Vivaldi: The Four Seasons (2015) Itzhak Perlman, London Philharmonic Orchestra When it comes to evoking the colors and moods of Vivaldi's Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter, Itzhak Perlman deploys an inimitably rich and varied palette. He directs the London Philharmonic Orchestra from the violin.

"The Enigma Variations, Froissart, Cockaigne, and In the South (a thrilling performance) all benefit from Slatkin's keen musical insight and impeccable execution. The London Philharmonic, long experienced in this music, provides its usual enthusiastic and authoritative performances."

--Victor Carr Jr, ClassicsToday.com [6/15/2004] Reviewing RCA 60389

Artfulness disguised as simplicity – achingly beautiful.

‘Flicka’, as she is known among friends, has garnered the opera houses and concert halls around the world for four decades and her agenda is still well-filled. As a recording artist she has been prolific and appeared in opera, art-song, sacred music, operetta, Broadway musical and cross-over albums – always with glorious results. The present disc, recorded in 1978 and reissued by Arkiv with the original cover picture and Lionel Salter’s liner notes, was one of the few records with her I never bought on LP – God knows why! Now that I finally have it in my collection I feel satisfied. Mahler songs and Frederica von Stade’s voice have always seemed the ideal combination.

Her clean, slim voice is especially well suited to Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen. One of her specialities in opera was the trouser role: Cherubino and Octavian. The opening lines of Wenn mein Schatz are sung with innocent, boyish tone and in Ging heut’ Morgen she is wonderfully fresh and youthful, singing the final lines touchingly with ‘naked’ tone. She can also be strong and dramatic: Ich hab’ ein glühend Messer has all the necessary intensity with desperation almost visible. Then Die zwei blauen Augen is simplicity itself. I have heard few recordings of this cycle that sound so right – and this in spite of a woman singing what is, after all, a man’s words.

The two Wunderhorn songs are just as affecting. In Rheinlegendchen she adopts that boyish tone again and sings, so to speak, with wide open eyes – a spontaneous story-teller. Wer hat dies Liedlein erdacht?, famously recorded in the 1930s by Elisabeth Schumann, definitely has an open-air atmosphere. Schumann was a charmer, ‘Flicka’ with rounder tone is no less charming.

The five Rückert songs are, for me, indelibly connected with Janet Baker and her late 1960s recording with Barbirolli. Baker could, like no-one else, combine simplicity and deep emotions. But Frederica von Stade’s leaner voice is equally well suited to these songs. Her sophisticated artlessness – sounds like a contradiction but is exactly what I hear; artfulness disguised as simplicity – makes Liebst du um Schönheit so achingly beautiful. She applies the same light touch on Um Mitternacht, and this doesn’t exclude interpretative depth. She has the required power for the big emotional moments, most importantly the final pages of this great song.

The final song, Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen, has for forty years been one of the family’s great favourites – always in Janet Baker’s reading. Other recordings have popped up and we have admired them, listened closely and in the last analysis returned to Ms Baker. I still find it the deepest-probing but Frederica von Stade’s ethereal rendering of Ich bin gestorben dem Weltgetümmel (Rückert actually wrote Weltgewimmel) has also etched itself into my store of unforgettable musical moments. A wonderful end to a memorable recording.

The recording is first class and the LPO play like gods under Andrew Davis’s watchful direction. There are no song texts in the booklet, which is a pity, but they are easily available on the internet.

-- Göran Forsling, MusicWeb International [6/2011]

Leonard Slatkin conducts the briskest Belshazzar in years. When we have had so recent a reminder of the composer's own very first wartime recording, far faster in most of its speeds than has become the custom, Slatkin's approach would have certainly pleased Walton himself... The choral ensemble is generally first-rate... What is superb is the singing of the baritone soloist, Thomas Allen, covering the broadest tonal and expressive range... Slatkin directs a splendidly rumbustious performance of the opening Toccata... [The final Giga burlesca of] the Pastorale Siciliana (with David Theodore sounding glorious on the oboe)...with its snappy cross-rhythms is exuberantly done...

-- Edward Greenfield, Gramophone [9/1992]

John Ireland was another one of those high-quality composers who avoided large forms, and so will always rate as (at best) a "minor master". But his Piano Concerto is an early 20th century masterpiece, a real crowd-pleaser in a Prokofiev-meets-Gershwin sort of way. Eric Parkin is the pianist most closely associated with Ireland's work, and this recording of the concerto is the finest available. Parkin re-recorded the piece for Chandos, but that version is comparatively labored and heavy-handed, as well as glaringly recorded. Here, Parkin plays with an ease of rhythm, a flexibility and flow that makes the music swing as it must, and (as usual) Lyrita's sonics are terrific.

