LASSUS Prophetiae Sibyllarum. Omnes de Saba. Jerusalem plantabis. Sidus ex claro veniens. Cum natus esset Jesus. Descendit sicut pluvia. Mirabile mysterium. Verbum caro. Jubilemus singuli. Resonet in laudibus • Manfred Cordes, dir; Weser-Renaissance Bremen • CPO 777468-2 (64:44 Text and Translation)


The Sibylline Prophecies constitutes one of the most familiar works of Lassus. I know of 11 previous recordings, including one that Alpha has not sent for review, and most recently Walter Testolin ( Fanfare 31:2) was praised for his interpretation. Like several other versions, this one offers one voice to a part, unaccompanied (except for a harp) like the last five issues. But in a program unlike any previous version, the movements are sung in pairs with a motet inserted after each pair to break up the sequence, and all the motets include an instrumental ensemble. The motets are set for five to eight voices, and the parts are distributed in various combinations among the six singers and seven players. At one end of the spectrum, Jerusalem plantabis and Descendit sicut pluvia have one singer and four players, while Sidus ex claro veniens has five singers with harp and Jubilemus singuli has six singers with harp. The others are more elaborate. All are Christmas motets complementing the theme of the prophecies, which were written in the composer’s time as a Humanist revival of the Classical pagan sibyls, who had long been seen as pagan prophets of the coming of Christ.


Manfred Cordes suggests in his notes that the chromaticism of the main work does not wear well, militating against listening straight through, hence his decision to insert the relief provided by the contrasting motets. This is a good notion and it distinguishes this set from the competition. The first and last motets are the most familiar, and Cum natus esset Jesus was on a Hilliard Ensemble disc, but the rest may possibly be first recordings. Cordes has been giving us a dependable run of recordings on this label, including a recent Lassus disc (31:1), so there are probably readers already prepared to grab this one. The singing and playing are admirable.


FANFARE: J. F. Weber

Includes work(s) by Friedrich Ernst Fesca. Ensemble: North German Radio Symphony Orchestra Hannover. Conductor: Frank Beermann.

ENESCU Piano Quartets: No. 1 in D; No. 2 in d • Tammuz Pn Qrt • CPO 777506 (65:40)


Pianist Oliver Triendl is a veteran of numerous cpo chamber-music recordings in which the ensembles he is part of—the Minguet, Sine Nomine, and Vogler quartets, and Ensemble Acht—seem to change from one release to the next. I mention this because the Tammuz Piano Quartet is yet another ensemble recently established when Triendl and this time friends Daniel Gaede, violin; Lars Anders Tomter, viola; and cellist Gustav Rivinius (not to be confused with pianist Paul Rivinius) came together. This is their first, and as far as I’m aware, their only commercial recording.


The name of the ensemble struck me as odd, the booklet note informing us that Tammuz, in Babylonian and Assyrian mythology, was the lover of Ishtar, the goddess of love. I suppose for those up on their ancient Mesopotamian history, Ishtar might be the first reference to come to mind, but for many more of us, I suspect, Tammuz will ring a bell as the name of the 10th month on the Hebrew calendar, corresponding roughly to the Gregorian calendar month of July.


For most of my early years of musical discovery, I knew Romanian composer George Enescu (1881–1955) only by his Romanian Rhapsodies . I still remember a Columbia LP recording of them I had with Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra. It has only been within the last 20 or so years, I’d say, that Enescu’s large body of works has made inroads among the classical-music listening public. Live performances of his symphonies, orchestral compositions, and many chamber works are still relatively rare, and his large scale opera Œdipe , completed in 1931, had to wait until 2005 for its U.S. premiere. However, much of Enescu’s music is today available on record, and what has emerged in works like the C-Major Octet and the Sinfonia Concertante for Cello and Orchestra, which can be heard on Volume 1 of Hyperion’s Romantic Cello Concerto series, is a composer of broader scope than might have been thought from some of his popular folk-styled works.


