Classical Music

Chandos has been a major player in the long overdue rehabilitation of Parry's music. Here his most important large scale choral works are available as a 2-CD set for the first time at the price of one full price disc. Parry's two finest and most popular anthems, Blest Pair of Sirens and I was glad, make an attractive coupling to his famous choral works. The 45-minute work The Soul's Ransom, with its sequence of solos and choruses, forms a broadly symphonic four-movement structure and The Lotos eaters; a setting for soprano, chorus and orchestra is performed by Della Jones, a characterful soloist. This is a full and atmospheric recording to match the incandescent performances. On its original release these works received 3 stars in the Penguin Guide, and consequently make a welcome return to the Chandos catalogue. 'The choral singing and the playing of the LPO under Matthias Bamert is magnificent, ably championing these deserved revivals.' - Classic CD Other releases: Parry: Complete Symphonies with LPO and Matthias Bamert - CHAN9120 (3 CD set) Symphonic Variations with LPO and Matthias Bamert - CHAN6610

BEN-HAIM Piano Quartet in c, op. 4 1. Two Landscapes for Viola and Piano, op. 27 2. Five Pieces for Piano: Canzonetta (No. 4), op. 34 3. Improvisation and Dance for Violin and Piano, op. 30 4. Clarinet Quintet, op. 31a 5 • 1 Benjamin Bowman (vn); 1,2,5 Steven Dann (va); 1,5 Bryan Epperson (vc); 1 David Louie (pn); 2-4 Dianne Werner (pn); 4,5 Erika Raum (vn); 5 Joaquin Valdepeñas (cl); 5 Marie Bérard (vn) • CHANDOS 10769 (77:05)

Here is a long overdue collection of chamber works by Israeli composer Paul Ben-Haim (1897–1984). Only the C-Minor Piano Quartet on this disc is noted as a premiere recording, but to the extent that recordings of any of the other pieces heard here exist, they’re few and far between. Among the five works on the disc, only the Improvisation and Dance shows up in the Fanfare Archive, in a 30:6 review of a Hyperion CD containing several violin and piano works by Ben-Haim, performed by Hagai Shaham and Amon Erez. Otherwise I’m not finding any other current listings for the pieces on this disc. Perhaps I just didn’t look hard enough.

Ben-Haim’s bio, briefly, is as follows: He was born Paul Frankenburger in Munich, studied composition under Friedrich Klose (a former Bruckner student), and served as assistant conductor to Hans Knappertsbusch and Bruno Walter. In 1933, Ben-Haim emigrated to the British Mandate of Palestine, settled in Tel Aviv, Hebraized his name (which means “son of life,” not “to life,” as it’s sometimes incorrectly translated), and became an Israeli citizen in 1948 when the country declared its independence.

The Piano Quartet, composed in 1921 by the young Frankenburger while still in Munich, is easily described. It’s the next piano quartet Brahms would have written had he lived another 24 years. Everything about the piece—the gestural language, the melodic material, the thematic development, and the piano patterns and figurations—evokes the spirit of Brahms, except for one thing. The harmonic context, with its somewhat more liberal application of dissonance, parallelism, and freer approach to progression, suggests that Ben-Haim had received some exposure to Fauré, Debussy, Ravel, and, according to the note, Richard Strauss and Max Reger. Nonetheless, for all its youthful susceptibility to the musical influences that would have been part of Frankenburger’s German world, his Piano Quartet is a masterful and powerful work, at times turbulent and tragic, and at other times meltingly poignant. In three large movements, it’s a big, late romantic work of nearly 30 minutes’ duration. The performance of it by the ARC Ensemble’s players is nothing short of magnificent. But it’s such a compelling work, I can’t imagine it not being taken up by others and becoming part of the standard piano quartet repertoire.

