When Ignaz Pleyel concluded his work on the last of his twelve “Prussian Quartets,” he had already garnered a great deal of experience as a composer of string quartets. His unmistakable musical voice had brought him countless admirers – including, not least, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who enthusiastically wrote of the Quartets op. 1 in a letter to his father. The dedicatory preface suggests that Pleyel had composed all of its pieces in Italy. He described them as “musically profound,” thereby indicating that Haydn’s Quartets op. 20 may have been their immediate model. The fugue movements in the Quartets Benton 328 and 330 are fascinating. Although Pleyel claimed that he had written them in the Italian style, Mozart was not fooled here: in their refined elegance he recognized the unique signature of Pleyel’s teacher Joseph Haydn. Nevertheless, the pupil had succeeded in writing a brilliant series of quartets in keeping with his own ideas and combining the clarity of the Italian style with the wealth of technical imagination characterizing the Viennese style.

Federico Moreno Torroba composed about one hundred works for the guitar, thereby reinforcing his status as one of Spain's great twentieth-century composers. Homenaje a la seguidilla pays lively tribute to that characteristically Spanish song and dance, while the Tonada concertante is in turns playful and introspective. Concierto de Castilla features a free-spirited lyricism evocative of the folklore of Castile, a vast expanse in the middle of Spain with which the composer strongly identified. "You would expect Pepe Romero to excel at the Concierto en Flamenco...The piece is gorgeous, the performance vibrant and passionate...The soloist in Dialogos is Romero's gifted pupil, Vicente Coves, who plays as well as his mentor, and whose brother leads the orchestra vividly and sympathetically." (ClassicsToday.com on Volume 1, 8573255)

Ján Cikker (1911–89) was one of the leading 20th c. Slovak composers, credited with no fewer than nine operas. This disc features several first recordings of his piano music, of which little is known even in his native Slovakia. The music sits downstream from Szymanowski and Janáček, like them blending folk influences with French impressionism echoes. As also with Szymanowski, some of the pieces evoke the composer’s fondness for the Tatras, the mountainous borderland between Poland and Slovakia.

MYSTERY VARIATIONS ON GIUSEPPE COLOMBI’S CHIACONA • Anssi Karttunen (vc) • TOCCATA 0171 (79:57)


COLOMBI Chiacona. KAIPAINEN Anything Goes. MATALON Polvo. REYNOLDS Colombi Daydream. COHEN Chaconne. TIENSUU Bleuelein. STUCKY Partite Sopra un Basso. SALONEN Sarabande per un Coyote. CAMPION Something to Go On. WALLIN Ciacconetta. ORTIZ Paloma. HEININEN Triple Antienne. HILLBORG Still and Flow. LERDAHL There and Back Again. PUUMALA Se Sillan. DUSAPIN 50 Notes in 3 Variations . HAKOLA Colombi Variation. DUN Chiacona After Colombi. NEIKRUG Tiny Colombi. YUASA Locus on Colombi’s Chiacona. WIGGLESWORTH Arietta. MATTHEWS Drammatico. SAARIAHO Dreaming Chaconne. FEDELE Preludio and Ciaccona. GLOBOKAR Idée Fixe. DAZZI Variation Sombre et Libre d’après Chiacona. TUOMELA Idulla. JOLAS A Fancy for Anssi. SRNKA A Variation. FRANCESCONI Anssimetry. LINDBERG Duello


Mystery Variations contains 30 different short works based on Giuseppe Colombi’s Chiacona. Colombi who lived from 1635 to 1694 replaced Giovanni Bononcini as maestro di cappella of the Modena Cathedral in Italy in 1678. The Chiacona is only one of an enormous number of pieces he wrote for various instruments, chamber groups, and orchestras. It is, however, said to be the oldest piece written for the cello. The music is part of a collection from the court of Francesco II of Este at the Biblioteca Estense in Modena. The idea for the Mystery Variations came from composer Kaija Saariaho and Muriel von Braun, the wife of cellist Anssi Karttunen, as a means of celebrating the cellist’s 50th birthday. They asked each of 30 composers to write a variation on the Chiacona . None of the composers knew who else had been asked and Karttunen promised to premiere music that he had not yet heard. Most of the variations range from just under two to just over three minutes long, so all of them fit on one disc. Few of these variations are truly melodic, most depend on texture, drama, percussion, and tonal color to excite the senses of the listener. Only one of the composers, Colin Matthews, uses electronics. Mark Neikrug and Magnus Lindberg use the letters of the cellist’s name as part of their variations. Some composers, such as Tan Dun, who was born in China and Pablo Ortiz from Argentina, make use of their native cultures while others, like Argentinian Martin Matalon and Texan Edmund Campion turn elsewhere. Matalon creates novel textures and far off sounds with a mute while Campion includes some aspects of Happy Birthday in his variation. Roger Reynolds’s Colombi Daydream , evokes an element of foreboding, while Jukka Tiensuu’s Bleuelein and Paavo Heininen’s Triple Antienne have plaintive, pleading qualities.


