After this vibrant program of Ernest Bloch’s music for viola and piano was recorded in 2001, the tapes disappeared for fifteen years. When they resurfaced, artists Paul Neubauer and Margo Garrett were thrilled that the tapes were not only salvageable, but also featured playing that they felt presented their best possible efforts to bring these works to life. Among the works offered here are Bloch’s powerful Suite for Viola and Piano, hailed by one critic as “the greatest work for viola in musical literature.” We are also treated to the Suite Hebraique, an artful and engaging synthesis of Jewish themes with multiple musical influences, typical of Bloch’s mature style. Paul Neubauer’s solid reputation as one of the great violists of our time is enhanced by his collaboration with award-winning pianist Margo Garrett.

This album celebrates dance music, from waltz to tango, from slow foxtrot to quickstep, from samba to jive. Seventy years of music rooted in the 1920s, assembled by the enthusiastic musicians of the Ludwig Orchestra, who have taken to playing them at festivals, alongside their usual programs devoted to Stravinsky or Schoenberg, to get the audience dancing – a phenomenal success story that now becomes an album, Dance with me!

For this project, the Ludwig musicians naturally turned to a partner dear to their hearts, Barbara Hannigan, with whom they recorded Crazy Girl Crazy (Alpha 293), which received a Grammy Award in 2018, in collaboration with composer-arranger Bill Elliott. The trio has reformed here: ‘I was thrilled to go back to this aspect of my musical roots, to reawaken special memories of singing and playing keyboards with a dance band in Nova Scotia’, says Barbara Hannigan. ‘Couples were smiling and dancing to tunes like Moonlight Serenade and In the Mood with a few polkas thrown in towards the end of the evening.’ The Canadian soprano performs four songs, including "I could have danced all night," "Moonlight Serenade," and Kurt Weill’s famous and moving "Youkali."

More musicians round out the guest-list for the party – the trumpeter Lucienne Renaudin-Vary and the Berlage Saxophone Quartet. Dance with me: an invitation to feel happy and light-hearted, quite an achievement these days . . .

REVIEW:

The tautness of the Ludwig Orchestra’s playing – augmented in four dances by the Berlage Saxophone Quartet – echoes that of the best bands of the big band era, and the arrangements are not only effective but cleverly detailed.

-- Gramophone

Musical America has just announced its awarding of Conductor of the Year to Semyon Bychkov. To learn more, click here.

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After their critically-acclaimed recording of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony, the Czech Philharmonic and Semyon Bychkov continue their Pentatone Mahler cycle with a rendition of the composer’s Fifth. The Fifth Symphony marks an important turning point in Mahler’s symphonic output, away from the prominence of vocal movements in his previous symphonies. And whereas the Fifth seems to follow a teleology from darkness to light like its predecessors, the trajectory is much less straightforward, and full of enigmatic turns. Bychkov’s exceptional eye for detail and pacing make him an ideal guide through this work, while the Czech Philharmonic is capable of letting all the colors of Mahler’s score shine.

The Czech Philharmonic is one of the world’s most acclaimed orchestras, with a rich tradition of performing Czech masters and music from Central Europe. Semyon Bychkov has led the greatest orchestras of the world, and is Chief Conductor and Music Director of the Czech Philharmonic as of the 2018/2019 season. Orchestra and maestro made their Pentatone debut with a recording of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony (2022), kicking off a complete Mahler cycle.

REVIEWS:

Bychkov is careful to keep the strings’ lyric funeral-marches objective, and it’s fascinating how the Adagietto sounds otherworldly until the cellos bring in a richly portamentoed human warmth.

The pace generally keeps things on the move – crucial in what I think of as Mahler’s trickiest movement, the ‘stormy, vehement’ sequel to the opening ritual, paced to perfection – though there are a couple of unmarked slackenings in the outer movements. Only here does Bychkov seem to me to fall briefly victim to seeing ‘nicht eilen’ (don’t hasten) and ‘unmerklich etwas einhaltend’ (imperceptibly somewhat holding back) either side of the last big build and slamming on the brakes.

I’d have liked a bit more wildness in the central Scherzo, though the end is uproarious, and from the opening trumpet solo through the lopsided horn obbligato at the dancing heart of the work to the reassertion of the chorale at the end, the brass both individually and collectively play their parts in underlining that this is still very much one of the world’s great orchestras. In all there’s clarity and beauty of tone. The luminous recording captures both high and low frequencies with exceptional vividness.