James Manheim, reviewing the current CD for the website AllMusic, writes that “Enescu’s Piano Quartet No. 1, composed in 1909, sounds a bit like what might have happened if Richard Strauss had grown up in Paris.” Manheim’s observation that “the quartet is a large piece (for a chamber work), with the first two of its three movements clocking in at over 13 minutes each,” comports with Christoph Schlüren’s booklet note in which he states, “If only in point of length, the First Piano Quartet is a composition of epic dimensions.” “Epic” may be a bit exaggerated, for certainly there are chamber works, like Franck’s D-Major String Quartet, that exceed Enescu’s in duration. But “epic” has as much to do with weight and gravity of content as with length; and these two piano quartets are as serious in intent as they are seriously gorgeous.


Up until World War II, Enescu divided his time between his native Romania and France, but following the Soviet occupation of Romania, he repaired permanently to Paris. The French influence on Enescu cannot be downplayed. He studied with Massenet and Fauré, and in the first decade of the 20th century he would have heard not only the works of his teachers but also of Debussy. So, Manheim got the Paris part right, but not, I think, the Strauss reference. Enescu’s Piano Quartet No. 1 sounds to me like Fauré on testosterone, which is to say it has much the same restless harmony, arresting melody, and free-flowing rhythm, but it’s scruffier around the edges, with a week-old beard, sounding more masculine and muscular and smelling more of musk than of hyacinth and lavender.


Writing during the worst of times, Enescu composed his Piano Quartet No. 2 between 1943 and 1944. It was written to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Fauré’s death. Unlike its older companion, however, which is heavily influenced by Fauré’s melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic language, if not so much his elegant, refined style, the later work seems to take note of Bartók in the way it draws upon Magyar folk elements in its first and last movements, and to explore a kind of post-Debussy Impressionism in its slow movement.


Both of these works make very personal, very powerful, and very moving musical statements. For several years now, there has been a Naxos recording of the Piano Quartet No. 2 with the Solomon Ensemble, but it’s coupled with a performance of the composer’s Piano Quintet. To the extent that current listings can be trusted, this new cpo recording seems to be the only one available of the Piano Quartet No. 1. But it’s not trumpeted as a world premiere recording, which record companies usually boast when they’ve managed a coup.


The Tammuz Piano Quartet is really outstanding. The music sounds quite technically challenging, yet I hear no stress or strain in these performances. Playing and recording are superb. If the Romanian Rhapsodies are the only Enescu in your collection, you are in for a real surprise and a real treat with this CD. Not only do I urgently recommend it, I’m setting it aside as a potential candidate for my 2011 Want List.


FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

RIES Concerto for Two Horns. Violin Concerto. Die Räuberbraut: Overture. Liska, oder Die Hexe von Gyllensteen: Overture • Michael Alexander Willens, cond; Teunis van der Zwart (hn); Erwin Wieringa (hn); Anton Steck (vn); Die Kölner Akademie (period instruments) • cpo 777 353 (65:30)


Here’s another helping of Ries’s pieces from cpo. I expect that Ries’s ghost is hovering benignly over cpo’s corporate offices in recognition of what the label has done for the composer’s music over the past several years. As I’ve said before in these pages, Ferdinand Ries (1784–1838) is most famous for being Beethoven’s pupil, factotum, and friend. Some of Ries’s music sounds a lot like Beethoven’s, and a lithograph of Ries, printed in cpo’s booklet, suggests that they even looked similar. The two concertos on this CD were composed around 1811, after his professional relationship (but not his friendship) with Beethoven had come to an end. The two overtures are much later works. His first opera, Die Räuberbraut , was composed in 1827, and was premiered the following year in Frankfurt am Main. As often happens, the Overture achieved some success as an independent work. His second opera, Liska, oder Die Hexe von Gyllensteen , was commissioned by the Royal Adelphi Theatre in London, where it was premiered in 1831.