By the time Ben-Haim came to compose the Two Landscapes for viola and piano, respectively titled “The Hills of Judea” and “The Spring,” in 1939, he’d been living in Israel for six years, and his style had already radically changed as a result of adapting to his surroundings and embracing his Jewish culture. We now hear in these two short musical sketches the familiar sounds of nomads in the desert and the exoticisms we tend to associate with the Hebraic melos.

Alone among the pieces on this disc, the Improvisation and Dance , also composed in 1939, is the one that has enjoyed a bit more exposure on disc. As noted above, it was included on Hyperion’s CD (67571), coupled with works by Bloch, and it can be heard in an all-Ben-Haim program of works on a Centaur CD (2766), which also contains the composer’s arrangement of the last movement of his Clarinet Quintet, op. 31a (on this disc) as the Pastorale variée for Clarinet, Harp, and String Orchestra, op. 31b. Ben-Haim dedicated The Improvisation and Dance for Violin and Piano to Zino Francescatti. Whether he ever recorded it or not, I don’t know, but Francescatti did record Ben-Haim’s G-Major Sonata for Solo Violin in 1958, a recording that has circulated on more than one label, but is currently available on an Orfeo CD (711081).

The Improvisation movement is a kind of free-flowing dolente thing, marked Molto rubato , and evoking that image, once again, of a camel caravan wending its way across the desert dunes. The Dance movement, as you’d expect, is an animated, spirited, strongly accented rhythmic piece that sounds like a bunch of riled-up shtetl Klezmerim going after a marauding mob of Bartók’s Rumanian peasants.

In 1944, Ben-Haim composed a set of five piano miniatures, published as Five Pieces for Piano, op. 34. Considering that the timing of the disc is a generous 77 minutes, it’s churlish to complain that Dianne Werner gives us only one of the pieces from the group, No. 4, titled “Canzonetta,” but you can hear the entire set, for free no less, in a number of YouTube performances by half-a-dozen different pianists. The style Ben-Haim adopts for these pieces is best characterized as Impressionistic.

Originally written in 1941, the Clarinet Quintet was revised in 1965, and, as mentioned above, Ben-Haim rescored its last movement, a set of variations, for clarinet, harp, and string orchestra, assigning it the same opus number, but with a “b” appended. Like the Piano Quintet that opens the disc, the Clarinet Quintet is a large three-movement work lasting over 27 minutes, but unlike the much earlier Quartet, the Quintet is in a dissonant, occasionally almost atonal language that’s more difficult to penetrate in just one or two hearings. But the score’s romantic impulses do break through to the surface now and then, reminding us once again of Ben-Haim’s musical roots.

On that subject, there remains some controversy regarding Ben-Haim’s bona fides as an authentic Israeli composer. Not all commentators and critics accept Ben-Haim as either a true Israeli composer or even a particularly significant composer. An in-depth online paper by Ronit Seter in Volume 9 (2011) of Israeli Studies in Musicology Online (biu.ac.il/hu/mu/min-ad/11/Seter-Hirshberg_Ben-Haim.pdf) cites a number of sources that advance the opinion that Ben-Haim, not entirely unlike Ernest Bloch, was essentially a European romantic who colored his works with Hebraic-sounding melodies and harmonies without making a real effort to explore the more modern “art” music of some of his Israeli contemporaries, like Josef Tal, for example. What I read in this, however, is sour grapes. The crux of the criticism seems to me to be not that Ben-Haim wasn’t Jewish or Israeli enough, but that he wasn’t modern enough—that he retained his romantic roots far into the 20th century, resisting the various avant-garde movements, and that he continued to compose music that’s beautiful and deeply moving.

