What poses the greater danger for a young violinist? Recording unusual repertoire that will appeal only to a few (unfamiliar showpieces by obscure composers, avant-garde repertoire, manuscript Baroque works, and on and on) or taking the plunge and recording the 198th and 206th (not actual numbers) versions of war-horses committed to disc in this decade alone that will, again, appeal to only a few? What?s a young man to do? Nicolaj Znaider has chosen to record Beethoven?s Violin Concerto and to couple it with Mendelssohn?s. The two concertos, he contends (in snippets from an interview that Eric Wen included in the booklet) call forth the essential qualities a violinist must possess. At one time, critics?reserving judgment to find out how they later met more substantive challenges?tended to give short shrift to violinists who initially recorded less than significant repertoire. Of course, the bold and the brave would then be mercilessly compared with Heifetz, Szigeti, Oistrakh, Milstein, Francescatti, and others. Znaider has strong partners in Zubin Mehta and the Israel Philharmonic, who play with abundant nuance in Mendelssohn?s Concerto and with powerful solidity to Beethoven?s. Occasionally, even seemingly ordinary phrases in Mendelssohn?s Concerto benefit from their attention, which consistently sets Znaider in a warmly nurturing context. And the monumental opening tutti (as Mehta and the Orchestra make it) throws a strong spotlight on the soloist in its equally prepossessing entry. The engineers? balance of soloist and orchestra (Znaider?s far enough forward to be clearly prominent yet not unnaturally dominant) provides an ideal. Znaider plays the 1704 ex-Liebig Stradivari, on loan to him, with sleek elegance, producing an even response in all registers. His sound?s never quite lush, but it?s commanding and appropriately subtle. When he?s unaccompanied in Beethoven?s first movement, his flexible tone production doesn?t require an underlying blanket to convey harmonic meaning. If he doesn?t sound sprightly in Mendelssohn?s Concerto, he never forces the piece into the Procrustean bed of late-Romantic expressivity, either. His playing?s never supercharged, like Maxim Vengerov?s (which, of course, risks mannerism), and it just as seldom flows so naturally as did Anne-Sophie Mutter?s early interpretations. But his technique shows itself to advantage in Kreisler?s first-movement cadenza, which he strops to a keen technical edge but also graces with penetrating musical insight. Has he solved the problem he explicitly set himself in Beethoven?s Concerto?making the omnipresent scales and arpeggios assigned to the violinist serve structural ends? In collaboration with Mehta and the orchestra, he?s made a good stab at it. These readings seem undergirded by a strong partnership and, in themselves, display all the virtues. What could be missing? My grandmother told my father about how easily recognizable Kreisler?s manner had been. Vengerov and Mutter, though not so individual as Heifetz or Oistrakh, can still be picked out after careful listening. Some violinists seek to solve musical problems, believing that in their solution they will find the Holy Grail. Breughel?s Landscape with the Fall of Icarus portrays the small figure of Icarus falling in a vast landscape, with all the countryside simply going about its own business. Of course, Icarus hadn?t solved his technical problems; but if he had, and had continued to soar, would the folk be portrayed watching him? Heifetz could bolt everybody to attention with a few notes, and I?m not sure that he did so by dint of having solved intellectual problems. What will my son tell his children about Nicolaj Znaider?


For anyone seeking this particular partnership of great violin concertos (and it?s not the most common coupling?the last Schwann Opus lists only several examples, some of these in sets) Znaider?s offers such a wealth of musical and violinistic virtues, that nobody could withhold a recommendation. But still, some unfulfilled desire to discern a personality, a human face with recognizable features, prompts me to issue that recommendation with less enthusiasm than the musical merits of the performances might otherwise deserve.


FANFARE: Robert Maxham

The Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, the city's glittering new landmark, opened in January 2017. "Light & Dark" is the world's first recording of a solo organ recital in the Grand Hall. Featuring a range of appealing contemporary works, the album showcases the wide tonal spectrum of the Elbphilharmonie's organ. Built by the Bonn-based firm Klais, the organ is an instrument of superlatives. 4,765 pipes extend over five rows of seats, their lengths ranging from just eleven millimeters to an imposing ten meters. Thanks to the very open structure of the hall's "white skin" around the organ, audiences can actually look inside the instrument and some of the pipes have been coated such that they can be touched without leaving any marks. The organ fits perfectly into the spectacular architecture and has a very impressive sound. "There's nothing this organ can't do," Iveta Apkalna enthused. "It's warm and rich, with many beautiful fundamental tones that sound from everywhere, and from the depths. The sound embraces the audience." With it's modern selection of repertoire, seemingly tailor-made for both the organist and the instrument, the album compellingly draws listeners into a fascinating world of sound. At the heart of the recording is the work that gives the album it's name - Sofia Gubaidulina's "Light and Darkness", a piece of great extremes that penetrates every fiber of the body. Two composers, Aivars Kalejs and Lucija Garuta, hail from the organist's native Latvia, and the album also includes works by Leoš Janacek, Gyorgy Ligeti, Dmitri Shostakovich, and Thierry Escaich. Iveta Apkalna has made an album that brings to life the qualities of this organ with a modern and extremely diverse selection of works. Iveta Apkalna is one of the world's most famous organists and, as titular organist, knows the Elbphilharmonie instrument like no other musician. She is fully committed to seeing the glittering beauty of the organ better represented in concert halls. Iveta Apkalna is a cultural ambassador of Latvia and dedicates this album to her country.

