Classical Music

Classical Music

Beethoven began composing his Second Symphony around late 1800, after a successful performance of his First Symphony at a benefit concert in April that year. The hope seems to have been to perform it at a similar concert the following spring - the week before Easter was just about the only time of year when such concerts could be staged in Vienna at that time, since the orchestras were engaged mainly in operas during the rest of the season. After sketching the first movement in considerable detail, however, plans for the rest of the work were suddenly put on hold when he was commissioned to write a ballet, Die Geschöpfe des Prometheus. This was duly performed in March 1801, and Beethoven finally returned to complete the symphony the following winter, in readiness for the next opportunity for a benefit concert. When the time came in April 1802, however, Beethoven was disgusted to find that he had not been given one of the few available slots in the calendar, and that the date had instead been allocated to what he called 'thoroughly mediocre artists'. Nevertheless, this misfortune may have enabled him to make further refinements to the music before it was first performed. Certainly he did make substantial alterations to the finale at a late stage, in particular by greatly enlarging the coda. Osmo Vänskä became the Minnesota Orchestra's tenth music director in September 2003. Praised for his intense and dynamic performances, Vänskä is recognized for compelling interpretations of the standard, contemporary and Nordic repertoires, as well as the close rapport he establishes with the musicians he leads. He began his musical career as a clarinettist, occupying the co-principal's chair in the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra for several years. After studying conducting at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, he won first prize in the 1982 Besançon International Young Conductor's Competition. His conducting career has featured substantial commitments to such orchestras as the Tapiola Sinfonietta, Iceland Symphony Orchestra and BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. His numerous recordings for BIS continue to attract the highest acclaim; his Beethoven symphony cycle with the Minnesota Orchestra - including a Grammy-nominated recording of Symphony No.9 - has broadcast the exceptional dynamism of this musical partnership to audiences worldwide. Meanwhile Vänskä is heavily in demand internationally as a guest conductor with the world's leading orchestras, enjoying regular relationships with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra and National Symphony Orchestra of Washington. In May 2008, after two decades at the helm of the Lahti Symphony Orchestra, Vänskä was named that ensemble's conductor laureate. Among the many honours and distinctions he has been awarded are the Pro Finlandia medal, a Royal Philharmonic Society Award, Musical America's 2005 Conductor of the Year Award, the Sibelius Medal in 2005 and the Finlandia Foundation Arts and Letters Award in 2006.

The Beethoven piano trio marketplace hardly lacks for outstanding recordings, as recent entries from the Abegg, Vienna Piano, Parnassus, and Kalichstein/Laredo/Robinson ensembles prove. Yet even this esteemed roster can make room for pianist Freddy Kempf and his cohorts, whose individual and collective agility dazzles the ear and serves the composer well. They unleash all of the early C minor trio's combative energy in the outer movements while observing each and every dynamic marking in its proper perspective. The musicians bring such warmth and infinite nuance to the Andante cantabile variations (the pianist's shifts of voicing on the repeats) that you hardly notice the more-expansive-than-usual basic tempo.


Similar refinement of detail and sensitivity prevails throughout the "Archduke". Notice, for instance, the subtle rhetorical adjustments in the Scherzo and the breathtaking give-and-take characterizing the stepwise motives and scale passages. The musicians' deftly effected transitions between the great slow movement variations are worth noting, as well as the extraordinary tonal control with which they shape the Finale's rapid figurations. Either in conventional two-channel stereo or SACD surround-sound playback, BIS's intimate, full-bodied, and ravishing sonics will please even the pickiest audiophile. Certainly this release bodes well for a complete Beethoven cycle from the Kempf trio, and represents its pianist's finest playing on disc to date. [11/29/2004]
--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

Classical Music

In 1819 the Viennese music publisher and composer Anton Diabelli sent a short waltz to a long list of composers. These included Schubert, Hummel, a very young Franz Liszt and, as the most prominent composer of the time, naturally Beethoven. Diabelli was proposing to compile an anthology of variations on his own waltz, one from each composer. Beethoven responded in a characteristic manner: first there was nothing, and then there was nothing … and then, in 1823, there was an entire, and monumental, set of no less than thirty-three variations. There are several possible reasons for this, one being that Beethoven felt that it was below his dignity to take part in a project of this nature. What is certain, however, is that he must have found Diabelli’s theme intriguing material to work with – and against: Beethoven often seems to poke fun at the waltz, starting already in the first variation by turning it into a pompous march. But like all truly great variation works the Diabelli Variations take in the high as well as the low, jokes as well as drama – or serenity, as in Variation 24, a Fughetta, clearly inspired by the Aria in Bach’s Goldberg Variations. As the last large-scale piano work by Beethoven, the Diabelli Variations form a fitting close to Ronald Brautigam’s traversal of the complete solo piano music. Described in International Record Review as ‘a Beethoven player whose musical discernment is a constant source of wonderment’, Brautigam has through the course of this series performed works composed between 1783 and 1825, using four different fortepianos. On the present release we hear a copy of a 4-stringed fortepiano by Conrad Graf from 1822 – similar to Beethoven’s own last instrument, which Graf supplied him with in 1826, a year before the composer’s death.