That can certainly be said of the works on this disc. The players that make up the ARC Ensemble give deeply committed performances of every one of them, and Chandos’s usual wide-range and deep sound stage add excellent dimensionality to the recording. Urgently recommended.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

"As Rumon Gamba's nicely slick performances with BBCNOW show, these are all nicely proportioned pieces...they don't deserve the total neglect they've suffered for the last three-quarters of a century." - The Guardian

Rumon Gamba and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales present a collection of rarely heard overtures from the British Isles. Among these is Sir Frederic Cowen’s The Butterfly’s Ball (1901), illustrating a popular children’s poem by William Roscoe. All is vividly evoked by Cowen’s pleasing melodic lines and delicate instrumental colour. It is easy to see why, in its day, the piece was a firm favourite, being played twenty-six times at the Proms between 1900 and 1940. Samuel Coleridge-Taylor achieved immediate success early in his career with his four-part cantata cycle collectively known as Scenes from The Song of Hiawatha. The Overture, composed in 1899, was intended as a prelude to the complete cycle but is now rarely heard in this context. Indeed, very little of the material in this Overture comes from the other Hiawatha pieces, the principal theme being the spiritual ‘Nobody knows the trouble I see, Lord’. Perhaps better known as a leading baritone of his generation, Frederic Austin was also a composer of some achievement. In his tuneful and exciting concert overture The Sea Venturers, from 1936, he wanted to evoke ‘something of the lives and character of English seamen who...took peril and pleasure as it came’. - Chandos

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

Norway is a gorgeous country, and it’s no surprise that Delius found much of his inspiration there. The pieces on this intelligently planned program run from 1889-1917, and are programmed in roughly chronological order. They range from the charming orchestration of good friend Edvard Grieg’s Norwegian Bridal Procession to Delius’ first major works for orchestra (Paa Vidderne) and for the theatre (the incidental music to Folkeraadet), taking in a couple of orchestral songs along the way.

Paa Vidderne (On the Mountains) is a tone poem obviously of the Wagner/Liszt school, with plenty of hefty brass scoring and way too many cymbal crashes. It does not sound particularly Delian, but curiously the earlier Sleigh Ride’s calm central section clearly foreshadows the composer to come. Few listeners are probably aware that On Hearing the First Cuckoo in Spring is based on a Norwegian theme, but there it is, while Eventyr, which concludes the program, is a masterpiece of mood and turbulent atmosphere, sort of Delius’ answer to Sibelius’ En Saga.

This is one of those programs in which the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The selections are nicely varied. Ann-Helen Moen sings the two songs quite beautifully, and Andrew Davis, who recorded some very nice Delius for Teldec back in the day, knows his way around the music. It’s also good to hear non-British orchestras taking on this repertoire. Certainly the Bergen Philharmonic sounds just fine, although curiously, in Eventyr, the second of the two shouts (literally: the plays have to shout) is quite untidy. Not important, though, especially with fine sonics and a very generous nearly eighty minutes of playing time. A very enjoyable and interesting disc.

- ClassicsToday

Classical Music

RESPIGHI Burlesca. Preludio, corale e fuga. Rossiniana. RACHMANINOFF (Orch. Respighi) 5 Études-tableaux • Gianandrea Noseda, cond; BBC PO • CHANDOS 10388 (73:04)


When I played an RAI recording of Respighi’s puppet opera La bella dormente nel bosco on a radio program in Dallas about 30 years ago, we received several enthusiastic calls—none more so than that of an individual who liked the work immensely and had been, until then, unaware that the composer had ever written anything other than a few tone poems and the three Ancient Airs and Dances suites. An extreme case, perhaps, but matters have improved since then for Respighi. There will never be any lack of musical fountains or pines about Rome for anyone to appreciate, but a lot more of the composer’s music has visibility now, and an attentive public. The Preludio, corale e fuga appears occasionally on concert programs, and I’m sure we’ll soon hear that the Burlesca is doing the same.


The Preludio, corale e fuga was composed in 1900, when Respighi was taking lessons from Rimsky-Korsakov in St. Petersburg. The work was written under the older master’s supervision; and certainly his touch can be heard in some of the harmonic progressions, the characteristic use of the strings and winds (especially the flutes), and the transformation of themes. There’s much of Respighi already present, however, notably in the arresting brass chorale (before it is harmonized and enters an Eastern Orthodox church), and the fugue subject and its chromatic treatment. Above all, the scope of the work and its mix of rigor and fancy point to a young, ambitious composer of considerable promise.


