Yevhen Stankovych is one of teh Ukraine's leading contemporary composers. His music for violin and piano is recorded here almost all of it for the first time. The works on this album cover a wide range of emotions, from wild highland dances that distantly recall Szymanowski to the plangent, lyrical lament of Maydan Fresco, protesting the deaths of demonstrators in Maydan Square in 2013. The musicians here - wife and husband team Ukrainian Solomia Soroka and American Arthur Greene - have consulted the composer on the preparation of this program, giving their interpretations a rare authenticity. Solomia Soroka was born in Lviv, Ukraine. She earned her master's degree and completed her postgraduate studies in the Kiev Conservatoire, and later served on its staff in the department of chamber music. Since her American debut in 1997, she has performed throughout the United States as well.

REVIEW:

Both Solomia Soroka and Arthur Greene play with sensitivity and passion and have been well recorded. The violinist’s own booklet notes are customarily excellent. This is a valuable addition to the roster of approachable and valuable new violin music available on the Toccata label.

-- MusicWeb International

The music of Buxton Orr (b. Glasgow, 1924), was hardly over-exposed during his lifetime but has encountered even more neglect since his death in 1997. This CD takes a step in the right direction, presenting Orr’s mildly modernist, elegant and honest music in first recordings of four of his chamber works for strings.

REVIEW:

All of the performances are passionate, committed and of the highest quality as is the recording which does not get between the performers and the listeners. The music needs to be ‘Listened to’ and, more than once. It is not fashionable, it does not always come out to meet you half way but it is approachable and emotional and has its own strong rewards.

The reason why the disc has taken over a decade to emerge, and I do recall it being mentioned many years ago, is that the company which originally recorded it lost interest and abandoned the project. Well done Toccata for picking up these most valuable pieces

-- MusicWeb International

The CD begins with one of Friedrich Cerha’s first surviving compositions, the Hindemith-like First Violin Sonata of 1947. Two later works, from almost half a century on, complete the stylistic trajectory. One of them, the Sechs Stücke für Violine Solo, was written for the violinist on this CD, Ernst Kovacic, a friend of the composer for many years. Cerha wrote the booklet notes, available in English and German.

REVIEW:

For those who wish to explore a cross-section of the violin music of what appears to be one of the most commanding voices among recent composers, not to mention violinist-composers, Toccata’s collection, with its brilliant and, seemingly, authoritative performances and lively recorded sound, should be a natural choice. In every way, it’s another winner from Toccata that can be very warmly recommended.

-- Fanfare

Grigoriu (b. Moldavia, 1926) is one of the major Romanian composers in the period after Enescu. His vast output is little known outside his own country, although it includes oratorios, symphonies, cantatas, chamber music, film-scores, and much more. His musical roots reach back to Romanian folk-music and the modal melodies of ancient Byzantium.

Born in 1934, the Czech jazz composer Milan Dvořák, no relation to his better-known classical composer namesake, has been active since the 1960s leading big bands and swing ensembles and remains active today. This is the debut recording of his 45 Jazz Piano Etudes which combine transcriptions of popular songs with classical influences and features the pianist Milan Franěk.

Estonian violinist Kerem (b.Tallinn, 1981) is familiar as a performer in Britain as well as at home. He is also a prolific composer, with over 100 works to his credit, 3 symphonies among them. The three-movement 3rd Symphonny (2003) and the Lamento for viola and strings (2008–9) lie downstream from Shostakovich and Boris Tishchenko, and were inspired by the idea of the struggle of the individual voice against oppressive ideology.

Nikolai Peyko (1916–95) is a major Russian composer completely unknown in the west. He is another composer who wrote nine symphonies, and much other orchestral music besides, but fell foul of the Soviet regime and was sidelined. His piano music shares certain characteristics with both Shostakovich’s and Prokofiev’s, but sounds an individual tone nonetheless. This second and final CD in this complete recording of his piano music is the first time that any of this music has been heard recorded on a western label. Pianists Dmitry Korostelyov and where needed, Maria Dzhemesiuk perform.

