If you happened to see Daniel Barenboim’s 2003 Beethoven master classes on DVD, you might remember an unusually poised young pianist, Alessio Bax, who chose the “Hammerklavier” sonata’s daunting final movement. Fast-forward 11 years to Bax’s recording of the complete work, coupled with the composer’s ubiquitous “Moonlight” sonata. Bax might not take the “Hammerklavier” Allegro at Beethoven’s admittedly optimistic metronome marking, but the hurling momentum, lean yet nuanced textures, and astute ear for voice leading (the amazingly well contoured fughetta, for instance) convey both structure and kinetic energy. Also note Bax’s explosive build-up of the upward alternating broken fifths and sixths leading into the recapitulation, complete with the controversial “misprint masterstroke” Urtext A-sharp (played by Schnabel and Arrau) rather than the more logical yet less quirky A-natural (Brendel and Kempff).

The brisk, appropriately sardonic Scherzo features stinging offbeat accents and a ferocious upward F major scale buttoning the Trio. When I played the Adagio sostenuto for my college piano teacher, he constantly admonished me to “put some beef on that left hand.” I pass that advice down to Alessio! While he certainly sustains his slow basic tempo with the utmost in expressive economy, he does tend to uniformly voice his slow-moving chords, with the top melody line to the fore. Bax brilliantly characterizes the Largo’s madcap mood swings and broken chord transition into the Fugue, while the Fugue itself is a knockout: brisk, clear, clean, and jazzy as hell.

Bax sets an ideal and flexible pace for the “Moonlight” sonata’s iconic Adagio sostenuto, which he plays gorgeously. A few of the Allegretto’s clipped phrase endings and teensy tenutos strike me as what one of my British colleagues describes as “a mite twee.” However, Bax’s rhythmic discipline, focused articulation, and sharp attention to dynamics in the Presto agitato finale make the performance sound faster than it actually is.

Under Bax’s virtuosic fingers, the Chorus of the Dervishes whirls with Lisztian abandon. On the other hand, his overly fast and lightweight treatment of the Turkish March lacks the thrust and force of Beethoven’s original orchestral version, not to mention the once-popular Anton Rubinstein transcription. Reservations aside, this release adds up to an impressive achievement for which Bax should be proud.

-- Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

O charming night – like a common thread, the romantic motifs of yearning for peace, farewell to lovers and mystical experiences of nature run through the works in this recording. With particular sensitivity and subtle harmonic effects, Rheinberger brings the world of elves and mermaids to life. Brahms’s “charming night,” moonlit and enhanced by the song of the nightingale, serves as the backdrop for an implied amorous adventure. And Herzogenberg’s Notturnos evoke an entirely otherworldly reverie. The Orpheus Vokalensemble, consisting of singers from all over the world, was founded in 2005 as the Landesakademie Ochsenhausen’s professional chamber choir. Since then, the ensemble has grown into a significant chamber choir enjoying international respect, working with renowned choral conductors such as Michael Alber, Gunnar Eriksson, Gary Graden, Florian Helgath, Bo Holten and others. The musical and stylistic spectrum of the ensemble is documented by further artistic partners such as Ida Bieler, Konrad Elser, Jürgen Essl, Edita Gruberová, Dieter Ilg, Sibylla Rubens, the Stenzl Piano Duo, Ars Antiqua Austria, Concerto Köln, the SWR Symphony Orchestra Baden-Baden/Freiburg and many more.

Ever since its triumphal premiere on 12th September 1910 in Munich, Mahler’s 8th Symphony in E flat major has had the reputation of being, along with Arnold Schönberg’s “Gurre-Liedern”, the piece on the whole of the symphonic repertoire calling for the largest number of participants. This recording has a number of musicians much less than the average, but Gabriel Feltz sees it more like a great chance. He used flanking positions for the choir in relation to the orchestra and lager parts of the choirs were facing each other, which gives especially the first parts stereophonic effects. For Feltz these performances of Mahler’s 8th symphony on 3rd and 4th July 2018 were especially successful and fulfilling moments in his life as a musician.

This is the first of five recordings dedicated to Beethoven's complete symphonies transcriptions. Gabriele Baldocci has appeared at the most important concert halls and at major music festivals. He is an ambassador, performer and professor of the Martha Argerich Presents Project and frequently plays in chamber ensembles.

Quite possibly the most melodically gifted composer to have ever lived, Franz Schubert’s uniqueness extends as well to his individual works notoriety, some of which is universal, as in the Trout Quintet, much of which remains in the shadows, even unfinished, as is the beautiful Notturno or the F major quartet, D487. Consistent throughout however is the composer’s grace, elegance and Biedermeyer charm, firmly in evidence on this recording.

With Resound Beethoven, the Orchester Wiener Akademie brings the music of the great master back into the venues where they received their premiere performances. The focus of this recording is theatre music. Herbert Fottinger has taken the role of narrator in this production of Egmont. John Malkovich serves as narrator in the English version. Producer Stephan Reh captures the acoustic qualities of these venues with fullness and transparency.

BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas: No. 6 in F; No. 29 in B?, “Hammerklavier.” SCHUBERT Impromptu in B?, D 935/3 • Wilhelm Backhaus (pn) • ICA 5055 (62:35) Live: Bonn 9/24/1959


This recital features Wilhelm Backhaus (1884–1969) near the end of his long career. The German pianist was known throughout his lifetime for his interpretations of Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, and Mozart primarily, though it should not be forgotten that he was the first person ever to record the 24 Chopin etudes back in 1928. This recording remains a remarkable document of the ease of execution and the elegance of musical interpretation he shared with certain members of that generation of pianists. His technique was formidable in his heyday and—perhaps even more astonishing—it remained so to the very end of his career.


The opening of the “Hammerklavier” Sonata is a bit slow and heavy, but this soon gives way to a torrent of energy and an upsurge in tempo just a few bars later. Backhaus seems to want to show that each theme, each section, has its own character, which needs an adjustment in tempo to best bring that out. The pianist makes the most of the diverse musical sections in the sonata, from the fluid and graceful scalar passages in the first movement, which sound like shimmering silky waves made of delicate musical fabric in his hands, to the big chordal passages, which are powerful walls of sound that surround and engulf the listener. Backhaus has no qualms about enhancing the effect of certain of these latter passages by adding extra sonority in the bass parts—most often just doubling the octave. The slow movement, one of the most difficult and sublime in Beethoven’s oeuvre, is emotionally taxing to even the most seasoned performers. Backhaus intelligently chooses a flowing tempo: never so slow as to drag, but never too fast as to trivialize the music. The finale is taken at a brisk pace. There may be a few wrong notes here and there (albeit not very many), but his sense of pacing is thrilling: There is more than just a sense of danger; there is in his interpretations the conviction that regardless of the obstacles, he will triumph in the end. There is as much fire in this “Hammerklavier” as the best of them.


The other works on the recital are well played as well, the Schubert being particularly inspired. The gentle way in which the pianist caresses the instrument betrays the age in which he matured: This is elegant and lyrical, and Backhaus shows that though this composition is in the same key as Beethoven’s grandest essay for the piano, it is in character lightyears apart. The Beethoven F-Major Sonata is no minor work, and Backhaus gives it all the respect and love that he does the rest of the program. The opening movement is playful in that Haydnesque vein, the fugato finale lighthearted yet filled with Beethovenian determination and drive. The quirky middle movement is perhaps my favorite in the sonata, though. Backhaus revels in the mysterious opening phrases, lightening the path through the middle section, bringing the piece to a wistful end. It is three and a half minutes of pure bliss.


This is a remarkable recital, one that grows on you the more you listen to it—one captured in remarkable sound given its vintage. For a live recital, one should expect a few wrong notes here and there. Backhaus at 75 plays as few as I’ve ever heard in a riveting performance of the “Hammerklavier.” This is no lightweight rendering of the piece, either; this is one to remember. That said, I have a few other favorites: Richter, Gilels, Rudolf Serkin. The one that I come back to more than any other, though, is Peter Serkin (on Pro Arte). There is in his playing the soaring of spiritual heights along with a real sense of structural logic. The fugal finale is brisk, light, rhythmic—almost jazzy—in his hands. But Backhaus is a welcome addition to my collection. If you are a fan of the “Hammerklavier,” then this recording should be welcome to yours as well.


FANFARE: Scott Noriega

SCHUBERT String Quartet No. 15. BEETHOVEN String No. 16 • New Orford Str Qrt • BRIDGE 9363 (74:47)



This would be an impressive release for any seasoned ensemble; all the more so then that it marks the New Orford String Quartet’s debut album. An ensemble entering into the fray of such highly competitive arenas as Schubert’s and Beethoven’s quartets often raises the question critics invariably ask, “Do these performances offer new insights or have something special to say?” To that I can answer with a most emphatic yes.


“Unstable” is a key word in describing Schubert’s G-Major Quartet—harmonically unstable in its vacillation between major and minor and its undermining of tonality; rhythmically unstable in its strange leaping figures and shuddering tremolos; and most of all, emotionally unstable in its dizzying mood swings, evidence of a mind in the grip of a serious mental disorder. Much of Schubert’s private life and personal affairs has been revealed in recent years, but in many ways the boy-man remains an enigma.


Save for a fragment of a string quartet in F Major that appears in the Schubert catalog as D 998, the G-Major Quartet is the end of the line for the composer’s string quartets, though it would not be his last great chamber work for strings. That would be the String Quintet in C Major, which came two years later, in 1828, not long before his death. In a number of ways, this G-Major work, the last of Schubert’s completed quartets, picks up where its immediate predecessor, the “Death and the Maiden” Quartet of 1824, left off. I’m reminded of what Mahler is reputed to have said in reply to someone who had asked him why the funeral march in his First Symphony was so much different from the funeral march in Beethoven’s “Eroica” Symphony. “Ah,” replied Mahler, “Beethoven describes the mourner; I depict the corpse.” Gruesome as the medical examiner’s lab imagery may be, Schubert’s G-Major Quartet strikes me as the Maiden on the autopsy table.


