Weinberger is clearly capable of playing with poetry and expressiveness, and many of the chorale preludes are genuinely gorgeous and even moving. The instruments employed bring us close to what Bach would have recognised as ‘his’, and for that we can value this set.

– MusicWeb International

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

PLEYEL Clarinet Concertos: No. 1 in Bb; No. 2 in Bb. Sinfonia concertante in Bb 1 • Sebastian Tewinkel, cond; Dieter Klöcker (cl); Sandra Arnold (cl); 1 Southwest German CO • cpo 777 241 (68:22)


The resurgence of interest in music of the Baroque and Classical eras and the formation of now almost countless ensembles performing music from those periods on historical instruments have fostered renewed curiosity in the musical unknown. In some cases, the result of this has evolved into a situation where the details of the interpretation surpass the music being performed, but there is a more practical aspect to this evolution: the establishment of organizations whose purpose is to foster interest in the music of Haydn and Mozart’s contemporaries, some of whom include Franz Hoffmeister, Antonio Rosetti, and Antonio Salieri.


The enthusiasm of these organizations has resulted in numerous scores, recordings, and concerts that further the cause of these societies. Ignaz Pleyel (1757–1831) is no exception to the trend. Music history has pronounced an indefinite judgment on this student of Haydn and colleague and friend of Mozart. While some of Pleyel’s music is available on disc, we have yet to scratch the surface of his output, preferring to remember Pleyel by his later endeavors as a music publisher and manufacturer of pianos. Some posit that there was no room in the inn for the likes of Pleyel during the 19th century, and the unavoidable stylistic assignment of his work to the cubbyhole of Viennese classicism was the expected consequence, but others counter with the statement that the language of the greats did not always or accurately reflect the entire spectrum of musical life.


But this pupil of Haydn earned his stripes and was the recipient of high praise during his lifetime. The high point of his career came in 1791 and 1792 when an invitation from a London concert organization—the Professional Concerts­—brought him to the English capital, where he was to be installed as a sort of rival to his former teacher who was also in London and performing as a part of the Salomon Concerts. In order to diffuse any bad feelings between the two, the pupil sought out the teacher shortly after the former’s arrival on the sceptered isle and strengthened their friendship. The result was that the two were frequently seen together and even attended each other’s concerts, thereby refusing to be set one against the other.


Pleyel’s widespread reputation as a gifted composer abounds in contemporary reports and correspondence from his colleagues, and his fame even reached the eastern shore of the young United States. The small town of Nantucket, Massachusetts, then still a whaling port, formed a Pleyel Society in 1822 “to chasten the taste of auditors,” according to a notice in a newspaper. But the most significant evidence of the appeal of Pleyel’s music lies in the thousands of manuscript copies that filled the shelves of archives, libraries, churches, castles, and private homes, and in the thousands of editions produced in Europe and North America. In quality the works vary greatly, although most show considerable ability and a thorough knowledge of his chosen profession. The music on this late 2008 release from cpo not only attests to Pleyel’s effective and facile skill as a composer, but it also supports Mozart’s deep respect and admiration for his colleague.


The first of the two concertos on this release was originally notated in C Major and published in an edition indicating it could be performed on clarinet (in C), flute, violin, or cello. This was because it was the easiest tonality for all three instruments. Pleyel ignored the trend to write for the Bb clarinet and to write in either Bb or Eb major. However Dieter Klöcker transposed the Concerto to Bb Major, allowing him to perform it on the more traditional instrument in Bb and therefore to avoid the higher pitched and more piercing timbre of the C clarinet. The Second Concerto, while presented in its original key, also represents an effort to reach a broader market in that the cello is suggested as an alternate solo instrument. As for the Sinfonia concertante, it may be a reworking of previous and lost material for a concert series in Paris.


In my estimation, Dieter Klöcker has never made a bad recording and—with very few exceptions­—he has­ been consistent in introducing music-lovers to much unjustly neglected repertoire. These well-written and challenging Pleyel concertos are no exception. The technical and expressive demands are confidently confronted and easily conquered by Klöcker, whose technique is both fluid and fluent, whose melodic expressiveness leaves nothing to be desired, and whose tone is rich and woody throughout. The playing of the Southwest German Chamber Orchestra is confident, assertive, and precise with appropriate panache and energy.


Overall, this is another revelatory release and yet another winner for cpo and Klöcker.