The remainder of the program is scarcely less attractive. These Things Shall Be is an optimistic choral paean that packs a lot of musical material into 20 scant minutes. Satyricon, an overture that for some reason never gets played these days, once again reveals Ireland's high level of melodic inspiration and sheer craftsmanship in those few works he composed with orchestra. The Legend for piano and orchestra has Parkin once again in top form, and all of this music benefits from Adrian Boult's authoritative but unobtrusively sensitive podium guidance. So many of these Lyrita discs are true "building a collection titles"--the one disc you must have if you want the best and most representative selection of its respective composer's work. Here is another in that distinguished line.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

This is one of the "new" Lyritas, in the sense that the recordings on this CD have never been issued before, even though they were made thirteen years ago. Though it’s a matter for regret that the recordings have lain in the vaults for so long it’s cause for unqualified rejoicing that such a delightful collection, all in sparkling performances, should now be available.

David Pyatt is an outstanding young British musician. I recall his victory in the BBC Young Musician of the year competition in 1988. At that time he was aged only 14 – he’d only taken up the horn six years earlier, I believe. He has since gone on to build a highly successful solo career, combining that with the post of Principal Horn in the London Philharmonic Orchestra, an assignment that he took up in the 1998/9 season.

All the works included here, with the exception of Ruth Gipps’s concerto were closely associated with the great Dennis Brain. I’m sure he played all of them superbly – he gave the premières of the Jacob, Arnold and Bowen works - but it’s hard to imagine stronger advocacy than all the pieces receive from David Pyatt. He’s recorded relatively closely, though not aggressively so, and not in such a way as to eclipse the consistently interesting orchestral parts. The closeness of the balance allows us to appreciate to the full his rich, round, golden tone as well as his seemingly effortless technique. This is, in short a superb demonstration of horn playing. There are other links within the programme too, besides the "Brain factor". For example, both Malcolm Arnold and Ruth Gipps were pupils of Gordon Jacob and the first broadcast performance of the Gipps concerto was given, in 1982, by Frank Lloyd, David Pyatt’s own teacher.

The concerto by Ruth Gipps seems to me to be the most serious of the pieces on this disc – not that any of them is exactly frivolous. She wrote it for her son, who gave the first performance. The first movement offers the soloist frequent opportunities for virtuosity but it’s predominantly a thoughtful movement. Unusually the middle movement is not slow in tempo; instead it’s a scherzo, featuring what Lewis Foreman memorably describes as a "thistledown tune". There’s a vivacious start to the finale but before long we reach a more lyrical and pensive section and this music alternates thereafter with livelier episodes. The accompaniment to this concerto features the fullest orchestration of the four and the scoring is consistently resourceful and interesting. Nowhere is this more apparent that in the short passage in the finale that Lewis Foreman highlights in his notes. Here, beginning at 4:30, the soloist duets with the celesta in a most imaginative and unusual piece of scoring. Like its companions on the disc this concerto cries out to be heard more often and David Pyatt is a splendid advocate for it.

He’s no less admirable in the splendid concerto by York Bowen, himself a horn player. The more I hear of Bowen’s music the more I like it and the more I marvel at its neglect. This is an inventive and tremendously enjoyable work in which a short, reflective slow movement catches the listener’s attention. The finale is cast mainly in a lively frame of mind but the romantic in York Bowen can’t resist pausing along the way for a lovely middle section in a slower tempo – and thank goodness for it.

Malcolm Arnold’s concerto is probably the best known of these concertos. Another work inspired by Dennis Brain, he gave its first performance at the Cheltenham Festival in July 1957, just a matter of weeks before his tragic and untimely death. Arnold, himself an orchestral trumpeter and therefore well versed in brass instruments, appears to write with complete understanding not just of the solo instrument but of the personality for whom he had written the work. The main material of the central slow movement is a nostalgic slow waltz that David Pyatt clearly relishes and which offers a few moments of relative repose before the headlong virtuosity of the finale.

The Gordon Jacob concerto is a delight from start to finish. The first movement frequently has the strings playing in motor rhythms but over the top of this material the soloist has interesting and lively music. There’s a substantial and lovely lyrical core to this movement and a demanding cadenza (from 7:20). The slow movement is a wonderfully atmospheric nocturne, which is imbued with a fine sense of lyrical repose. Pyatt is most eloquent here. Most of the time the finale dances along giving the soloist ample opportunity for display but there are some disarming lyrical stretches too.