These arrangements for string orchestra of works by Alban Berg take their cue from Berg himself: he arranged three of the six movements of the Lyric Suite for string orchestra; the Dutch composer Theo Verby arranged the other three. The CD includes an arrangement of Berg’s Piano Sonata for strings by Wijnand van Klaveren. Ernst Kovacic arranged Berg’s early works especially for this recording. The arrangements chart Berg’s development as a composer, from prentice pieces composed under the tutelage of Schoenberg to the rich, mature style of one of his masterpieces, the Lyric Suite, written to express an impassioned and illicit love. Ernst Kovacic is one of Austria’s best-known violinists as well as a conductor. Among the composers who have written works for him are Krenek, Holloway, Gruber and Schwertsik. Ernst Kovacic and the NRM Leopoldinum Chamber Orchestra’s previous Toccata release of music by Ernst Krenek (TOCC 0199), was received with universal enthusiasm, the reviewer for Fanfare writing: ‘This Toccata Classics CD is a model of fine production values…(and) magisterial performances…an absolute must for Krenek fanciers’.

REVIEW:

The Lyric Suite is played complete. It gains from the extra players, not only in obvious richness of sound, but in nuances of phrasing. The arrangements accomplish a broad range of expressive tonecolor, with nearly every conceivable string effect on display. In the trickier parts where there are several extremely chromatic legato lines playing against one another, they play accurately and in tune. The album is a curiosity for a limited audience, but they’ll be happy.

-- American Record Guide

The music of the Czech-born Viennese composer Kornauth (1891-1959) was once a staple of Austrian concert-halls. It has been largely forgotten in the half-century since his death. In this pioneering recording, British pianist Jonathan owell uncovers the many strands that fed into Kornauth’s rich and full-bodied compositions.

REVIEW:

This is the first full disc of piano music by Egon Kornauth, a composer born in what is now Olomouc in the Czech Republic (and was then Olmütz) who studied with Robert Fuchs in Vienna and then later with Schreker and Franz Schmidt.

Jonathan Powell is one of the most eloquent commentators on the music he plays I have come across, whether that be Sorabji or Kornauth, and his booklet note is a source of great interest. The angular, active Fantasy (1915) contains distinctly Richard Straussian turns of harmony and phrase in the sweet contrasting themes (that influence is less obvious in the more Schwung sections); the overt lush Straussian gestures sound more like a reduction of an orchestral tone poem. The op. 25 Klavierstücke (1920) are more modernist, probably because of his experiences of Schreker. The first is decidedly Bergian (think the op. 1 Piano Sonata), while the central Improvisation sounds exactly like that. Most fascinating is the final “Walzer,” a very sprightly evocation of Viennese dance, a bit like an Austro-Germanic Ravel La Valse in places.

The Kleine Suite (1923) has fewer ambitions than the other works on the disc and receives another fantastic performance from Powell. The Barcarolle (third movement) sums the suite up in essence, reflecting the less demanding demeanor of the piece, while the penultimate “Walzer” elicits a phenomenally light touch from Powell before the cheekily scampering Finale rounds things off with a smile.

The Präludium und Passacaglia offers maximal contrast, the B♭-Minor twilight of Bachian rigor and severity of the Prelude meeting the storm clouds of Chopin’s finest turbulence; the Passacaglia continues the gloominess. Powell paces it superbly: The close is truly crushing before the final surprise major-key end. The op. 44 Klavierstücke of 1940 is also sometimes known as the Second Suite. It is shot through with sweet nostalgia. The five pieces (“Präludium”; “Intermezzo”; “Capriccio”; “Mährische Ballade”; “Walzer”) speak of sweet nostalgia. Powell lavishes them with an attention to detail that almost makes them sparkle (in a retrospective sort of way). The “Mährische Ballade” (Moravian Ballad) is the highlight. Its almost folkish mode of discourse hides a strong compositional rudder steering the work perfectly; the final “Walzer” is the suite’s longest movement, and drips with charm.

This is a fascinating disc (as we are beginning to expect from Toccata Classics). The recording (made at Durham University, U.K.) is excellent.

