REVIEW:

It's so comforting to know that these excellent performances will have a new lease on life courtesy of Naxos. David Diamond's First Symphony (1841) is a compact, three-movement work lasting 22 minutes that stands with the best American products of the period. Characteristically springy rhythms in the outer movements make the music quite refreshing and emphasize the touching lyricism of the central Andante maestoso. The Violin Concerto No. 2 was receiving only its second performances ever when this recording was made. The talented Finnish violinst Ilkka Talvi proves an able exponent of this grandly conceived and marvelously scored work (listen to the imaginative violin/xylophone writing at the opening of the finale). It's a major statement by any definition and it surely deserves to return to the repertoire. The Enourmous Room, a fantasia for orchestra after the book by e.e. cummings, drives home Diamond's fundamentally Romantic outlook and caps a wholly winning disc that is as well played as it is well recorded. If you missed this the first time around, here's your chance to make up the loss.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Walter Piston's lovely Fourth Symphony certainly deserves greater exposure than it gets, and there's no reason why it shouldn't be popular. It begins with a lovely, pastoral opening that leads to a rambunctious scherzo with some elegant waltz music interludes. The slow movement is one of the composer's finest: it builds to a superb climax of Brucknerian intensity, while the amiable finale closes the work in high spirits. Really, what's not to like? This is the work's only stereo recording (Ormandy's is screechy mono, but wonderful all the same), and it's a very fine one. Schwarz keeps rhythms crisp in the fast movements, and phrases the "Comtemplativo" very broadly and affectingly, with some excellent solo work from the winds of the Seattle Symphony.


The couplings are also very well done, the Capriccio's naturally dry string textures and bracing harmonic idiom providing an excellent stylistic foil to the solo harp. Three New England Sketches, one of Piston's very few "titled" works, also has impressive atmosphere, though Slatkin's out of print version on RCA was better still. No matter: these are fine performances very well recorded, and deserve your attention. Thanks to Naxos for keeping them in the catalog (and to the Seattle Symphony, which understood the necessity of not leaving the master tapes to molder in some closet or basement storage room once Delos deleted the original issues).
--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Villa-Lobos seemed to have a bottomless well of simple, predominantly diatonic, yet affecting tunes, to which his harmonic eclecticism lent an exotic air; there is not one on this recording which is not capable of staying in the memory. Robert Bonfiglio is a most accomplished soloist in every respect... a most enjoyable programme...
-- John Duarte, Gramophone [4/1990]

REVIEW:

It's a mystery why David Diamond has not been generally acclaimed as one of the top handful of American symphonists. His Third Symphony has everything: good tunes, terrific orchestration, tight construction, and a satisfying form. Its beauties are numerous and immediately appealing, from the zesty rhythmic kick of its first and third movements to the lovely writing for harp and piano in the second movement, all grounded in a slow finale of ineffable purity and gentleness. Of course, it's that slow finale that probably seals the symphony's doom in terms of its chances for live performance, but there's no reason we can't enjoy it at home in this excellently played and recorded performance (here getting new lease on life from Naxos after its first appearance on Delos).

The two couplings at first might look to have a certain outward resemblance in that they both enshrine spiritual subjects, but they couldn't sound more different. Psalm (1936) is vintage early Diamond, a slow-fast-slow piece that bespeaks a certain French flavor (Ravel is never far away from Diamond's quiet music). Kaddish (1987), on the other hand, is an elegiac apotheosis of the modes of synagogue chant. It's beautifully played by Janos Starker, and altogether this collection represents a fine tribute to a still underrated major composer.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

REVIEW:

Gerard Schwarz's David Diamond symphony recordings originally appeared on the Delos label in the early 1990s. They remain impressive (though unfortunately still rare) documents of this composer's uniquely engaging music. In contrast to Symphony No. 1's ebullient opening, Diamond's Second begins with a wistful Adagio funebre, one of the work's longer and more profound movements, another being the beautiful Andante expressivo (with its evocative string and woodwind writing). The harmonic and melodic style occasionally recalls Copland, who comes most immediately to mind in the brass and bass drum play of the scherzo. However, the finale brings that unique blend of folksy Americana and classical rigor that marks much of Diamond's work.

