Directed by Andre Delacroix. Starring William Pleeth.

Henri Vieuxtemps’ fiendishly difficult but beautifully melodious Cello Concerto no. 1 in A minor is the central work on this album, which also includes Saint-Saens’ Cello Concerto no. 1, as well as his Allegro Appassionato, which is seldom heard in its orchestral guise. All these works are French/Belgian in origin and pioneered by the leading Belgian cellists of the day. South African cellist Peter Martens, who himself enjoys Belgian ancestry, is partnered with Bernhard Gueller, showcasing the Cape Town Philharmonic Orchestra at its very best. “Martens’ cello is one of the most beautiful sounds – a deep rich harmonic wooden stringed singing being. His playing is superb, compassionate elegant phrasing, and flawless technique. His bow knows the exact line between the tender softness and the hard edge, and this extra dimension is masterfully applied to his dynamics. He expresses a full range of emotion, from angst and agitation to acceptance and wisdom.” (Andy Wilding- FOM Soiree)

Directed by Andre Delacroix. Starring William Pleeth.

Inspirales features works written and inspired by the great cellist-composers of the past, from Fitzenhagen and Popper through to Tortelier and Rostropovich. Zori himself has a contributed a dazzling "Carmeniana' based on Bizet's Carmen, and recorded here for the first time. Hailed by the renowned cellist Bernard Greenhouse to have 'all of the wonderful attributes of a young Emanuel Feuerman,'Hillel Zori has distinguished himself by winning coveted prizes in many international competitions, and enjoys a distinguished career as soloist as well as a member of the Israel Piano Trio.

Fascinating music for cellos, brilliantly played, challenging and deeply rewarding.

First, the personnel. Paul Desenne is a Venezuelan composer. He was a founder member of the Simón Bolivar Youth Orchestra, playing the cello. He is also active in music journalism. Nancy Green is an American cellist. Her discography includes such staples as the Debussy Sonata alongside more unusual repertoire. Each of the two artists has a useful website.

It is unsurprising that, as a cellist himself, Desenne has composed so much music for the instrument. He writes in the booklet, “For many years, I have worked to renew the role of the cello in solo and ensemble composition, stressing ingredients and natural resources that many composers had previously hinted at, such as percussive and tone color combinations.” Of the six works on this disc, Jaguar Songs is a sonata for solo cello, whereas all the other works are written either for three or four cellos. Amazingly, Nancy Green plays all the parts.

This music is derived from, and aims to recreate, the sounds of Latin America. The composer writes that Glass Bamboo Frog Consort “transposes flamboyant Renaissance stretto polyphony to the Caribbean tropical night of insects and spirits.” It’s a very affecting piece. For four cellos, it begins with a gently moving passage in triple time which eventually gives way to a livelier middle section, becoming calmer once again before the end. Quite a few chromatic notes creep in, and whilst the majority of the music lies in the upper reaches of the cello register, there is plenty of variety of texture. The Steve Reich of Different Trains or Violin Phase comes to mind. Pájaro-Guaracha and Kaliguasa, on the other hand, sound nothing like him. I’d have to evoke Piazzolla, but this would be inadequate, as this music sounds like no other I have encountered. Again for an ensemble of four cellos, Desenne describes them as “studies in local Venezuelan genres”. He also writes that the music relates to “Villa-Lobos’ thick scoring for cello consorts”. One immediately thinks of the Bachianas Brasileiras for cello ensemble, but there is more affinity in sound with the ninth in the series, for string orchestra. Each of these two short pieces pulsates with life, highly rhythmic, as you would expect, but very lyrical too, the melodic elements more and more in evidence with each hearing. Kaliguasa is the gentler of the two, with a more sustained high-lying melodic line, but each one is characterised by a virtuoso control of texture, with pizzicato effects frequently used to mark the rhythm.

