Born in Buenos Aires in 1916, Alberto Ginastera lived to become unquestionably the most significant figure in Argentine music in the 20th century. This CD combines Ginastera's deep interest in the authentic folk music of his country alongside the more radical compositional techniques which gave his music such individual personality. Commissioned in 1941 for Lincoln Kirstein's Ballet Caravan, the 1943 Suite made from Estancia became the piece that launched Ginastera's international fame - the spectacular Danza Final is perhaps Ginastera's most celebrated essay in the style of the Malambo - an exhilarating explosion of kinetic energy. Also in 1943, Ginastera composed his Overture to the Creole Faust, and it is, in a way an appendix to the Estancia dances, since it again deals with the life of the gauchos. Ollantay is nearly a symphony. Composed in 1947 for Erich Kleiber, the three movement work takes its inspiration from a poem from the early Incan period. Pampeana No. 3 is even closer to the symphony that Ginastera never wrote. Pampeana No. 3, like Ollantay, is also in three movements. The title recalls rhythms and melodies of the Argentine pampas, and the second movement contains one of the most extraordinary rhythmic tours-de-force in all of Ginastera's output. The Odense Symphony Orchestra continues their new series on Bridge with this outstanding recording. Bridge discs which also feature the Odense Symphony Orchestra include: Bridge 9129 (Villa-Lobos Symphonic Music), Bridge 9122 (Poul Ruders Edition, Vol. 3) and Bridge 9100 (Nielsen Violin Concerto).

In his final year as BBC Philharmonic’s Chief Conductor, Juanjo Mena completes a highly-acclaimed Ginastera series with this third volume. Like in his previous series ‘La Musica de Espana,’ Mena brings the composer’s creative genius to a more deserved fame, showcasing here three works that belonged to three different periods of his compositional life. While the Concierto Argentino is the most significant score of his early years, drawing directly on Argentinian folk music and full of youthful exuberance, the Variaciones Concertantes (more a concerto for orchestra than a set of variations) assumes a more personal and abstract form in accordance with the development of his harmonic ideas in the later stage of his life. The rhythmic energy and magic scoring of the ‘neo-expressionist’ piano concerto (as Ginastera defined the third phase of his life) is faithfully expressed by the highly technical and virtuosic playing of Xiayin Wang, widely praised for her recent solo recording of piano works by Enrique Granados.

Also available: Ginastera: Orchestral Works, Vol. 1 / Mena, BBC Philharmonic

This is the second in our three-volume series of Juanjo Mena's idiomatic exploration of Ginastera's orchestra works with the BBC Philharmonic. The series was started to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of the greatest of all Argentinean composers, Vol. 1 - receiving uniformly high praise. This album features a late work, lesser-known, yet rich in surprises, namely the Second Piano Concerto. Here the keen musicality and sweeping virtuosity of Xiayin Wang meet the sumptuous sound of the BBC orchestra. It succeeds her recording of concertos by Tchaikovsky and Khachaturian with the RSNO which was made Editor's Choice by Gramophone. It is coupled with the exotic early ballet Panambi, heard complete with a concluding contribution from the Manchester Chamber Choir.

Considered one of the most influential 20th century composers of the Americas, Alberto Ginastera (1916-1983) composed a great oeuvre including ballets, operas, piano works, orchestral pieces and more. His works can be grouped into three periods, “Objective Nationalism” (1934-1948), “Subjective Nationalism” (1948-1958), and “Neo-Expressionism” (1958-1983). The four works featured on this release come from his late period of neo-expressionism. In these pieces traditional classical style can be heard, as well as Ginastera’s experimentations with the avant-garde. Arturo Tamayo conducts the brilliant Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin for this recording. Tamayo conducts in both the concert hall as well as the opera house, and conducts with orchestras across Europe, Asia, and the Americas.