FANFARE: Michael Carter

RÖNTGEN Symphony No. 10, “Waltz Symphony.” Symphonietta humoristica. Preludes and Fugues on G. H. G. B. F. Old Netherlands Suite • David Porcelijn, cond; Rheinland-Pfalz St PO • cpo 777 308 (63:19)


Not too long ago, it would have been “Julius who?” But Julius Röntgen (1855–1932) has now appeared enough times in these pages that he should be a candidate for mainstreaming. And yes, in case anyone was wondering, Julius was indeed related by some distant familial remove to Conrad, the discoverer of the X-ray. Thus, the pun in the title, “Through the Bone,” of a Röntgen CD that made my 2008 Want List. The phrase is actually attributed to Grieg who, in describing the effect Röntgen’s music had on him, said, “It cuts through the bone.” But the X-ray reference is unavoidable.


If you have so far been reluctant to explore the music of this Leipzig-born composer whose father played first violin in the Gewandhaus Orchestra and whose mother Pauline Klengel was a well-known pianist in her time, here is the CD with which to start your journey of discovery. Much of what has appeared of Röntgen’s music on disc so far has been his chamber works, though two or three Dutch labels—Donemus, Et’cetera, and NM Classics—have recorded a handful of his symphonies and concertos. But until 2007, when cpo put out a release of the composer’s Third Symphony, Röntgen continued to fly just below the radar, known mainly to those of us who like to wander the byways of the Romantic road.


Describing Röntgen’s music is not terribly difficult. He studied with Carl Reinecke and later with Franz Lachner, but the main influences on his evolving style were Schumann and Liszt, the latter whom he visited and played for in Weimar in 1870 at the age of 15, and of course Brahms, a friend of the Röntgens whom Julius came to know through Herzogenberg. In 1877, Röntgen made a fateful choice, one that may well have led to his fading into relative obscurity. He could have chosen Vienna, where he might have established a lasting reputation; but instead, he resettled in Amsterdam, where he took up a piano-teaching post at a less than fully accredited music school. It was in Amsterdam, however, that Röntgen received Brahms as a frequent guest, and, in 1887, performed Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto with the composer conducting. Röntgen also played a key role in the founding of the Concertgebouw Orchestra, and was bitterly disappointed when he was passed over for its directorship in favor of Hans von Bülow.


Despite their friendship, the shadow cast by Brahms on Röntgen’s music is insubstantial at best. What you will hear in his single movement Symphony No. 10, written in 1930, is, true to its “Waltz Symphony” subtitle, a postscript to Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier filtered through a long-distance lens all the way back to Röntgen’s teacher, Franz Lachner. That a composer should still have been writing such music in the third decade of the 20th century may also have contributed to Röntgen’s rapid vanishing; but then Richard Strauss himself was still alive and composing music like this right up until his death in 1949.


Röntgen’s first successful symphony—he had destroyed two earlier attempts—his 1922 Symphonietta humoristica is reminiscent of Mendelssohn in A Midsummer Night’s Dream mode and, in its midsection distantly recalls Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto.


Unlike Max Reger’s many examples of Bach-envy, Röntgen’s Three Preludes and Fugues wear their contrapuntal learning lightly, ranging from fanfare-like marches to playful ear-teasers. There’s not a Bach bone in their bodies, and each is unique and delightful.


From 1907 comes Röntgen’s Old Netherlands Suite . Loosely—very loosely—based on a Dutch variant of the Bluebeard legend in which the serial wife killer is in the end decapitated by his latest bride, Röntgen sidesteps all of the blood and gore so favored by Dvo?ák in his tone poems of murder, mayhem, and madness. Instead, Röntgen focuses on the happier and more tender moments—whatever those might be—giving us a symphonic suite in four movements that in the words of note author Dr. Jürgen Vis “is festive and noble from beginning to end . . . and presents a jubilant apotheosis with timpani and trumpets.”


One could hardly wish for better performances or recording. Please acquaint yourselves with Julius Röntgen; you will not regret it.


FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

This album was nominated for the 2008 Grammy Award for "Best Opera Recording."

Classical Music

HERZOGENBERG Quintet in E?. Trio in D • Orsolino Qnt members; Oliver Triendl (pn) • cpo 777 081 (51:16)


Readers will already know from prior reviews, both mine and those of other contributors, that of Brahms’s many contemporaries and wannabes Heinrich von Herzogenberg (1843–1900) was the closest of all of them to the elder composer, both professionally and personally. After all, they shared a romantic interest in the same woman, Elisabet von Stockhausen, who came close to marrying Brahms, and who then married Herzogenberg when Brahms dumped her. The relationship between the two men could not have been a comfortable one, and Herzogenberg didn’t help matters any with his toadying behavior towards Brahms, as if merely breathing the master’s exhaled air would somehow fill his own sails with the winds of inspiration. But not even modest talent, let alone genius, is transferable through osmosis.