-- BBC Music Magazine

Bychkov’s version opens up a very different way of seeing this virtually ubiquitous symphony and he delivers on that vision with great panache and total commitment from all involved. Bychkov has emerged in the last few years as an unmissable conductor and the thought of what he might do with the Sixth symphony after hearing this Fifth has me tingling with anticipation.

-- MusicWeb International (David McDade)

 

Both Zygmunt Noskowski and Władysław Żeleński were leading exponents of Polish nationalism in the period from the last quarter of the 19th century. Noskowski is best remembered as a symphonist but his large-scale Violin Sonata in A minor is an imposing work that suggests the influence both of Beethoven’s ‘Kreutzer’ Sonata and of Brahms. Żeleński was as eminent a teacher as he was a composer, seeking to broaden Poland’s provincial outlook through works such his opera Janek (Naxos 8.660521-22). His Violin Sonata in F major typifies the essentially conservative idiom that Żeleński pursued in his maturity.

Renowned French pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard kicks off his exclusive engagement to PENTATONE with a recording of Olivier Messiaen’s Catalogue d’Oiseaux (1956-1958). The pianist had intimate ties to the composer himself and his wife, Yvonne Loriod, for whom Messiaen wrote the Catalogue.

Praised by The Guardian as “one of the best Messiaen interpreters around,“ this is Aimard’s first recording of Messiaen’s most extensive, demanding and colorful piano composition. The luxurious release set contains an accompanying bonus film, on which Aimard shares his vast knowledge of and love for Messiaen’s work from behind the piano.

Due to its radical naturalism, the Catalogue d’Oiseaux is exceptional within the repertoire for solo piano. It is the grand hymn to nature from a man who never ceased to marvel at the stupefying beauty of landscapes or the magic of bird song. With his Catalogue, Messiaen tried – in his own words – “to render exactly the typical birdsong of a region, surrounded by its neighbors from the same habitat, as well as the form of song at different hours of the day and night,” suggesting an almost scientific approach to his subjects. The idea of ‘reproduction’ may have been central to Messiaen’s conception of the Catalogue d’Oiseaux, but in the finished work we hear a great composer at work, a master of innovative structures who finds an astonishing range of piano sonorities. In a world that is increasingly being destructed by man, Aimard views this cycle as “a musical refuge that resonates with an audience ever more concerned, expanded and affected.”

REVIEWS:

Unsurprisingly, Pierre-Laurent Aimard’s interpretations are anything but tame. His dynamic range is formidable, his voicing of chords scrupulously faithful, his clarity unimpeachable. It’s hard to imagine the textures having greater impact or precision, or the continuity and discontinuity being projected with greater concentration. Nigel Simeone’s essay for Pentatone is exceptionally informative on factual background. One can only salute this outstanding achievement.

– Gramophone (Editor's Choice, April 2018)

Pierre-Laurent Aimard’s long association with Olivier Messiaen’s music dates back to the early 1970s, when the teenaged pianist was a protégée of both the composer and his wife Yvonne Loriod. His 2000 recording of Vingt regards sur l’enfant Jésus has long held sway as a version of reference. In August 2017 Aimard set down the complete Catalogue d’Oiseaux, now released by Pentatone on three SACDS, accompanied by informative booklet notes by Nigel Simone and a valuable DVD where Aimard presents succinct overviews of each piece from the piano and offers interesting insights into Messiaen’s methodology and personality.

As the set reveals time and again, Aimard has long digested and internalized Messiaen’s colorful keyboard syntax. The pianist voices and balances extended sequences of chords with the utmost clarity and specificity. Minute variations in rhythmic asymmetry are scrupulously articulated, while Aimard never shortchanges the music’s frequent moments of silence. He also brings impressive timbral and characterful variety to low-register passagework that can sound muddy or indistinct in the wrong hands. Cases in point include Messiaen’s playful evocation of mating mallards in Le Merle de roche’s opening pages, and Le Loriot’s slow-motion chords that contrast with lively high-register dialogues depicting Garden Warblers.

Le Rousserolle Effarvatte, the cycle’s epicenter and longest movement, emerges as a dramatic and virtuoso tour-de-force, showcasing Aimard’s remarkable concentration throughout sustained contemplative passages, along with his sophisticated gradations in dynamics and touch that seemingly project the gnarly, tumultuous sequences in three-dimensional perspective. To be sure, the pianist’s fortissimos convey an edgy, even metallic patina (so do Yvonne Loriod’s, in fairness), and his occasional vocal grimaces distract. Moreover, there sometimes is more humor to the music than Aimard is willing to concede.