More consistently interesting is the Burlesca , a phantasmagoric piece despite its title, rather than something mock-serious like Strauss’s Burleske . The shape and harmonization of the Burlesca ’s main theme and the piece’s use of pedal points seem to point to Sibelius. As the work was composed in 1906, the possibility of influence cannot be set aside. Still, Sibelius wasn’t given to this kind of filigree work, and it is the subtlety, rather than the overt brilliance of the orchestration, as well as its suitability to the task, that impresses the most.


Rossiniana is nowhere near as well known as La boutique fantasque , but the source is the same: Rossini’s large collection of incidental piano music, nearly all of it composed late in life. It appeared in 1925 and was a success at its premiere, but has been eclipsed through the years by a suite drawn from the ballet. By contrast, while Rossiniana still gets heard on occasion, that can’t be said of the Five études-tableaux . They began life as Rachmaninoff’s ops. 33 and 39 piano collections from 1911 and 1917, respectively. For whatever reason, the composer had no interest in orchestrating a selection of these, so it was left to Serge Koussevitzky to suggest Respighi as a likely candidate. Rachmaninoff agreed; and the results come surprisingly close, not merely in the romantic, fantastical and warlike passages, but in singling out the mordant thread that runs through both “La Foire” and “Le Chaperon rouge et le loup.”


I find the value of these performances to be mixed. Noseda strives above all for clarity, which yields a harvest of welcome orchestral detail from this orchestrally brilliant composer. At times the conductor is too willing to sacrifice momentum and accent, as in the final “Marche” of the Five études-tableaux that frankly, falls flat; yet the concluding “Tarantella” of Rossiniana has all the brio one could desire. The “Marche funèbre” from the Five études-tableaux is colorful but prosaic—too fast and heavy in its tread; but nothing could be lighter or honed more delicately than the filigree work in the Burlesca . Throughout the program, individual soloists are too reticent, but Noseda coaxes a fat, beautiful Russian sound from his sections.


The “Tarantella” to one side, there are certainly better versions of Rossiniana available, though many now fall into the category of historical. Dorati’s old recording with the Royal Philharmonic on Decca 444106 has been re-released under arrangement with ArkivMusic, and is well worth pursuing for its infectious high spirits. Good, too, is Janigro/Vienna SO (Vanguard 41), another vintage release, despite an orchestra that was never within striking distance of the BBC Philharmonic in matters of virtuosity. Dorati and Janigro knew how to bring this music to life. On the evidence of this album, Noseda is still learning.


But in the Burlesca and Preludio, corale e fuga his only competition comes from a slapdash pair of performances featuring Adriano and the Slovak RSO in coarse sound (Naxos 8.557820). So if you want those works, and in excellent sound, too, this disc becomes self-recommending.


FANFARE: Barry Brenesal

The four-disc re-release of York Bowen’s Works for Piano is performed by the Dutch pianist Joop Celis. Gramophone Magazine described Volume II as “triumphant… not a single piece on this excellently recorded disc could be in more sensitive hands.”

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.

Classical Music

This young star bassoonist has brought a great deal of attention to solo repertoire for her instrument. Gorgeous French Romantic and Impressionist music (including works by Debussy and Faur) in an intimate chamber recital.

Howard Shelley and the London Mozart Players present the latest in his series of Hummel works for Chandos and on this occasion shows a less-known side to Hummel's compositional style: that of dance-composer. All three works receive their premiere recordings with this release.