Classical Music

2020 saw the release of the first installment in this three-album traversal of Beethoven’s violin sonatas – a disc which has garnered distinctions such as Choc de Classica and Cum Laude (Luister), with performances that ‘wed classical verve to a profoundly Romantic spirit’ (Gramophone) in ‘recordings that are conversations by a perfect instrumental pairing’ (BBC Music Magazine). As Frank Peter Zimmermann and Martin Helmchen open the second disc, they do so with the iconic Spring Sonata, Op. 24. Completed in 1801, the work proved immediately popular with a second edition appearing only months after the first publication. There were also numerous arrangements for a variety of forces – including a song based on motifs from the sonata’s slow movement. Soon after completing Op. 24, Beethoven began work on a set of three sonatas of which the first two are included on this album. Musically the Op. 30 sonatas continue the development that had begun with the Spring Sonata towards a contrast-rich, symphonic style. Beethoven originally planned to end the first and shortest of the three with the expansive movement that later became the finale of the great Kreutzer Sonata. As this would clearly have ruined the proportions of the work, he eventually replaced it with a set of variations. Closing this album is the second sonata of Op. 30, in C minor. It is the most important of the set; a genuine Grande Sonate in four movements, and an early example of Beethoven’s ‘heroic’ style.

REVIEW:

This is one of the most responsive partnerships I’ve heard in these sonatas, and I’ve heard some really outstanding ones. The togetherness of these two artists in precision of timing and harmonic vibration in matters of phrasing and dynamics is an amazing thing to experience.

-- Fanfare

Import Hybrid-SACD pressing.

The Minnesota Orchestra has an illustrious past, numbering such legendary figures as Eugene Ormandy, Dimitri Mitropoulos and Antal Dorati among its music directors. As of 2003, Osmo Vänskä is the tenth man on the post, and has had a very successful first season, rounded off by a European tour. During this eventful year, the team also recorded the first volume in what will be one of the first complete cycles of Beethoven's symphonies in Surround Sound. We are now releasing this recording on a disc which is sure to make its mark! Osmo Vänskä -- described as 'an exemplary Beethoven conductor, it's hard to think of anyone better at present' (Andrew Clements in The Guardian) -- has chosen to open his Beethoven cycle with Symphonies No.4 and No.5. The Fourth was on the programme during the orchestra's European tour this spring in performances that were very warmly applauded by the critics: the Vänskä/Minnesota interpretation ?bristled with energy and displayed a muscular, finely honed ensemble-- and 'proved that the possibilities of the modern-instrument approach are not exhausted yet' according to the British music press, and a German reviewer was struck by the symphony's Finale ('one could not imagine it played more vivaciously and grippingly') as well as 'the immensely rich' dynamic contrasts of the performance as a whole qualities that certainly are brought out in the Surround Sound version on the present disc. (As all our Surround Sound releases, this too is issued on a so-called hybrid disc playable on all CD-players in stereo.) In first-class acoustics (Orchestra Hall, Minneapolis) and using the latest recording technology, our most experienced recording team have given free sonic rein to Osmo Vänskä and his Minnesota Orchestra in performances that are among the most exciting one can imagine!

Beethoven - German identity, high culture, a myth. The crossover formation Uwaga! And the Folkwang Kammerorchester dedicate their second joint project to the composer. The musicians, united in curiosity and openness as well as the desire to try out new things, examine Beethoven's music; disassemble it in order to put it together in a completely new way. They explore the past and present of Beethoven's myth and bow to his music. With much love and respect, the Bonn native is confronted with the Balkans, the Orient, Swing and Rock. An album that consistently and creatively extends the boundaries of classical music.

Donka Angatschewa presents this album of Beethoven’s solo piano works. This recording features Beethoven’s Appassionata, Op. 57, 11 Bagatellen, Op. 119, Sonata, Op. 90, and Rondo a capriccio, Op. 129. Donka Angatcheva debuted with the Plovdiv Philharmonic Orchestra when she was only ten years old. She has won numerous awards at international piano competitions, and frequently performs internationally.

Classical Music

Classical Music

This new recording by Jimin Oh-Havenith presents three of Beethoven's most famous, beautiful, but also most demanding piano sonatas. In addition to the dramatic F minor Sonata, Op. 57 ('Appassionata'), the pianist plays the late Sonatas in E major, Op. 109, and C minor, Op. 111, the last of the 32 piano sonatas. The exploration and crossing of boundaries can be seen as a central motif in Beethoven's compositions in general, and in his piano music in particular. While the variation movement in the 'Appassionata' is flanked by rugged outer movements and the ending is a lively dance, Opp. 109 and 111 close with extended, expressive variation movements. In the finale of Op. 109 and in the simple, yet rapturously poignant Arietta of Op. 111 with the metamorphoses in it's five variations, Beethoven enters uncharted territory. Here, Beethoven not only reaches expressive extremes, but also challenges his instrument: the keyboard range is stretched to the limit. The listener experiences the end of the C minor Sonata as a farewell to the world and to the genre of the sonata itself, but also as a beginning of something new and unknown. Jimin Oh-Havenith's interpretation convinces through carefully chosen tempi, which facilitate a vivid and transparent presentation of the thematic structures and internal developments. The clarity and expressiveness of her playing provides an immediate experience of Beethoven's inexhaustible imaginative power and the transformation of the poetic idea.