Alberto Ginastera was one of the most admired and respected musical voices of the twentieth century, who successfully fused the strong traditional influences of his national heritage with experimental, contemporary, and classical techniques. The two Cello Concertos are among his most innovative, brilliant and technically formidable compositions. The First Concerto, the definitive version of which was premièred by Ginastera’s second wife Aurora Nátola in 1978, is notable for the provocative singing lines, Latin dance rhythms and virtuosity of its solo part, and the intense colours and abundant percussion of the orchestral accompaniment. The Second Concerto, composed as a 10th wedding anniversary tribute ‘To my dear Aurora’, makes more prominent use of Argentine folk elements. It includes a brilliant depiction of the rising sun, percussion instruments portraying sounds of the jungle, and a celebratory rustic finale.

Alberto Ginastera (1916-1983) is a distinctive voice in twentieth-century classical music, and together with the master of the tango, Astor Piazzolla, he is the towering musical figure of Argentina. Born in Buenos Aires of an Italian mother and a Catalonian father, Ginastera is a complex composer and personality, shaped by the traditional folk culture and history of his native country and by impulses from the world at large, during a time of radical upheavals in the realm of Western classical music. The Harp Concerto was commissioned in 1956 by Edna Phillips. The work was not premiered until 1965, and then it was the Spanish harpist Nicanor Zabaleta. When the concerto first appeared, it became a brilliant addition to the harp literature and twentieth-century instrumental concertos. Variaciones concertantes was completed more than ten years earlier and was premiered in Buenos Aires in 1953. The music is an irresistible combination of orchestral timbres and virtuosity communicating directly with the listener, especially as regards the entertainment aspect inherent in virtuosic orchestral sound and a demanding soloist performance.

For the five works on this disc, Ginastera drew upon Argentine and other Meso- and South American subjects. Evocative of native influences, the life of the gaucho on the pampas, and influenced by the music of his time, they span the composer’s entire creative life, from his first acknowledged work, the ballet score Panambí, and the Inca-inspired Ollantay, to the Mayan mythological compendium Popol Vuh, which occupied him for about eight years and remained unfinished. These exciting, richly orchestrated works abound in the beauty and energy of dance.

Ginastera: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 & 2

Throughout his musical career, Argentinean composer Alberto Ginastera artfully incorporated the folk music and dance forms of his native land into increasingly modernist creations. From the populist to the avant-garde, his work was created using an architectural approach that effectively set his music apart. Ginastera: One Hundred is released in celebration of the centennial anniversary of Ginastera’s birth. The work serves as a musical ‘thank you’ from world-renowned harpist Yolanda Kondonassis, whose career has been heavily influenced by Ginastera. She has performed his Harp Concerto nearly 200 times. Alongside the Harp Concerto is Danzas Argentinas, with its themes that evoke Argentinean history and culture juxtaposed with modernist structures. This is the work which catapulted Ginastera into fame in his home country. Finally, Pampeana No. 1 shows influences from Aaron Copland, with whom Ginastera studied, and Sonata for Guitar, which is the composer’s only work for Argentina’s national instrument.

GINASTERA Pampeana No. 2. 5 canciones populares argentinas (arr. Kosower). Puneña No. 2, “Homage à Paul Sacher.” Cello Sonata • Mark Kosower (vc); Jee-Won Oh (pn) • NAXOS 8.570569 (52:10)


Ginastera was one of those composers who, in continually evolving and experimenting, could not easily be pinned down stylistically. His famous Harp Concerto, written for Osian Ellis, is as different from his stark, atonal opera Bomarzo (still one of the neglected masterpieces of the 20th century) as night is from day. Yet despite his evolution, he did break his music into three styles: objective nationalism, subjective nationalism, and neo-Expressionism. Cellist Mark Kosower presents all three styles here by transcribing the Cinco canciones populares (“Five Popular Songs”), music of objective nationalism, from their original voice setting to the cello. The CD, however, starts with a subjective work, the Pampeana No. 2 , in which folk music is never actually quoted but suggested in his original themes. Compressing four sections into one continuous piece lasting only nine minutes, Ginastera tried to capture the alternating feelings of ebullience, awe, and melancholy that crossing the pampas evoked in him. It is a marvelous piece, played with tremendous élan by Kosower and Oh.


