Edward Gardner's Schubert cycle concludes with the 'Great' Symphony No. 9 in C major. Having (remarkably) composed a symphony a year between 1813 and 1818, the onset of syphilis and it's intrusive treatment seemed to shake the composer's confidence as a symphonist - the Ninth is the only symphony after those first six that he actually completed. This is attributed by many to a wonderful holiday with friends in the high Austrian Alps that seems to have re-ignited his enthusiasm. The nickname 'Great' may originally have arisen to distinguish it from the 'little' C major Symphony (No. 6), but is apt, as the Ninth is on so much greater a scale than any symphony before it, which can run to almost an hour in some performances. The soprano Mary Bevan joins Edward Gardner and the CBSO in a selection of orchestral songs that complete the album. One was orchestrated by Schubert himself, the others are settings by Britten, Berlioz, Brahms, and Reger.

Classical Music

CD with color book & posters

PIANO DREAMS - Most Popular Melodies (The)

Classical Music

SCHUBERT, SCHUMANN SERGEI EDE

SCHUBERT: PIANO MUSIC FOR FOUR

When planning this record, I wonder what streak of perversity prompted Richard Stoltzman to include only one work originally designed for clarinet? That, of course, is the set of Fanta.sie stücke, Op. 73, launching the series of miniatures Schumann wrote for various instruments in early 1849, while relaxing after the Strain of larger undertakings like his opera, Genoveva, and incidental music for Byron's Manfred. The layout of the clarinet part tells us how clearly his imagination was fired by the instrument's tonal range, and it reveals Stoltzman at his most persuasive. I enormously enjoyed his fluid phrasing, his superfine dynamic nuances and, last but not least, the way he unifies the three pieces as a suite travelling in mood from nostalgia to the hope that springs eternal in the human breast. Nor is it possible to over-praise the intimate interweaving of clarinet and piano. Richard Goode is a partner in a thousand here—as indeed throughout the recital. Though the three Op. 94 Romances (also of 1849) were originally intended for oboe, Schumann himself sanctioned the clarinet or violin as possible alternatives. Perhaps it's because of the piano's essential contribution to the first and last pieces that they lose little of their character in the transfer—especially the last in Marchen style. All three are again most sensitively shaded by both artists even if in observing Schumann's fastish metronome marking For the cradle-song-like second, they sacrifice just a little of the requested lnnigkeit.

The recital is completed by the first two of the 19-year-old Schubert's three Sonatinas in transcriptions (with no transposition and only minimal adjustments elsewhere) by Stoltzman himself. Because of the often high-lying line in the clarinet's thinner upper register, these emerge just a little chillier than from the violin, with its vibrato to give a touch of extra vibrancy in song. The development section of the A minor Sonata's opening Allegro is perhaps the best example. In the D major Sonata's Andante the players very occasionally enrich the line with small embellishments of their own—as they also do at the fermata, before the last return of the leading theme, in the A minor Sonata's concluding Rondo. The overall impression is of hearing both these works as it were in translation. But the playing is again first rate in its suavity and tonal refinement no less than its spirit. The recording itself certainly could not be more clear and true.

-- J.O.C., Gramophone [9/1989]

This recording was formerly available as EMI-Deutsche Harmonia Mundi 47876.

"Right from the start you know that the Tokyo Quartet's will be a dramatic, fiery reading: there's that hair-raising initial attack, with subsequent loud/soft contrasts powerfully underlined. Each movement has its basic pulse, but within that pulse there's plenty of freedom. . . . [T]he trio of the Scherzo has a real lilt: a strong contrast with the biting, vigorous playing immediately before it. And I like the way they evoke the ghost of a dance in the variations—the spectral ballerina effect in Variation No. 1 is genuinely touching." -- Stephen Johnson, Gramophone

SCHUBERT: ARPEGGIONE SONATA, P

SCHUBERT: OCTET CLEVELAND OCT

SCHUBERT: WINTERREISE HAGEGAR

This recording was formerly available as EMI-Deutsche Harmonia Mundi 47878.

VOCAL SERIES - JUSSI BJ?RLING