This generously filled disc concludes with an encore in the shape of Hunter’s Moon. by Gilbert Vinter. This wasn’t written for Dennis Brain but he took it up towards the end of his life as something of a party piece. I hadn’t encountered it before and I found it most engaging. The outer sections, which contain a bouncy little march, frame a gorgeous cantabile central section. The whole piece breathes the atmosphere of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

I enjoyed the Vinter piece, but then I enjoyed the whole disc immensely. The music is of high quality and the standard of performance is consistently superb. In this last comment I include not just the marvellous solo playing of David Pyatt but also the fine support given to him by Nicholas Braithwaite and the LPO. The recorded sound is first rate and Lewis Foreman’s authoritative and enthusiastic notes are a model of their kind. For sheer listening pleasure this is one of the best discs to have come my way for a long time.

-- John Quinn, MusicWeb International

Lyrita is back, thank God, courtesy of Nimbus, and this now-legendary recording of Malcolm Arnold conducting his own delightful English, Scottish, Irish, and Cornish Dances (plus the Sarabande and Polka from the ballet Solitaire) never has been surpassed. True, the playing isn't quite perfect. There are a couple of brass flubs here and there, but you have to strain to hear them and probably won't notice. More to the point, the sheer gusto of the interpretations (witness English Dance No. 4) and the impact of the superb engineering remain in a class of their own. Colorful, tuneful, and a delight from first note to last, this disc is a treasure whose appeal hasn't dimmed a bit since the day it was released. No self-respecting collector of English music can afford to be without it. [9/19/2006]--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

A fascinating assembly of Holstiana. Three of these pieces have already appeared on record before, two of which—the colourful 1921 ballet, The Lure, and Dances from The Morning of the Year (an effective concert suite edited by Imogen Holst and Colin Matthews from Holst's 1926-7 choral ballet)—were available on an earlier Lyrita compilation from 1982, coupled with the ambitious 1904 scena for soprano and orchestra, The Mystic Trumpeter. David Atherton was the admirable conductor on that occasion, with the LSO enthusiastic protagonists and the engineers on top form. Wisely, then, this enterprising label has invited the same conductor (this time with the LPO) to continue the good work, and the result is this notably generous collection of absorbing rarities.

Just one work offers the chance for comparative listening, the haunting Invocation for cello and orchestra from 1911. Imogen Holst has observed that, from a textural point of view, this music presages many features of ''Venus'' from The Planets (indeed, if I'm not mistaken, the cello's opening senza misura passage even quotes a turn of phrase later used in that selfsame movement). Memorably recorded for RCA by Julian Lloyd Webber and Vernon Handley in 1983, this often magical creation is equally well served by these newcomers: perhaps Alexander Baillie is the more hyper-sensitive and tonally beautiful of the two soloists, whereas Handley is a rather more imaginative partner than Atherton. Its companion opus, A Song of the Night for violin and orchestra, was composed in 1905: a less characteristic essay, its central climax glows with romantic fervour, especially in a performance as passionately dedicated as this one.

From 1899 to 1906, Holst worked on his large-scale opera based on Indian mythology, Sita. Colin Matthews has put together this brief orchestral interlude containing music from Act 3: its excitable, very Wagnerian manners are striking, as, for that matter, is Holst's beautifully judged orchestral writing at the hushed conclusion. There's plenty more Wagnerian spectacle in Holst's earliest completed Indian-inspired creation, the 12-minute tone-poem, Indra, from 1903. This colourful, enjoyably rhetorical portrait-in-sound of the god, Indra, and his battle against the drought, again reveals a confident, assertive master of the orchestra, if not without an occasional touch of vulgarity in some of the more over-blown tuttis. The heartfelt, if not especially memorable Elegy in memoriam William Morris in fact comprises the slow movement of Holst's Cotswold Symphony from 1900. To begin with, Holst's processional is momentarily reminiscent of Magnard's glorious Chant funebre, though, as the music progresses, the comparison quickly becomes a cruel one! Finally, there's A Winter Idyll which, although the earliest work on this CD (it dates from 1897, when the composer was still a student at the Royal College of Music), is scored with no little aplomb; certainly, Holst's teacher, Stanford, would have approved of the felicitous transparency and sure design of this, his pupil's very first orchestral work.

In all, a most rewarding survey, handsomely played and engineered, and graced by extensive and knowledgeable booklet-notes from Lewis Foreman.