Anyone wanting a taster of this disc would probably not be advised to begin with Aeroglifos. For three cellos, this is the least immediately attractive work here. The composer describes it as “a nocturne inspired by the hallucinating Kamu Purrui musical ritual of the Kuna people from Colombia and Panama … each player knows exactly when to blow his note within a precise sequence of hundreds.” It features rather more than the others some astringent harmonies as well as effects such as playing near the bridge or the fingerboard. It leads without a break into Pizziquitiplás, also for three cellos, suggesting that the composer is happy for the two pieces to form a pair, even though the second dates from 1989 and is the earliest music on the disc. As its title suggests, this work makes important use of pizzicato techniques. In effect, one of the three voices sustains a cantabile line, made up of short melodic fragments, constantly repeated and played with the bow, whilst the other two voices display a dazzling range of pizzicato techniques as accompaniment. The composer found that the cello could “imitate the spirit” of the quitiplás, “an Afro-Venezuelan form of bamboo percussion in trios”. The work begins in a spirit of boundless energy, gradually becoming calmer and lapsing almost into silence at the close.

The longest work on the disc is entitled Jaguar Songs. The composer again: “In Amazonian mythology, the jaguar represents blood, and also death, or sudden commotion.” Quite so. The first movement begins with rhythmic, drum-like effects, and the whole movement is rapid and bewilderingly varied. The second is a lament for the destruction of the rain forests. It opens with soft pulsing, representing the forests, and leads to more violent music representing chainsaws. The cello imitates an electric guitar in the third movement, very successfully too, and in the fourth evokes the spirit of the Brazilian traditional instrument, the berimbau, whose single string is struck with a metal prong. Then there is the very strange, slithering passage where “friars of the Conquest are … eaten by carnivorous worms that then start to sing and modulate in Gregorian modes.” The ensuing violent dance is delivered with startling virtuosity.

The final track on the disc, Birimbao-Jaguar with effects, is the final movement of the sonata with electronic effects added by the sound engineer, Wiley Ross. The composer writes that “amazingly, the effects seem to express the latent desires of the text.”

The performances by Nancy Green are stunning. She deserves official honours, both for her technical skill and for her faith in the music. And her faith is well founded, as these works are fascinating, engaging, exciting and often very beautiful. They are also superbly well written for the forces involved. The recorded sound is magnificent. I’m happy to nominate this as a Disc of the Month to all those with a sense of adventure. But not for the first time I also want to shout from the rooftops: “Heaven deliver us from composers who write about their own music!”

-- William Hedley, MusicWeb International

Keith Harvey was born in 1938 and is a prestigious member of the cello fraternity. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music with Douglas Cameron and after only seven years’ study became, at 20, principal of the LPO. You may well know him from his membership of the Gabrieli Quartet or as principal cello of the English Chamber Orchestra (ECO). Collectors of recordings have reason to be grateful, as Harvey contributed many a shellac to Pearl for their transfer projects. It’s rare to find a first-rank performer who is also a serious record collector but in Keith Harvey and Malcolm Binns - they wouldn’t be a bad duo, come to think of it - Britain has two of the world leaders.
 
Harvey has constructed a charming two-disc series of transcriptions dedicated to ‘his friends within’, as it were. They range from the profound complexities of the extensive Bach Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue arranged by Ferruccio Busoni to the affectionate delicacy of Purcell’s Music for a while. One can note with interest and enthusiasm the composers Harvey has chosen to arrange as well as to whom each arrangement is dedicated. This latter group ranges from Henry Mancini through cellistic idols such as Feuermann, Piatigorsky, André Navarra, Casals and Rostropovich to Dinu Lipatti and close personal chums. In most of the 37 pieces he is elegantly accompanied by Linn Hendry.
 
Some of the pieces, it’s true, are arranged by others - the others being Piatigorsky, Heifetz, Kreisler, Fournier, and Luigi Silva - but the vast bulk were arranged adroitly by Harvey himself. Rich portamenti and ripe melancholy inform the playing in Tchaikovsky’s Autumn Song and there’s a hint of a cellistic bumblebee in Yuri Shaporin’s Scherzo. Harvey takes on Heifetz’s scintillating Gershwin arrangements and offers three Nin transcriptions of his own. As befits a connoisseur he dedicates one of them to the violinist Miguel Candela, who made, as Harvey says, some gorgeous 78s. I have his Glazunov Concerto set and it’s terrific - one of the first recordings of it ever made.
 