I found this transcription of the five popular Argentine songs to be effective but not entirely convincing as cello music. It’s the sort of piece that I’m sure I would enjoy in a live concert setting, but listening on record, I found myself becoming restless. Some of this, however, stems from Oh’s piano accompaniment, which I found carefully crafted but emotionally cold. Kosower plays with warmth of tone and generous spirit, but these are still songs. I want to hear a voice, I want to hear words. Falla’s Popular Spanish Songs works for the violin; these do not translate quite as well, at least not for me.


Ginatsera’s neo-Expressionist period, his last and longest (1958–1983), is the one that includes both the unaccompanied Puneña No. 2 and the Cello Sonata. The first work is intended to capture the feelings of the mysterious world of the Inca Empire, and is divided into two movements, a melancholy love song (“Harawi”) and a wild carnival dance (“Wayno karnavalito”). I personally found Kosower’s performance of the first movement to be lacking in atmosphere. Whether this is due to the actual music or merely his interpretation of it is difficult to determine. In the second movement, Kosower has great energy for the Argentinean rhythms, and the highly imaginative writing (including octave glisses into the stratosphere and rapid finger triplets) brings out some wonderful effects on the cello. This was, for me, one of the highlights of the entire recital, and I was sorry when it was over.


The Cello Sonata is a real masterpiece in every respect. From its opening jagged rhythms to the sizzling finale, this is a work that constantly entertains as it challenges the listener. Despite an almost constant use of bitonality and tone clusters, there is an almost modal feeling to the first movement—at least, until the music melts down into the collegamento section. The music still hovers around tone clusters, but its range is tightly circumscribed. The second movement, an Adagio passionato, is extremely odd. To begin with, the music moves at a snail’s pace, more of a Lento than an Adagio. For another, there is no forward propulsion at all. In a way, this sounds like subconscious music, very close to the effects created by “automatic composers.” Every phrase sounds as if it were being improvised into being—at least, until the piano begins a more energetic rumbling, followed later on by dramatic singing, flourishes, and suspenseful silences in the cadenza. The third movement, Presto mormoroso, is a murmuring piece that begins with a note here and there, the instruments alternating as if in dialogue. Both instruments climb into the upper registers as piano flourishes suspend time at the movement’s midpoint. The change in pitch begins the musical inversion; at the cello’s reentry, the two instruments play in retrograde back to the beginning, disappearing into nothingness. The final movement is an uninhibited romp, starting in marcato clusters before moving into wild passages combining sonata form with a toccata and complex interplay between the two instruments. As Kosower puts it in the liner notes, “The explosive nature of the music is fueled by syncopated dance rhythms including the Karnavalito, obsessive running sixteenth notes, sudden shifts in material, and a boldness of character.”


Overall, the performance of the Sonata is quite good; even pianist Oh plays with more boldness than on the other pieces. It is certainly finer than the poorly recorded version by Carter Brey and Christopher O’Riley (Helicon) and, in the recording by the Sonata’s dedicatee, Aurora Natola (Pierian), her superb work is undercut by the rhythmically driving but lead-footed playing of pianist Barbara Nissman. I feel that the other performances could be improved on somewhat, but this is still an interesting disc and a good place to start in these works.

FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

Classical Music

Classical Music

GINASTERA String Quartets: No. 1; No. 2; No. 3 1 • Ens? Qrt; Lucy Shelton (sop) 1 • NAXOS 8.570780 (73:31 Text and Translation)


More than most, Ginastera’s compositional output may be divided into three stylistic periods. His early works, using an impressionist language, were nationalistic in influence and drew heavily on Argentine dance rhythms. During his middle period, he expanded the scope of his tonality while remaining attached to his Hispanic roots, and in his late works he turned to contemporary avant-garde idioms. In my view, his best work comes from the middle period: the brilliant Harp Concerto and the succinct Variaciones concertantes. He was more individual than in his early impressionistic mode, and paradoxically more individual than he was to become after he adopted the standard stylistic traits of the 1960s and 1970s. His first two string quartets date from the beginning and end of that middle period.