Herzogenberg did in fact possess a modicum of talent of his own, most evident when he wasn’t trying so hard to imitate Brahms. And that comes through in these two delightful chamber works. The E?-Major Quintet, written in 1883, is scored for the unusual combination of oboe, clarinet, horn, bassoon, and piano. Few such works exist for this combination of instruments, Mozart’s K 452, Beethoven’s op. 16, and Friedrich Witt’s op. 5 being the best-known—possibly the only known—examples. All share the same key of E? as the most logical compromise and accommodation to the two transposing instruments, the clarinet and the horn. Though Herzogenberg’s quintet would not be as easily mistaken for Brahms as some of his other works, it does exude something of the relaxed, engaging character of Brahms’s much earlier A-Major Serenade. And its last movement, as well as the third movement of the oboe trio, with its running triplets, does call to mind Brahms’s op. 40 Trio for violin, horn, and piano.


The Trio in D for oboe, horn, and piano was written in 1889 during Herzogenberg’s stay in Nice, where he had gone, with Elisabet, to recover from a serious illness. Described by the composer himself as “jolly and so new,” the piece is obviously one of good spirits that reflects the warm Mediterranean clime and Herzogenberg’s improved state of health. In terms of its instrumentation, the trio has even fewer precedents than the quintet, an 1886 work by Carl Reinecke being the only known example, and one that apparently Herzogenberg was unaware of when he wrote his own trio.


The two works on this disc make two things about Herzogenberg abundantly clear. First, he had a life independent of Brahms, and a fairly rich one at that. A Bach scholar of no mean accomplishment, he took up residence in Leipzig where, with Philipp Spitta, he established the Leipzig Bach-Verein, which dedicated itself to the revival of Bach’s cantatas. During his 10-year directorship of the institute, he taught composition to a number of students, one of whom was Ethel Smyth. Relocating to Berlin, he then took up the post of professor of composition at the Hochschule für Musik, where he advised Vaughan Williams to study with Max Bruch. Herzogenberg’s catalog of compositions is far larger than current listings of recordings would indicate. It includes major choral works, among which is a requiem, a mass, a number of large-scale oratorios, eight symphonies, a violin concerto, and a vast amount of chamber music.


The second thing we learn is that as a composer, Herzogenberg was not just a conservative—in itself not an indictment, as many composers of this time and milieu, which included Fuchs, Reinecke, and Bruch, among others—were also “old-school” traditionalists—but that he lacked their gift for lyrical melody and the grand Romantic gesture. As one listens to the quintet and trio on this disc, what emerges is a sunny, somewhat carefree disposition, one in which the rustic charm and blithe surfaces are never rippled by any momentous or memorable events. Despite their four-movement classically structured forms and their chamber-music category titles, in musical character these are serenades or divertimento-type works—likeable enough but unremarkable.


Remarkably good, however, are the performances by the Orsolino Quintet, a young German-Austrian ensemble founded in 1996. This is one of those groups from which individual members are drawn on an as-needed basis, depending on the scoring of the work at hand. The services of flutist Walter Auer, for example—one of the Orsolino’s permanent five—are not required in this instance. All players are also members of major orchestras: Jochen Tschabrun is principal clarinet in Frankfurt-am-Main’s RSO; Anne Angerer is principal oboe in Stuttgart’s Southwest RSO; Jan Wessely is deputy principal horn in the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra; and Marion Reinhard is double-bassoonist in the Berlin Philharmonic. Thus, it comes as no surprise that articulation, intonation, phrasing, and ensemble balance are at the highest professional levels. Joined by pianist Oliver Triendl, and given every advantage by cpo’s excellent recording, these performers make as good a case as any can for a composer who, despite the heroic efforts on his behalf, is not likely to rescind the “DNR” stamped on his medical chart.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

Imagine this: Brahms' wistful, long-lined lyricism years before Brahms was born; Schubert's effortless melodies and off-the-wall modulations long before Schubert matured; Chopin-like roulades and decorations popping up all over the place, written by a composer who died when Chopin was only two; fast movements whose virtuosic flair evokes Mozart or Clementi, yet maintains its own, pungent identity; Beethovenian thrust fortified by plusher, more Schumannesque keyboard deployment. I'm speaking of Jan Ladislav Dussek (1760-1812), a genuine, unsung original among composer/pianists of his era.

