Continuing their collaboration in the Discoveries series, the latest Decca album from Riccardo Chailly and the Filarmonica della Scala features works by Luigi Cherubini, including his Symphony in D Major, Marche Fun�bre, and nine world premiere recordings.

Classical Music

Luigi Cherubini is one of the most interesting artistic personalities in a historical period of great changes that straddled two centuries, the eighteenth and the nineteenth. His musical career met the best possible conditions in a city, Florence, that was extremely rich in culture and dotted with important events, ranging from the performance of Handel's Messiah in Italian and the staging of operas by Hasse, Gluck, Paisiello, Piccinni, Rutini and Traetta, to Mozart's performance in 1770. The Luigi Cherubini sonatas performed by Chiara Cattani in this recording can be defined as 'galant' without depleting their meaning as compared to the great compositions of the previous period. The eighteenth century is a very prolific century for the cembalistic literature, particularly for the Sonata form, affected by various influences and changes that will bring it to it's apogee in the period of the Classicism. The taste of the Italian society goes through a profound mutation: it is now more pleasing with melodic expansion, clarity, transparency and lightness, characteristics that permeate the art of this century at 360 degrees. Simplicity and proportion are the pillars of the structure and together favor the emanation of a sense of vividness and fervor that makes writing energetic and never obvious.

The Italian composer Cherubini came to occupy a dominant position in French musical life. He was employed at the Conservatoire in Paris on its foundation and from 1822 was director of the institution, retaining this position until the year of his death. His works include compositions for the stage, for the church and for political purposes, a requirement of the turbulent revolutionary years. On this release, Andrea Chudak, Yuri Mizobuchi, Irene Schneider, Liv Migdal, Anne Bussewitz, and Yuki Inagawa present a wide selection of works for voice and accompaniment.

Classical Music

Classical Music

The opera Faniska, which premiered at the K�rntnertor Theatre in Vienna in 1806, is said to have been enthusiastically received by both Haydn and Beethoven. The libretto is available in German and Italian, and is based on the melodrama Les Mines de Pologne by the Nancy-born French playwright Ren� Charles Guilbert de Pix�r�court. The action takes place in Poland, from where the first recording of the opera also comes. Zamoski, the Baron of Sandomir, orders his henchman Oranski to kidnap Faniska, the wife of the Baron of Rava, Rasinski. Faniska is taken to Zamoski's castle. Various attempts to free her fail. After being imprisoned with her husband, the couple finally manage to escape with Rasno's help. Rasinski's soldiers attack the castle, Zamoski is killed, Oranski is captured and put on trial. Faniska is sometimes called an op�ra comique, but more often (and more accurately) an opera in three acts or even a 'grand heroic opera'. Like Lodo�ska, Faniska is a typical example of the 'rescue opera' genre. Cherubini invested all his melodic talent in this work. Compared to Lodo�ska his talent has clearly gained in quality. Natalia Rubis sings the technically difficult title role very sensitively and with a beautifully led but somewhat tight voice. Krystian Adam remains all too pale as her husband Rasinski. In the role of Rasno Piotr Kalna's singing is rather strained. The supporting roles are more or less well cast. With only one really good voice, that of bass-baritone Robert Gierlach as Zamoski, the vocal side is somewhat weak. On the other hand, Lukasz Borowicz is all the more impressive as the conductor. He puts a lot of lightness and transparency into the orchestral part, which he controls admirably, enlivening it with many details. Because Cherubini's score is so imaginative and so closely connected to the drama, this counts for a lot.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

REVIEWS:
Fanfare (1-2/00, pp.232-233) - "...The Third Quartet has an unusually bouncy opening movement for a minor-key work, and the playing here is a beath of fresh air....As a Cherubini enthusiast, I welcome the David Quartet recordings wholeheartedly..."

