When Giovanni Benedetto Platti was born, Johann Sebastian Bach was already twelve years old, and when he died, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was only two weeks short of his seventh birthday. So far scholars have not been able to unearth any significant information about this composer’s childhood and youth, and his dates make it easy to understand why posterity has assigned him to one of those perilous »transitional gap periods« from which many composers like him never reemerge. However, especially since the beginning of the new millennium Platti by exception has enjoyed something of a renaissance. From 1722 until his death in 1763 Platti served the Würzburg Prince Archbishop Johann Philipp Franz von Schönborn and his hardly less renowned brothers. He was a highly regarded virtuoso and composer who as a productive musician not only was diligent but also and above all very imaginative and even fond of experimentation. The writing style of his harpsichord and cello sonatas, trios, and concertos is often so highly original that they practically had to be rediscovered sooner or later. The selection of works recorded here also shows that this Italian-in-Franconia was an artist who in particular expertly negotiated oscillating harmonic boundaries, never reached his limits with the means of expression available to him at the time, and formulated astonishing solutions to meet the needs of instrumental virtuosos.

Vasilije Mokranjac is one of the most important Serbian composers from the second half of the 20th century. In his first works, Mokranjac was clearly oriented towards late Romanticism and Impressionism, which he enriched with folk elements. Over time there was a stylistic development that led to a moderately modern expression - also in his piano works. The connection of compositional and pianistic ambitions marked the first, folkloristically influenced creative period in the 1950s. The expressionist overload that characterized the music of the second creative phase turned into the opposite in the 1970s: This last period of full creative maturity saw Mokranjac ’return to the piano and culminated in some of the most complex works ever written for the instrument. The folkloric elements that were typical of the early compositions are missing in these piano pieces, as are the expressionist tensions of the second creative phase. Instead, the lyrical expression now prevails. It looked as if these mystical, extremely meditative and ever more sonorous pieces of late had intended to suggest the reconciliation of their creator with the world when he himself ended his life on May 27, 1984.

While the ubiquitous Canon and Gigue in D refuses to suffer in obscurity--or even to stop reproducing and multiplying like a rampant tumor--recordings devoted to Johann Pachelbel's vocal music are extremely rare. It's a shame because Pachelbel's vocal works are often remarkably heartfelt and stirring. J.S. Bach was certainly impressed. Listen for instance to Pachelbel's richly textured, contrapuntal chorale cantata Christ lag in Todesbanden (Christ lay in the bonds of death) and compare it to Bach's famous later treatment (BWV 4). Bach's harmonic structure and thematic development throughout are remarkably similar to Pachelbel's earlier model. In fact, Pachelbel's subtler, seamless gradations between vocal and instrumental parts arguably heighten the solemn nature of Luther's familiar hymn more effectively than the master. For those who missed Rolf Schweizer's stunning, reverential, and long-deleted performance on Da Camera Magna (with Bachorchester Pforzheim), this leaner, more focused rendering by Roland Wilson with La Capella Ducale and Musica Fiata serves Pachelbel equally well.

Like his nearly exact contemporary Heinrich Biber, Pachelbel was regarded in his day as quite the progressive, often extravagantly augmenting his vocal scores with antiphonal choirs and plenty of rousing brass and percussion. Though every work on this program incorporates these elements to some extent, the cantata Halleluja! Lobet den Herrn (Praise the Lord) offers the grandest, most celebratory display. The splendor of this unusually large setting for five trumpets, trombone, timpani, bells, strings, two oboes, harp, dulcian, full concertante and ripieno voices, and basso continuo is further complemented by Pachelbel's frequent use of permutation fugues (two or three contrasting themes played simultaneously in revolving cycles) that Wilson and his forces effortlessly negotiate. The disc's concluding Magnificat in C major, though longer and with slightly less instrumentation, equally impresses.

CPO's warmly reverberant, spacious yet detailed sound ideally suits the grand scale and often colorful scoring of these very appealing works. Pachelbel's vocal music is highly underrated, and listeners who are even remotely interested in music of this period are strongly encouraged to take a chance here.
--John Greene, ClassicsToday.com

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Franz Lachner was a very productive composer. His work catalogue registers almost two hundred opus numbers representing practically all the important musical genres. Stylistically, Lachner was influenced by Beethoven and Spohr, by Meyerbeer, and above all by Franz Schubert. His music is distinguished by a sovereign command of form and above all by counterpoint. This month cpo is releasing the world premiere recordings of two of his symphonic works. Lachner composed his Symphony No. 3 between the spring of 1833 and April 1834, and after its premiere it was enthusiastically received and reviewed. The Vienna correspondent of the Leipziger Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung celebrated the work emphatically as the “bold product of an imagination of youthful fire moderated by the laws of eternal truth and beauty; a conglomerate of harmonic art and melodic delightfulness, an appealing interplay of pathos and melancholy, of mirth and yearning, of gloomy lament and triumphant jubilation. Everything, however, is spun with golden threads of ordering unity and firmly guiding clarity.” This work lasting approximately fifty minutes may be extraordinarily long, but its length does not come from redundant passages or unnecessary repetitions. Instead it is the logical consequence of a formal architectonic design operating with generously dimensioned thematic blocks such as they again are encountered – of course much more strictly elaborated – in the symphonies of Anton Bruckner. The Festive Overture in E flat major, which remained unpublished, is dated “22 February 1864” in the autograph. Although the autograph does not indicate a specific occasion for the Festive Overture, its composition might have had something to do with the wedding of Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria and Duchess Elisabeth of Bavaria. A recording marking the rediscovery of an important German composer of the nineteenth century!