His best piano sonatas are charming, sophisticated, imaginatively crafted, intensely expressive, and woefully ignored. The ambitious Op. 77 sonata that opens Markus Becker's Dussek recital is a real find. In fact, some collectors may have found it long ago via Rudolf Firkusny's Vox recording. Becker's intimately scaled, occasionally clipped, and subjectively nuanced reading differs from Firkusny's more fervent, dynamically charged performance, much in the way that Wilhelm Kempff's Beethoven interpretations contrast with Artur Schnabel's. At the same time, the early Op. 9 D major and C major sonata presto finales go like the wind, with Becker's brash and joyful fingers wildly ablaze, yet always in absolute control. Clearly Becker has evolved in this repertoire since his previous CPO Dussek release, and I look forward to more. The sound and annotations are also superb. Recommended with pleasure!

--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

Classical Music

Written towards the end of his life, Cimarosa’s Dixit Dominus of 1797 numbers among his greatest compositions. A sacred composition on a large scale, it features three soloists, a four-part choir, and an orchestra including four pairs of wind instruments. The sequencing of the solo and choir parts employs a compositional-technical method that had proved itself for more than 150 years for the setting of sacred works based on verses.

Domenico Cimarosa contributed significantly to the development of the opera during the second half of the eighteenth century. He was held in great esteem by his contemporaries, above all by Haydn and Mozart, not only because of his eighty operas but also his sacred works endowing the traditional church style with his trademark grace and sweetness of tone.

PRAETORIUS Nun komm der Heiden Heiland. In dulci jubilo. Vom Himmel hoch. Puer natus in Bethlehem. Conditor alme siderum. Gelobet seist du, Jesu Christ. Resonet in laudibus. A solis ortus cardine • Manfred Cordes, dir; Bremer Barock Consort • cpo 777 327 (67:33 Text and Translation)


Straightforward, “musicologically correct” recordings of Michael Praetorius’s music are more present in the imagination than they are thick on the ground. While several of his simpler arrangements of chorale tunes can be found scattered among a myriad of seasonal albums, the more complicated concerted works, which, while based often on the same familiar tunes, stake a greater claim for his brilliance as a composer, are much harder to find. So this present, absorbing account of eight of his concerted motets is especially welcome. Performed as well as they are here, one quickly forgets that it is quite “out of season” to be reviewing them in early spring.


Most of his motets—or at least most of the ones that people bother to record—are built on famous hymn and chorale tunes penned much earlier, ranging from the ubiquitous In dulci jubilo to the most famous Lutheran melodies from the previous century, including Vom Himmel hoch and Nun komm der Heiden Heiland. Puer Natus in Bethlehem and Gelobet seist du Jesu Christ derive from less familiar source material, but are no less compelling. In some cases, Praetorius built his compositions on versions of the texts that interleaved the Latin original.


However, the surprisingly sparse discography of the nearly 1,000 hymns and concerted motets by this earlier (1571–1621) contemporary of the great Heinrich Schütz makes it difficult to assess his full range. The most direct competition for the present disc would seem to come from a now 10-year old Sony anthology on two CDs of concerted motets with Musica Fiata conducted by Roland Wilson (Sony 62929). But Praetorius composed multiple responses to the most familiar hymns, and none of the five similarly titled items is actually duplicated between the releases. Moreover, the two recordings present Praetorius on two different scales: the earlier disc opts for grander polychoral versions, fleshed out with a full 17th-century orchestra of strings, trumpets, cornettos, and sackbuts. Cpo’s Bremen release scales the works to medium grouping of four recorders, four violas da gamba, harp, and an organ positive, accompanying a seven-voice choir. Even these pointed differences, though, do not prevent comparisons, because the different repertoire items present shared challenges of ornamentation, textural clarity, and rhythm. Now over 10 years old, the Roland Wilson release was undercut by a muddier soundscape, with recessed strings and a longer echo in cavernous surroundings. The occasionally resplendent solo singing was inconsistent, falling short of the madrigalesque incisiveness of Manfred Cordes’s assembled singers for cpo. Even on its lighter, 17th-century scale, the brass tended there to overwhelm the male voices. And, while Wilson often succeeded in conveying the monumentality of some of this music—though surely not as powerfully as Paul McCreesh in his fabled “Praetorius Christmas Mass” recording (Archiv 439250)—it often lacked engagement and rhythmic excitement, qualities Cordes supplies in abundance.