Composers like Steven Stucky, Kimmo Hakola, Joji Yuasa, Ivan Fedele, and Magnus Lindberg are fully aware of Karttunen’s virtuosity and have written works that show off some of his skills. Esa-Pekka Salonen’s Sarabande for a Coyote starts with the cello sounding a bit like a harp, before introducing some charming harmonies that expand the usual cello range. Rolf Wallin’s Ciacconetta has sliding arpeggios that resolve into an impressive dance. Lerdahl’s There and Back Again uses the dance to guide us from Colombi’s time forward to our own and back again. Anders Hillborg’s Still and Flow treats us to his seriously studied version of Bach. The in-your-face style of Veli-Mali Puumala’s… Se Sillan… is rather unique and it added a bit of spice to the mixture on this disc. Kartunnen follows it with Dusapin’s 50 Notes in 3 Variations, an inventive and intuitive work that resolves into a tone color-filled meditation. Also in the meditative mood, Ryan Wigglesworth’s Arietta offers more respite from the dramatic. Kaija Saariaho’s Dreaming Chaconne portrays a pastoral scene with her full-blooded sound vocabulary. In Idée Fixe, Vinko Globokar asks the cellist to sing and I found it a distraction. Gualtiero Dazzi’s Variation Sombre et Libre d’après Chiacona brings us a sweet and smooth melody played in the cello’s lowest notes. Idulla means germinating and Tapio Tuomela brings us a fantasy that includes tonal color and percussion. Betsy Jolas’s A Fancy for Anssi creates rivers of sound that broaden out to reflect fragments of Colombi’s theme. Miroslav Srnka, on the other hand, uses slides and double-stops to make us hunt for the theme while Luca Francesconi makes use of it openly but varies it in unexpected ways. The finale is Magnus Lindberg’s Duello , a dialogue between the Chiacona and music based on the cellist’s full name. It ends with a pleasing melody that leaves the listener feeling that the music was worthwhile hearing. The sound on this disc is excellent and I think many of our readers will find it interesting.


FANFARE: Maria Nockin

Jazz and swing undoubtedly weighed the most in Ib Glindemann's creative life, and few others meant more to big-band and jazz music in Denmark from the 1950s onwards than he. It remains, however, that Denmark's well-known jazz orchestra leader, trumpeter and composer had a classical side. This recording is the first to feature a fully classical Glindemann program: two sublime instrumental concertos and an impressive medley of his music celebrating his distinctive flair for writing happy, undemanding, festive and effective music. The Medley is a gathering of four pieces into a suite, arranged by Glindemann and Wolfgang Käfer. The pieces collected here come from films or from the world of program music, evoking pictures of everyday life in Copenhagen.

Another wonderful disc from Ilya Kaler.

Ilya Kaler’s new recording of the Brahms concerto on Naxos is eminently recommendable. When reviewing his recent recording of the Tchaikovsky violin concerto (see review) I remarked that Kaler’s performance was one “of elegance as well as brilliance” that “wears it war-horse status lightly, impressing itself upon the listener by virtue of its freshness and natural feeling”. Those comments are equally applicable to this recording.

Kaler’s conception of Brahms’ score is one that rejoices in its beauties. Ably supported by the warm sounds exhaled by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, Kaler’s violin sings with a golden tone and sweetly inflected phrasing. He takes his time over the first movement, but maintains his rhythmic control and sense of the music’s overall architecture. In this his performance succeeds where, as Jonathan Woolf points out, Julia Fischer’s similarly conceived account fails. Kaler also lingers lovingly over the gorgeous slow movement – taking over 10 minutes. His pacing is more conventional in the Hungarian finale, which smiles more than it swaggers here.

The coupling of Brahms and Schumann is astute. Firstly it makes programmatic sense. Both concertos share the tonality of D – Brahms in the glowing major, Schumann in the dramatic minor. Both were written for Joachim, and the bond between Schumann and Brahms themselves is as well known as it is complicated.