A leading ensemble of period performance practice, Concerto Koln has been acknowledged for their rediscovery of musical rarities. Regardless, the ensemble still views the Baroque as being shaped by two driving forces- Bach and Handel. For this release, parts of three masterpieces have been coupled for the first time: Bach’s “Brandenburg Concerto,” No. 5 and No. 1 of his Orchestral Suites along with Handel’s “Water Music.” Artistic Director Lorenzo Alpert explains the symbiotic nature of this release: “Our intensive engagement over the last 30 years with composers, music theorists and contemporaries from the time of Bach and Handel… opens up new vistas for us as we approach the works of these two great masters… What a joy to recreate a sound that seemed lost forever!”

As a child, Sebastian Knauer was present at seminal performances of the St Matthew Passion and the “Christmas Oratorio” in St Michael’s Church in Hamburg. And even at that early age, he enjoyed playing Bach on the piano. But his childhood enthusiasm was tempered with respect for the works of the great Thomaskantor. “I noticed at once: It is a huge challenge – not only in terms of keyboard technique, but mentally too,” he recalls. “In my student days and during the first few years of my career as a pianist I was constantly working on his music, but rarely played it in public concerts. Particularly when it came to the piano concertos, I never really felt myself to be ready, because I was searching all the time for my own picture of the music.” Sebastian Knauer deliberately gave himself time, engaging himself intensively with Bach’s musical cosmos until he was prepared to take his discoveries before an audience. The conductor’s artistic credo, that what matters for historical performance practice is not the sort of instrument you play, but the way and the style in which you play it, is one that Sebastian Knauer fully subscribes to. That is no less true of “Bach & Sons 2”, on which the pianist has once more explored the musical legacy of the Bach dynasty. It is this mixture of exceptional curiosity with the aspiration to enrich the established repertoire with unusual pieces that so typifies Sebastian Knauer – elsewhere and on this recording. Alongside the two Concertos BWV 1055 and 1056 there are real rarities on this release, such as the Concerto by C.P.E. Bach. The compositions selected by Sebastian Knauer are of great interest not only as repertoire but because they give an absorbing account of how the piano-concerto genre evolved. That is relevant to the works of C.P.E. Bach, an intermediary between the classic Baroque of his father and the dawning age of Viennese Classicism.

This new release is the soundtrack from the motion picture, Bach in Brazil. The story is inspired by true events, and follows retired German music teacher Marten Brueckling as he travels to Brazil to collect a sheet of original Bach manuscript, but ends up teaching music to children in a juvenile detention center. The tracks on this release are enchanting arrangements of Bach’s best loved melodies, mixed with Brazilian flair. “Our aim in Bach in Brazil is to bring Bach’s melodies to life with Brazilian rhythms and instrumentations, rather like Marten Brueckling in the film gaining a new perspective on his life from the children and the Brazilian feeling for life.”

This is a disc that many strictly "classical" listeners may pass over--not surprisingly, since this isn't really a "classical" recording. However, its illustrious and very accomplished host deserves a chance to show another side (or sides, actually) of his musical life, one that includes informal collaboration in his New York home with artists from pop, jazz, and non-western classical genres--and so he offers this rather congenial hodge-podge that somehow goes together while juxtaposing extremely diverse styles and levels of artistic refinement.

Actually, when you hear the opening track--a fine light jazz treatment of I loves you Porgy, with Bell, pianist Billy Childs, a number of other instrumental players, and featuring jazz/pop trumpeter Chris Botti--you may just wish this group would take the whole program. But we move from Gershwin to Dowland via the voice of Sting, whose slightly strained, boyish quality is overshadowed by the lively obbligato/accompaniment of Bell's violin.

There are hits--bandoneon-ist Carel Kraayenhof and Bell in Piazzolla's Oblivion and Luis Bacalov's Il Postino; Bell, baritone Nathan Gunn, and pianist Jeremy Denk in Rachmaninov's song O, cease thy singing, maiden fair (with obbligato by Fritz Kreisler); Ravi Shankar's duet for sitar and violin, performed by daughter Anoushka and Bell; Bell and Marvin Hamlisch's rendition of I'll take Manhattan--and misses: pop singer Josh Groban's Cinema Paradiso (exactly what language is that...?); Kristin Chenoweth's unconvincing, uncomfortable My Funny Valentine (not her song); bassist Edgar Meyer and mandolinist Chris Thile's weirdly meandering Look Away. But hey, this is a hodge-podge meant to capture the spirit of Bell's "anything goes" house concerts--and in that it succeeds.

