Gluck, C.W.: Orfeo Ed Euridice [Opera]

Mozart, W.A.: String Quartets Nos. 14, 15

A monumental set of 33 variations built from a simple waltz theme by Anton Diabelli. A stunning performance of a legendary masterwork by one of the great pianists of our time. Pianist Gabriel Chodos has been a revered New England Conservatory faculty member for a quarter-century.

BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 6 / Choral Fantasy / BRAHMS: Double

Haydn, J.: Jahreszeiten (Die)

Haydn, J.: Schöpfung (Die)

Mozart: Ouvertüren

Haydn: Symphonies Nos. 93, 94 & 103

HAYDN: Mass No. 3 in C major, "Missa Cellensis"

Beethoven: Triple Concerto - Piano Concerto No. 3

Mozart: String Quartets Nos. 16, 17, "Hunt", 21, "Prussian N

Kurt Masur 85th Anniversary (Live)

From Bow to String

One evening I paid a visit to the Opéra. There I saw Les Danaïdes, by Salieri. The gorgeous splendor of the spectacle, the rich fullness of the orchestra and the chorus, the wonderful voice and pathetic charm of Madame Branchu, Dériviss rugged power filled me with an excitement and enthusiasm that I cannot attempt to describe. Thus Berlioz related his encounter with one of the most revolutionary operas of the ancien régime, written by an eminent pupil of Gluck, Antonio Salieri. Feeling the stirrings of early Romanticism, the latter imbued the tragic fate of Hypermnestra with pathos and vehemence such as were rarely attained even by his teacher. The horrible plot fomented by Danaus with his daughters, the Danaids, takes us from palatial splendor to the sinister darkness of a secret temple, and finally to the Underworld itself, where a vulture, serpents, demons and the Furies avenge the mass murder of the sons of Egyptus.

Beethoven: Mass In C / Elegiac Song / Calm Sea And Prosperou

For this new release, the Hagen Quartet presents Mozart String Quartets K. 387 and K. 458. These two works are part of a group of six quartets that were dedicated to Joseph Haydn. The Hagen Quartet recorded this album using the ‘Paganini Quartet,’ which is the only complete set of Stradivarius instruments owned by Niccolo Paganini that is known to exist today.

An die Geliebte

After a first album devoted to Mozart quartets (awarded a ‘Choc de Classica’ and a ‘Diapason Découverte’), a second to French music (Debussy, Ravel and Chausson) and a third to two quartets by Schubert, nos.10 and 14 (the mythical Death and the Maiden), the group founded by Nicolas Van Kuijk returns to its first love by recording more Mozart. This recording is the second part of an eventual triptych that will contain the six string quartets dedicated to Haydn: no.14 in G major, K387, the first of them, was composed in 1782, when Mozart had just arrived on the Viennese musical scene; no.15 in D minor K421, the second, is the only one in the minor mode and was completed in 1783 while his wife Constanze was in labor – she related that the rising intervals of the second movement recalled her cries from the room next door as he composed.

Internationally acclaimed pianist Benjamin Hochman brings his new conductorial skills to the impeccable release of two Mozart concertos, the joyful and lithe No. 17 in G major, and the dark and explosive No. 24 in C minor. Directing from the keyboard, Benjamin leads the finest Mozartian orchestra in the world, the English Chamber Orchestra.

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REVIEW:

His rendition of the G major concerto is captivating: fluent and subtly shaded throughout, Hochman directs the English Chamber Orchestra from the keyboard with aplomb. Avie’s sound, as always, is clean and natural, allowing the music to bloom.

– International Piano

This is Volume 3 in Centaur's cycle of the complete piano sonatas of Hummel, performed by Antonio Pompa-Baldi. This cycle is setting a very high bar for complete Hummel sonata cycles. Born and raised in Foggia, Italy, Antonio Pompa-Baldi won the Cleveland International Piano Competition in 1999 and embarked on a career that continues to extend across five continents. He also won a silver medal at the 2001 Van Cliburn Competition, as well as a bronze medal at the 1998 Marguerite Long Competition in Paris. The New York Times described his playing as “meltingly beautiful.” Pompa-Baldi founded the Todi International Music Masters Festival, of which he is artistic director and faculty member, and sits on the juries of the most prestigious piano competitions in the world.