Secondly, the coupling is an attractive addition to the Naxos catalogue. It complements an earlier disc (Naxos 8.550938), on which Kaler joins cellist Maria Kliegel in Brahms’ double concerto, offered as a coupling for Kliegel’s performance of the Schumann cello concerto. Buy these two discs, and you have the complete Schumann and Brahms string concertos at one fell swoop.

The coupling of the Schumann and Brahms concertos is also fairly unusual in the broader catalogue. While recordings of the Brahms proliferate, there are few recordings of the Schumann concerto and when they do appear they tend to be lumped together with more Schumann. Only Joshua Bell, to my knowledge, has coupled these two concertos on disc before. That disc now forms half of a mid-price twofer in the price bracket above this release (Decca – The Joshua Bell Edition – 4756703). Bell's recording is also available at bargain basement price on Australian Eloquence, but sundered from its Brahms coupling.

Schumann wrote his violin concerto very quickly in the autumn of 1853. Joseph Joachim and Clara Schumann had reservations about the piece. In happier times Schumann would probably have revised the piece, but the rapid decline in his mental health prevented this and the score languished unplayed and unknown until the 1930s. It is an attractive piece, constructed along classical lines, and deserves more attention and respect than it is usually accorded. The first movement has a symphonic seriousness and integrity, contrasting the wild, surging argument of its first subject with a gentle, sensitive second subject. The central movement is quietly beautiful. The finale, in the form of a polonaise and with prominent wind writing, brings the concerto dancing to a close.

Kaler's performance is successful and offers collectors a distinct choice. Bell's recording has a straight forward brilliance and Kremer's EMI recording with Muti, like Menuhin's electric premiere recording of the uncut score, emphasises the drama of the work. Kaler takes a different view. Again favouring spacious tempi – his first movement at 14:28 takes a minute longer than Bell's and two minutes longer than Menuhin's – he presents the concerto very much as the classical conception of a poetic soul. Where the other interpreters listed above play for Florestan, Kaler takes Eusebius' part.

The balance favours the violin in both concertos, but there is air enough around the soloist, and the warm Lighthouse Concert Hall acoustic gives the orchestral sound a lovely glow. Listening through earphones can be disconcerting in the Schumann where either Kaler's or the conductor’s breathing is quite prominent. I did not notice this so much when listening through speakers.

Keith Anderson's liner-notes live up to his usual high standard, but gloss over the circumstances of the Schumann concerto's rediscovery by Joachim's great-niece and avoid entirely discussion of the political wrangling over the concerto's premiere performances.

Another wonderful disc from Ilya Kaler and a bargain of the month.

-- Tim Perry, MusicWeb International

Classical Music

The birth of the classical guitar

Gerald Finzi made an important contribution to British twentieth-century song, choral and orchestral repertoire. His acute awareness of the frailty of existence found it's musical expression not only in his song settings, but in the Cello Concerto.

Internationally established musicians Hanna Shybayeva (piano), Utrecht String Quartet and Luis Cabrera (double bass) present on this album the rarely performed and even more rarely recorded chamber music transcriptions of Beethoven's piano concertos Nos. 3 and 4 by Vinzenz Lachner. Hanna Shybayeva started her international career at the age of eleven as a "child prodigy." She recorded for several labels, bringing out repertoire by Ravel, Prokofiev, Chopin, Takemitsu, Shostakovich, and the complete Etudes-Tableaux of Rachmaninov. Since 2008 she has been a member of the New European Ensemble, one of the most innovative, vibrant, and versatile ensembles for New Music. Since 2013 she has been a professor at the International Anton Rubinstein Music Academy in Dusseldorf and at Conservatorio Giacomo Puccini La Spezia.

Grammy Award-nominated cellist Antonio Meneses’ dazzling virtuosity in on display in the Suite for Solo Cello by Gaspar Cassadó, and two works by Zoltán Kodály - the Duo for Violin and Cello with violinist Claudio Cruz, and the Sonata for Solo Cello that was written in 1915. It is released in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the work.

Following the success of Capriccioso, a solo spectacular of works written by cellists for cellists, Antonio Meneses' brilliance is demonstrated again, with the rarely recorded Suite for Solo Cello by the Spanish cellist-composer Gaspar Cassadó. Alongside two early works by his Hungarian contemporary Zoltán Kodály - the Duo for Violin and Cello, with violinist Claudio Cruz, who was the conductor on Antonio's Grammy-nominated recording of the Concertos by Elgar and Gál; and the Sonata for Solo Cello, which was written in 1915 and is released in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the work.