-- Fanfare

Ashton (b. 1859, Durham), is a best-kept secret of British music. He has a generous output of piano music, chamber works and songs. Ashton’s writing for both cello and piano is virtuosic. What strikes the ear is the quality of his melodic inspiration – the lyrical immediacy of his tunes suggests Schubert, set in a style of Brahmsian richness. This CD features world premiere recordings.

REVIEW:

Algernon Ashton, (1859–1937) was a British-born composer who was educated in Germany. When his father died in 1863, his mother moved the family to Leipzig where she was befriended by Clara Schumann. Even as a child, Algernon attended the famous Schumann soirees and rubbed shoulders with famous musicians. After finishing his education, he returned to England. He became professor of piano at the Royal Academy of Music in London and spent the rest of his life in England. Ashton was a prolific composer but many of his works were not published and very few have been recorded. His chamber music output includes four sonatas for violin and piano, four for cello and piano, two piano quartets, and two piano quintets. He also wrote symphonies, but they were never published. The opening work on this Toccata disc is his Arioso, a beautiful piece in a contemplative mood. It has some of the colors of Brahms, but none of his rhythmic bite. The Sonata No. 1 in F Major opens with an Allegro Appassionato, an impassioned plea begging the listener to take a mental voyage to Ashton’s lyrical world of drawing rooms with polished grand pianos and crimson velvet drapes where chamber music was as common as video games are today. He develops the second movement, the Larghetto, with consummate skill and clothes it with jewel tones. Only in the Finale, which he asks to be played Allegro Frescamente, does he bring in a truly rhythmic melody. It could be a happy folk dance replete with clapping and stomping on the accented notes. It’s the kind of music that makes you get up and move! Abbate and Mizerska play all of this music joyfully and with great skill.

The Phantasiestücke is an invitation to reverie. Ashton is a master of melody and he begins with a broad sunny tune that might bring back memories of a hike in German or English woodlands. In the second movement, marked Andantino con Gran Espressione, he leads us away from the cares of the everyday world into the nirvana of pure musical concentration where we can spend a few blissful minutes. After we reach our goal, we return to the village for the last movement marked Allegro Scherzando. There we can relax and tap our toes to another of Ashton’s fast and furious folk tunes. The Second Sonata is a bit more dramatic than the First. Its markings, Moderato and Adagio ma non troppo are somewhat deceiving, because this work is constantly increasing in tension as it builds toward its marvelously animated finale. The two fine artists who currently reside and teach in London, the Polish-born Evva Mizerska and the Naples-born Emma Abbate, play all of this music with great finesse. Ashton’s music is a revelation. It deserves a much wider audience than it has had so far. The sound on the disc is clear with each instrument given equal presence. I enjoyed getting to know Ashton’s story and his music and think this disc should have a place in many record libraries.

-- Fanfare

• Henri Hardouin (1727–1808) was a chorister at Rheims Cathedral, rising to maître de chapelle – until the French Revolution disbanded religious establishments.
• Hardouin’s six four-part masses, published in 1772, are unusual for their time in being a cappella and enjoyed wide circulation in pre-Revolutionary France.
• Since then they have been roundly neglected – an omission this two-CD survey intends to rectify.

In his piano music, as in his symphonies and string quartets, the English composer David Matthews (b. 1943) marries the idiom of classical tradition with that of his own day. His 2009 Piano Concerto, Mozartian in spirit, contains both a tango and a blues; his Piano Sonata of 1989 includes jazz elements, and his 1997 Variations feature both further blues and a homage to Beethoven. The mood of the music on this CD ranges from contemplative introspection to fiery, rhythmic energy. David Matthews describes the Finnish pianist Laura Mikkola as ‘a marvellous exponent of my music’. This disc is released to mark David Matthews’ 70th birthday in March.

REVIEW:

David Matthews’s 2009 Piano Concerto, with string orchestra, is an approachable, joyfully tonal work that should appeal to pianists and audiences seeking a diverting, fresh 20-minute extension of the worlds of Britten and Tippett, with excellent craftsmanship and minimal complication. It would take an act of desperation not to enjoy it, and unless you are a firebreathing modernist you will.