Penelope Crawford presents a program of four of Beethoven's most important transitional sonatas, bridging the gap between his "middle" and "late" periods. Composed against the backdrop of Napoleonic Europe and Metternich's Congress of Vienna, these four works chart Beethoven's growth as a composer in a rapidly changing world. As with her first Beethoven sonata recording (opp. 109-11), Musica Omnia MO 0308), a splendid fortepiano by the great Viennese builder, Conrad Graf, is used here, similar to one of the last pianos owned by Beethoven, also by Conrad Graf.

Award-winning Lithuanian, London-based pianist Indre Petrauskaite makes her AVIE label debut with a selection of Mozart’s piano works with a twist: she uniquely brings together the composer’s solo keyboard works written in minor keys. The nine works offered here represent a fraction of the composer’s overall oeuvre, yet they span a gamut of genres – including improvisatory and emotional fantasies, enigmatic miniatures and complex sonatas. Indre showcases these pieces – much loved staples of stage and studio alike – in a novel and stunning album. “Strong and well-played performances.” (MusicWeb International)

REVIEW:

Petrauskaite has an original voice in Mozart, not something that's so easy to accomplish. She is what's called a strong pianist, generally avoiding the delicately lyrical style in Mozart except in small details. Although this certainly isn't a historically oriented performance, Petrauskaite avoids Romantic gestures and extensive use of the pedal except in the fantasies; her playing is clean, tough, and insightful. The album, as a whole, offers an emotional journey that's rare in Mozart recordings, yet in Petrauskaite's hands, it seems to make sense. A superior Mozart recording.

– AllMusicGuide.com (James Manheim)

Ondine is pleased to announce a long-term recording collaboration with German violinist Christian Tetzlaff, internationally recognized as one of the leading soloists of his generation. The selection of these sonatas for piano and violin by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart demonstrate distinctly the composer's ingeniousness and show a wide range and strong ambiguity of emotions.

During the late 18th century, compositions for string trio with a wind instrument were extremely popular in amateur circles; and in keeping with this highly fashionable trend, Mozart composed four quartets for flute and strings while on a tour of France and Germany with his mother. The 22-year-old composer had lately made the acquaintance of a solo flautist, Johann Baptist Wendling, who was in contact with a rich flute-playing patron. A handsome fee was offered for some concertos and quartets – more than Mozart’s annual salary as a court musician back at home in Salzburg – and so he set to work, completing the first quartet, K385, on Christmas Day 1777. The other works here may have been composed later – perhaps Mozart ran out of enthusiasm for the project – but they all count as examples of refined chamber music conceived for skilled amateur players and domestic consumption, While hardly as complex a showcase of Mozart’s compositional skills as the string quartets he dedicated to Haydn, all four quartets abounding in gentle wit and good humour, and written not as mini-concertos for flute and string trio but as chamber music for equal partners. Every now and then Mozart touches the sublime, as so often he could, such as the slow variation movement of K285b, which recalls the similar movement in the ‘Gran Partita’ wind serenade in its weightless gravity of expression. This new recording of the quartets offers a substantial bonus, in the shape of the Oboe Quartet K370 arranged for the ensemble at hand. The performances are led by the Italian flautist Andrea Manco, who in 2003, at just 20 years old, became principal flute of the Teatro Regio orchestra in Turin under the directorship of Gianandrea Noseda.

