The Seasons 2.0 is an adventurous, contemporary journey through the year, where music, poetry, illustration and performance flow together into a single 360° artistic experience. Pianist Marie Francois reimagines Tchaikovsky's 150-year-old concept for today. Every four weeks, a new interpretation of one of his monthly pieces is released, paired with a freshly written poem and a bespoke illustration - each publication including a QR code that leads directly to the corresponding music and the narrated poetry. This new album is a compilation of the piano music.
How can music by Mozart still feel undiscovered? For this ensemble, the answer lies in the piano trios: works that, despite their composer's fame, remain surprisingly absent from the concert hall. Bringing together K. 254, K. 496 and K. 548, this first volume follows Mozart's style across twelve formative years, representing three distinct periods in his writing for piano trio, from the lingering influence of the accompanied sonata to a richly conversational chamber style.
In their second Boccherini release, the Karski Quartet and cellist Raphaël Feye again present four string quintets, including two world premiere recordings. Composed for the unusual combination of two cellos, these pieces showcase Boccherini's versatility, moving from Mediterranean warmth to the elegance of Viennese classicism. The album successfully combines historical awareness with contemporary depth, providing a refined and compelling portrayal of the composer.
On this generous last installment of their Schubert-Brahms pilgrimage, Pieter Wispelwey and Paolo Giacometti serve us three iconic sonatas, including a world premiere. In it's original hue of G Major, Brahms' first violin sonata op. 78 is more scintillating and transparent than the D-major cell adaptation, and much more enchanting in it's opening Vivace. Brahms' third violin sonata op. 108 fuses surprising ebullience with superior mastery of form, in an epic piece which is an undiluted kick in the groin when played on a cello. And thankfully, Pieter and Paolo revisit Schubert's Arpeggione, that gem of intimacy, fragility, frivolity and humbling, unattainable beauty. A fitting final, in all respects.
Can we get into Beethoven’s creative mind, especially in the last phase of his life when he was coping with severe hearing loss? Tom Beghin’s new recording of Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas Opus 109, 110, and 111 is an artistic exploration of how Beethoven’s musicking was shaped by the work environment he created with the help of colleagues and friends. Not only does pianist Tom Beghin perform Beethoven’s trilogy of pianistic masterpieces on a magnificent new replica of Beethoven’s Broadwood piano, he uses a reconstruction of the Gehormaschine that was mounted on the composer’s piano so he could continue to create music as his hearing declined. “You do hear better when you bring your head under this machine, don’t you?” Andre Stein asked Beethoven. Two centuries later, we too can bring our heads under the machine and wonder: Do we hear Beethoven differently? Beghin draws us inside the hearing machine, where we feel as well as hear the essence of Beethoven’s rambunctious and irresistibly poetic musical vibrations. Inside the Hearing Machine invites us into the multisensory playground of a deaf composer for whom the machine was more than a hearing aid and who interacted with his instrument through much more than sound.
Although Beethoven's C Minor Symphony is probably the best-known piece of classical music ever written, it is veiled in myths and misunderstandings that are beginning to clear up thanks to research and performance efforts of musicians such as Jos van Immerseel.
On the final installment of it's Requiem series, the Flemish Radio Choir tackles Poulenc's iconic Stabat Mater (1950) and Alfred Desenclos' Requiem (1963), stunning works which steer clear of the typical Requiem horrors to convey a message of hope. Teaming up with the Brussels Philharmonic, the Flemish Radio Choir and it's acclaimed chief Herve Niquet extract the emotional and rhetorical essence of music which is eminently French, unusually tender, and delicately majestic. Since 1937, the Vlaams Radiokoor has been a reference for vocal music, both in Flanders and in Europe. The voice is the ultimate interpreter of our emotions, and the choir is one of it's greatest ambassadors.
An unusual, intriguing coupling of C.P.E. Bach's "original" Rococo, and the neo-classical ones by Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky. Pieter Wispelwey is equally at ease on the modern or period cello. His acute stylistic awareness, combined with a truly original interpretation and a phenomenal technical mastery, has won the hearts of critics and public alike in a wide-ranging repertoire. Wispelwey plays a 1760 Giovanni Battista Guadagnini cello.
Pergolesi: Stabat Mater / Naessens, Dieltiens, Linde, Capriola di Gioia
Evil Penguin
CD
$18.99Jun 05, 2020
Conductor Bart Naessens writes of this release: “For this version, we brought together two wonderful vocalists who are symbiotic and complementary both in terms of personality and musical interpretation. To emphasize the intimate and personal character of the work we have deliberately chosen a string ensemble with solo instruments, supported by the most traditional line-up of basso continuo in sacred music (organ & theorbo), which was given all possible improvisational freedom. This resulted in a ‘new’, fresh interpretation of this well-known piece of music, while we searched for the primal emotions of this beautiful poem about Mary and the melody it inspired.”
In 1803 Beethoven received a piano from Erard Frères in Paris. Why had he been so keen to own a French instrument and how did it inspire him, both as a pianist and a composer? The answer may lie in these performances on a new replica of Beethoven’s French piano, created as part of a unique research project. Placing the iconic “Waldstein” and “Appassionata” sonatas alongside equally grand pieces by two of his Parisian contemporaries, they reveal an unfamiliar French aspect to Beethoven’s genius. The present release is the first recording ever on the first (and brand new) replica of Beethoven’s Erard piano. It tells the story of a “French” Beethoven; someone who related to what happened in Paris through the piano’s technology.
Our fetishist regard for John Sebastian Bach as the pinnacle of Western art music obscures the fact that his talent was spawned by at least three generations of gifted predecessors. We celebrate this lineage by exploring the musical family archive Bach discovered in 1735. Among the hidden gems are intensely moving Geistliche Konzerte by his cousin Johann Christoph Bach, and the latter’s father Heinrich Bach. In his earliest preserved cantata Christ lag in Todesbanden, Johann Sebastian superbly imitates the polyphonic motet style of these foregoers, which was going out of fashion.
The summer of 1886 was one of the most prolific in the life of Johannes Brahms. The alpine grandeur of Lake Thun and Brahms’ buoyant holiday mood conjured up so many melodies that he declared he was “afraid to step on them.” In a few weeks’ time, Brahms produced two of his major chamber works, the Cello Sonata op. 99 and the Violin Sonata op. 100, that suits the cello delightfully. These chamber icons are aptly coupled to Schubert’s blissfully uplifting Sonata D 574. Wispelwey and Giacometti have been called “exceptionally imaginative and impassioned performers” (American Record Guide), and their collaboration has spawned recordings rated as “fascinating, provocative, almost perverse” (Sunday Times). The first installment of the Duo Pilgrimage was hailed a “successful launch” (Kulturradio) on account of the “unspoken complicity between two virtuosi… who accomplish a sparkling, playful, cantabile account.” (Cobra.be)
The cycle of six solo Sonatas and Partitas by J.S. Bach is arguably one of the most powerful and most important compositions in musical history. These works have been with Linus Roth since he was nine years old, when he first learned the Gigue from the E major Partita, moving on by the ageof twelve to the first Fugue in G minor to tackling at fifteen the Ciaconna, which represents a cosmos in its own right. By seventeen, Roth had finally learned the entire oeuvre for the first time and since then he is fortunate to have been able to grow as a musician through the constant and welcome challenge of interpreting these remarkable works. This recording was made during lockdown, in which all of our lives have had to be reduced to a minimum in almost every area. The chance to renew the intense preoccupation with this miraculous music in preparation for the recording was a huge privilege as it allowed Linus an escape into a spiritual freedom which helped me greatly on a personal level at this time.
