V 11: COMPLETE SONATAS, K 476-

The Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, the city's glittering new landmark, opened in January 2017. "Light & Dark" is the world's first recording of a solo organ recital in the Grand Hall. Featuring a range of appealing contemporary works, the album showcases the wide tonal spectrum of the Elbphilharmonie's organ. Built by the Bonn-based firm Klais, the organ is an instrument of superlatives. 4,765 pipes extend over five rows of seats, their lengths ranging from just eleven millimeters to an imposing ten meters. Thanks to the very open structure of the hall's "white skin" around the organ, audiences can actually look inside the instrument and some of the pipes have been coated such that they can be touched without leaving any marks. The organ fits perfectly into the spectacular architecture and has a very impressive sound. "There's nothing this organ can't do," Iveta Apkalna enthused. "It's warm and rich, with many beautiful fundamental tones that sound from everywhere, and from the depths. The sound embraces the audience." With it's modern selection of repertoire, seemingly tailor-made for both the organist and the instrument, the album compellingly draws listeners into a fascinating world of sound. At the heart of the recording is the work that gives the album it's name - Sofia Gubaidulina's "Light and Darkness", a piece of great extremes that penetrates every fiber of the body. Two composers, Aivars Kalejs and Lucija Garuta, hail from the organist's native Latvia, and the album also includes works by Leoš Janacek, Gyorgy Ligeti, Dmitri Shostakovich, and Thierry Escaich. Iveta Apkalna has made an album that brings to life the qualities of this organ with a modern and extremely diverse selection of works. Iveta Apkalna is one of the world's most famous organists and, as titular organist, knows the Elbphilharmonie instrument like no other musician. She is fully committed to seeing the glittering beauty of the organ better represented in concert halls. Iveta Apkalna is a cultural ambassador of Latvia and dedicates this album to her country.

Bach: Mass in B minor

Johann Sebastian Bach is revered by musicians and music lovers around the world. The German weekly Die Zeit has described him as the “fount of all music,” and violinist Yehudi Menuhin had a very simple explanation for our continuing fascination with Bach’s works: “He represents something greater within us.” Classical saxophonist Asya Fateyeva has engaged with Bach’s oeuvre since her youth, albeit at a disadvantage to many of her colleagues- the Thomaskantor wrote no works for the saxophone. This has not put off the young musician, who was voted Best Female Newcomer at ECHO Klassik 2016: her latest release “Bachiana” featuring works by J. S. Bach and Heitor Villa-Lobos prove her to be not only a virtuosa of her instrument but also a gifted arranger. She is ably supported by the inspired Wurttemberg Chamber Orchestra of Heilbronn under its principal conductor Ruben Gazarian. Asya writes: “Even when I was a child, I was really inspired by the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. That was when I began to play the piano, later I switched to the saxophone- and his music was simply always there. I think every musician feels the same; Bach’s universal language knows no frontiers and when you come into contact with his music, you sense that you are in touch with eternity.”

BACH:GROSSE GEISTLICHE CHORMUS

A leading ensemble of period performance practice, Concerto Koln has been acknowledged for their rediscovery of musical rarities. Regardless, the ensemble still views the Baroque as being shaped by two driving forces- Bach and Handel. For this release, parts of three masterpieces have been coupled for the first time: Bach’s “Brandenburg Concerto,” No. 5 and No. 1 of his Orchestral Suites along with Handel’s “Water Music.” Artistic Director Lorenzo Alpert explains the symbiotic nature of this release: “Our intensive engagement over the last 30 years with composers, music theorists and contemporaries from the time of Bach and Handel… opens up new vistas for us as we approach the works of these two great masters… What a joy to recreate a sound that seemed lost forever!”