Ries’s mind, at least as far as composition was concerned, was not a brilliantly original one, but he was a fine craftsman whose music offers many pleasures even today. The Double Horn Concerto is conventionally outdoorsy, but Ries allows the two soloists not just to coexist in brotherly harmony, but also to strike sparks off one another. In fact, this Concerto was composed for two horn-playing brothers: Johann Gottfried and Johann Michael Schuncke, who played in the Kassel court orchestra. The use of natural horns on this recording is authentic, and allows for the production of some delightfully buzzy timbres. As for the Violin Concerto, its first movement is perhaps too conventional—no echoes of Beethoven here!—but the second movement sings sweetly and strikingly, and the third is a bouncy Rondeau. Chronologically, this Concerto is closer to Beethoven’s, but sometimes it sounds more like Mendelssohn’s E-Minor Concerto, which wasn’t premiered until 1845!


The Overture to Die Räuberbraut is in a heroic mode— Fidelio No. 2 , perhaps? I can understand why audiences of the time found it appealing. The second Overture (I want to rename it “The Witches of (Jake) Gyllenhaal”) also has the flavor of minor Schubert and (surprisingly) Rossini. It’s fun stuff.


Steck plays a Gagliano violin from 1701 on this recording, and I expect the wiry and sometimes shrill and unsteady tone is associated with the instrument, and not with any deficiencies in Steck’s technique. The two horn players have fun with their concerto, and revel in its opportunities for showmanship. The Cologne Academy plays excitingly and with idiomatic bite. This group is recording the complete Mozart piano concertos (with Ronald Brautigam) for BIS, and I look forward to hearing the results. Bert Hagels’s booklet notes are scholarly in their thoroughness. Cpo always does well in this area.


This disc is one of the plums in cpo’s Ries series thus far. If you don’t know the composer but are curious, or have an affinity for music from the late Classical period edging into Romanticism, I recommend giving this CD a try.


FANFARE: Raymond Tuttle

A fascinating example of Viennese operetta. Its sheer tunefulness is an obvious attraction.

Collections of overtures by Suppé are common – and very welcome. Most include that to “Pique Dame”. It is surely one of the best, from its quiet, intriguing, start to its infectious galop at the end, not forgetting the comically prim section with two flutes in thirds in the middle. Here, not before time, is a chance to find out what happens in the rest. Or at least, to hear the rest of the music, as no libretto is included and the synopsis given in the notes is far from clear. Whilst I do not miss the dialogue I am sure that my enjoyment would have been greatly increased by something more than brief and poorly written indications as to what happens in each number. As it is, the notes do explain that “Pique Dame” is a revision of an earlier operetta, “Die Kartenschlägerin”, which was also derived at several removes from Pushkin’s story, “The Queen of Spades”. Neither seems to have much in common with Tchaikovsky’s opera of that name. Essentially the operetta on this disc concerns a young composer, Emil, in love with Hedwig. Her guardian, Fabian Muker, is also in love with her. The plot revolves around the actions of Judith, a fortune-teller wrongly thought to be Emil’s mother, in exposing Muker and ensuring the marriage of Emil and Hedwig. At the end Muker is revealed as Emil’s uncle. Perhaps this is all clearer with a full libretto but given the luke-warm reception the work had at its first performance I would doubt it.

Operas and operettas let down by mediocre librettos are not uncommon, but they can be worth reviving if the music is of sufficient quality. That is the case here, although I have to say that in compiling the overture Suppé did make use of most of the better parts of the nine vocal sections that follow it. The opening number is a solo for Emil who is composing in his garret. Part is accompanied by the piano – a delightful and very effective idea – and indeed Suppé’s imagination and skill in orchestration is one of the main pleasures of the work as a whole. It is followed by a duet for Emil and Judith. The booklet notes rightly describe this as reminding the listener of “Il Trovatore” and of items from other Verdi operas. This is certainly true, although it has to be admitted that as a parody it is not as amusing as, say, the duet for Frederic and Ruth in “The Pirates of Penzance”. It is nonetheless entertaining, as is the work as a whole.