Rustem Hayroudinoff follows up the critical success of his recent disc of Rachmaninov's complete Preludes for solo piano with this recording of Rachmaninov's complete works for cello and piano. He is joined on this disc by Alexander Ivashkin, one of today's most distinguished cellists, who has made an enormous contribution to the Chandos catalogue with his benchmark recordings of his native Russian repertoire. Recorded in: St Michael's Church, Highgate, London 2-4 April 2003 Producer(s) Rachel Smith Sound Engineer(s) Jonathan Cooper Michael Common (Assistant)

"Howard Shelley has made a project of recording Hummel’s eight piano concertos. This C-Major concerto is the composer’s first mature work in this genre, written in 1809—the same year that Beethoven wrote his “Emperor” concerto. There are surface resemblances between the two concertos. In their outer movements, we catch a whiff of the military parade ground (if not the battlefield). The middle movements are long-breathed songs of limpid beauty. Of course, the difference between the two is that Beethoven’s concerto is surprising and innovative, while Hummel’s is (for the most part) safe and rather predictable. Let’s face it, though: aren’t there times when you are relieved by things that are safe and predictable?

The Rondos brilliant date from approximately 1814 and 1822, respectively. Each is just over 16 minutes long. The first one is musique pour les dames, and the second is based on Russian folk material. (Hummel was touring Russia when he wrote it.) If the relatively lengthy C-Major concerto (34:49) is a panoramic canvas, these two works are concertos in miniature—perfectly formed, thoughtfully appointed, and precise... Shelley’s performances, leading the London Mozart Players from the keyboard of a Steinway concert grand, do not attempt to make Hummel into the firebrand that he was not. This is stylish, always genteel playing, reminding us that Hummel was a young protégé of Mozart. Although Hummel’s slow movements sometimes anticipate Chopin, particularly in the decoration of the piano part, that sort of pre-Romantic freedom is not emphasized here. The musicianship overall is small-scaled, but not disappointingly so. Chandos’s engineering is bright, and Derek Carew’s booklet notes are informative."

Raymond Tuttle, FANFARE

2 discs for the price of 1!

Classical Music

Richard Hickox's Vaughan Williams symphonies have collected many awards and accolades. Of major interest is the premiere recording of Vaughan Williams's Nocturne, which was only discovered in 2000. Its first known performance was given at the Three Choirs Festival in 2001, conducted by Richard Hickox. Recorded in: All Saints' Church, Tooting, London 21 & 22 January 2003 Producer(s) Brian Couzens Sound Engineer(s) Ralph Couzens Matthew Walker (Assistant)

Howard Shelley and the London Mozart Players, one of the UK's most distinguished chamber orchestras, have recorded many works by Hummel. Chandos has been renowned for championing Hummel's music since the premiere recordings of his piano concertos in 1987 received the Gramophone 'concerto' award. The company's exposure of this increasingly admired composer has ensured that he is finally beginning to enjoy the popularity he deserves. 'Shelley...is outstanding in this music, synthesizing the classical and romantic elements perfectly. A natural Mozartian, he allies his poise and clarity to a fearless technique, and absorbs Hummel's most ostentatious demands into the musical fabric, giving the decorative solo part the necessary grace and piquancy.' - Gramophone 'Critics Choice' of January 2000 on CHAN9867 (Hummel)

What pushes this release over the top is the brilliant fiddling of James Ehnes, combined with the incredibly intelligent idea of putting all of Bartók's string concertos together on a single disc. Ehnes, for his part, is just as comfortable on the viola as he is on the violin. He digs into the rustic Hungarian melodies in the finale of the Viola Concerto or the beginning of the Violin Concerto No. 2 with a richly resonant gusto that never turns crude, while at the same time his impeccable intonation gives the slithery chromatics of the First concerto real shape and direction. He's a phenomenal artist, make no mistake. Gianandrea Noseda's accompaniments are very good--bracing and very well paced. As so often from these forces, however, the orchestra is a touch bland--never less than proficient, most of the time a good bit more than that, but also not as arresting and colorful as it could be. Still, as I said, the quality of Ehnes' playing and the value of the program earn this disc a top recommendation. Anything less would be churlish.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

