This is the penultimate release in the Chandos series of Brahms works for solo piano, performed by Barry Douglas. | Brahms is often considered both a traditionalist and an innovator with his music being rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of Baroque and Classical eras. | These recordings are being performed in the finest international venues including the Wigmore Hall and Concertgebouw. | This fifth volume is the most virtuosic of the series, including the Scherzo in E flat minor, technically demanding variations, several intermezzi, and three Hungarian Dances. | Barry Douglas is gainging a reputation of one the few world-class piano virtuosi of the romantic repertoire. | Barry Douglas won the 1986 Tchaikovksy Competition in Russia.
For his second album in this series, Barry Douglas couples Tchaikovsky’s Grande Sonata with Rachmaninov’s Six Moments Musicaux. Barry Douglas has established a major international career since winning the Gold Medal at the 1986 Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition, Moscow. As Artistic Director of Camerata Ireland and the Clandeboye Festival, he continues to celebrate his Irish heritage whilst also maintaining a busy international touring schedule. Barry is an exclusive Chandos recording artist. He recently completed recording the full works for solo piano of Brahms, the six albums of which have received much critical praise. International Record Review wrote that “this is indeed Brahms playing of the utmost integrity and authority… this cycle looks set to become a benchmark version.” The interesting programming of each release presents each album as a stand-alone recital, providing a varied and engaging listening experience. Also with Chandos Barry is exploring Irish folk music through his own arrangements, working with ancient melodies through to pieces by contemporary songwriters. The first in this series, Celtic Reflections, was released in September 2014 and was followed in 2016 by a second album: Celtic Airs.
Barry Douglas CBE has established a major international career since winning the Gold Medal at the 1986 Tchaikovsky International Piano Competition, in Moscow. In demand as a soloist and as a recitalist and chamber musician, he has performed with most of the world's leading orchestras. He celebrates his Irish heritage as Artistic Director of Camerata Ireland, the only all-Ireland orchestra, and of the Clandeboye Festival. Celtic Nocturne combines nocturns by John Field, traditional Irish melodies, and three compositions by Barry Douglas, all of which share the lyrical, melodic nature characteristic of Irish music. Born in Dublin in 1782, John Field moved to London in 1793 and continued his studies with Muzio Clementi. Following an extensive European tour with Clementi in 1802, Field finally settled in Russia. His Nocturnes combine classical structure with romantic expressiveness.
This new release from pianist Barry Douglas is the sixth and final volume in his exploration of Brahms’s output for solo piano. BBC Music writes of this series, “Douglas’s tone is a deep velvet cushion, the legatos full of affection and the rhythms galvanized with great energy.” This unique collection of works shows Brahms not only as a composer, but also an arranger, pedagogue, historian, virtuoso, and pianist. Barry Douglas hails from Belfast, Northern Ireland. He has won numerous awards all over the globe, including an appointment as an Officer of the Order of the British Empire and the gold medal in the International Tchaikovsky Competition.
REVIEW:
Douglas’s hefty, full-bodied sound, built from the bottom up, befits the mellow power of Brahms’s sound world. In the dark E flat minor Op 118 Intermezzo, most pianists focus attention on the right-hand melody and treat the rumbling left-hand lines as muted filigree. Douglas, however, does almost the exact opposite, and the effect is revelatory.
Each recording in this 40-disc set has been selected by Chandos Managing Director, Ralph Couzens, son of the label founder, because it represents a turning point, or ‘Landmark’, in the development of the label.
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Founded by Brian Couzens in 1979, Chandos quickly established itself as one of the world’s leading classical labels. The ‘Chandos Sound’ has become a benchmark for quality, renowned alike among artists and critics around the globe.
From its inception, Chandos has specialised in recording British music, and in bringing lesser-known (and unknown) music to public attention. Released to celebrate the 40th Anniversary of the label, this handsomely packaged 40-disc set comprises 40 complete recordings from Chandos’ extensive catalogue.
Each of the four decades is represented, and each recording has been hand-picked by the Managing Director, Ralph Couzens, because it represents a turning point, or ‘Landmark’, in the development of the label.
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Excerpts from select reviews of previously released volumes included in this set:
Prokofiev: Symphony No 6, Waltzes Suite, Etc. / Järvi, Royal Scottish National Orchestra - NLA
This 1984 recording put the somewhat neglected Sixth Symphony of Prokofiev back on the musical map; it remains on balance the finest available.