The performance starts well with a splendid account of the overture – at least as good as any of the many recordings of it I have already in collections of operatic orchestral items. Thereafter the orchestra, and the chorus in the few moments in which they appear, continue to be the main strength of the disc. The soloists are all clearly no strangers to the idiom but none have voices of outstanding beauty and indeed there are a few uncomfortable moments from the men. Nonetheless these are certainly not enough to put off anyone wanting to explore this fascinating example of the birth of Viennese operetta. There are no rival recordings as far as I am aware and its comparative brevity and sheer tunefulness are obvious attractions. It is surely an essential purchase for the devotee of Viennese operetta. It would also have much to offer those whose taste is more usually for Offenbach or Sullivan.

-- John Sheppard, MusicWeb International

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SUPPÉ Pique Dame • Michail Jurowski, cond; Anjara Ingrid Bartz ( Judith ); Mojca Erdmann ( Hedwig ); Tom Erik Lie ( Emil ); Thomas Dewald ( Fabian Muker ); Anneli Pfeffer ( Henriette ); others; WDR RO and Ch • CPO 777 480-2 (55:56)


Franz von Suppé’s overtures continue to be popular, but how often do we hear the works they were intended to precede? Not once in decades of collecting have I heard an operetta by Suppé, and now that I have, thanks to this CD, I am no less willing to hear another.


I recently wrote booklet notes for a release that included the overture to Pique Dame , and in researching it, I read that (1) the operetta was lost, and (2) that it was based on the same Pushkin story that was the basis of Tchaikovsky’s eponymous opera. Wrong and wrong. Obviously the music is not lost, and although the operetta may have been composed to capitalize on the popularity of Pushkin’s story and other works it inspired, it has nothing to do with the story itself. Instead, Suppé’s operetta, with a libretto by one “S.S.,” is standard genre fare involving an impecunious composer (Emil), the woman he loves (Hedwig), a wealthy competitor (Fabian Muker) who holds Emil in debt, and a cartomancer (Judith) who arranges a happy ending for Emil and Hedwig and the comeuppance of the wolfish Muker. Pique Dame is a revision of an unsuccessful operetta called Die Kartenschlägerin , and its predecesor really does appear to be lost. Pique Dame premiered in Graz in 1864. Only a little more successful than its predecessor, parts of it were recycled in Boccaccio.


Apart from the justly popular overture, there are nine numbers—arias, duets, a terzetto, and two involving the entire cast. Most of the overture’s tunes appear in the operetta proper. The rip-snorting can-can that ends the overture corresponds to No. 8 in the score, racily designated as “Orgy,” but don’t get your hopes up, because the action is strictly G-rated! Suppé casts his net wider, stylistically speaking, than Johann Strauss II did in his operettas. The Viennese element is obvious, but Pique Dame also looks west to France and south to Italy, and while several of the numbers “have a good beat, and you can dance to them” (to quote American Bandstand ) there is more to them than that. I think even fans of Gilbert and Sullivan will find something to enjoy in Pique Dame . I will be returning to it with pleasure.


This recording makes a good case for it. Baritone Tom Erik Lie and mezzo-soprano Anjara Ingrid Bartz have voices that are a little more wobbly than one might like. However, this is operetta, not Parsifal , and one appreciates their efforts at creating a character. Soprano Mojca Erdmann is both characterful and pretty in voice, so she is the cast’s stand-out singer. The supporting cast members, who have relatively little to do, do it very capably. The element that keeps everyone ticking along is Michail Jurowski’s conducting, which allows the score its share of sparkle and melodic interest. Pique Dame is hardly serious music, but the performers respect it and do their share to help it succeed. The only black mark on this enterprise is the absence of German texts and translations. The booklet note gives a number-by-number outline of the operetta’s action, but that really is not enough, and cpo would have earned my unqualified praise had it at least published the texts and translations online. Still, even that omission did not prevent me from enjoying Pique Dame . Even if you find Strauss too cozy and Offenbach too silly, Suppé might make you happy.