The ongoing, critically acclaimed Chandos series of orchestral works by Mieczyslaw Weinberg (1919–96) now explores some of the composer’s lesser-known late works. This disc features the last two Chamber Symphonies, which indeed reflect a largely hidden yet still prolific period of his life. The highly experienced and versatile Thord Svedlund conducts the Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra, here recording with Chandos for the first time. Not only is Chamber Symphony No. 4 the penultimate work that Weinberg completed, but it can also be read as a summation of his entire life and oeuvre. The elegiac mood shaping the piece echoes his last decade – of infirmity, loss and gradual decline in public and professional interest in his work. Apart from the sad, wistful last movement (Andantino) heralding No. 4, Chamber Symphony No. 3 is closely linked to his Fifth String Quartet, op. 27 through its recitative-like melody. At the same time, it perfectly justifies both the term ‘Chamber Symphony’ and the orchestra here playing it: the Helsingborg Symphony, one of Sweden’s oldest, was founded in 1912 originally as a chamber orchestra.

Edward Gardner and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra present Volume 2 in their series Mendelssohn in Birmingham; this time they perform Symphonies Nos 1 and 3 and the Overture to Ruy Blas. The impressive first volume was roundly praised, International Record Review commending the ‘powerfully engaging and alert performances’, while The Sunday Times made it their ‘Album of the Week’.

Among the fruits of his prodigiously gifted youth were thirteen string symphonies, which Mendelssohn composed privately as ‘practice’ pieces. At age fifteen he returned to the last of these, expanded the orchestration, and published it as the first of his mature numbered symphonies. As heard here, this energetic work, bursting with youthful high spirits, shows the influence of Mozart, Beethoven, and Weber, but that influence is always absorbed in a personal way.

Although numbered as the third of five, the ‘Scottish’ Symphony was actually the last which Mendelssohn composed. Inspiration for it had come while Mendelssohn was visiting Edinburgh in 1829. He was immediately moved to compose the brooding melody that begins and ends the work, but not until 1842 did he actually finish this masterpiece.

No such time span was needed to complete the Overture to Victor Hugo’s tragedy Ruy Blas, which was commissioned only three days before the production’s opening night. Mendelssohn loathed Hugo’s drama and though the opening is suitably sombre, the rest of the overture disregards the play’s form and character, concluding in celebration where Hugo’s story culminates in murder and suicide.

Review:

Gardner conducts these pieces with a highly satisfying blend of freedom and discipline. In some of Mendelssohn's more lyrical moments you need a metronome to judge his rhythmic flexibility, so naturally does he apply it, and throughout the disc the strings articulate with splendid vigor.

– BBC Music Magazine

The highlight of this sunny, consistently delightful disc comes in the form of 26 Variations on "La folia di Spagna", based on one of the most famous tunes in Western civilization. A veritable "concerto for orchestra", this late (1815) masterpiece offers a compendium of orchestral tricks of the trade, with brilliant sectional writing, echo effects, and solos for everyone, including (alongside more traditional strings and winds) trombones, harp, and even snare drum. Why it's not an orchestral staple even today simply defies the imagination, and aside from a less-than-seductive principal violin solo, it's brilliantly played here.


The remaining works consist of opera overtures and symphonies created from them, in the purest pre-Rossini Italian tradition. Zesty rhythms, lively tunes, and daring wind writing make these pieces a joy from first note to last. The Sinfonia "Il giorno onomastico" and the overtures to Falstaff and Angiolina offer particularly enticing melodies set amid bold splashes of orchestral color. As noted, Matthias Bamert and his London Mozart players do the music proud, though Chandos' recording does not quite solve the problem of recording a small orchestra up close in an overly ample acoustic. Great fun.
--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Recorded in: New Broadcasting House, Manchester 20,21 March 1996 Producer(s) Ralph Couzens Brian Pidgeon Sound Engineer(s) Don Hartridge

Russian Piano Music

Recorded in: All Saints' Church, Tooting, London 24-25 March 1998 Producer(s) Ralph Couzens Sound Engineer(s) Jonathan Cooper Richard Smoker (Assistant)