Ginastera’s quartets demand a high level of virtuosity from the performers. Extreme dynamics, high harmonics, and syncopated rhythms requiring tight ensemble appear throughout. The First Quartet of 1948 is notable for its light-footed Scherzo ( vivacissimo ), its atmospheric slow movement ( calmo e poetico ), and a vigorous, stamping finale ( allegramente rustico ).


A similar wispy Scherzo movement occurs in the Second Quartet (1958, rev. 1968), but there it is deconstructed. In five movements, the Second Quartet contains an “extra” movement built from a series of cadenzas from each of the instruments ( libero e rapsodico ), before plunging into its own modernized version of a dance-inflected finale. The first movement presents a 12-tone theme, the first use of that technique in the composer’s work.


By the time of the Third Quartet, Ginastera had left his previous formal procedures behind. He introduced a soprano soloist, as did Schoenberg in his Second Quartet—a precedent of which the status-conscious Argentine composer was well aware. He set texts by Jiménez, Lorca, and Alberti, illuminating the soprano’s vocalizing and occasional spoken declamation with a series of ingenious string effects. The imagery and atmosphere of the poems dictate the musical form, so the task for the musicians is to reproduce specific moods, on top of the considerable technical challenges.


Previous recordings of all three quartets exist, though only one currently available brings them together on a single CD: the Cuarteto Latinoamericano (on Élan). I have not heard that disc, but I have the Latinoamericano recording of Quartet No. 1 in a mixed program from the same label (which may or may not be the same performance): they bring genuine excitement and tight ensemble to the piece, but are equally matched by the Ens? on this new release.


The original performers of the Third Quartet, Benita Valente and the Juilliard Quartet, recorded the work for the Bridge label in an interesting mixed recital that is well worth hearing for the couplings by Harbison and Wernick. Valente sings with great control and understanding, but the recording was made some 27 years after the event, by which time her voice had lost much of its bloom.


On the new disc, Lucy Shelton is a revelation: she brings pure tone and a wide range of vocal color to her interpretation. (Valente is more convincing in the relatively few spoken passages.) The U.S.-based Ens? Quartet plays with warmth and unanimity, meeting all the technical and interpretive hurdles with apparent ease. Naxos’s sound is excellent, the timing is generous, and a translation of the poetry is provided, making this CD the version of choice, regardless of price.


FANFARE: Phillip Scott

For Omar Massa, it is important to break new ground to bring the music of Buenos Aires into the 21st century. This task requires him to be creative and searching, without forgetting his roots and the past. This is his passion: to write contemporary tango. In Argentina, tango embodies the so-called "way of life" and apart from the fact that it is not as popular today as it was in the days of his grandparents or in the "Golden Age", many people still gather in the nights of Buenos Aires to surrender to the music, the dance and the poetry of tango. For Omar Mass, the tango is still a hidden treasure of the nights of Buenos Aires. To deal with its mystery, its mysticism, is a very wonderful ritual for him. Together with Markus Däunert and Kim Barbier, Massa presents music that is almost congenial for exploring and exploring extreme ranges of sound possibilities. The classical musicians Däunert and Barbier discover new sides of themselves through the Argentine tango.

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REVIEWS:

The Massa Trio plays their own pieces as well as those of Piazzolla with gripping intensity, with glowing colors and passionate rhythms. Consequently, I rank this outstandingly recorded SACD as one of the most exciting and immersive tango recordings in my collection.

© 2022 Pizzicato

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Lovers of Latin American music will find some interesting things to discover in this release.

The extensive liner notes give full details of each of the works. So, there is no need for me to elaborate on that. Listeners should nonetheless be aware that not all is easy on the ears. Although Massa, in his personal note believes that “Tango is a form of meditation”, some of his dances may arouse powerful emotion. But that is all part of the discovery trip, though I take it that for insiders Piazzolla and Ginastera are familiar ground.