As a child, Sebastian Knauer was present at seminal performances of the St Matthew Passion and the “Christmas Oratorio” in St Michael’s Church in Hamburg. And even at that early age, he enjoyed playing Bach on the piano. But his childhood enthusiasm was tempered with respect for the works of the great Thomaskantor. “I noticed at once: It is a huge challenge – not only in terms of keyboard technique, but mentally too,” he recalls. “In my student days and during the first few years of my career as a pianist I was constantly working on his music, but rarely played it in public concerts. Particularly when it came to the piano concertos, I never really felt myself to be ready, because I was searching all the time for my own picture of the music.” Sebastian Knauer deliberately gave himself time, engaging himself intensively with Bach’s musical cosmos until he was prepared to take his discoveries before an audience. The conductor’s artistic credo, that what matters for historical performance practice is not the sort of instrument you play, but the way and the style in which you play it, is one that Sebastian Knauer fully subscribes to. That is no less true of “Bach & Sons 2”, on which the pianist has once more explored the musical legacy of the Bach dynasty. It is this mixture of exceptional curiosity with the aspiration to enrich the established repertoire with unusual pieces that so typifies Sebastian Knauer – elsewhere and on this recording. Alongside the two Concertos BWV 1055 and 1056 there are real rarities on this release, such as the Concerto by C.P.E. Bach. The compositions selected by Sebastian Knauer are of great interest not only as repertoire but because they give an absorbing account of how the piano-concerto genre evolved. That is relevant to the works of C.P.E. Bach, an intermediary between the classic Baroque of his father and the dawning age of Viennese Classicism.

CANTATAS BWV29,61,140

This new release is the soundtrack from the motion picture, Bach in Brazil. The story is inspired by true events, and follows retired German music teacher Marten Brueckling as he travels to Brazil to collect a sheet of original Bach manuscript, but ends up teaching music to children in a juvenile detention center. The tracks on this release are enchanting arrangements of Bach’s best loved melodies, mixed with Brazilian flair. “Our aim in Bach in Brazil is to bring Bach’s melodies to life with Brazilian rhythms and instrumentations, rather like Marten Brueckling in the film gaining a new perspective on his life from the children and the Brazilian feeling for life.”

YO-YO MA: MADE IN AMERICA

Discover Bach includes some of this great Baroque composer’s best known works, such as Ave Maria, Air, Brandenburg Concerto, Cello Suites, Goldberg Variations, and many more.; The Discover Series from Berlin Classic aims to make classics popular, firing people up about the music presented, regardless of musical taste.; Rather than focusing on complete works, this series focuses on individual pieces that have rewritten our musical history.

For 20 years now, Bell’Arte Salzburg has been one of the leading ensembles for period performance practice. For its new album “Himlische Weynacht”, the musicians under the direction of Annegret Siedel went in search of the most impressive and moving works of Luther’s day. Vocal support for Bell’Arte Salzburg in the choral works comes from young soprano Marie Luise Werneburg and the well-known bass Klaus Mertens, two exceptional vocal soloists in this genre. In consort with the ensemble, they perform a highly varied round of festive airs, adding detail to our mental picture of Luther’s time with their musical representation of a Christmas celebration in those days.

Bach: Brandenburg Concertos

Bach’s Cello Suites, the finest of all such works in the literature, speak in pure and clear voice, always spiritual yet down to earth. Isang Enders (b. 1988) was principal leader of the Dresden Staatskapelle cello section for four years before embarking on his solo career. He is a co-founder of the Ceres Ensemble and a founding member of the Int’l Shostakovich Festival. “The suites should speak, sing, dance, hunt and contemplate – altogether subjectively and characteristically. The subjective aspect of this recording is the result of my firm conviction." – Isang Enders

MOZART:ENTFÜHRUNG AUS DEM SERA

Simone Dinnersteins first recording for Sony Classical, BACH: A STRANGE BEAUTY, has the critically-acclaimed pianist returning to Bach, this time combining three transcriptions of his Chorale Preludes, with one of his English Suites and two of his Keyboard Concerti, again revealing her intense and expressive playing style, as well as her individual approach to Bach's music. For her first orchestral recording Simone is joined by members of one of Berlin's most venerable institutions - Kammerorchester Staatskapelle Berlin, with Stephan Mai as concertmaster. Grammy Award winning producer Adam Abe's house, who produced Dinnerstein's Goldberg Variations disc and her follow-up album THE BERLIN CONCERT, returns to recapture her distinctive sound on BACH: A STRANGE BEAUTY.