I don’t wish to go down the road of this analogy too far by saying that the New Orford Quartet’s performance resembles an autopsy on the deceased, but the ensemble’s reading does have a laser-sharp focus to it that lays bare every strand and fiber of the piece. The players take their time and exercise meticulous care, as well as respect, in cutting through and folding back the many layers of tissue. Oftentimes, performances of this work can have a frantic edge to them; I’m thinking, for example, of the recording by the Hagen Quartet. But tension built more slowly over longer arches can turn the emotional screws even tighter than sudden explosive outbursts. The New Orford’s reading of Schubert’s G-Major Quartet is an exemplary study in how to put the most elegant and refined playing to the purpose of delivering the most upsetting news—tragedy without the hysterics.


It’s obvious from the above interview that cellist Brian Manker and I don’t see completely eye-to-eye (or, should I say, don’t hear completely ear-to-ear?) on Beethoven’s final complete quartet, the F Major, op. 135. His speculation about the connection between the es in the Muss es sein introduction to the last movement and Es in German being the designation for E?, which could be an internal musical joke referring back to an event in the first movement, is certainly interesting and worth entertaining. But there is another joke, less abstruse, that has been connected to the Muss es sein incipit, and that is a scribbled note in which Beethoven is allegedly complaining about his housekeeper insisting on putting too much starch in his shirts: “Must it be? It must be.” This, in combination with the actual musical content of the movement, has always led me to hear the whole thing as a fairly lighthearted, even silly, romp. I think we would agree, however, that the Lento assai movement is one of Beethoven’s profoundest utterances.


The New Orford’s tempo at the outset of the quartet is a bit slower than I’m accustomed to hearing it. But it’s not one of the works Beethoven provided metronome markings for—only his quartets through op. 95 contain his own markings—and the first movement is marked Allegretto, so the New Orford’s reading may be entirely justified. But something else emerges at this slightly slower tempo that I find interesting and quite delightful, and that is a sly, slightly underplayed, tongue-in-cheek humor that tickles the funny bone in a different, perhaps more sophisticated way than other, more slapstick approaches.


Take, for example, the hiccups in the cello part that come shortly into the development section following the double bar and change of key signature to one sharp. Not a few cellists take these for rude, sophomoric belches, which, admittedly, is funny, especially if you’re into high school hijinks. But Manker sees these more as little burps that slip out embarrassedly in polite company, making them all the funnier for their lack of social propriety and grace. It puts me in mind of the long-circulated tale, 1601 , attributed to Mark Twain, in which he is privy to a conversation among Francis Bacon, Sir Walter Raleigh, Ben Johnson, and 16-year-old Francis Beaumonte engaged in sniffing out who broke wind in company of the Queen. If memory serves, I think the culprit turns out to be the Queen herself. Twain, of course (whether he was the author of this particular farce or not) can always be counted on to entertain and edify and, so too, I think, can the playing of the New Orford Quartet.


FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

Mozart's final opera returns to Glyndebourne after an absence of nearly 20 years in a 'stark, compelling and very well acted' production directed by Claus Guth. Richard Croft sings the title role 'with exemplary stylistic poise and tonal sweetness', and Anna Stéphany is a Sesto 'touchingly full of angst and remorse... with terrific élan and immaculate technical control' in the arias (The Telegraph) - her "Parto, Parto" 'simply breathtaking' (The Guardian). Guth's vision sets the first-century Roman story in a two-storey office suite bureaucracy 'exquisitely lit by Olaf Winter', aptly framing the scheming of Vitelia, sung by Alice Coote 'in terrific form'. The OAE under Robin Ticciati 'brings out the sheer beauty' of Mozart's score (Express). Extra features on this release include 'When Worlds Divide' and a cast gallery. The press gave rave reviews: '... The director gives an exceptionally convincing cast the time to develop their characters, conflicting relationships and moral dilemmas' (The Times) 'Conductor Robin Ticciati combined elegance with urgency' (The Guardian) 'Stark, compelling and very well acted' (The Daily Telegraph)

In 1961, Ruggiero Ricci was already a world famous violin soloist. He asked the up-and-coming pianist Martha Argerich, then only 19, to join him on a tour to Russia. Presented here is the radio broadcast of their second Leningrad recital. The first was already released by DOREMI (DHR-8040). The recital took place on April 22, 1961. All items of this live performance presentation are recorded here for the first time. "Her concerts conjure up scenes from another place and time; grown men running down the aisles clutching bouquets, world-renowned musicians pummeling the railings of the upper boxes, jaded critics breaking into foolish smiles." So ran Alex Ross's rhapsodic description of a Martha Argerich recital

A work of great depth and eloquence, and the longest work in Brahms’s œuvre, A German Requiem inspiration from Bach’s contrapuntal genius but avoids overt religious tradition. Brahms chose the texts himself, placing an emphasis on an affirmation of life with the suggestion that he would gladly have substituted ‘human’ for ‘German’ in the title. This release joins Antoni Wit’s ‘richly satisfying’ (Gramophone) recording of Brahms Choral Music [8.572694].