Appropriately he dedicates his performance of his Paraphrase on Prélude à l'après-midi d'un Faune to his wife Meralyn Knight, who accompanies on three tracks, but not this one. Her three recordings are noticeably boxier than the others, and are less kind to Harvey’s tone though they’re all very warmly played. He has dedicated Achron’s Hebrew Melody to Raphael Wallfisch and was inspired to arrange it after hearing the tragically short-lived Joseph Hassid’s recording. I’m very glad that he has included Heifetz’s arrangement of the folk song Gweedore Brae. It’s that much more evocative on Brunswick 78 even than on the recent complete Heifetz box set.
 
In each disc there’s one ‘big’ arrangement. The Bach-Busoni is on disc one and Ferdinand Ries’s Variations on Three Russian Airs is on disc two. It’s full of decorative élan, not least for the piano (here, played by Peter Pettinger) as well as suave cellistic lyricism. There’s a blockbuster Paganini brace and two movements from Reger Suites, about which Harvey is rightly admiring.
 
His little notes about pieces and dedications make for affectionate, often amusing, wry reading. He was badly in the wars, medically speaking, not so long ago but has now recovered. He is an outstanding player and a generous colleague, alert to admirable qualities both musical and human. These discs reflect those very same qualities in abundance.
 
-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International 

CD 1
Claudio MONTEVERDI (1567-1643)
Lamento Di Arianna [2:17]
Johann Sebastian BACH (1685-1750)
Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue arr. Ferrucio Busoni [12:41]
Alexander SCRIABIN (1872-1915)
Romance in a Minor arr. Gregor Piatigorsky [2:25]
Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)
Autumn Song [4:08]
Igor STRAVINSKY (1882-1971)
Russian Maiden's Song [3:54]
Yuri SHAPORIN (1887-1966)
Scherzo [1:59]
George GERSHWIN (1898-1937)
Bess You Is My Woman Now, from Porgy and Bess arr. Jascha Heifetz [3:16]
It Ain't Necessarily So from Porgy and Bess arr. Jascha Heifetz [2:55]
Joaquin NIN (1879-1949)
Murciana [2:03]
Saeta [3:06]
Andalucia [1:55]
Ed POLDINI (1869-1857)
Poupée Valsante [2:30]
Maurice RAVEL (1875-1937)
Pavane Pour Une Infante Défunte [6:01]
Claude DEBUSSY (1862-1918)
Paraphrase on Prélude à L'après-midi d'un Faune [8:13]
Henri DUPARC (1848-1933)
Chanson triste [3:36]
Joseph CANTELOUBE (1879-1957)
Bourée Auvergnate [2:23]
Joseph ACHRON (1886-1943)
Hebrew Melody [5:25]
Mario CASTELNUOVO-TEDESCO (1895-1968)
Sea Murmurs [2:00]
TRADITIONAL
Gweedore Brae arr. Jascha Heifetz [3:09]
Johannes BRAHMS (1833-1897)
Four Serious Songs - No.3 [3:29]
CD 2
Henry PURCELL (1659-1695)
Music for a While [4:36]
Ferdinand RIES (1784-1838)
Variations On Three Russian Airs [12:39]
Edvard GRIEG (1843-1907)
Varen [4:11]
Reinhold GLIÈRE (1875-1956)
Romance in D Major [4:53]
Sergei PROKOFIEV (1891-1953)
Waltz [1:48] and March [1:50]
Fryderyk CHOPIN (1810-1849)
Mazurka in a Minor arr. Fritz Kreisler [3:34]
Karol SZYMANOWSKI (1882-1937)
Etude in B flat minor [4:49]
Nicolò PAGANINI (1782-1840)
Variations On Theme from 'Moses' [7:12]
Caprice Op.1 No. 5 arr. Luigi Silva [2:34]
Ernesto HALLFTER (1905-1989)
Serenade a Dulcinea [5:03]
Pregon; Cuban Dance [2:40]
Max REGER (1873-1916)
Cello Suite in D, Op. 131c - Prelude [5:28] and Variations [7:03]
Erik SATIE (1866-1925)
Gymnopédie [2:17]
Claude DEBUSSY (1862-1918)
Beau Soir arr. Pierre Fournier [2:58]
Edward ELGAR (1857-1934)
Adieu [2:43]