Andrew Achenbach, Gramophone [6/1993]

BAX Symphonies: No. 2; 1 No. 5 2 • Myer Fredman, cond; 1 Raymond Leppard, cond; 2 London PO • LYRITA 233 (78:28)


Lyrita’s versions of Bax’s First, Second, Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Symphonies were, in my opinion, the most important recordings in their catalog, especially at the time of their release, because they introduced the remarkable output of a major symphonist to American listeners for the first time in modern sound. Three complete recorded cycles of Bax’s symphonies conducted by Vernon Handley and Bryden Thomson (Chandos) and David Lloyd-Jones (Naxos) have followed. This album containing the Second and Fifth Symphonies completes the CD release of Lyrita’s Bax Symphonies. The long wait has been worth it. First of all, the CD represents an incredible value, with two major symphonies adding up to nearly 80 minutes of music. In the Second Symphony, Bax calls for a huge orchestra including piano, organ, and a large but subtly applied percussion section. For the most part, aside from a few brief lyrical passages, the music sounds angry and threatening. The discrete and sparing use of the organ is dramatically effective. In the second movement, the organ pedal underlines the dark atmosphere before the luminous closing chords. At the climax of the third movement, Bax briefly unleashes the full power of the organ in a terrifying outburst that has to make you speculate as to what it means. The music then fades to a desolate conclusion marked niente (“nothing”).


The Fifth Symphony is dedicated to Sibelius. The opening theme is nearly a direct quote from the second movement of Sibelius’s Fifth Symphony. Bax then essentially evolves the thematic material of the whole symphony out of that single motific kernel. In the second movement, he briefly hints at expanding the Sibelius fragment into a lush Baxian melody, but the mood is transient. The third movement is a brilliantly orchestrated set of variations that culminates in Bax’s only fortissimo epilogue dominated by massed brass playing the motto theme. So, the Fifth Symphony is dedicated to Sibelius, nearly quotes a theme by Sibelius, is perhaps influenced by Sibelius, but ultimately sounds like Bax and no one else.


Myer Fredman and Raymond Leppard match Vernon Handley in his fine Chandos set at every point in these performances, but this Lyrita release has no peer because of its sound. The Second and Fifth Symphonies were respectively recorded in 1970 and 1971 in Walthamstow Hall in London. The engineers (Kenneth Wilkinson and Stanley Goodall) provide a nearly perfect reproduction of Bax’s unique and highly personal sound world. Dynamic range is massive, but there is no harshness or sense of strain. Instrumental balances are outstanding and there is no artificial spotlighting of individual instruments. The overall texture is lean and muscular, but it is rich and seductively sweet when necessary, as at the end of the second movement of the Symphony No. 2. This recording is clearly Want List material, along with the incomparable Bax Sixth Symphony on Lyrita 296 ( Fanfare: 31:5).


FANFARE: Arthur Lintgen

Famous for his role as keyboard player in the progressive rock band Genesis, Tony Banks has always been fascinated by the idea of writing orchestral music. Five of the seven pieces in this orchestral suite were written specifically for the Seven project.

In this celebrated Glyndebourne Festival production, David Hockney’s designs for director John Cox reinterpret the Hogarth etchings that inspired the opera’s libretto, written for Stravinsky by W.H. Auden and Chester Kallman. In 2010, this revival under Glyndebourne’s Music Director, Vladimir Jurowski, captured the opera’s neo-classical spirit and its juxtaposition of whimsy, cynicism and compassion, prompting the Financial Times to call it,‘‘as enjoyable a performance of Stravinsky’s opera as any that has come along".

Recorded live at the Glyndebourne Opera House 18–19 December 2010

Bonus:
- Documentary includes an interview with David Hockney
- Introduction to the Rake’s Progress

• Picture format: NTSC 16:9
• Sound format: LPCM 2.0 / DTS 5.1
• Region code: 0 (worldwide)
• Subtitles: English, French, German, Dutch, Japanese, Korean
• Running time: 140 mins
• No. of DVDs: 1
  

REVIEW:

Nick Shadow speaks directly to the audience in Act 2, which justifies his winking and gurning at them at various points throughout, usually to show what a dupe his master is, and always to delicious comic effect. His costume, and in particular his hairdo, is ridiculous, yet strangely disquieting. Matthew Rose plays the part to the hilt, making clear from his very first scene that Tom is a pushover and that Anne is where the danger lies. He manages adeptly the comic aspects of the role, at least as far as the graveyard scene, when everything changes. It’s possible to imagine a darker voice for Shadow, but I find his assumption totally convincing. Topi Lehtipuu as Tom is very fine too. He captures very well indeed Tom’s love for Anne, which is genuine and will be his salvation, but which he abandons by weakness of will. Miah Persson is adorable as Anne. She brings out beautifully the vulnerability of the character, but crucially she has brilliantly understood the steely determination present in Anne’s music, and acts it out, both physically and vocally, to perfection. The smaller roles are beautifully taken, and the chorus sings and acts splendidly. Time and again I was struck, as never before, by the sheer beauty of the sound of this work, and the orchestra plays magnificently under the inspiring direction of Vladimir Jurowski.