FANFARE: Raymond Tuttle

DAVIDOFF Cello Concertos: No. 4 in e; No. 3 in D. TCHAIKOVSKY Nocturne, op. 19/4. Pezzo Capriccioso, op. 62. Andante cantabile • Wenn-Sinn Yang (vc); Terje Mikkelsen, cond; Shanghai SO • CPO 777432 (71:39)


This completes cpo’s survey of Carl Davidoff’s cello concertos; and, like the earlier recording from these same forces (777263), which paired Davidoff’s first and second concertos with Tchaikovsky’s Variations on a Rococo Theme , this disc also mates the two composers. It’s a logical coupling since the two men knew each other professionally and held each other in high regard, despite rivalries that existed between their competing conservatories in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Tchaikovsky is in fact often quoted as having dubbed Davidoff “the tsar of cellists,” and I’ve often wondered, if not for the politics, how much better Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations might have fared had the composer entrusted the editing and revising to Davidoff instead of to a fellow professor at the Moscow Conservatory, Wilhelm Fitzenhagen.


In Fanfare 31:1 Tom Godell reviewed the previous release, declaring Davidoff’s concertos “of dubious value.” He did, however, heap praise on cellist Wenn-Sinn Yang. One issue later (31:2) that CD turned up on my 2007 Want List.


Born in what is now part of Latvia, Carl Davidoff (1838–89) completed a degree in mathematics at the St. Petersburg University before he enrolled at the Leipzig Conservatory to study composition. He had been playing cello, however, since he was 12; after renowned cellist Friedrich Wilhelm Grutzmacher departed his post, Davidoff, at 22, was offered his cello professorship at the Leipzig Conservatory. In 1876, after internal squabbling among the administrators of the St. Petersburg Conservatory, Davidoff was appointed that institution’s director, no doubt to the displeasure of Tchaikovsky, who had been a candidate for the position. I suspect this was the irritant that caused Tchaikovsky to turn to Fitzenhagen instead of Davidoff for assistance with his Rococo Variations . The rest, as they say, is history. Davidoff, along with David Popper, became one of the most celebrated cellists of the second half of the 19th century, and was honored as the dedicatee of Dvo?ák’s famous concerto.


It’s not in the least far-fetched to draw parallels between Davidoff, the virtuoso cellist, and Wienawski (1835–80), the virtuoso violinist. Not only were they near contemporaries, but more significantly, at the invitation of Anton Rubinstein, Wieniawski moved to St. Petersburg, where he lived from 1860 to 1872, teaching violin in Rubinstein’s Russian Music Society. Davidoff had been teaching cello at the St. Petersburg Conservatory since 1863, so it’s almost certain that during Wieniawski’s years in the city the two men would have crossed paths.


The compositions written by both of them for their respective instruments represent a next phase in the development of the virtuoso concerto after Paganini. Hair-raising pyrotechnics and high-wire daredevil cadenzas still abound, but now there is at least some semblance of more serious, expansive concerted scores in which the orchestra plays more than a barrel-organ accompanimental role. Contrasting lyrical passages vie for attention more convincingly amid the miles of blistering runs up and down the fingerboard, joint-dislocating double-stops, bow-bending arpeggios, artificial harmonics, and flying staccato.


As music, I would tend to agree with Godell’s “of dubious value” judgment. But the technical innovations and challenges are not of dubious value, for they opened the door to works, like the cello concertos of Dvo?ák, Elgar, Shostakovich, Myaskovsky, and many others that would take those innovations for granted and make them an integral part of the composition.


