New York based composer Arnold Rosner (1945-2013) composed in a style that was thick with pre-Baroque polyphonic modal harmonies and rhythms, and rich with Romantic colors, creating his own unique style. Opening this album is his piano concerto, which, incredibly, was composed before Rosner had any formal musical training. This is the first release from the London Philharmonic Orchestra on Toccata Classics.

REVIEW:

It is encouraging to see that interest in Arnold Rosner’s music continues even after his death in 2013 at the age of 68. One of his major champions has long been Fanfare writer Walter Simmons, and his notes accompanying this disc are as good as it gets. Another of his champions has been David Amos, who has conducted many of Rosner’s works in the past.

Rosner’s style is hard to describe. On the surface, one can say that his music is conservative, tuneful, and easily accessible to any audience. But that makes it sound too simplistic and perhaps unoriginal. The more of Rosner’s music one hears, the more one learns that he has his own unique sound. Some of that is because of his interest in modal harmonies and the polyphony found in early music. But he also reveals a slight jazz influence (particularly noticeable in the outer movements of his Piano Concerto here). Most importantly, there is an emotional truth in his compositions. It never sounds like empty effects, nor is it solely written to entertain. While he never minimizes the value of entertainment, neither does Rosner shrink from its power to move, to stir deeper emotions. The Largo of the Piano Concerto begins and ends calmly, but travels a huge distance that includes genuine emotional turmoil and struggle.

Gematria is a work influenced by the composer’s Jewish roots, taking its inspiration from Kabbalah mysticism, but not literally basing itself on the numerology central to that world. This work is haunting, and reading Simmons’s explanation of its structure is a great help in absorbing it. The music is brilliantly scored and gains in power and intensity as it goes, and then unwinds without ever fully relaxing.

Six Pastoral Dances is a suite that recalls (but doesn’t imitate) Respighi’s Ancient Dances and Airs, except that Rosner’s tunes are all original with him. The suite is lightly orchestrated for wind quartet and string orchestra, and while it strongly references an Elizabethan style and tone, Rosner’s voice is not completely subsumed. His signature use of chromaticism is evident throughout. These are very pleasant, piquant pieces that would be a meaningful addition to any chamber orchestra’s repertoire.

Aside from the Piano Concerto, the other major work on the disc is From the Diaries of Adam Czerniaków. To quote from Rosner’s own introduction to the score: “Adam Czerniaków was the Chairman of the Judenrat, or Jewish local government, in the Warsaw ghetto from 1939 (the beginning of the German occupation and administration of the ghetto) until 1942 when he took his own life during the time of mass deportation of the population to death camps in the east…”

Czerniaków kept a secret diary, excerpts of which are read by a narrator over dramatic and deeply moving music. As one would expect, this music is much darker, more somber, than much of Rosner’s output. At moments it sounds like a very effective Hollywood score. That is not meant as a backhanded compliment; the best film scores heighten the tension in the dramatic scene, and that is the way this score interacts with its text. The diary is read in an English translation, and in a powerful, understated way by Peter Riegert. One is grateful that Riegert avoids the temptation of turning melodramatic in reading this horrifying text, and it can be said that Rosner’s music also stays away from that pitfall. It is moving, at times even harrowing, but never cheap or sensationalistic. One central orchestral passage, from 12:47 of the piece, is extraordinarily poignant at first, then alternately desolate and proud in its character.

The performances and recording quality are first-rate. As indicated above, the accompanying notes are extremely insightful and informative. Strongly recommended.

-- Fanfare (Henry Fogel)

This album is the fourth release in a series of orchestral recordings by Hungarian composer Ferenc Farkas (1905-2000). The album focuses on his compositions for strings and flute. These works have all the transparent scoring, driving rhythms, and hearkening to Baroque-style dance forms that make Neo-Classical music so appealing. Flutist Andras Adorjan is featured on this album, alongside Viktoria Herencsar on cimbalom. Janos Rolla also leads the Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra on this recording.