The Quartetto David's Cherubini cycle concludes with this excellent disc containing the composer's last two quartets. Their playing is up to the very high standards of the series thus far, and features impeccable phrasing, optimal balances, and a truly enlivening sense of rhythm. This last quality not only gives the finales a welcome jolt of energy and minimizes any suspicion of academicism in the often busy contrapuntal writing, but it also carries the listener through both of the long opening movements, in which the "moderato" stipulation might otherwise offer a temptation to allow the music to bog down. In truth, these works are excellently proportioned: Cherubini compensates for the broad beginnings by writing relatively brief, aria-like slow movements and highly developed scherzos and finales. The music thus builds in excitement as each quartet progresses, and the Quartetto David's characterful response ideally captures the increase in tension and brilliance. Recorded sound is outstanding too. This is clearly the finest cycle of Cherubini's quartets currently available. --David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Luigi Cherubini was the Napoleon of the music world. Like the "little corporal" (who was, by the way, a great admirer), he was a Frenchified Italian who for years reigned at the helm of the Paris Conservatoire, the most prestigious institution of its kind in Europe, just as Napoleon dominated France. Unlike his less fortunate compatriot, however, Cherubini survived the restoration of the monarchy, living out his 82 years in honor and comfort, becoming one of the first composers to actually write his own Requiem Mass (in our own century, Frank Martin was another). As a composer, his reputation is kept alive solely by the opera Medea, one of Maria Callas' major vehicles, and in the instrumental realm, by his six late string quartets. Fastidiously crafted and supremely musical, these quartets recall Haydn, Beethoven, and Mozart in their superior thematic workmanship and classical sense of balance. They've ranked among the best-kept secrets of quartet lovers for years, and only the comparative dearth of recordings has kept them from a wider public. The complete set appeared on Deutsche Grammophon for about 15 minutes several years ago--if you blinked you probably missed it--so kudos to BIS for not only undertaking this worthy project, but also for the determination to keep it in print! The Quartetto David sounds like the best group to come out of Italy since the old Quartetto Italiano, and they do the music proud, playing with sensitivity, taste, and a real singing tone. --David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Classical Music

Giovanni Battista Viotti was a man of humble origins who studied with Gaetano Pugnani in the tradition of the Corelli school. By the age of 20 he was already an esteemed violinist, performing concerts in Geneva, Bern, Berlin and Saint Petersburg, and he eventually chose to settle in Paris. However, as a court musician for Marie Antoniette, he was forced to flee to London in 1792, where, a short while later, he was accused of spying on behalf of the Jacobins. He returned to Paris and was celebrated during the Restoration period, but eventually came back to London, where he died in poverty. Compositionally he serves as a bridge between the Classical period and the first signs of Romanticism, and he wrote an impressive 29 concertos for his own instrument, the violin. The 22nd, in A minor, shows his renowned compositional intelligence at it's peak. Brahms, by no means known for the generosity of his opinions, wrote in a letter to Clara Schumann: "This concerto... is a magnificent piece, of remarkable freedom in it's invention; it sounds as if [Viotti] were fantasising, and everything is masterfully conceived and executed". The work is divided into three movements: the first of these, an Allegro moderato, abandons the tradition of an energetic and virtuosic opening, and instead introduces a meditative, highly refined atmosphere. The cantabile violin theme soon evolves into a flourish that pre-empts the subsequent bright and complex dramatic beauty of the cadenza. Only the third movement, Agitato assai, is Classical in it's inspiration, featuring a nimble dialogue between soloist and orchestra, albeit with strong contrapuntal hints, while the vibrant central Adagio's echoes of Mozart are pulled in the direction of pre-Romantic angst. Luigi Maria Cherubini, perhaps best known today for his monumental Requiem, like Viotti suffered the consequences of being culturally close to an overthrown ancien r�gime, in his case that of Napoleon. The arrival of King Louis XVIII gave him respite, and indeed he became one of France's greatest musicians, despite his Italian origins. His Symphony in D major's four movements convey that "dual compositional nationality" right from the initial Moderato, straying at times into pomposity but with plenty of moments of progressive expressive intimacy. Cherubini was admired by Haydn, and even by the moody Beethoven, who appreciated the "dramaticism" of his work. The coupling on this album reflects a real-life acquaintance: Cherubini directed a theatre in Paris with Viotti for a period. The two were also both initiated into French masonic orders, joining the ranks of many other freemason musicians from Haydn and Mozart to Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong. Both men were significant figures in the history of music, producing a wealth of content and materials yet to be fully explored.