Of such insignificance, apparently, are the three Tchaikovsky fillers on the disc that not a single word about them is to be found in eight pages of vanishingly small print by note author Eckhardt van den Hoogen who, nonetheless, finds it important to ramble on for a full page about Davidoff’s 1712 Stradivarius cello. So, to fill in the blank, Tchaikovsky’s Nocturne in C?-Minor has long been a favorite of cellists. It’s the fourth piece from the six Morceaux, op. 19, originally for solo piano. The Pezzo Capriccioso is an original piece for cello and orchestra written in 1887. Its title belies its depressive B-Minor mood, which is generally attributed to Tchaikovsky’s tending to a dying friend, Nikolay Kondratyev, who was nearing the end in his battle against syphilis. The Andante cantabile will of course be recognized as an arrangement for cello and orchestra of the second movement from Tchaikovsky’s D-Major String Quartet, op. 11.


At present, there does not appear to be any recorded competition for these two Davidoff concertos, so it’s good news that Wenn-Sinn Yang can be recommended without reservation to those who take pleasure in cello gymnastics of the most demanding kind. Yang never once loses composure, and even manages to play these extremely difficult works with a good deal of tonal beauty and, where the music allows it, with considerable emotional expressivity. Norwegian maestro Terje Mikkelsen, who studied under Mariss Jansons, and who has led the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra since 2006, is a conductor who made quite an impression on me with a recent recording he made with the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra for Sterling of two symphonies by Norwegian Romantic composer Eyvind Alnæs. I expect we will be hearing a lot more from Mikkelsen in the not-too-distant future.


In sum, this cpo release is an excellent recording, and one that may be strongly recommended to those with an appreciation for this type of repertoire.


FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

Classical Music

If not for the predominantly square rhythms and repetitive-to-a-fault main theme, you might mistake the full textures and imitative writing in the first movement of Karl Goldmark's 1879 B-flat Piano Quintet for Brahms. Still, a singular compositional voice begins to emerge in the development section's sustained string solos surrounded by rapid piano filigree, as well as in the recapitulation's modulatory twists and turns. The long Adagio begins with a poignant cello feature and gradually gains contrapuntal and expressive complexity as it progresses. Some might liken the Ländler-like Scherzo's obsessive dotted rhythms to those of Schumann; perhaps its earthy melodic charm resonates in more Schubertian terms. If the spirited finale goes on a bit long in proportion to its musical content, the syncopated accents on unresolved chords keep our attention from wandering.

The C-sharp minor Piano Quintet dates from the end of the composer's long life, and it proves a far more interesting, texturally varied, and musically wide-ranging piece, from the first movement's jagged urgency and the Adagio's gorgeously unfolding long lines to the third movement's Hungarian Dance breakouts and the finale's jaunty, narrative drive and weird thematic allusions to "Hail To The Chief".

The Quatuor Sine Nomine members aim for all the tonal variety they can muster in these works, even when both violinists occasionally push their vibratos into cloying territory. The ensemble's kinetic interaction with Oliver Treindl's rock-solid and imaginatively-shaded keyboard work certainly will please collectors who know the pianist's other CPO releases devoted to other chamber rarities of the Romantic Era. As is often the case, CPO's co-production with Bayerischer Rudfunk yields superb sonics, although the German booklet notes' English translation leaves a lot to be desired. Warmly recommended.

--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

ELIASSON Quo Vadis • Johannes Gustavsson, cond; Michael Weinius (ten); Swedish RSO & Ch • CPO 777 495-2 (59:52)


This is my first encounter with the music of Swedish-born composer Anders Eliasson, and I am sure I am not the only newcomer. Eliasson doesn’t exactly help himself; no agent, no professional post, no exact definition of his style. From the detailed and very high-minded notes, Eliasson comes across as a thoroughly sincere and committed tonalist, unconvinced and alienated by much of contemporary music’s dogmatic rejection of melody and metrical rhythms. He grew up primarily with jazz, with his counterpoint and harmony training in his teens being his first introduction to classical composition. Despite much subsequent tutoring in the modernist techniques of Cage and Ligeti, Eliasson appears to rely more on a kind of neo-tonality (better explained in cpo’s notes) and quest for emotion, rather than mere clinical technique for his work.