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REVIEWS:

In Cassado's dark, sensuous Suite, inspired by Kodaly but infused with Spanish undertones, he exudes a mesmerising, Zen-like calm: tenderly shaped curlicues, ornate arabesques, and complex harmonic accompanying figurations never disturb his long, arching lines or the sense of easy, improvisational charm. You can almost forget you're listening to a virtuoso display; in his refreshingly self-effacing, idiomatic approach musical substance is always to the fore.

– BBC Music Magazine

Meneses gives a performance that has been crafted down to the tiniest detail, the swirling finale in particular confident and polished, with every technical trick in the cellist's book pulled off with panache.

– Gramophone

For all those for whom the heavy Wagnerian voices are too much, OehmsClassics presents a treat with the Frankfurt Opera and Museum Orchestra and General Music Director Sebastian Weigle - selected orchestral music from the Ring of the Nibelung, tactfully cut together. Some singers can also be briefly heard during excerpts, so as not to endanger the authenticity of the live impression. A compact hour you won't want to miss!

Fourteen years ago, Till Brönner - one of Germany's leading trumpet soloists - won hearts with an album of favorite holiday melodies adapted for his instrument. In 2021, he returns with a new look at the music of the Christmas season in intimate arrangements for trumpet, bass, and drums.

To this day, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 is one of the most popular pieces of classical music in the world. But what is it about this global hit? The film charts the success of the symphony around the globe and encounters passionate amateur musicians and musical personalities. Watch as Greek conductor Teodor Currentzis works on Beethoven’s Ninth with his ensemble, MusicAeterna. Follow Chinese composer and Oscar winner Tan Dun as he creates a new composition inspired by the great Beethoven symphony. Experience the Orchestre Symphonique Kimbanguiste in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as they play the Ninth. Visit a favela in Brazil, where Beethovens’s music helps people get off the streets. Be amazed as a choir of 10,000 in Japan sings the final chorus of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, with great enthusiasm. Learn how Paul Whittaker helps make Beethoven accessible for deaf people. And find out how British DJ Gabriel Prokofiev performs a symphonic remix of Beethoven’s Ninth.

This Myto release of Gaetano Donizetti’s repertoire staple opera ‘Lucia di Lammermoor’ with its famed “mad scene” features, among others, a stellar trio of singers at or near their respective vocal primes in Renata Scotto, Alfredo Kraus and Sesto Bruscantini. + This live recording from July, 1963 finds distinguished conductor Bruno Rigacci, a musician with over 100 operas in his repertoire, directing the proceedings.

The strident conviction of Goffredo Petrassi (1904-2003) his seven postwar Concertos for Orchestra could hardly be anticipated from the fluent pastiche of his piano Partita, composed in 1926. The Baroque titles of the four movements introduce a disarming simplicity of expression, whose dominant strains are the Classicism of Mozart and Beethoven. Even the more exploratory harmonies of the Toccata (1933) are couched in an idiom of gentle introspection – a far cry from the contemporary toccatas of Bartok and Prokofiev, for example – and an escapist, playful spirit courses through the seven Inventions of 1944. Extant surveys of Petrassi’s piano music end there, whereas Andrea Molteni adds three further, attractive miniatures: a mischievous Petit Piece of 1950 and then the two movements of Oh Les Beaux Jours! (1976), which rework material from the early 1940s including an unfinished Divertimento Scarlattiano. Unexpected this may be, for all but the most devoted student of Petrassi, but Andrea Molteni brings out the most attractive and witty features of his piano writing.

Luigi Dallapiccola (1904-1975) was, if anything, an even keener student of Baroque music than Petrassi, and blessed with a more subversive wit: in one of his most famous works, the Quaderno Musicale di Annalibera (1951-2) he fashions a dodecaphonic sequence on Bach’s name (B.A.C.H). Twelve-tone counterpoint should be a contradiction in terms, but that would underestimate Dallapiccola’s powers of technique and invention, which create a genuine homage in the spirit of his own time. Before that, Andrea Molteni presents two further works in a haunting neoclassical vein: a ‘Canonic Sonata’ based on Paganini’s Capricci for solo violin, and a set of three ‘Episodes’ drawn from his ballet Marsia, by turns anguished and serene in mood.