There are other performances of The Rake’s Progress on DVD, including an earlier incarnation of this same production, finely sung but now superseded technically. Then there is the production from La Monnaie in Brussels, garishly updated to 1950s America. Rapturously received in many quarters, you are likely to love it or hate it. Either way, there is no question, this life-enhancing DVD from Glyndebourne is truly special and not to be missed.

-- MusicWeb International

Okay, we all know that at this point no one needs a new Brahms cycle, but this first installment has one thing going for it: Marin Alsop appears to be a fine Brahms conductor. She begins the First Symphony with an introduction that would have made Klemperer sit up and take notice: it's that grand and imposing. Happily, she also launches the allegro (exposition repeat retained) with genuine thrust and energy, while her generous rubato as she relaxes into the second subject is effortlessly managed--and she builds to the recapitulation with plenty of excitement and rhythmic tension. This is the genuine article, make no mistake. The slow movement reveals the same beautifully controlled transitions, the tempo nicely flowing, marred only by an insensitive solo violin, too closely miked.


The third movement reveals one other small flaw in the performance: rather faceless wind playing from clarinets and oboes (to some degree a function of the forward string balances and generous reverberation that otherwise serves the music to impressive effect). Alsop builds the brooding introduction to the finale with an unerring feel for the music's atmosphere, though I wish she had launched the movement proper with a swifter account of the "big tune". To her credit, though, she doesn't lurch forward at the forte counterstatement, but rather accumulates energy naturally. The coda goes really well, with an impressive feeling of culmination, and Alsop takes care to make the trombones audible in the final bars, a nice touch that sets the seal on a very distinguished effort.


The two overtures are no less impressive. Of course, the Academic Festival is practically unkillable, but Alsop's pointed rhythms help project the music's joyous humor while preventing the familiar tunes from sounding foursquare. Her Tragic Overture is one of the best, at a tempo remarkably close to Ancerl's benchmark interpretation--which is to say slowish and implacably serious. At this speed, the rich harmonies of the second subject and throughout the development really tell, and the climaxes have time to register with the necessary impact. I look forward very much to the next installments in this series.


As I said, the market doesn't really need this, but Naxos is right to let Alsop shine in the music she identifies with most strongly, and her Brahms certainly qualifies. Besides, wonderful though it is to conduct lots of Barber, Reich, and Glass, the fact remains that careers are made in the standard repertoire, where comparisons with illustrious interpretations past and present are made. Certainly on evidence here Alsop has nothing to fear from the competition. If the rest of this cycle remains at this high level (that is, if she pegs the finale of the Second Symphony and becomes one of the very few conductors to play the Third really well), then I would say her reputation will be secure for some time to come.
--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Miah Persson, Topi Lehtipuu, Clive Bayley, Matthew Rose, Susan Gorton, Elena Manistina, Graham Clark, and Duncan Rock star in this Glyndebourne proudction of the Stravinsky opera conducted by Vladimir Jurowski and directed by John Cox, with David Hockney.

For five decades Wolfgang Sawallisch (1923-2013) held a central position in the musical world. That centrality was reflected in a series of top orchestral and operatic posts and in his interpretations, free of self-regarding eccentricities. His modest but highly effective conducting technique also made him the ideal recording artist. Sawallisch was a Bavarian born in Munich, city of orchestras and a great opera company, which he headed for 21 years. He started his career as an outstanding pianist and remained a sought-after accompanist to great Lieder singers and instrumentalists. Volume 1 of a complete conspectus of his Warner Classics recordings (made for Electrola and EMI Classics between 1954 to 1997) includes wonderful Lieder and song collaborations, as well as famous concerto accompaniments for eminent soloists and a heartwarming traversal of Schubert's secular vocal and sacred choral music with Bavarian Radio colleagues. But the main focus among the 65 discs is on his symphonic achievements: Beethoven, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Bruckner and Dvorak - the latter's Eighth Symphony was his first published recording, from 1954. Richard Strauss, an early influence, is strongly represented. This 65CD-box brings together all the non-operatic recordings that the German conductor and pianist Wolfgang Sawallisch (1923-2013) made in the years from 1954 to 1997 for EMI Classics and Electrola (now Warner Classics).