With a career of already very high-profile symphonic commissions, Eliasson was approached by conductor Manfred Honeck to compose a Requiem. Struggling with his conflicting views on Christian belief and the clerical institution, the result that premiered in 2009 is Quo Vadis , an 11-part oratorio, containing not just the Latin apocryphal reference, but also six other texts, German translations of ancient Sumerian and anonymous poems and songs. Defying genre (Eliasson relunctantly accepts “symphonic cantata”), this grandly conceived work is through-composed, with the vocal sections spread out between orchestral interludes. Despite the composer’s upbringing, this is not very jazzy. From its opening brass trills and lush string lines, Quo Vadis is a grandly orchestrated work for our austere times. In length, ambition, and use of ancient texts, Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde seems an obvious comparison, despite that work’s separate movements and lack of chorus. There is a primal element to both pieces and a similar bold approach to orchestration. Despite his belief in harmony, Eliasson achieves some dissonant, almost Soviet-sounding effects, like in the first allegro , playing off the massed strings against the wild, high brass writing. Throughout, his innate understanding of orchestration is impressive; his word-setting, especially for the chorus, is exemplary, and not once is there the impression that Eliasson is wasting his huge forces, or merely throwing everyone together to make a big noise. Climaxes are overwhelming, but also properly built up and balanced. He also knows how to complete a journey, ending with the words of Enheduanna’s Exhaltation of Inanna : “That I have exalted you, goddess, that you are the beloved of An, I have sung of your wrath.” Then with a little flutter from the flutes it is all over. Mahler would have been proud, and I must admit this work grabs me on a very immediate, emotional level.


Michael Weinius is a fine soloist, beautifully supported by crystal-clear choral singing and colorful orchestral playing, with nothing in Johannes Gustavsson’s conducting suggesting a clinical, skim reading of this new score. Sound is bright and full, if rather too spacious. As usual with cpo, notes and translations are excellent. I do hate writing “a must-buy” for niche stuff like this, and I bet Eliasson will squirm at my pigeonholing and comparisons, but if you know your Zemlinsky, Schreker, and Schoeck, you will be as pleased as I am to hear this stylish work.


FANFARE: Barnaby Rayfield

Includes cantata(s) by Georg Philipp Telemann. Ensemble: Accademia Daniel. Conductor: Shalev Ad-El. Soloists: Dorothee Mields, Klaus Mertens.

Italian Passion in Surround. The Munich Radio Orchestra now turns to the sensuous fascination offered by Ottorino Respighi's masterpieces - a logical and natural choice for this orchestra, which during the course of it's history of more than sixty years has developed into an ensemble with an enormously broad artistic spectrum and earned a firm place in the orchestral landscape precisely because of it's versatility. For Respighi familiarity with music history and the old masters was not only a sublime pastime but also a source of inspiration for his own compositional work, and he certainly also contributed a great deal to the now current concert practice involving the performance of early music with modern orchestras. His Antiche danze ed arie, free arrangements of arias and dances from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, enables us to rediscover forgotten rhythms and tones. While he alters the character of the music by introducing a rich array of instruments, all sorts of different orchestrations, and harmonic modulations of modern coloration, the art of the old masters remains untouched. These works are finely complemented by his Gli Uccelli (The Birds) suite. In 1927 he drew on various harpsichord and lute miniatures for this quasi-ornithological "Suite for Small Orchestra," producing picturesque snapshots here showing him from his admirable and remarkable side as a sensitive observer who discovers the pictorial element in all that he sees.