As the predecessors of Sony Classical, CBS Masterworks had not a catalogue of "authenticity-minded" recordings (the pioneering efforts of Raymond Leppard and Jean-Claude Malgoire notwithstanding), Sony made a distinctive new start and engaged indubitably one of the most experienced producers in the field of early music, Wolf Erichson. If the successes secured by such musicians as Gustav Leonhardt, Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Frans Brüggen in the 1960s were the most visible signs to a wider audience of thorough-going change in the interpretation of music from medieval to baroque times, there was no doubt in assigning a part of the general success to the work of the production teams behind the recordings. Wolf Erichson was involved in producing recordings for many artists through his work for Das Alte Werk series. Success followed him since the early 1970s, when he founded the SEON production company. Later, Sony Classical’s SEON line brought the pioneers of period intruments and vocal performances such as Frans Brüggen, Amer Bylsma, the Kuijkens, Gustav Leonhardt, and Konrad Ruhland on the international market at a budget price. Recordings made on SEON enjoyed both popular and critical acclaim. Later, producer Wolf Erichson, supervised Sony's VIVARTE label, which was a label devoted solely to producing historical music using modern recording technologies. Music critic Tom Manoff said these digital recordings of the VIVARTE series are among the best he has ever heard. The upcoming VIVARTE collector’s boxed sets feature attractive repertoire selection out of the legendary catalogue of ancient music. The CDs appear in their original coupling and cover at a special price. Some VIVARTE sets also include selected recordings from the SEON catalogue to round up the collections of selected titles.

GOULD IN CONCERT: LIVE IN SALZ

By choosing to record classical repertoire with electric bass, including Bach’s Cello Suites, Jacques Bono has acquired a unique position in the music business. Playing them at their Thuringian church “original sites” put Bach's works into high contrast by interpreting them on an instrument of our times, more than 300 years after their composition – a project never ventured before. The time, the separation into musical genres and the familiar listening sensations are all overcome in Jacques Bono's performances. The cellist unperturbedly countered initial doubts by critics who claimed that it was impossible to perform Bach's cello suites on an electric bass with a musical venture that has music lovers of all origins intrigued – a revolutionary act in the best sense of musical tradition. In 2013 Jacques Bono had the idea of recording Bach’s 'Inventionen' in two voices together with a female violinist. On the German classical music scene he could not find a female violinist who would venture to play freely with him without fear of offending academically imposed values. He was thus delighted to find Tien-Hsin Cindy Wu in Los Angeles, who proved to be a violinist capable of playing J. B. Bach's music vivaciously, in a heart-felt manner and free of dogma.

On his debut Navona Records release, ALL THE WAY BACK, pianist and composer Vytautas Smetona presents a collection of keyboard repertoire that highlights his enthralling and committed interpretations of some of the great composers' masterworks as well as an example of his faculty as a cultivated and dynamic composer.

The pieces on this album offer Smetona technical feats and expressive themes, all of which the pianist handles with ease, determination, and eloquence. From Bach's lyrical and joyous Prelude and Fugue in C-sharp Major, BWV 848 to the somber and dramatic range of Liszt's Funerailles (October 1849), Smetona evokes passion and refinement in his performances. The technical mastery of works such as Brahms's Intermezzo in B-flat Minor, Op. 117, No. 2, Schumann's Fantasie in C Major, Op. 17, and Chopin's Ballade No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 23 is handled by Smetona with sophistication, lucidity, and powerful passage work. Smetona shows us a balance between accurately playing the notes on the score and interpreting the feeling between them.