Aimard’s technical, stylistic, and musical authority build upon Loriod’s interpretive legacy, and set modern-day standards that will both inspire and intimidate future generations of Messiaen pianists.

– ClassicsToday (Jed Distler)

Transfigured Night brings together two outstanding composers associated with Vienna: Joseph Haydn and Arnold Schoenberg. The former is often seen as the oldest representative of the “First Viennese School”, whereas the latter founded the “Second Viennese School”, using the classicism of his predecessors to explore new, atonal musical paths into the twentieth century. By combining Haydn’s two cello concertos (in C-major and D-major) and Schoenberg’s symphonic poem Verklärte Nacht – in the 1943 edition for string orchestra – this album sheds a new, fascinating light on both Viennese masters. The connection between the stylistically contrasting pieces on this album is further enhanced by the inspired playing of American cellist Alisa Weilerstein and the Trondheim Soloists. For Weilerstein, this album is not only a fascinating exploration of the rich Viennese musical heritage, but just as much a confrontation with the dark history of a city her grandparents had to flee in 1938. Transfigured Night is Weilerstein’s first album as an exclusive PENTATONE artist, as well as the first album recorded with the Trondheim Soloists since her appointment as Artistic Partner of the ensemble in 2017.

REVIEW:

You’d go far to find performances of the Haydn concertos that match Alisa Weilerstein’s mix of stylistic sensitivity, verve, and spontaneous delight in discovery, and for a performance of the Schoenberg that combines chamber-musical intimacy, transparency of detail, and urgent human expressiveness, you won’t do better than this.

– Gramophone

Gathered here are Rachel Podger’s award-winning recordings from 2003-18 of Vivaldi’s Concerti for Violin: La Cetra, La Stravaganza, Le Quattro Stagioni, and L’Estro Armonico. La Stravaganza (with Arte dei Suonatori) won Gramophone’s 2003 Baroque Album of the Year. “the performances by Rachel Podger are crackling with vitality and executed with consistent brilliance, a performance to leave you breathless”. La Cetra (with Holland Baroque) was awarded a Diapason d’Or: “Superb orchestral image, rich, large and profound”. The Times on 2015’s L’Estro Armonico (with Brecon Baroque): “as her fingers fly through the concerto 12-pack, your feet tap and your pulse quickens without the music being pushed to extremes. A scintillating album.”

Producer Jonathan Freeman-Attwood on 2018’s Le Quattro Stagioni (with Brecon Baroque): “Virtuosity is non-negotiable here and Rachel has it in abundance. But it’s the colour, poetry, vibrancy and evocative characterisation of weather, human warmth and fragility, captured by the dynamic flux of Rachel interlocking with her colleagues in Brecon Baroque, that deliver near-unimaginable qualities in this music.”

The Calidore Quartet begin their new cycle of Beethoven's complete String Quartets with the Late Quartets, a 3-volume set of Opp. 127, 130, 131, 132, 133 & 135. Performances of the Calidore String Quartet are renowned for their “deep reserves of virtuosity and irrepressible dramatic instinct” (New York Times). Their unique “balance of intellect and expression” (Los Angeles Times) is complemented by the feeling that “four more individual musicians are unimaginable, yet these speak, breathe, think and feel as one” (Washington Post). After over a decade of performances and residencies in the world’s most esteemed venues and festivals, the release of numerous critically acclaimed recordings and lauded with significant awards, the Calidore String Quartet is recognized as one of the world’s foremost interpreters of a vast repertory; from the cycles of quartets by Beethoven and Mendelssohn to works of celebrated contemporary voices like Grygory Kurtag, Jörg Widmann and Caroline Shaw.