SOLO SUITE BEFORE BACHJACQUES BUISSON; LE SEIUR DE MACHY; NICOLAS HOTMAN; MARIN MARAIS;SAINTE-COLOMBE THE ELDER CHARLES MEDLAM - BASS VIOL FLEUR DE LYS - THE SOLO SUITE BEFORE BACH - FRENCH BASS VIOLSUITES 1660 - 1700JACQUES BUISSON: SUITE IN D MINORLE SEIUR DE MACHY: SUITE NO 4 IN G MAJORNICOLAS HOTMAN: SUITE IN D MINORMARIN MARAIS: TOMBEAU POUR MONSIEUR DE SAINTE-COLOMBESAINTE-COLOMBE THE ELDER: SUITE IN D MINOR

The Hungarian Emanuel Moór enjoyed huge success in Europe at the beginning of the 20C, associated with the great musicians of the day, writing for Ysaÿe, Cortot, Thibaud and Casals, who called him 'a genius'. Two sonatas, dedicated to Piatti and to Casals are heard alongside the 1909 Quartet for 4 cellos, first performed by Pablo Casals, Joseph Salmon, André Hekking and Diran Alexanian. Today this music is largely neglected, and this Cd, recorded by artists who have embraced the works and re-introduced them to the concert public, will help to restore the reputation of a once revered composer. Programme essay by Andrew Stewart.

Mendelssohn: Complete Works for Cello & Piano

Klengel was one of the most important figures in the history of the cello.

Julius Klengel (1859-1933) was one of the most important figures in the history of the cello. He studied composition in his native Leipzig with Salomon Jadassohn (who taught Grieg and Delius) and whose own music has been recorded, very successfully, of late. Klengel made his debut at 17 whilst a member of the Leipzig Gewandhaus, whose ranks he had joined two years earlier. His pupils at the Leipzig Conservatoire included some of the most prominent players of the twentieth century: Feuermann, Suggia, Piatigorsky, Edmund Kurtz, Paul Grümmer and William Pleeth amongst them. He composed quite widely, and was the recipient of many dedications and gave many premieres. Reger was a particularly good colleague but he was a good friend of Brahms, as well as Taneyev amongst many others.
 
This celebratory disc intersperses some of Klengel’s own 78 discs between original compositions and adds up to a fine portrait. His Capriccio was written in 1905 and dedicated to his most flamboyant student, Guilhermina Suggia. It makes appropriately strong demands whilst basing itself strongly on the introduction of Schumann’s Op.121 Violin Sonata. There then follow some testing variations, and serious investigations of every aspect of left and right hand technique. No wonder it used to be a competition favourite.
 
Three Pieces for two cellos and organ was published in 1931. There’s a definite sense of poignancy as the two cellos entwine supported by the organ - and a strong element of spiritual sensitivity too, as well as quiet charm. The Little Suite is in five movements, Klengel ensuring the three cellist’s parts are cleverly distributed and not tangled up. There’s a coquettish Gavotte, a Borodin or maybe even Taneyev-like Largo and a confident Fughette to end. He goes one better in the Impromptu for four cellos, which opens as a hymnal affair but then bursts into the Wedding March most unexpectedly and most amusingly. The final piece is the poignant Hymnus, for twelve cellos, dedicated to the memory of the conductor Artur Nikisch at whose funeral it was played in 1922. It exemplifies his gift for beautiful part writing and rich romanticism.
 
Klengel’s own playing can be heard in four works - his portamenti are pervasive, often promoting pathos (as in the Tartini Adagio), rhythm solid, technique powerful (try the tricksy Crossmann Taranetlla) and reasonable tone. I wish the examples had been dated with full discographic details however. The Bach Sarabande is a fine performance and I know was recorded in 1927.
 
