about finding an audience for band music.

As the title of this post indicates, he's a class act.