Founded by Philippe Herreweghe at a time when the Baroque revival was still a matter for specialists, Collegium Vocale Gent has been at the heart of the rediscovery of Bach's sacred music. This ten-album set brings together some of his finest sacred vocal works, from a selection of Leipzig cantatas (Gramophone Editor’s Choice, Choc de Classica etc.) to the St John Passion (Gramophone Editor’s Choice, Trophée Radio Classique) by way of the Mass in B minor. Collegium Vocale Gent was one of the first ensembles to use new ideas about baroque performance practice in vocal music. Their authentic, text-oriented and rhetorical approach gave the ensemble the transparent sound with which it would acquire world fame. In recent years, Collegium Vocale Gent has grown organically into an extremely flexible ensemble whose wide repertoire encompasses the full range of different stylistic periods from Renaissance up to contemporary music. Besides its own baroque orchestra, Collegium Vocale Gent works together with several historically informed ensembles, including the Orchestre des Champs-Élysées, Freiburger Barockorchester and Akademie fü r Alte Musik Berlin. It also works with prominent symphony orchestras such as the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra, Budapest Festival Orchestra and Amsterdam’s Concertgebouworkest. Since 2017 the ensemble runs its own summer festival, Collegium Vocale Crete Senesi, in Tuscany, Italy. Collegium Vocale Gent enjoys the financial support of the Flemish Community and the city of Ghent.

After their acclaimed recording of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice, La Nuova Musica and David Bates expand their PENTATONE discography with Handel’s Unsung Heroes, in which the instrumentalists of Handel’s operas are put centre stage. Traditionally restricted to an “invisible” existence in the orchestra pit, La Nuova Musica’s obbligato instrumentalists – violinist Thomas Gould, oboist Leo Duarte and bassoonist Joe Qiu – are now in the limelight. They will stand as equal partners alongside a world-class line up of soloists – soprano Lucy Crowe, mezzo-soprano Christine Rice and countertenor Iestyn Davies – showing how Handel wrote music as virtuosic and lyrical for his unsung heroes as for their singing counterparts. The album includes arias from Handel masterpieces such as Rinaldo, Giulio Cesare, Agrippina and Ariodante. La Nuova Musica and its artistic director David Bates are among the most exciting Baroque ensembles of today. Their PENTATONE debut with Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice was both BBC Music Magazine Choice and Gramophone Editor’s Choice in December 2019. Iestyn Davies returns to PENTATONE after having sung the title role in that same release, whereas Lucy Crowe and Christine Rice make their PENTATONE debut.

Inon Barnatan presents Rachmaninoff Reflections, offering some of the composer’s most cherished piano works, including his Moments musicaux, Prelude in G-Sharp Minor and Barnatan’s own arrangement of the Vocalise. Centrepiece of this project is Barnatan’s breathtaking new piano arrangement of the Symphonic Dances. Inon Barnatan is one of the most admired pianists of his generation (New York Times). His Pentatone discography consists of Time Traveler’s Suite (2021), Beethoven’s complete cello sonatas with Alisa Weilerstein (2022), as well as complete recordings of Beethoven’s piano concertos together with the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and Alan Gilbert (2019 and 2020).

The Sacred Veil - a project led by Eric Whitacre and Charles Anthony Silvestri - was created following the passing of Charles’ wife, Julia in 2005. It represents a journey towards the answer for many questions, including whether departed loved ones are truly gone, and how can we mourn those we have lost whilst still moving forward? In Charles’ own words, the project became “a significant part of my journey toward healing and wholeness after great loss.”

Poet, author, composer, and speaker Charles Anthony Silvestri has worked with other artists from all over the world to create texts tailor-made for their commissions and specific artistic needs. He enjoys the challenge of solving these creative problems and has provided custom choral texts, opera libretti, program notes and other writing for composers including Eric Whitacre, Ola Gjeilo, Kim Arnesen, and Dan Forrest, and for ensembles ranging from high schools to the Houston Grand Opera, from the King’s Singers to the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus, from Westminster Choir College to Westminster Abbey.

Grammy® Award-winning composer and conductor Eric Whitacre is one of the world’s most performed living composers. His works have been programmed worldwide by millions of amateur and professional performers, while his ground-breaking Virtual Choirs have united singers from over 120 different countries. Eric, a graduate of the prestigious Juilliard School of Music, is presently Artist in Residence with the Los Angeles Master Chorale, following five years as Composer in Residence at the University of Cambridge, UK.As conductor of the Eric Whitacre Singers, he has released such chart-topping albums including Light and Gold and Water Night. In high demand as guest conductor, he has drawn capacity audiences to concerts with the Netherlands Radio Choir, London Symphony Orchestra, Flemish Radio Choir, and Minnesota Orchestra.

REVIEWS

The Sacred Veil is notable simply as one of the most deeply personal pieces of concert music heard in quite some time. Yet there is more to its profound effect than this. Whitacre responds to the texts with a sober language akin to but quite distinct from his usual style, something like the dark language cultivated by Renaissance composers for the requiem mass and other serious texts. The performances by the Los Angeles Master Chorale, under Whitacre's direction, are superb, and the sound, from California's Musco Center for the Arts, is exemplary.