REVIEW:

Petrassi and Dallapiccola were born the same year. Their earliest piano works reflect past styles and history. Petrassi’s four-movement Partita is crackling Neoclassical and the bittersweet Toccata is a theme and variations. Dallapiccola’s Sonatina Canonica leverages material from Paganini’s violin caprices. Both composers gravitated towards lean styles: Petrassi’s Invenzioni demonstrate atonal counterpoint whereas Dallapiccola jumped wholeheartedly into serialism as evidenced by the excerpts from the ballet, Marsia. The pair of short pieces in Petrassi’s Oh Les Beaux Jours! is playful and spontaneous, hinting at earlier efforts. Rarely heard, the 11-part Quaderno offers crafted miniatures reflecting serialism and canons.

-- La Folia

Music for William Shakespeare. Music from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries composed for Shakespeare's plays or to celebrate his work. A wide range of instrumental sounds and some splendid singing create a fascinating programme of dynamic and cheerful English music, performed by one of Britain's leading ensembles.

This is an interesting and enterprising selection. There is no doubt that Pauline Haas is an accomplished harpist and she has chosen a programme that shows off the many-sided facets and interpretative possibilities of her instrument.

John Thomas was official harpist to Queen Victoria and was known as the Chief of the Welsh Minstrels. His doleful The Minstrel’s Adieu to His Native Land illustrates the traditional folk heritage associations with the instrument.

The Smetana Die Moldau transcription is much more impressive and one of the most successful pieces in this collection. The harp brilliantly evokes the fresh tinkling, sparkling thrills of running water through the gushing springs of the upper Moldau, its progress through rapids, and forests and plains and onto Prague. The music growing from light-hearted youth in character through to proud mature grandeur as it approaches the Capital.

The lyrical beauty of Tchaikovsky’s two pieces from The Seasons are beguilingly caught by the harp, especially so of the June Barcarolle.

Virtuoso harpist Albert Zabel, was solo harpist for the Imperial Ballet in St. Petersburg. His Fantasy on themes from Faust by Charles Gounod is the most substantial piece in the programme and it allows the instrument to show off its virtuoso and dramatic/melodramatic capabilities. The Faust themes he chose seem less familiar and it would have been helpful if Pauline Haas could have elaborated her otherwise splendid, if rather colourfully effusive album notes. Ms Haas suggests that this Fantasy ‘follows the tradition of pieces written for virtuoso performance and is inspired by fashionable tunes of the period’? Whatever, here the harp sings romantically and dramatically enough and the virtuoso challenges are eagerly surmounted.

Mendelssohn’s Prelude and Fugue in E minor is a formidable work half in the Romantic tradition but also definitely in homage to the influence of Bach. The Prelude, beautifully evocatively played, ‘is often compared to a river of tears’ and the Fugue transcends tension and anger to a beatific acceptance of death. An extraordinary piece nicely, sensitively transcribed by Pauline Haas.

Finally, there is a formidable challenge for Haas; her arrangement for harp from Liszt’s piano transcription of Wagner’s Liebestodt. She successfully creates an atmosphere of calm at the beginning and serenity at the close. The emotionally intense climb to the peak of passion, is fine to start with, with plenty of sound perspective and power but, to me, it loses momentum on the way up when there is a mood-breaking sag and pause. Nevertheless this is a brave and worthy attempt.

A small moan, occasionally there is some distracting and disconcerting background noise –the soloist breathing I understand. Nevertheless this is a most interesting and enterprising collection demonstrating the undervalued capabilities of the most romantic of instruments.

– MusicWeb International (Ian Lace)

GRÉTRY Le magnifique • Ryan Brown, cond; Emiliano Gonzalez Toro ( Octave, Le Magnifique ); Elizabeth Calleo ( Clémentine ); Jeffrey Thompson ( Aldobrandin ); Karim Sulayman ( Fabio ); Marguerite Krull ( Alix ); Douglas Williams ( Laurence ); Opera Lafayette • NAXOS 8.660305 (80:00)


The operas of André-Ernest-Modeste Grétry, once wildly popular, are virtually unknown today—this is the world premiere recording of this 1773 work—even though his most famous work, Richard Cœur de Lion of 1784 was still occasionally performed in the late 19th century. In order to fit the whole opera on one CD, conductor Ryan Brown and his forces chose to omit all of the spoken dialogue, which some may see as a demerit and others a plus.