Thomas Bowes' Sei Solo shines the spotlight on the sonatas and partitas for solo violin composed by Johann Sebastian Bach in 1720. Bowes believes that these six stand-alone compositions, while each individually offering insight into Bach's genius reveal more when taken as one epic work - and especially when set against the tragedy in Bach’s life in the year of composition. The three albums in Bowes’ release contain a total of six tracks. Each album starts with a sonata and concludes with a partita, moving through different keys. The sonatas showcase a larger, more abstract expression, while movements in the partitas are more focused on elements of the dance. Bowes views these six compositions as a vehicle for exploration into the existential, taking his cue from Bach’s cryptic title ‘sei solo’, which reads ‘you are alone’, punning on the Italian for ‘6’ and ‘you are’. Though the performer flies solo on all of the tracks, he reaches well beyond the limitations of just one instrument. The focus and attention the violinist brings to all six tracks draws the listener into a meditative state of mind. It’s almost as if Bowes is performing solely for each individual listener, providing an intimate experience that demands attention yet allows room for contemplation.

FANTASIA UND FUGE

Bach: Italienisches Konzert - Französische Ouvertüre

Internationally renowned flutist Ulla Miilmann is the recipient of numerous awards and prizes including the prestigious “Flute-Talk” competition in Chicago and the Gold Medal at the Danish All Music Competition, among others. Flutist Ulla Miilmann was born in 1972 in Denmark. She received her Bachelor of Music at North Carolina School of the Arts in 1992. During her college years, Ms Miilmann was already selected as representative of Denmark in the European Broadcasting Union "Concerts for Young Soloist". Currently she is the principal flutist of the Danish National Symphony Orchestra. Ms. Miilmann was nominated for the GRAMMY award for her performance of Ole Schmidt's Concerto for flute and string orchestra. Together with the elite instrumentalists of Denmark: Søren Johannsen on harpsichord and Kjeld Lybecker Steffensen on Baroque cello, Ms Miilmann interprets the complete flute works by J. S. Bach including the Partita in A minor for solo flute.

ÆTERNUM is a tribute to music's infallible steadfastness against the mundane adversity of human existence. Brazilian-born pianist Eliane Rodrigues convinces with her forceful, furious interpretations of keyboard works by Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven – among them the latter's Fifth Symphony, grippingly arranged by Rodrigues herself. Rodrigues, who currently teaches piano at the Antwerp Conservatoire, is well-known for her prolific output of recordings. ÆTERNUM stands out not only for its celebration of Beethoven and his respected predecessor J. S. Bach, but also for the pianist's ability to uncover the hidden layers of well-known repertoire pieces. The listener encounters a Beethoven of unparalleled vehemence, but also, hauntingly, sees the veil lifted from Bach's sublimity, usually hidden in plain sight. When it comes to the struggle of the limits of individual existence with its desire for the eternal, this is the clearest example one could imagine. The secret star of the album, however, is Rodrigues' Brahmsian arrangement of Beethoven's Symphony No. 5. The pianistic interpretation of her own arrangement is strikingly Romantic, not Classical: there is no trace of the straight, light-fingered piano technique of the era, but instead a truly Late-Romantic force which is quite appropriate for the subject. Beethoven, who himself was known for his powerful playing style, might very well have approved. But Rodrigues goes even further and infuses her rendition with an abundance of late 19th-century rubato, driving the music to an awe-inspiring frenzy. It's a truly futuristic approach, and possibly how the composer might have imagined his works to be played, had he lived half a century later. ÆTERNUM, Latin for "everlasting," pays appropriate tribute to this years' jubilarian Beethoven and his great proto-colleague J. S. Bach: the works on this album have stood the test of time, and it's not unlikely that Rodrigues' interpretation thereof will as well.

A celebration from The Orlando Consort of the musical and literary worlds of Florence's golden age under the Medici, in a selection of works which includes a number of first recordings.

Pianist Simone Dinnerstein and singer-songwriter Tift Merritt join forces for the first time in Night, a unique collaboration merging classical, folk, and rock worlds, exploring common terrain and uncovering new musical landscapes.

Night features new songs written especially for the duo by Brad Mehldau (I Shall Weep at Night) and Patty Griffin (Night), as well as Tift Merritt's own songs (Only in Songs, Still Not Home, Colors, Feel of the World), and classical selections (an arrangement of Schubert's Night and Dreams, Bach's Prelude in B minor). The album also includes the world premiere recording of The Cohen Variations by Daniel Felsenfeld, a solo piano piece commissioned by Dinnerstein based on one of her favorite songs, Leonard Cohen's Suzanne.