Speaking of “firebreathing”, the earlier Piano Sonata (1989), in three continuous movements, is far more acerbic and breathlessly dramatic. Prokofieff may be a distant influence, but the language is more relentlessly dissonant, and some would call it “advanced”. It’s pretty exciting, and like most of this composer’s work is unfailingly musical.

The 1997 Variations is an imaginative and very effective set built on a theme of descending thirds very distantly related to Brahms, but its treatment is very much of our time. Always with a distant flavor of tonality in the background, the seemingly improvisatory work holds the attention until the quiet, bluesy close.

Dionysus Dithyrambs (2007, 2004) are two brief pieces inspired by Nietzsche. Scriabin lurks, especially in the pieces dealing with Nietzsche’s insanity, most obviously in the wild final piece (‘Esultante’) with its whiffs of Tristan toward the end. Tristan gets up to dance in the final piece on the program, ‘One to Tango’ (1990, rev 1993), a pleasant but not trivial coda.

This should be of interest to pianists looking for high-quality end of century repertoire.

The excellent Finnish pianist Laura Mikkola acquits herself nobly.

-- American Record Guide

REVIEW:

We are told that Luis Carlos Figueroa is one of the senior and much esteemed figures in Colombian music. As such this disc is very welcome as to most intents and purposes it serve as an initiation into the man’s music. Given his dates we might perhaps have expected a thornier style but it is warm and welcoming. This is attractive music that is well worth your ear-time.

-- MusicWeb International

Anglo-German composer Sherwood (b.1866) has slipped through the cracks of history—his impressive output of orchestral, chamber, choral and instrumental music is only now beginning to be discovered. Once an important figure in his native Dresden, in WWI he faded from view and by the time of his death in London (1939) his music was as good as forgotten.

REVIEW:

Percy Sherwood (1866–1939)—who is he? Well, Toccata is starting a Sherwood collection, and the liner notes give us much detail complete with some fine illustrations and footnotes. Sherwood was English but was born and grew up in Germany, moving to London during WW II. He was well thought of in both countries.

This program of his cello music reveals a romantic composer of verve and originality, lively to listen to and by no means boring. Spooner and Norris play him with passion and accuracy. There are two fine sonatas from 1891 and 1900 and three pieces, Op. 14 of considerable originality. The early set of Little Pieces is less unusual, but quite lovely. This is a composer worth following up, certainly when played as well as he is here.

-- American Record Guide

Throughout his long career Liszt’s songs – perhaps the most neglected part of his enormous output – took a radical approach to form: he eschewed convention in his search for a sincere musical response to each text. His free-spirited creativity meant that a single song would often call on a range of stylistic devices, among them bel canto vocal lines, unaccompanied recitative, orchestrally conceived piano textures and audacious harmonic procedures. This first recording of his songs by a bass voice brings out both the power and poetry of Liszt’s remarkable imagination. The American bass Jared Schwartz was born in Berne, Indiana, where he began piano lessons at the age of three, violin at seven and French horn at ten. He began a double major in pre-med and music at Bethel College, Indiana, then studied piano with Alexander Toradze and voice with Victoria Garrett, earning a graduate degree from the Eastman School of Music. For Toccata Classics he has already recorded albums of songs by Faure and Flegier.

REVIEW:

Schwartz's forte singing is most impressive, and his voice remains lustrously smooth and elegant in all registers. His vocal coloring, use of contrasting dynamics, and feeling for the text combine to make his readings thoroughly engaging. When he sings with gentleness and lyricism he weaves a magic spell, as in ‘Des Tages Laute Stimmen Schweigen’, which ends sublimely as he delivers the final line of the text (“As night embraces you with gentle silence”). It is stunning.

Mary Dibbern, who collaborated with him in his Flegier album and in preparing his Fauré album, does a superb job with Liszt’s often challenging accompaniment. She also wrote the comprehensive and informative notes for the release.

I learned to enjoy Liszt through his songs, especially his early high-flying Schiller and Petrarch settings, sung by tenors. I am now enjoying a voice that plumbs the sonic and textual depths of the songs.

-- American Record Guide