Of Carl Loewe's oeuvre, his comprehensive Lied edition is best known. In contrast, his two symphonies are rarities that we do not want to withhold from you. Unfortunately, nothing is really known about the exact circumstances of the composition and premiere of the two symphonies. With regard to the E minor symphony, Loewe himself at least left the note that the composition was completed on December 15, 1834. With regard to the D minor symphony, it is assumed that it was composed in 1835. Especially the D minor symphony, which was composed later, comes up with surprises in its formal layout. The instrumentation is very similar to his first symphony in E minor, but the frequent use of four horns is striking, with which Loewe takes a step further towards the typical Romantic instrumentation. When looking at the sequence of movements, the interchange of slow movement and scherzo is striking, and in the harmonic structure Loewe allows himself an extravagant excursion into F-sharp major in the introduction of the fourth movement. The album is completed with Loewe's Themisto Overture, a compressed drama whose atmosphere comes to a head with tremolo surfaces, falling lines and syncopated counter-motives.

Of all the composers who wrote for the gamba during his times, Johann Gottlieb Graun must have been the most diligent one, even though he was not a virtuoso on this instrument. The twenty-seven works by him that are known to us represent significant contributions to the repertoire of the concerto, cantata, and sonata. All three of the works presented here contain grand solo parts for the viola da gamba that prove to be of the highest virtuosity. Graun evidently was interested in putting a virtuoso to the test. And the Italian gambist Cristiano Contadin, the founder of the Opera Prima ensemble, lives up to his reputation (as certified by the Musica magazine and other sources) as a first-class artist whose delightful delineation of tone and flawless style reveal a complete command of his instrument. The two sacred cantatas were composed in the Italian style on the basis of texts by Pietro Metastasio, the most famous librettist and poet of his times. They are sung by the American soprano Amanda Forsythe, who has won admiration especially for her interpretations of Baroque music – and is known from our cpo albums with the Boston Early Music Festival.

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Leopold Kozeluch enjoyed such an outstanding reputation in 1781 that he received an offer from the Archbishop of Salzburg to succeed Mozart as court organist. Kozeluch’s piano trios must have been very popular since more than sixty of them appeared in print from 1781 to 1810. The three trios presented here were published in 1798 / 99 and had been preceded by forty other such works by him. The special feature of these three piano trios lies in his use of melodies from Scottish folk songs in their middle and last movements. Toward the end of the eighteenth century the Edinburgh publisher George Thomson had the idea to have Viennese classical composers set Scottish, Irish, and Welsh folk songs to music with an accompaniment for piano, violin, and violoncello and contacted Haydn, Kozeluch, Pleyel, and (later) Beethoven in the hope of winning them for this project. They gratefully accepted the offer and produced settings in rich supply – in Beethoven’s case alone, more than two hundred – that unfortunately are almost completely forgotten today. The works are presented here by Trio 1790, consisting of cellist and violist Imola Gombos, violinist Annette Wehnert, and pianist Harald Hoeren.

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These two short, perfectly proportioned symphonies provide an appropriate ending to the orchestral achievement of a grossly underrated, even misunderstood composer--one of the very few who was self-aware enough to understand exactly what his gifts were and how to make the most of them. Unlike the comparatively more expansive earlier symphonies, both of these works are based on a single short theme or motif, which Wirén then subjects to variations of exceptional ingenuity, all cloaked in staggeringly efficient and colorful orchestration. Although he claimed to revere Nielsen above all other symphonic composers, Wirén's actual technique resembles nothing so much as a sort of Swedish Janácek. His symphonies are, one and all, magnificent mosaics; and while these last two employ more tonally ambiguous thematic material than their siblings, and end slowly and quietly (the kiss of death when it comes to their chances of being played live), they are so beautifully sculpted and so easy to follow that they truly deserve the widest dissemination among music lovers. The delicious ballet suite Oscarsbalen reveals Wirén's gift for gentle parody in a typically glittering orchestral context. Here is the composer of the ever-popular Serenade for Strings, in case you were wondering what happened to him after the two symphonies. The performances here are as distinguished as the music, with the Norrköping orchestra's excellent solo winds seizing every opportunity to shine. Excellent sonics add the finishing touch to a truly memorable disc.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Johann Rosenmüller’s vocal oeuvre is distinguished by textual interpretation that is just as finely sensitive as it is highly imaginative – and this manifoldness is nowhere so clearly revealed as in the seven settings of Psalm 31 (after Luther’s numbering) that have been transmitted to us under his name and form the program on this album. These various compositions based on one and the same text prove to be a genuine kaleidoscope of compositional ideas. Rosenmüller implements changing combinations of singers and richly imaginative motivic work, even in the instrumental parts, which are in part virtuosic in character. The works are divided into sections, and the composer usually creates larger interconnected structures in them by using recurring ritornellos and repeatedly returning to the first verse of the particular work. The text concerns David’s petition for divine assistance in the greatest distress. The psalm has a special significance in the Christian church because according to Luke the words from its sixth verse, “Into your hands I commend my spirit,” were among Christ’s last words on the cross. The variety and wealth of nuances achieved by Rosenmüller in the interpretation of the text and in the textures are considerable, and it is precisely the comparative listening experience that opens our ears to hear the special qualities his contemporaries valued in his art.

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