In these love songs in waltz style for chorus or solo voices accompanied by piano four hands, Brahms freely indulged his taste for Viennese folk music. The RIAS Kammerchor Berlin instills a wonderful inner life in these musical landscapes, sometimes cheerful, sometimes melancholy, punctuated here by a selection from the Hungarian Dances - also eminently popular in their inspiration.

Bach's devotion to the organ, and his desire to excel on it, is without question but whereas much of his output was written with a specific purpose or occasion in mind, the toccatas and fugues are less easily categorized. Almost all of them date from Bach's Weimar years (1708-1717), when he had the most opportunities to play the organ, although he may have revised them in Leipzig (after 1723). Their elaborate nature belies the fact that Bach had to be careful about showing off: in 1705, while temporarily in Leipzig, he had been censured for an over-long organ prelude before Communion and in 1706 he had attracted the ire of the Arnstadt authorities by confusing the congregation with complicated chorale accompaniments. Organist Elena Privalova presents a program of these works, beautifully recorded at the Riga Cathedral.

Review

Elena Privalova concentrates on the Toccata and Fugue works that date from Bach’s Weimar years of 1708-1717. It is a matter of record that such elaborate music was by no means always welcome during church services, so one can imagine these pieces being delivered perhaps at the end of formalities, sending the congregation out into the world in a wash of inspired but complex organ sound. These are all glorious works, and perhaps the only criticism one could have of such a programme is that it is rather relentlessly glorious. There are of course some contrasts of registration, but “the richest possible texture” forms the majority from beginning to end, which is of course in the nature of this particular programme. You may find yourself wanting to pick out a track or two rather than blasting through the whole CD in one go, but the temptation to whack up the volume and stir up the dust in your listening room is powerful indeed.

Elena Privalova’s technical prowess and stylish musicality is very much in evidence throughout. She is rhythmically accurate and doesn’t rush, but nor does she avoid brisk and exciting tempi, for instance in BWV 564, the rasping bottom end of the pedal solo in the opening Toccata of which is also a highlight. The D minor “Dorian” Toccata and Fugue BWV 538 is one of the more famous pieces here, and Privalova delivers that ‘demonstration’ quality that the virtuoso Bach might have employed while testing and giving organs their thorough workout.

The programme ends with that most famous of all organ works, the Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565 but, while that dramatic opening has become something of a classical music cliché this is a work that never fails to fascinate when you listen properly. It is nice to find it at the end of the recital rather than the beginning, forming a suitable climax rather than an impressive opening. Privalova is less reverential than many, swiftly joining each section in a fantasia-like fashion that doesn’t wait around for us to get bored, and reminding us of this composer’s amazing inventiveness (there are of course arguments that this may not be a Bach original) with the sheer quantity of ideas that pass by on this most special of musical conveyor-belts.

This is a very fine Bach organ CD that has been superbly recorded and with playing that is both musically insightful and technically magnificent, and you can also add this to your collection in the knowledge that it is free of gimmicks or annoying mannerisms. I had a look around for a single disc release that covers the same music and came up with Kåre Nordstoga’s recording on Simax Classics PSC1152. This is another fine release, though made on a slightly smaller-scale instrument. Your own taste will dictate which you prefer, though for me that gorgeous adagio of BWV 564 has more expressive weight with Privalova. This kind of detail, along with the sheer impact of the recording as a whole, makes this something of a winner.

--MusicWeb International (Dominy Clements)

2 CDs for the price of 1. Bach's Art of Fugue is a great musical enigma; left strangely unfinished, it is thought perhaps to have been intended not for performance but as a definitive guide to the writing of fugues, or a personal musical message meant as the composer's greatest legacy in any event it is a supreme masterpiece and here is given a brilliant and individual interpretation, in which Diana Boyle (whose Metier CD of the 48 Preludes and Fugues, Book II is also highly praised) brings out classical-style emphasis and phrasing, bring the music alive more than in traditional dry and academic accounts. The recording omits the optional 'canons' but includes the 'Inversus' sections of Contrapuncti 12 and 13.