Cho-Liang Lin; Chicago Symphony Orchestra/Leonard Slatkin. CBS MK 42315 [with Scottish Fantasy; also available with Mendelssohn: Concerto in E minor, and various encore pieces (CBS MDK 44902)] (recorded 1986). Lin’s is a straightforward, expressive reading of the concerto, distinguished by extraordinarily beautiful playing. Bruch was a melodist of the first rank, and the soloist emphasizes that aspect of the music in his warmly phrased account. Leonard Slatkin and the Chicago Symphony provide outstanding support, and the performance is captured in a recording of ideal depth and spaciousness. Two versions of the account are now available; the choice for most buyers is the mid-price recoupling that pairs the Bruch with Mendelssohn’s Concerto in E minor and encore pieces by Kreisler and Sarasate. – Ted Libbey, author of The NPR Guide to Building a Classical CD Collection.

Prokofiev: Violin Concertos Nos. 1 & 2

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Bach's Fight for Freedom (Music From the Film)

Zino Francescatti never made a better disc than his 1958 coupling of Mozart's Violin Concertos Nos. 3 in G, K216 and 4 in D, K218. The Californian sound is again warm and well balanced and Walter and the Columbia Symphony provide affectionate, immaculately turned accompaniments. The slow movements are slightly romantic in feeling, but agreeably so, and the overall impression is one of freshness combined with the performers' love for the music.

-- Gramophone [8/1995]

Having already enjoyed substantial reissue programmes devoted to Furtwangler, Klemperer and Toscanini, I was delighted to receive the initial instalment of Sony Classical's admirable "Bruno Walter: The Edition", doubly so in view of its superb presentation, exceptional technical quality (the best of Walter's stereo recordings were always remarkably lifelike) and its rich trawl of topdrawer repertory. This particular feast includes two violin concertos: the Beethoven with Szigeti, and the Mendelssohn with Milstein-interpretatively worlds apart but instructive in that Walter's accompaniments reflect (and respect) the very different styles of his two soloists. Then there is a two-CD Wagner compilation [ Sony 64459] that gathers together all the stereo Columbia Symphony material and adds a 45-minute Siegfried Idyll rehearsal, and a magnificent run of Mahler: the NYPO Dos Lied von der Erde (with Ernst Haefliger and Mildred Miller—and in my view one of the most profoundly inspired ever made, certainly in terms of the conducting and orchestral playing [ Sony 64455]), the NYPO Fourth and Fifth Symphonies (from 1945 and 1947, respectively), the Lieder und Gesfinge aus der Jugendzeit (with Desi Halban and Walter at the piano) and the stereo Mahler recordings—the First, Second and Ninth Symphonies (the latter appended with "A Talking Portrait" and "A Working Portrait"), and the Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen with Mildred Miller.

-- Robert Cowan, Gramophone [2/1995]

Contains the composer's complete works for strings Dedicated to the memory of our beloved mentor and dear friend Jenö Lehner (1906-1997) - Schoenberg Quartet Recorded in: Oud-Katholieke Church, Delft, The Netherlands ; Waalse Kerk, Amsterdam; Maria Minor, Utrecht; Main Hall, Muziekcentrum Vredenburg, Utrecht; Musis Sacrum, Arnhem Recorded between 29 June 1991 and 11 June 2001 Sound Engineer(s) Benno Torrenga (Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra) Adriaan Verstijnen (other works) Adriaan Verstijnen (Editing)

This re-issue brings together the Violin Concertos of Prokofiev, along with Violin Sonata No.1, performed by Lydia Mordkovitch under Neeme Jarvi. 'Jarvi is an outstanding collaborator. His feeling for this composer's music is well established, and he brings out details that other conductors are content to overlook. Ms Mordkovitch has a powerful musical voice and a committed approach. I have returned to this recording with increasing fascination and would recommend it highly.' American Record Guide

The Welsh flautist Emily Beynon plays a selection of British flute concertos, accompanied by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Bramwell Tovey. Beynon is the Principal Flute of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam. Equally at home in front of the orchestra as in its midst, she has also performed as soloist with, amongst others, several BBC Orchestras, the Philharmonia Orchestra, NHK Symphony, and the Vienna, Prague, Netherlands and English Chamber orchestras.

For this new recording of orchestral works by Mendelssohn, the CBSO and its principal guest conductor, Edward Gardner, join the violinist Jennifer Pike, who made a remarkable debut at Carnegie Hall this year. She here performs the Violin Concerto in E minor, the piece that launched her career thirteen years ago when she became the youngest-ever winner of the BBC Young Musician of the Year Award. This recording contains another of Mendelssohn's later works: the Incidental Music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1843), in which he managed to recapture and amplify the unique magic of his early years.