Of course, the recordings were not actually made in Bell's home--rather they were made in a couple of different studios, and you can tell. There's a decided artificiality to the balances due to some odd mixing and highlighting of certain instruments that do not seem to share the same acoustic space. Nevertheless, I enjoyed this, especially for Bell's clever, artful, and always appropriately stylish playing.

--David Vernier, ClassicsToday.com

Discover Bach includes some of this great Baroque composer’s best known works, such as Ave Maria, Air, Brandenburg Concerto, Cello Suites, Goldberg Variations, and many more.; The Discover Series from Berlin Classic aims to make classics popular, firing people up about the music presented, regardless of musical taste.; Rather than focusing on complete works, this series focuses on individual pieces that have rewritten our musical history.

Bach’s Cello Suites, the finest of all such works in the literature, speak in pure and clear voice, always spiritual yet down to earth. Isang Enders (b. 1988) was principal leader of the Dresden Staatskapelle cello section for four years before embarking on his solo career. He is a co-founder of the Ceres Ensemble and a founding member of the Int’l Shostakovich Festival. “The suites should speak, sing, dance, hunt and contemplate – altogether subjectively and characteristically. The subjective aspect of this recording is the result of my firm conviction." – Isang Enders

As the predecessors of Sony Classical, CBS Masterworks had not a catalogue of "authenticity-minded" recordings (the pioneering efforts of Raymond Leppard and Jean-Claude Malgoire notwithstanding), Sony made a distinctive new start and engaged indubitably one of the most experienced producers in the field of early music, Wolf Erichson. If the successes secured by such musicians as Gustav Leonhardt, Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Frans Brüggen in the 1960s were the most visible signs to a wider audience of thorough-going change in the interpretation of music from medieval to baroque times, there was no doubt in assigning a part of the general success to the work of the production teams behind the recordings. Wolf Erichson was involved in producing recordings for many artists through his work for Das Alte Werk series. Success followed him since the early 1970s, when he founded the SEON production company. Later, Sony Classical’s SEON line brought the pioneers of period intruments and vocal performances such as Frans Brüggen, Amer Bylsma, the Kuijkens, Gustav Leonhardt, and Konrad Ruhland on the international market at a budget price. Recordings made on SEON enjoyed both popular and critical acclaim. Later, producer Wolf Erichson, supervised Sony's VIVARTE label, which was a label devoted solely to producing historical music using modern recording technologies. Music critic Tom Manoff said these digital recordings of the VIVARTE series are among the best he has ever heard. The upcoming VIVARTE collector’s boxed sets feature attractive repertoire selection out of the legendary catalogue of ancient music. The CDs appear in their original coupling and cover at a special price. Some VIVARTE sets also include selected recordings from the SEON catalogue to round up the collections of selected titles.

"The quartets Nos. 21, 22, and 23 were composed by Mozart with the hope of a dedication to King William of Prussia. The king was a cellist, and Mozart lovingly favors the cello in these quartets of supreme craftsmanship." - Herbert Russcol

[Quartet No. 23 in F Major, K. 590] "...makes an exciting culmination to them all, in Mozart's most mature handling of the style...The composer ends his adventures in the string quartet at the very top of his bent." - John Burk, Mozart and his Music

"Though CBS in its latter days of independence reissued the Juilliard Quartet’s recordings of the last Schubert String Quartets on a mid-price 2-CD set, re-reissued by Sony on SB2K89978, neither they nor their present owners Sony/BMG ever released these Mozart recordings on CD, to the best of my knowledge, perhaps because there is such strong competition in the Mozart, not least from the Quartetto Italiano and Amadeus Quartet in recordings of much the same vintage. With those stylish Italian recordings currently unavailable, however, either as part of their 8-CD collection of all the Mozart Quartets, singly, or on Philips Duo, except as downloads or from ArkivMusic, and the Amadeus as a box set only, it makes excellent sense to reissue the Juilliard recordings...If you are looking for a 2-CD set of the last four quartets, the ArkivMusik reissue of the Juilliards makes an obvious recommendation. There’s a detailed booklet with some useful analyses of the music and the recording has worn well." -- MusicWeb International

By choosing to record classical repertoire with electric bass, including Bach’s Cello Suites, Jacques Bono has acquired a unique position in the music business. Playing them at their Thuringian church “original sites” put Bach's works into high contrast by interpreting them on an instrument of our times, more than 300 years after their composition – a project never ventured before. The time, the separation into musical genres and the familiar listening sensations are all overcome in Jacques Bono's performances. The cellist unperturbedly countered initial doubts by critics who claimed that it was impossible to perform Bach's cello suites on an electric bass with a musical venture that has music lovers of all origins intrigued – a revolutionary act in the best sense of musical tradition. In 2013 Jacques Bono had the idea of recording Bach’s 'Inventionen' in two voices together with a female violinist. On the German classical music scene he could not find a female violinist who would venture to play freely with him without fear of offending academically imposed values. He was thus delighted to find Tien-Hsin Cindy Wu in Los Angeles, who proved to be a violinist capable of playing J. B. Bach's music vivaciously, in a heart-felt manner and free of dogma.