Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Szymanowski: King Roger

SHOSTAKOVICH: Cello Concertos Nos. 1 and 2

Somewhat unusually, the fourth volume of the Naxos series of Lutoslawski orchestral recordings concentrates entirely on the music of his full maturity where the composer used brief passages of aleatoric counterpoint. As the composer stated many times, this is not improvisation: All the music is written out, but the precise coordination over a set duration is left to the moment. Thus each performance is, in its small details, literally unique. By the time of 'Livre pour orchestre,' written in 1968, Lutoslawski had begun to incorporate a certain amount of indeterminacy in all of his music.
The masterful Cello Concerto, written for Rostropovich in 1970, marked Lutoslawski's mature return to concertante writing. At the great cellist's request, only musical considerations were taken into account, hence the fearsome solo part. It is one of the composer's finest works, and is very well performed here. The 'Novelette' was also written for Rostropovich, this time as conductor, as a companion piece to the Cello Concerto in 1979. Finally, from Lutoslawski's last period comes 'Chain No.3,' the last of three works all employing a similar chain method of construction. All three works reflect the increasingly refined idiom of Lutoslawski's final decades.