Review:

Pike allies the luminous beauty of her tone to her innate musicality and mercurial technique to produce an exceptionally lyrical interpretation of the evergreen Violin Concerto in E minor.

– Guardian (UK)

Classical Music

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Strangely compelling.

You would expect Krzysztof Penderecki to draw the best out of his musicians in his own work, especially after an impressive track record in this field in the past. I listened to the re-release of his recordings for EMI from the 1970s, and these are still impressive even when compared with this new digital recording.

Taking the Capriccio, the earlier recording is a tad more compact at 11:38, but easily equals the new recording in terms of drama. The soloist is set closer with the new recording, so that the balance is less natural in terms of what you might experience in the concert hall, but in all other respects this new recording is an improvement. The detail in terms of instrumentation comes through far more clearly – percussion of course, but all of those other sliding and quivering exotic sounds from all quarters, like the bowed saw for instance, are revealed in all their glory. I’ll still listen to the earlier recording for its chilling atmosphere, but recommend the new one for sheer clarity.

De Natura Sonoris No.2 is an early 1970s chiller classic, continuing and developing some of the textures in Capriccio in a purely orchestral context. Again comparing the EMI recording, made when the piece was brand new, this new Dux version has more immediacy and clarity, but more importantly shows up some of the ways in which Penderecki’s view on the work has changed over the years. There are some dynamic differences in the balance here and there, and those dry, choking clusters in the strings in the beginning are taken more slowly and with less of a sense of murderous drama. Strangely, even though the new recording is a good two minutes shorter than the old one, the new version seems slower: listening to the cacophonous brass and strings beyond four minutes into the piece, there is a greater sense of drive and urgency in the old EMI version. Where Penderecki saves time in the new recording is by compressing the longer stretches of static atmosphere earlier in the work, which are less of a novelty these days. Either way, the old analogue tape coped badly with those fireman’s bells and the sheer weight of noise from the massed brass and percussion in this work, making this new recording a welcome alternative. The sliding brass beyond 5:00, with its conversational interruptions, is a definite goose-bump moment, and the final held note under that scraped percussion is like a small chorus of drowned angels.

Penderecki’s more recent style, in any case since the ultra-romanticism of the early 1980s, has in some way proved even more controversial than his earlier avant-gardism, and the Piano Concerto does sit rather strangely with its ghostly forebears on this disc. The work was written after a great deal of procrastination by the composer, who “refrained from writing a piano concerto for many years because I was afraid [of the] many excellent concertos written in the 20th century.” The final push came from a commission from New York, with Emanuel Ax and the Philadelphia Orchestra in mind as performers. Started in June 2001, the work was originally to have followed the Capriccio design, but after the terrorist attacks of September 2001 the light-hearted nature of such a title seemed inappropriate. The work took on a more serious character, and the non-religious title ‘resurrection’, which refers to mankind’s universal desire for renewal and re-birth after disaster and crisis.

The style of the work is linked to Penderecki’s 1996 seventh Symphony, The Seven Gates of Jerusalem, but also integrates the grand stylistic gestures of Mahler and some of the romanticism of the great piano composers such as Rachmaninov. At over 30 minutes in duration it certainly has a symphonic scale, and with no intermission between any of the sections the uninterrupted musical narrative is a ride of considerable intensity. If I have any problem with this work – and I do consider it a substantial masterpiece – it is the difficulty one has in establishing an individual character to either the source, the composer, or the intended message – the expressive aim. I don’t claim that all music should have immediate clarity in either of these aspects, but I doubt if I have any colleagues even in the musical fraternity who would be able to put their finger on what is going on here. I don’t mean this in a technical sense – the work is about as difficult to listen to as Shostakovich’s 1st Symphony; but in terms of where, what, why, huh?