– ClassicsToday.com
Vaughan Williams: London Symphony; Butterworth: Banks of Green Willow / Hickox, LSO
Conductor and orchestra respond with an unquenchable spirit, generous flexibility and tender affection that suit VW’s admirably ambitious inspiration to a T, and Chandos’s sound is big and bold to match. Quite simply, an essential purchase for anyone remotely interested in British music.
– Gramophone
Ravel, Debussy & Massenet / Bavouzet, Tortelier, BBC Symphony Bavouzet gets the tempo changes in Ravel's G Major Concerto absolutely right, following up with one of the most songfully flowing and elegantly shaped accounts of the Adagio on disc, and concluding with an absolutely scorching finale. The Massenet encores are both novel and delightful.
With this new volume, Barry Douglas once again weaves a magic web with Celtic tunes that have been handed down from generation to generation. His playing is entwined sometimes with new material composed by his musical companions, internationally renowned for their fearless explorations and interpretations of Scottish music. There is an old Irish proverb that translates into “There may be five versions of every story but there are twelve interpretations of each song.” This sentiment reflects an acknowledgement that each artist makes his or her own song out of material that has been handed down. The result is a beautiful, wistful celebration of melodic riches. Praise for Barry’s previous album of Celtic music includes: “Barry Douglas is to be applauded for these arrangements and his direct communication skills. This music means a lot to him and that shows in his performances… The playing, recording (clear and immediate) and musical content are all first class. It was probably a refreshing change for Mr. Douglas to move out of the highbrow arena for a short while and record something different from his usual fare. This is a lovely disc.” (musicweb-international.com)
Penderecki: Piano & Flute Concertos / Douglas, Wit
Naxos
CD
$19.99Mar 26, 2013
PENDERECKI Piano Concerto, “Resurrection.” Flute Concerto • Barry Douglas (pn); ?ukasz D?ugosz (fl); Antoni Wit, cond; Warsaw PO • NAXOS 8.572696 (60:30)
It is fascinating to trace the development of Penderecki’s compositional style, as he seems to become more conservative the older he gets. The Piano Concerto, composed in 2001/02 and revised in 2007, is a work that the Penderecki of the 1960s and the Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima probably never dreamed of writing. In fact, nothing in Penderecki’s canon, not even his recent works, prepared me for this concerto. After several auditions, I’m not sure it’s even a successful work (I’ve seen the adjective “kitschy” applied to it), but if it’s not, it is, in today’s popular terminology, a hot mess, and a fascinating one at that.
In this work, Penderecki has channeled the romantic piano concerto. In the words of annotator Richard Whitehouse, it renews “Penderecki’s direct involvement with the ‘grand’ concerto tradition—notably of the Russian lineage that had its culmination in Rachmaninov and Prokofiev.” Granted, the work is not as lyrical as, for example, Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto, or even Prokofiev’s Third, but there’s no missing the size and the strength of the emotional gestures, and the respect for virtuosic display. For the first time ever (in my experience, anyway), Penderecki has even included passages that a reasonable person might describe as “pretty”—for example, at 2:30 into the second section, and that passage returns near the end. (The work is in 10 continuous sections, and Naxos has tracked them separately.) Granted, the concerto’s overall mood is more tense than pretty, and there are violent climaxes. I have to say, though, that the music that kept coming to mind as I heard this concerto was Bernard Herrmann’s Concerto Macabre, a work that he composed for the 1954 film noir Hangover Square—and I intend that as a compliment. “Resurrection,” the concerto’s subtitle might be understood as a Christian reference, but apparently it is not meant to be taken too literally. Whitehouse indicates, however, that a “plainsong-like idea (which was conceived in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attack) . . . only gradually makes its way into the foreground before emerging at full strength during the climactic stages.” Barry Douglas, whose name now comes up less often than it did at the start of the CD era, plays the heck out of this 37-minute concerto, and does not stint on its steel, drama, and emotional power. The engineering, by the way, is outstanding—this is a sonic showpiece. I’d be interested to hear an earlier recording (on Dux), conducted by the composer, with pianist Beata Bili?ska.
