Known for music ranging from anguished gravity to kinetic power, Baltimore-born Christopher Rouse (b. 1949) is one of today’s most prominent American composers. Winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and a Grammy, Rouse was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2002 and now teaches at the Juilliard School. “In 1999–2000, I wrote an orchestral piece entitled Rapture for Mariss Jansons and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra,” Rouse says. “When approached by Ralph Kirshbaum to write a short, joyful piece for massed cellos for this year’s festival, I decided to develop further some of the material from Rapture. Rapturedux begins where Rapture ends, on an F-major chord, and then finds its own way forward.”