The booklet notes may have something of an answer to give. ‘The piano part is treated in a very original way in as much as… it explores first and foremost the piano’s percussive qualities.’ Yes, but not ‘in contrast to the major works of the piano literature’ as far as the 20th century goes: composers since Bartók have been doing little else. In any case, there is plenty of running up and down the keyboard in fairly standard romantic style, so I don’t feel any great claims can be made for originality in the solo part. More telling is that ‘the sound idiom employed by the composer harks back to the great symphonic tradition of the turn on the 19th century’. This push-me-pull-you treatment results in something akin to Saint-Saëns and Busoni fighting under a duvet, with the eclectic spirit of John Adams and the hothouse mania of Scriabin acting as referees. One of the central elements in the piece is a chorale, whose introduction at 7:10 is sheer White-Christmas Hollywood. The whole thing quasi-concludes with a final massive statement of this main chorale ‘theme’ at 28:17, with recorded bells kicking in at 29:23 which are as corny as hell. The only thing we miss at this point is a few blasts from a cannon, and the spirit of Tchaikovsky might be appeased as well: the title ‘resurrection’ might as well stand for a ‘revival’ of this way of expressing triumph of the human spirit over destructive forces.

Despite all this the Piano Concerto is strangely compelling – one of those works you know you’ll be playing again, if only to remind yourself of the strange conundrums it proposes – was it really like that? Yes, it really is, and one has to stand in awe of the way in which Penderecki rather audaciously and uniquely creates a new work out of such a gallimaufry of antique recipes. I do however wonder quite what place it will ultimately take in the canon of 21st century musical art.

-- Dominy Clements, MusicWeb International

Recordings were made of Szymon Goldberg (1909-1993) over virtually a 60-year period. It must have been one of the longest studio careers of any violinist - it was certainly one of the most consistent in quality. The present set gathers up all the 78rpm material, which itself covers some two decades and presents the violinist in repertoire to which he did not return in later years, such as string quartets, string trios and string duos. An earlier volume (Music & Arts CD-1223, 8 CDs) presented Goldberg's best live recordings. Despite an often difficult life, Goldberg had an extraordinary ability to project a balanced view of the music he played. He was the archetypal Classical violinist and in his everyday life, behaved exactly as he played - a rare gift. In person, he was diminutive and soft-spoken. On stage, he never hectored the audience through his violin or pulled the music about to create an effect. Taking the view that the composer knew best, he did not impose an egotistical interpretation. Rather, he sought out the quiet centre of the piece he was playing and let his performance grow out of that. It followed that he was a great Mozart violinist, possibly the finest of the last century. He was, perhaps, at his best in chamber music, well represented here; but he was also an assured soloist and made a few excellent concerto recordings in the 78rpm era. Volume I of this Goldberg project (CD-1223) was released in 2010 and was named a Musicweb International Record of the Year and earned a gold medal from Diapason Magazine.

Classical Music

When listening to this new CD it is difficult to comprehend why the music world had a negative opinion of Robert Schumann’s works for violin and orchestra for so long. Baiba Skride now offers a performer’s perspective on Schumann’s violin oeuvre by recording not just the Violin Concerto in D Minor but also the Phantasy in C Major op. 131 and the Violin Concerto in A Minor op. 129. The last of these is an arrangement for violin of Schumann’s Cello Concerto that the composer made for Joachim.

Includes concerto(s) for violin by various composers.

Lutoslawski: Concerto for Orchestra - Cello Concerto

The new Bronislav Gimpel Edition presents on three CDs all recordings made by the violinist between 1954 and 1957 for the RIAS Berlin, creating a striking profile of the artist and the broad stylistic range of his repertoire. This Master Release is of the finest audio quality as befits the artist, an "old school" virtuoso who had a profound effect on violin playing.

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Francescatti who was a year younger than Heifetz, was among the foremost violinists of the mid-20th century, from about 1935 to 1975. In the words of critic Henry Roth, there was "a special character, a vitality and a savoir faire to his playing that set him apart from a host of gifted virtuosi who possessed vibrant sound and creditable musicianship." The concert performances collected here, all of them previously unissued, provide good examples of his Italianate lyricism and ravishing tone.

Classical Music

Casals directed Mozart with regimented authority... Of the piano concertos, however, the hitherto unreleased K466 proves unexpectedly serviceable, although Serkin's account of K482, exultant and miraculous, utterly transcends Yvonne Lefebure in the other work.

-- Michael Jameson, BBC Music Magazine