– AllMusicGuide.com (James Manheim)

Composer Eric Whitacre and poet Charles Anthony Silvestri, longtime collaborators and close friends, come together for their most personal and expansive work to date. Whitacre has created a powerful score for Silvestri’s heartfelt poetry in the 12-movement work The Sacred Veil. Silvestri’s wife, Julie, died of ovarian cancer at age 36 in 2005, leaving two young children. His texts, written collaboratively with Whitacre, and the intimate, compelling score tell a story of courtship, love, loss, and the search for solace. Whitacre leads the Los Angeles Master Chorale in the world-premiere recording.

– WFMT-FM (Lisa Flynn)

Hugo Alfvén’s music has always been close to the hearts of the Swedish people, and ranks among some of the most significant and representative of the spirit of the country. Alfvén is known as a cheerful entertainer in compositions such as Den forlorade sonen (‘The Prodigal Son’), but his symphonies reveal a different, more elegiac and often more dramatic side. The success of Alfvén’s symphonies fundamentally changed Sweden’s musical climate and, with a substantial collection of further orchestral music representing his gloriously rich and varied style, these recordings sweep us into the remarkable world of Scandinavian landscape and culture.

Past praise for previously released volumes included in this set:

Symphony No. 5; Andante Religioso / Willén, Norrköping Symphony

The Norrköping Symphony plays with confidence and fervor. Alfvén was nothing if not expansive, and if his formal touch was never all that deft, he did know how to fill up time with arresting ideas, glowingly scored. A serenely lovely Andante religioso makes a perfect encore, one that puts the finale of the symphony’s straining for heroic effect in its proper perspective in the gentlest and most affecting way. Naxos’ sonics for this production are also excellent. Very enjoyable indeed.

-- ClassicsToday.com (David Hurwitz)

The Prodigal Son, Symphony No. 2 in D major, Op. 11 / Willén, Ireland NSO

Listen as Niklas Willén teases the skittish polka from “The Prodigal Son” ballet suite, or steers his players through the vehement fugue that rounds out his Symphony No. 2, and you’ll appreciate why this release commands unreserved praise. These works come to life in Willén’s hands.

Willén’s reading of the Symphony's Andante conjures a huge range of textures and sonorities, with the dark-hued horns and sombre lower winds particularly impressive. The players give all they have in music that’s probably new to them, and that extra effort is just one of the factors that makes these performances so compelling.

-- ClassicsToday.com (10/10; David Hurwitz)

Symphony No. 3; Skerries; Dalecarlien Rhapsody / Willén, RNSO

If you haven’t heard these charming, folk-music-inspired gems of late Romantic music, then here’s an excellent place to start. The Symphony also sounds consistently fresh and lively, though it’s hard to shake the impression that the composer was happier writing programmatic works in free form than in indulging the more intellectual rigors of symphonic development. In Willén’s sympathetic hands, however, none of its four movements outstays its welcome. In any event, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra plays with confidence and evident enjoyment, and the recorded sound is very good.

-- ClassicsToday.com

Edward Hart’s UNDER AN INDIGO SKY features A Charleston Concerto and Under an Indigo Sky, two concertos that celebrate and reflect the history and culture of the Southeastern United States. A native of Charleston SC, Hart finds inspiration in the natural beauty and multicultural heritage of his homeland. A Charleston Concerto was written to commemorate the 350th Anniversary of the City of Charleston; it features a collaboration with the Charleston Symphony and the world-renowned Harlem Quartet. It takes an unflinching yet ultimately hopeful view of the city’s complex history over those three and a half centuries. Under an Indigo Sky for violin and orchestra is a musical love letter written to Hart’s geographical home. It explores both the physical splendor of the mountains and coast, but also the feel and “soul” of these breathtaking places.

This release is tenor Stefano Secco’s first solo album for Delos. It follows his acclaimed appearance on the label’s well-received recording of Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra. The programme includes an exciting collection of familiar and loved arias by Puccini, Bizet, Donizetti, Verdi, Halevy, Boito, and Gounod. In these varied styles, ranging from bel canto to verismo, Secco displays his vocal and interpretive flexibility. Under the direction of Constantine Orbelian, Delos’s resident maestro, the Kaunas City Symphony and Caunas State Choir collaborate with Secco for these songs.