Carl Czerny found a continuing source of inspiration in the music of his teacher Beethoven, even after he had established himself with a series of influential pedagogic works, piano exercises and studies. His works for piano trio show a flair for vivacious themes and unusual rhythms, such as the Spanish bolero in the second of the ‘Deux Trios brillants, Op. 211’ as well as opportunities for brilliant display, notably for the pianist. The ‘Trois Sonatines, Op. 104’ are equally lively, showing a transitional style that bridges the period from Mozart to Liszt. Dr. Sun-Young Gemma Shin is an active performer on both Baroque and modern violin as a soloist, chamber musician and orchestra leader. She is presently associate concertmaster of the Champaign-Urbana Symphony Orchestra. Benjamin Hayek completed his bachelor and MM degrees in cello performance at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. Hayek is active as a modern cellist in addition to his frequent appearances as a Baroque cellist. Dr. Samuel Gingher is active as a solo and collaborative pianist, and has performed in piano and chamber festivals all over the world. He is currently a faculty member at Millikin University in Illinois.

Fritz Wunderlich is starring in this rare recording of Beethoven's Oratorio.

For his first release on Alpha, the clarinetist and conductor Jörg Widmann celebrates the music of a composer who wrote some of the finest pieces ever devoted to his instrument: Carl Maria von Weber. With the ensemble of which he is principal conductor, the Irish Chamber Orchestra, he has recorded the Clarinet Quintet (in its version with string ensemble) and the Concertino, composed in 1811 and 1815 respectively, along with the ever-popular Overture to Der Freischütz. The pianist Denis Kozhukhin joins Widmann to perform the Grand Duo concertant. This album is the first in a series of recordings that will also give us a chance to meet Jörg Widmann in his role as one of the most active composers of his generation.

At the heart of Trio Origo's repertoire are the earliest trios composed for clarinet, cello and piano. The origins of the repertoire lie in the 'Gassenhauer' Trio composed by Beethoven in 1797 for a clarinetist, probably Joseph Bähr, who also suggested to the composer that he use a hit tune - known as a 'Gassenhauer' - from a recent opera by Joseph Weigl. Beethoven (uncharacteristically, but with perhaps an eye on the work's future commercial success) duly obliged, and made Weigl's tune the basis for his theme-and-variations finale - but he also produced a version of the trio substituting the clarinet for the violin to ensure it's popularity. An adroit piece of reverse compositional engineering produced the Op.38 Trio from the Septet Op.20. The Septet was one of Beethoven's most popular early works, and resulted in a string of arrangements for smaller forces, most of them made by other hands, but the composer himself produced this arrangement for clarinet trio, which happily amplifies the solo instrument's prominence in the Septet. He never wrote a more joyous melody than the main subject of the first movement, and the work as a whole finds the composer at his most relaxed. While Beethoven's clarinet writing has never received the attention accorded to Mozart's, he wrote for it with no less warmth and affection, and this pair of trios displays a winning, sunny side of the composer that is often overshadowed by the cantankerous instrumental dramatist of popular myth and legend. The Finnish members of Trio Origo all pursue successful careers with chamber and period-instrument ensembles such as the Tapiola Sinfonietta, the Finnish Baroque Orchestra and the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra, but they have been performing Classical-era clarinet trios together since 2004, ranging beyond Beethoven to explore little-known gems by his contemporaries.

The present recording is taken from a live transmission of the Academy concert of May 8, 1972, from the Nationaltheater in Munich. The early death of Karl Richter in February 1981 frustrated the intention of releasing one of the great oratorios from his performing repertoire, Joseph Haydn’s “Creation”, in a studio recording. Happily it has proved possible to obtain the present sound recording from the archives of the Bayerische Staatsoper and, with the kind consent of the participants, to prepare a technically enhanced release. Despite a number of remaining technical inadequacies, such as may be considered characteristic for historic recordings of this nature, this audio document gives a particularly fine impression of the ambience and the authenticity of a live performance with conductor Karl Richter – complementing, as it were, the many available studio recordings of his wide-ranging musical repertoire. Special thanks are due to the musicians and all involved at the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich. For his help in advance preparation of this project, we wish to thank by name the opera house’s former Chief Executive of Administration Dr. Roland Felber!

Capella Istropolitana orchestra under the leading of conductors Wolfgang Sobotka and Harald Nerat perform MOZART's: Eine kleine Nachtmusik / Serenata Notturna / Divertimento.