Kolja Lessing, one of the most versatile musicians of our time, has energized music culture with significant impulses as a violinist and pianist who combines interpretive and scholarly work. For cpo he has now recorded two violin sonatas by Carl Czerny. After producing several violin and piano sonatas Czerny wrote his grand Sonata Concertante in four movements in 1848, the year of the failed revolution. The contrast to his first Violin Sonata of 1807, a work of his youth, could hardly be greater: reconsideration of Mozartian rhetoric and compositional technique mark this work pulsing with astonishing kinetic energy and with a concertante character for the most part embodied by the piano, while the violin part instead is assigned more the role of brilliant commentary or pointed interaction. Kolja Lessing himself wrote the booklet text and expresses the greatest thanks to Anton Kuerti – not only for his tireless research, investigation, and revival of Czerny’s colossal oeuvre but also just as much for his meticulous transcription of what in part are Czerny’s difficult-to-decipher manuscripts into modern notation. “Accordingly, Anton Kuerti, as Czerny’s real rediscoverer, shall have the last word with a deeply felt statement about these treasures that have now been unearthed: It is a rare privilege to find music that has been so inexcusably neglected and now brought back to life.”

Recording information: 12/2005; 01/2008.

Includes work(s) by Andreas Hammerschmidt.

Booklet notes in German, English and French; Libretto in Italian, German and English.

Before Otto Nicolai wrote the major work for which he is known--The Merry Wives of Windsor--he wrote Italian operas, of which Il Templario, first shown in 1840 in Turin and given more than 70 productions over the next 40 years, was the third. This recording is a reconstruction of Il Templario from various versions--there were revisions in Italy, a German language edition, a French piano-vocal score--by the musicologist Michael Wittmann. The result is a full-blown, exciting Italian opera in the bel canto tradition (more like Bellini, Mercadante, and Meyerbeer than Rossini) that looks forward to the energetic, melody-filled works of the young Verdi.

One of the opera's great joys, however, is the Germanic orchestration; brass and winds are flavorful and the latter in particular are used to intertwine with the voices. Taken from Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe, large choral pieces (there's jousting and feasting galore) dot the opera.

In brief, this finely racist drama involves the desire by the Anglo-Saxons to reclaim dominance over the conquering Normans who look down on them; meanwhile, local Jews and Moslems are simply pariahs. Cedric (bass), leader of the Anglo-Saxons, has a ward named Rowena (soprano); he wants her to marry into the English royal family, which will solidify the English dominance. But Cedric's son Vilfredo d'Ivanhoe (tenor) has fallen in love with Rowena, leading his father to disown him.

Vilfredo goes off to the Crusades; he is wounded and is taken care of by a Jewish woman named Rebecca (mezzo-soprano), who falls in love with him even though she realizes that she, as a Jew, can never be the wife of a Christian crusader. But she and her father Isaac (tenor) go to England so she can be near Vilfredo. Brian (baritone), an ambitious Knight Templar, falls in love with Rebecca--he would be willing to leave the Order for her.

All of this happens before the opera begins. The best-drawn characters are the conflicted Brian and Rebecca. In the opera's final scene, Brian drops dead immediately before a duel with Vilfredo--this is seen as a sign from God. Similarly, immediately after Rebecca confesses that she loves Vilfredo more than her God, she is struck dead. The Anglo-Saxons praise Vilfredo for his triumph over faithlessness.

We know we're in for a treat from the overture, which is as dark as the start of that for Der Freischütz and is similarly constructed. Drum rolls, an undercurrent of throbbing strings, and unexpected loud chords give way to martial music, handsome melodies, and conflict, with rousing energy at its close.

And the opera does not disappoint. A fine cavatina for Vilfredo comes soon after the opening chorus, and like all of his music, it is firmly rooted in bel canto, sitting quite high, with a showy lyricism. Tenor Stanley Jackson has all the notes but not enough true Italian style; still he's sincere and good enough throughout. Very convincing are Hans Christoph Begemann as Brian and Tiina Penttinen as Rebecca; they each have an impressive solo and join in a stunning second-act duet. Judith Kuhn is a fine Rowena and the rest of the cast is acceptable.

The Chemnitz Choir is superb; the Orchestra is good enough. Frank Beermann's leadership is firm and energetic. This is a terrific find in a far-more-than-passable performance. Highly recommended.

--Robert Levine, ClassicsToday.com