Raphael Wallfisch takes on the finger and wrist crunching challenges of the Capriccio on a theme of Schumann. His cellistic and other colleagues named in the head note and those in the twelve-strong Cello Classics Ensemble perform admirably and have been well recorded. The booklet is attractive. Maybe it’s time for some large-scale Klengel works to be recorded. How about his Double Concerto for starters?
 
-- Jonathan Woolf , MusicWeb International

Twice a winner at the Tchaikovsky Competition, Alexander Rudin is arguably the foremost cellist playing in Russia today. Already featured in 'Great Moments', Rudin brings to Cello Classics a stunning recording of the complete works for cello by the much neglected Soviet composer Nikolai Miaskovsky. Spanning from the 1st Sonata of 1911 to the Concerto of 1944 the works reflect the composers natural gift of melody and deep emotional expression. This ravishing recording is played with great eloquence by performers entirely at one with the genre.

This unusual programme highlights an area of cello repertoire largely unexplored on CD. There is a substantial body of fine music written throughout the ages for two cellos by leading composers and virtuosi of the instrument. This recording will surprise and delight listeners more accustomed to the sound world of the cello sonata.

The Englishman Stephen Paxton flourished in London in the late 18th century. Famous as a composer of glees and catches he wrote a large number of works for his own instrument, the cello. Mostly recorded here for the first time Sebastian Comberti brings these forgotten works to light accompanied by a continuo team of Ruth Alford and Maggie Cole, with The Pantheon Band.

HAYDN Cello Concertos: in C; in D. ZUMSTEEG Cello Concerto in A • Sebastian Comberti (vc); O of the Age of Enlightenment • CELLO CC 1023 (69:05)


The trouble with second-rate composers is that typically they seem to be trying just as hard as the geniuses. It’s a strain for us, and must have been for them. So I am happy to report that Johann Rudolf Zumsteeg (1760–1802), whose shorter life was tucked inside the years of Haydn’s (1732–1809), has written a charming, melodically satisfying, and unpretentious cello concerto. It is evidently a student work; it is certainly a work without angst. Its Andante, though, is lovely. There are no churning depths, but don’t some creatures look ravishing just wading? The other good news is that Sebastian Comberti is a consummate cellist with a beautiful tone and taste, and the orchestra is equally adept and musical. Of course, few listeners will be buying this disc for the Zumsteeg. The two Haydn concertos have often been recorded; for years the only recordings of the Concerto in D in my collection were by Fournier and by Feuermann. Since then, Rostropovich made them one of his specialties and there are famous recordings as well by Jacqueline du Pre and by early-music specialists such as Christophe Coin. Still, there is much to recommend in this new recording, including the bright, clear recorded sound, which is better than the sound on any of the above; the polished orchestral playing; and the tasteful, warm-hearted soloist. Comberti has energy, humor, and taste that make these recordings sound really like Haydn, and not Mozart manqué . Then there’s the Zumsteeg instead of the more typical addition, the Boccherini, whose charms would be limited even if Boccherini had composed every note.


FANFARE: Michael Ullman

Award-winning Chinese/Australian cellist Li-Wei makes his first Cd for Cello Classics with a programme that draws on his formidable talents, including a specially commissioned work by Ho Chee Kong.

Comprising six of the finest cellists in South Africa, I Grandi Violoncellisti have made this kind of repertoire their own. Working for many years with some of South Africa's finest composers they present an eclectic mix of new commissions and repertoire works, centring on a common theme of dance. Led by British-born Peter Martens, the group explores the sumptuous sound of 6 cellos to its full potential.

Capriccioso

Includes work(s) for cello by Jean Balthasar Tricklir. Ensemble: Musica Viva Chamber Orchestra. Conductor: Alexander Rudin. Soloist: Alexander Rudin.

Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata - written 'in the style of a concerto' - has long been considered one of the great challenges in the chamber music repertoire. Here a recently discovered transcription by the composer's pupil and friend Carl Czerny receives its world premiere recording by the distinguished partnership of Raphael Wallfisch and John York. Coupled with Beethoven's own transcription of his Horn Sonata and the rarely heard 'Eyeglass' Duet with Yuko Inoue, this Cd fulfils Cello Classics' remit to bring rare and neglected repertoire to the world stage.

Brahms: Piano Quintet in F Minor, Op. 34 - Weber: String Qui

The works on this recording reflect the richness of the cello repertoire from the late 18th and early 19th Centuries. Mozart's unfinished Sonata movement in Bb, is here, having been completed by Annette Isserlis. Works by his pupils include: J N Hummel's Variations alla Monférine Op.54 and Wölfl's Sonata in D Op. 31 are both beautifully crafted and make virtuoso demands on the performers. Together with the exquisite Mozart inspired sonata by Hélène Liebmann, this is a CD of exhillarating and unjustly neglected masterpieces. Cello Classics' founder Sebastian Comberti and fortepianist Maggie Cole play on instruments of the period bringing these works to light in all their true colours.

This rare collection of works offers an insight into the creative heritage of the great cellists of the past as composers and arrangers. 'Virtuoso Cello Transcriptions'combines highly virtuosic performing with a nostalgic look at the past, ranging from the baroque through to Schnittke. Since his studies with Nikitin and Shafran, and following early successes at competitions in Paris and Geneva, Leonid Gorokhov has been in great demand as soloist with orchestras throughout Europe. A large discography for Melodya and Supraphon has won many plaudits and his recent CD 'Russian Discoveries' was voted Record of the Month by London's Classic FM. 'Between the mercurial movements, such as Frescobaldi¹s Toccata, we can enjoy Gorokhov¹s smooth and lyrical qualities in the slow movements, the elegance of the Adagio in Locatelli's Sonata being of rare beauty. His bowing technique is so wonderfully fluid, Weber's Adagio being just one of the examples of his seamless legato.' The Strad August 2001 'Especially good however is the trilogy of Popper showpieces in which Gorokhov shows himself a deftly spirited advocate. A promising start for a new label that's certain to excite cello devotees, and whose promised historical bias should also have general wider appeal.' Michael Jameson, BBC Music Magazine August 2001

Including recently discovered works recorded here for the first time. Première Recording* For the first release, Cello Classics has chosen to bring out something of a coup, in hitherto unplayed works by the first great composer for the cello to achieve universal recognition, Luigi Boccherini. Three of the sonatas on this disc have been obtained from manuscripts until recently in a private collection, and provide a wonderful addition to the classical cello repertoire. Sebastian Comberti has been involved in the period instrument revival in London since the early 1980s and has made the study of late 18th Century cello repertoire something of a speciality. This recording has been made using original instruments with a continuo team unusually comprising archlute/guitar and cello, providing a rich and yet light accompaniment to these delightful works. It is bound to be of interest to lovers of the cello and scholars alike

One of the worlds most respected and recorded cellists, Raphael Wallfisch, in his first recording for Cello Classics, turns his attention to works inspired and written by the great Belgian violinist Eugene Ysaÿe During the years he spent in Paris, from 1883 to 1886, Ysaÿe formed close ties with many great composers of the day, receiving the dedication of Franck's Sonata in A, and commissioning what is probably the best known work by Guillaume Lekeu, himself a pupil of Franck. In addition to the many works for his own instrument, cellists are fortunate to have two works written by Ysaÿe, his Solo Sonata Op. 28 and the Rêve d'Enfant

Cello Classics explores the world of ensemble works for 4 Cellos, featuring little known gems by some of those best qualified to write for the instrument - the great Cellist-Composers of the 19th Century. Offenbach was a virtuoso himself, and his Adagio and Scherzo have only recently come to light. Grützmacher, Klengel and Fitzenhagen taught at the major conservatories in Europe and have left a wealth of literature for this wonderfully sonorous line-up - a String Quartet with four cellos. Sebastian Comberti, founder of Cello Classics, is joined by colleagues from the London Mozart Players, Julia Desbruslais, Ben Chappell and Sarah Butcher.