The Flute Concerto dates from 1992, and is more in line with what we have come to expect from latter-day Penderecki. It is, in other words, an anticlimax to the piano concerto, but worthwhile nevertheless. Like the piano concerto, it is a single-movement work, but that single movement contains several clearly contrasted sections. If the piano concerto is unexpectedly emotional, the flute concerto is in keeping with the composer’s familiar style, which I would describe as intellectual and objective, gaining its interest from the way in which Penderecki develops his material, and creates interesting instrumental timbres. The word “eclectic” keeps coming up, which I suppose is another way of saying that the music is modern, but not too modern. It was composed for Jean-Pierre Rampal, who did record it, with the composer, for Sony, but I have not heard that version. There’s also another Dux disc, with the composer conducting, and flutist David Aguilar, but the version I know, also on Naxos, is with flutist Petri Alanko and the Tapiola Sinfonietta, conducted by Okko Kamu. Alanko and Kamu pare more than three minutes from the score’s total length. Their reading is more dramatic than the new one, and Alanko emphasizes the lyrical aspects of the music more than Dlugosz does, wherever he can. Compared to Wit, Kamu is more precise, and creates more focused sonorities with his ensemble, but I do like the lush sound that comes out of the Warsaw Philharmonic, and I feel that Wit is a superior story-teller to Kamu.
Although neither of these works is new to CD, the combination is unique, and the performances are very strong. I see no reason not to be enthusiastic about this release, and the piano concerto is growing on me. Let’s see if this makes it onto my Want List in the next issue!
Vol. 4 in Barry Douglas’s monumental, well-regarded solo piano Brahms project prominently features the composer’s first published work, his C major Sonata, op. 1.The influence on Brahms of his predecessors Beethoven and Schubert is obvious, not only in the virtuoso demands on the performer but also in the opening, which recalls both Beethoven’s ‘Hammerklavier’ Sonata and Schubert’s ‘Wanderer’ Fantasy.Two other impeccable and impressive works, the Schumann Variations, op. 9, and the Paganini Variations, Op. 35 (Book 1) are included, along with several short keyboard character pieces.
Two of the most popular romantic Russian piano works from the mid-1870s are heard on this new album from the celebrated Barry Douglas. Lyricism lies at the heart of the twelve movements of Tchaikovsky’s ‘The Seasons’ (1875-76), commissioned by the periodical Nouvelliste to appear monthly, accompanied by poetic epigraphs. Tchaikovsky got his servant to remind him of his duty on a certain day in the month, and composed each piece in a single sitting. Each reflects characteristics of a different month, the style is simple, the mood introspective. While the poetic aspect of The Seasons was prompted by the individual musical contributions, ‘Pictures at an Exhibition’ (1874) was provoked by a visit which Mussorgsky made to an exhibition of sketches and paintings by his late friend Viktor Hartmann. The technically demanding memorial, a popular genre in Russian romanticism, is here played thoughtfully and sympathetically by Barry Douglas.
REVIEWS:
Musorgsky’s magnum opus requires pianism of dazzling virtuoso panache, and here Douglas is really in his element. His supreme technical ease and tonal control when the notes start flying – as in the ‘Ballet of the Chicks in their Shells’, ‘Limoges’, and (especially) ‘Baba Yaga’ – brings a special sense of frisson.
– BBC Music Magazine
I don’t know how long he has had these works in his repertoire but they sound like old friends, well played-in. Few performances of Pictures have been imbued with such musical and textual integrity; each section is deftly characterised; the full tonal and dynamic range of the piano brought appropriately to bear.
The acclaimed pianist Barry Douglas presents Volume 2 of his series devoted to solo piano works by Johannes Brahms. The wide breadth of repertoire encompasses works from Brahms’ early twenties to some of his final piano compositions and showcases Douglas’ immense musicality and technical acumen. Simply top-rate performances of Brahms.
Barry Douglas's acclaimed survey of Schubert's piano sonatas continues with this programme pairing the Sonata in E flat major, D 568 with the Sonata in G major, D 894. Published posthumously, the E flat major Sonata is a revision and completion of the D flat major Sonata, D 567. The original was written in June 1817, the revision soon afterwards. This sonata stands out in the canon for it's light-hearted, easy-going character in contrast to the more serious nature of the other sonatas. The G major Sonata, the last to be published in Schubert's lifetime, was completed in 1826. The work holds a special place for many pianists, including Imogen Cooper, Sviatoslav Richter, and Paul Lewis; the latter two have declared it their favourite, whilst Robert Schumann described it as 'the most perfect in form and conception' of any of Schubert's sonatas. Douglas completes his programme with two Liszt transcriptions of Schubert songs: 'Gretchen am Spinnrade', and 'Wohin?' (from Die schone Mullerin).
