Good things come to those who wait, so the saying goes, and in Richard Baker’s case, it’s been a particularly long wait: 30 years, to be precise, if one takes the date of the earliest work included on this, his debut album as a composer.

In many ways, the album’s witty, oxymoronic title, ‘The Tyranny of Fun’, captures Baker’s approach in a nutshell. One is often left wondering whether his music is meant to be serious or funny, or both. As Steph Power points out in the accompanying booklet notes, the dialectical qualities at play in Baker’s music are simultaneously playful and profound. They ask questions as much as they offer answers. Perhaps contemporary music should be asking more questions these days.

To give an example, a pounding bass drum rhythm heard at the beginning of the album’s title work draws inspiration from the dance rhythms of popular music. On one level, The Tyranny of Fun is a homage to the disco clubs of New York in the 1980s and the rave culture that followed during the 1990s. On another, one could imagine the title coming from a trenchant statement by Theodor Adorno on the evils of mass culture in consumer society, which is reflected in Baker’s brittle surfaces, edgy chromaticism and fragmentary lines. Yet the work’s ominous ending points to another message behind the work – the advent of the Aids pandemic during this time – and to what Jacques Attali called music’s prophetic nature, whereby significant future events are often anticipated within its noises and sounds.

The influence of Louis Andriessen, with whom the composer studied in The Hague during the 1980s, can be heard in the staggered lines and propulsive dissonances of early works such as Learning to Fly for solo basset clarinet and ensemble, but Baker’s approach is altogether more subtle, nuanced and ambiguous. A gentle, almost ambient quality permeates Angelus for two percussionists, while Crank for diatonic music box is at times reminiscent of jazz musician Chick Corea noodling on a Fender Rhodes electric piano.

If the political lies under the surface of Baker’s music, the recent (and ongoing) cycle of instrumental Motets demonstrates a deep commitment to – and immersion in – contemporary world events, to the point of using voices and messages as ‘source material’. Comprising six short movements, Motet II for ensemble transcribes sung pitches and speech rhythms from television recordings to create an absorbing and powerful work that draws attention to the evils of institutional and structural racism.

For many years, Baker has had to balance his compositional activities alongside a career as a much-in-demand conductor, teacher (at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama), mentor and artistic advisor. ‘The Tyranny of Fun’ is set to change all that. Another excellent release on the NMC label and certainly a contender for best debut recording by a composer who is finally getting the recognition his music deserves.