This CD production duplicates the cast that Brown used when he gave the modern world premiere of the opera at the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater in February 2011, reviewed by Charles T. Downey in Ionarts. Interestingly, the descriptions of the singers in that review virtually matched my own reaction, particularly the description of soprano Elizabeth Calleo as having “some lovely high notes but an overall vocal production that was tight in the jaw…and sounded a little shallow at the top,” but overall this cast is good.


The plot is a typically silly “rescue” opera mixed up with the usual love triangle. Put as simply as possible, the dashing young Octave, known as “Le Magnifique,” has just rescued the wealthy merchant Horace and his servant Laurence from the slave market where they mysteriously appeared. Meanwhile Horace’s daughter, Clémentine, is being wooed towards marriage by her tutor, Aldobrandin, while Alix, Clémentine’s servant and confidante, has rushed into the street having spotted Laurence (who is also her husband) marching with the slaves. Le Magnifique offers his best racing horse as a free gift to Aldobrandin if he is allowed 15 minutes alone with Clémentine, which the latter agrees to. Clémentine tacitly agrees to marry him, and in the course of time, of course, it is revealed that Aldobrandin and his servant Fabio actually kidnapped Horace and Laurence and sold them into slavery nine years ago. Reunions occur, Aldobrandin is dismissed, and Octave/Magnifique gets the girl.


What makes this opera interesting, however, is the music. Stuck stylistically somewhere between the baroque and classical styles, Le Magnifique has some very innovative and interesting moments, such as the slow march of the slaves which acts as the overture, a splendid duet for Clémentine and Aldobrandin, and a wonderful comic aria for Fabio, who sings of the glories of the horse Octave has promised his master. In fact, there ensues a trio for Octave, Fabio, and Aldobrandin—all of whom, incidentally, are tenors—singing for four minutes of how they’re going to go out and have a look at that horse! (All I could think of at that moment was Mr. Ed. ) By and large, Le Magnifique ’s style is that of a comic opera but, as I say, the style is very forward-looking. It much closer resembles Nicolai’s Merry Wives of Windsor than it does Mozart’s Die Entführung aus dem Serail. I was particularly struck by the musical invention in his extended act II finale, which lasts an astounding 17:22. Not until Mozart wrote the act I finale to Le nozze di Figaro did a composer, particularly in a comic opera, write something even more involved and complex.


All the singers have excellent voices, bright yet full (save Calleo whose voice is not bright on top but constricted). Sulayman has a rather over-bright and somewhat unsteady tenor, but since Fabio is a comic-comprimario role, Sulayman does a good enough job. In fact, his rendering of the “horse aria” is absolutely delightful. Brown conducts with a light, deft hand: He evidently understands the French galante style very well. Despite her slight vocal deficiencies, Calleo is called on to drop an octave into what would be her contralto range in her aria “Quelle contrainte!” Both the first and second acts end with an ensemble for the three tenors (I’m a little surprised that Plácido Domingo never dug this up for his Three Tenors concerts), and here one can discern the tonal difference between their three voices. This recording is an unexpected delight, and I commend both Ryan Brown for his superb musical direction and the foresight of Naxos to record this. Bravo, one and all!


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

1715: The famed Italian luthier Antonio Stradivari constructs what will become one of his most legendary violins. Among its first owners is Giuseppe Tartini, he of the "Devil's Trill" sonata.

c. 1817: The violin is bequeathed to Polish virtuoso violinist Karol Lipinski who inspired many works for the instrument.

2008: After passing through many countries and collections, the "Lipinski" Strad arrives in the hands of Frank Almond, through an anonymous donor.

2013: Frank Almond releases "A Violin's Life", an album that traces the provenance of the "Lipinski" Strad, with music by Schumann, Tartini, Julius Rontgen, and Lipinski himself.

January 2014: Following a concert, walking towards his car, Frank Almond is tasered by an assailant and the "Lipinski" Strad is stolen. An FBI pursuit results in the recovery of the "Lipinski" Strad a few weeks later. International media coverage goes viral, including international TV coverage, a feature in Vanity Fair, NPR, BBC, and much more.

May 2016: Frank Almond releases "A Violin's Life, Vol. 2", featuring more music associated with the "Lipinski" Strad, including works by Beethoven, Amanda Maier-Rontgen, and Eduard Tubin, poised to create another classic release.

The "Lipinski" Strad lives on.