The work’s high opus number should not mislead us: Mendelssohn composed his Sextet for piano and five strings when he was only fifteen years old. Here one will not yet find innovative writing of the caliber of what Mendelssohn would soon produce in the Octet or in the Overture to “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Louis Spohr and Hummel still hold sway as conventional musical models, but at least the agile Menuetto exudes Mendelssohnian flair, rushing on by with the grace of a fairy. The work was not printed until 1868, twenty-one years after Mendelssohn’s death, and has not circulated widely since then. Mendelssohn biographer Eric Werner described this work as a “miniature chamber concerto for the piano, contrasting the latter with the five other instruments. Along with Witold Lutosawski, Krzysztof Penderecki is regarded as the most outstanding Polish composer of the twentieth century. Starting in the 1980s, Penderecki abandoned all avant-garde tendencies and has been increasingly using the music of the 19th and early 20th centuries as his models. With a generous playing time of 35 minutes, the work presents itself as a reminiscence of great Slavic composers of the 20th century. Here one can easily detect Penderecki’s penchant for Stravinsky, even more so for Bartok and, above all, for Shostakovich. As Penderecki once put it himself: “I am, of course, a Slavic composer who is mainly interested in communicating his emotions through musical expression.”

Classical Music

“What we are about to hear is not a performance by conceptual artists who have decided to set a discarded Bechstein or Bluthner on fire- no, we are going to hear piano pieces by Galina Ivanovna Ustvolskaya.” The words of the renowned Dutch music critic quoted above offer a precise, vivid description of the musical output of one of the most enigmatic composers of our time. It is hard to apply the usual musicological jargon to Ustvolskaya’s music. She was not the apocalypse of the 20th century- she was its echo. Thanks to providence, she was never sent to one of Stalin’s concentration camps: destiny allowed her to live in seclusion as an artist never blinded by hopes of success. In choosing solitude, she was by no means a Romantic “hero” fleeing from reality, overtly proud of fulfilling a mission or playing an exclusive role. Her seclusion, instead, was the bitter loneliness of a noble soul trembling in view of the world’s utter imperfection. She mourns for it. She prays for us. Ustvolskaya chose to live the life of a hermit. Contact with other human beings was something she often found difficult- even with musicians who really liked her. As she put it herself: “My sincerest wish would be to crawl into a barrel like Diogenes and just live secluded therein. That would be the best option for my life…”

Classical Music

Classical Music

We are now in the year 2022: as chance would have it, this album’s release coincides with the 300th anniversary of the first volume of the Well-Tempered Clavier. Our lifestyle has changed in many ways over the past three centuries. We travel at much greater speed; we develop an increasing number of technologies and digital means of communication. Trained specialists are responsible for every area of our lives. But have we truly made progress? Excessive global travel, as we know, has an alarming impact on climate. While many areas of our life become digital, communication is made simpler but ultimately only leads to mental lethargy, social isolation, and emotional impoverishment. Specialists turn out to be one-track minds who accumulate isolated bits of knowledge – indeed, as ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus remarked, “knowing many things doesn’t teach insight.” Insight thus not only requires for us to have knowledge, but also for us to broaden our horizons. And that is exactly what is so fascinating about the Well-Tempered Clavier.

Claude Debussy left a profound mark on music history when he dissolved functional harmony under the influence of the music of the Far East. Toru Takemitsu had to distance himself from his own culture in order to listen to Japanese music with the ears of a Western-trained musician- adopting, for instance, the approach of John Cage. He came to realize that Japan's venerable musical tradition had long been highlighting individual notes as complex sonorities in their own right, instead of treating them as part of a series of several notes. From the human need for sound as well as silence, John Cage drew the most extreme conclusions. The concept of a "beautiful" sound was never static in music history: it has changed over the centuries, and it differs from one culture to another. Western musical aesthetics tend to differentiate between "noises" and "notes": the latter feature well-ordered harmonics. The concept of "dissonance" has also changed throughout different musical periods. What is more, musicians and their audiences have always felt the need to "savor" a dissonance- to listen to it consciously, to experience it- before it is resolved. This release showcases Debussy, Cage, and Takemitsu as they explore these ideas, as Sheila Arnold exploits the sound of the grand piano, bringing the listener into the space between the notes.

Classical Music

Classical Music

The title 'Solitaires' evokes the singularity of each work on this album; each of these works needs to be polished like a diamond, as Karla Haltenwanger, the pianist of the Boulanger Trio, remarks. Violinist Birgit Erz adds: "We want to shed new light on the piano trio genre by focusing on small, concentrated forms. In such short pieces, everything needs to be immediately in place: the tuning, the attitude, the timbre, from the very first second!"

Classical Music

Classical Music

What types of musical character do we associate with the oboe? We imagine long, lyrical phrases, mournful, fragile melodies, agile musicianship, and a folk-like character. During Viola Wilmsen’s time as principal oboist in the orchestra of the Deutsche Oper Berlin, it felt as if she “died a thousand deaths” every evening until the main character on stage had breathed its last breath and the sobbing oboe had sung its plaintive melody to the end. The 20th century produced a number for works for oboe and piano in which the woodwind instrument adopts an almost “furious” character, one that is not typically heard in most orchestral repertoire. On this new release, the artists would like to demonstrate the oboe’s variety of tone color and versatility. The main idea is centered on the oboe as a “singing voice” with its tremendous ability to phrase long cantilenas: hence, this program is closely associated with the human voice.

Cuarteto SolTango epitomizes the new generation of authentic tango, combining the luscious sound of a traditional orquesta with the verve that only chamber music can offer! Together, the four musicians interpret a wide diversity of classic tango including Astor Piazzolla and Osvaldo Pugliese.

Classical Music