“The Pacific Coast, and California in particular, has worked its magic on a host of American composers over the years, from figures like Henry Cowell and Lou Harrison, who started out here, to such postwar emigres as Stravinsky and Schoenberg who arrived here with centuries of European musical history packed inside their valises. But no one has fused those strains — the freedom and sunny openness of the California milieu with the expressive depth and constructive rigor of late Romanticism — with the facility and grace that Adams has shown over a long career.”