As a long-time friend of Bang on a Can’s founding composers and a creative firebrand in his own right, Jeffrey Brooks makes music that shimmers with bold intensity and an enveloping warmth. Big expressive gestures, heavy basslines, echoes of pop and rock, jagged dissonance and New York-style “downtown” noise are all signatures of his vibrant and electric sound.

Brooks might be best known for his wind ensemble work Dreadnought (1996), but perhaps just as significantly, he is one of the few modern classical composers with a penchant for chasing rhythm in a way that even dancefloor DJs can understand. (2015, dedicated to Steve Martland) and the epic title.

The Passion collects three of his most compelling works: After the Treewatcher, Capriccio on the Departure of a Beloved Brother (dedicated to Steve Martland) and the epic title piece. Featuring edgy, raucous performances by the Bang on a Can All-Stars (with Taylor Levine subbing on guitar for Mark Stewart) and the New York-based large ensemble Contemporaneous, conducted by David Bloom, the recording is, in essence, a tribute to the lasting power of friendship, and a triumph of the human spirit.