All of it was captured by Manfred Schumacher in Ars Produktion’s notably fine resolution in full (!) surround. Why not try it out?

© 2022 HRAudio.net

Sean Shibe returns to the classical guitar on Profesión, bringing together works by Agustín Barrios, Heitor Villa-Lobos and Alberto Ginastera. The album derives its name from Barrios’s “Profesión de Fe” (profession of faith), a poem which he often used as a preface to his concerts. The poem references indigenous mythological deities, and praises the power of the guitar as the ultimate conduit to the secrets of the divine South-American destiny. Barrios’s La Catedral and Julia Florida are combined with Villa Lobos’s 12 Études, while Ginastera’s Sonata completes the program.

These works by South American composers begin with homage and pastiche in reverence of the Old World, but build towards a totally original idiom - musical magical realism. The repertoire is voluminous, indulging in excess, and narcotic, and as such creates a counterweight to the reserved and introspective nature of Shibe’s acclaimed classical predecessor album Camino.

This will be Shibe’s first-ever album focusing on repertoire that was originally written for the classical guitar, and he plays a Hauser copy built for Julian Bream. It was considered one of the best instruments of the 1930s, and fits the sound world of this program like a glove.

REVIEWS:

It’s an extraordinary account [of the Villa-Lobos], bursting with nuance and personality and easily rivaling Julian Bream’s classic, late-1970s version.

— Gramophone

This is a gleaming and brilliant album that doesn’t fail to awaken the senses to the exhilarating world of un-adulterated acoustic sound.

— BBC Music Magazine

Had Alberto Ginastera not been born just three years after the scandalous premiere of The Rite of Spring, he could easily have been considered one of the earliest followers of the "pagan" Stravinsky. Although wild rhythms of ancient dances, volcanic eruptions of complex sound layers, and martyrs of all kinds permeate his works, they are never random in form. His First String Quartet from 1948, for example, follows a traditional path, with some bows losing a bit of horsehair during performance - not unlike his Piano Quintet, premiered in Venice in 1963, which explores the limits of what is possible in seven extremely concise sections that the composer described as "neo-expressionistic". Maurice Ravel's unique String Quartet acts as an "impressionist" antipode and delicate counterpoint in this context.

The Miro Quartet, celebrating their 30th anniversary this year, presents an album featuring the complete string quartets of Alberto Ginastera, one of the most influential Latin American composers of the 20th century. A master of vivid contrasts and emotional depth, Ginastera infused his music with the spirit of Argentine folk traditions, bold modernist language, and a profound sense of expression. These three quartets span the entirety of his creative development, tracing a fascinating journey across three distinct stylistic periods. The first two quartets are considered undiscovered masterpieces, often performed live to great reception but rarely recorded in their entirety alongside the third. The vibrant rhythmic energy and folkloric colours of the first quartet, the introspective lyricism of the second, and the haunting intensity of the third each reflect Ginastera's unique fusion of influences, drawing from composers like Bartok and Stravinsky to create a sound full of emotional rawness and storytelling. Together, these quartets form a powerful cycle, showcasing Ginastera's ability to create distinct narratives within each piece, while also weaving them into a larger, cohesive musical story. This is the Miro Quartet's third album on PENTATONE, following the recording of Beethoven's Complete String Quartets (2019) and Home (2024).

A vibrant collection of chamber works spanning different periods of Alberto Ginastera's career, written for piano with strings or voice. Rooted in the rhythms and colors of traditional Argentine music yet infused with the bold spirit of cosmopolitan modernism, these pieces strike a compelling balance between heritage and innovation. Inspired by the lifelong passion of acclaimed Krak�w pianist Andrzej Pikul for Argentina's most celebrated composer, this album highlights the expressive range, technical brilliance, and imaginative power of Ginastera's music, offering each performer a chance to shine with virtuosity and creative flair.