Immediately one is struck here, by not only the strength and thoughtfulness of the solo vocal work, but also by Cordes’s sonic imagination, particularly the different colors massaged from his foregrounded gambas and harp. The recorders are also more adept and well tuned than Wilson’s. This pays dividends in the more complicated numbers like the thrillingly canonic In dulci jubilo setting and in the Vom Himmel hoch and Puer natus in Bethlehem , both of which are straightforward multi-verse settings of the complete hymns.


The recording opens with a fascinating, nine-minute “variation concerto” on the hymn tune Nun komm der Heiden Heiland , but listeners may be drawn more immediately to the hypnotically over-layered canons of Resonent in laudibus/Joseph lieber, Joseph mein or the aforementioned In dulci Jubilo . The recording is caught in the natural but not overly reverberant acoustic of the Stiftskirche in Bassum, a small town about 25 kilometers south of Bremen. Of much more than seasonal interest, this disc draws a glowing recommendation.


FANFARE: Christopher Williams

A musical journey through the centuries from Renaissance to Pop.

Includes work(s) by composers. Ensembles: Sächsisches Vocal Ensemble, Batzdorfer Hofkapelle. Conductor: Matthias Jung.

WOLF-FERRARI Concertino in A, “Idillio.” Suite-Concertino in F. 1 Concertino in A? • Zsolt Hamar, cond; Diego Dini Ciacci (ob, hn); Paolo Carlini (bn); 1 Padova and Veneto O • cpo 777 157 (70:07)


Considering this album’s genial, melodic music, it really is amazing how Wolf-Ferrari has, until comparatively recently, been represented in the catalogs only with recordings of his operatic overtures and intermezzos, especially those of The Jewels of the Madonna, Susanna’s Secret , and The School for Fathers . Thankfully, the situation is now changing; cpo, for example, has already released his Violin Concerto in D and Serenade for Strings (cpo 777 271), and his Cello Concerto with the Sinfonia brevis (cpo 777 278). This new release follows the rival 2006 Talent recording of all three works with Hans Rotman conducting the Westsächisches Symphonie Orchester with Piet Van Bockstal (oboe and English horn) and Luc Loubry (bassoon). This Talent recording so enthused one reviewer that he placed it (elsewhere) as one of his recordings of the year.


Wolf-Ferrari (1876–1948) was born in Venice, Italy, the son of a German father and an Italian mother. He enjoyed early success with his operas and he also distinguished himself in the genres of chamber music and concertante wind music. The three works on this album, all cast in four short movements, are scored for small orchestras. All are comparatively late works. In each, soloists and orchestra are equal partners. The “Idillio” Concertino, premiered in 1933, is written in a light late-Romantic vein with string orchestra augmented by two horns imparting something of a bucolic character. It is reminiscent of the neo-Classical style of Respighi, especially in the Scherzo, where staccato chords from the oboe and answering strings are reminiscent of Respighi’s hen from The Birds . Both Dini Ciacci and Van Bockstal please with the latter just that bit snappier and more extroverted in the jolly outer movements. The hauntingly beautiful Adagio, taken at a much slower pace by Dini Ciacci and Hamar, is distinguished by some delectable string phrasing. The cpo players also make magic of the atmospheric Notturno opening movement of the Suite-Concertino for bassoon and small orchestra (1933), Hamar drawing lovely limpid music from his strings; and if you thought a bassoon could never be romantic, then you should listen to Carlini’s tender love song that is the Canzone (Andante cantabile). Loubry, on Talent, is more bubbly in the presto Strimpellata movement


Wolf-Ferrari’s Concertino for English horn, strings, and two horns was premiered posthumously in Salzburg in 1955. Listening to the Capriccio second movement, and the Finale, one might imagine commedia dell’arte characters, the English horn’s buffoonery, sometimes encouraged by prankish horns, contrasts with the strings’ frequent censorious tones; Stravinsky’s Pulcinella comes to mind. Once again, the affecting melancholy of Carlini’s English horn solo, combined with misty, atmospheric strings, lifts another exquisite Wolf-Ferrari Adagio, the horns adding perspective and heightening the elegiac mood.


Highly recommended, this new cpo release, by virtue of the beauty of its slow movements, eclipses its rival Talent recording.


FANFARE: Ian Lace

Includes work(s) by E. Nikolaus von Reznicek. Ensemble: Cologne West German Radio Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Michail Jurowski.