Symphony No. 4's finale uses a similar rhythmic structure and even shares the same key as the Second, but otherwise the two works are quite different. Diamond compacts a lot of material into three brief movements. The musical language is less overtly tuneful than in No. 2, but the composer's expanded harmonic and textural palette ensures ever-captivating sounds, just as his sense of dramatic contrast and well-timed climaxes provide substantial emotional impact throughout. Schwarz conducts both scores with keen sensitivity, while the Seattle Symphony (particularly the brass in No. 4) relishes the challenge of this then-unfamiliar music. The low-level recordings require a volume boost to register fully, and they retain some shallowness, but not enough to detract from full enjoyment of the performances.

--Victor Carr Jr, ClassicsToday.com

Diamond dedicated his Symphony No. 8 to his friend and mentor, composer Aaron Copland on the occasion of his sixtieth birthday. The work was completed in November 1960 and received it's premi�re with Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic on 27th October, 1961. While essentially tonal in harmonic language, Diamond incorporated highly chromatic elements and even a twelve-note tone row, not unlike what the Symphony's dedicatee was doing during this same period in his Connotations, though Diamond's work is far less aggressively dissonant in overall sound. The composer provided these notes for the premi�re performance: I. Moderato-Adagio-Allegro vivo. The basic row is proclaimed in the very opening bars of the introduction; it is in two halves. The first, a forceful rhythmic theme of five notes (4/4), is thundered out by the orchestra tutti. The second, a more lyric theme of seven notes (3/4), is sung softly by a single clarinet. Thematically, the second phrase is destined to be the more important; in fact, the row is immediately rearranged and presented by a solo horn, which starts with this second phrase in an even more lyric version, and concludes with a lyric transformation of the thundering five-note opening. The fast body of the movement, a free sonata-allegro structure, starts with a heavily syncopated version of the row as presented by the French horn. This is the principal theme; a contrasting second theme is presented at a more relaxed tempo by a solo clarinet, ben cantando, over a soft counterpart of strings. Both themes are developed, and return in very nearly their original form during the course of this long but highly concentrated movement. The conclusion is a stunning climax compounded of the essence of both themes. II. Theme (Adagio), Variations and Double Fugue. After a two-measure introduction, which turns into a sequential accompaniment, the first violins begin a high, flowing melody that is the theme (3/4). Soon the orchestral basses and cellos enter with this same melody, while the violins continue the forty-measure theme. Variation No. 1 is a canon, in which the violins lead and cellos follow with the same melody, always at a distance of one measure. There are seven variations in all, the last of which repeats a long section from No. 1, and then leads without pause into the lively double-fugue. The first principal theme of this is derived from the principal theme of the first movement. Other themes from the first movement make their appearance, too, as the Symphony moves on to it's climax and conclusion.

Gregory Doran directs King and Country: Shakespeare's Great Cycle of Kings- the complete cycle of Richard II, Henry IV, Pts. 1 & 2, and Henry V. David Tennant plays the title role in Richard II, with Antony Sher and Jasper Britton as Falstaff and Henry IV respectively in Henry IV, Pts. 1 & 2. Alex Hassell follows his performance as Prince Hal in Henry IV, Pts. 1 & 2 as Henry V in the final play in the tetralogy.

"A definitive production of a great play" - Daily Mail on Richard II

"Gregory Doran's productions are a triumphant achievement." - Times on Henry IV, Pts. 1 & 2 Sound Format: 2.0LPCM, 5.1 DTS
Subtitles: EN/FR/GE (Except Henry V with EN only)
Region: 0 (Worldwide)
Running Time: 663 mins

Gregory Doran directs King and Country: Shakespeare's Great Cycle of Kings- the complete cycle of Richard II, Henry IV, Pts. 1 & 2, and Henry V. David Tennant plays the title role in Richard II, with Antony Sher and Jasper Britton as Falstaff and Henry IV respectively in Henry IV, Pts. 1 & 2. Alex Hassell follows his performance as Prince Hal in Henry IV, Pts. 1 & 2 as Henry V in the final play in the tetralogy.

"A definitive production of a great play" - Daily Mail on Richard II

"Gregory Doran's productions are a triumphant achievement." - Times on Henry IV, Pts. 1 & 2

Sound Format: 2.0LPCM, 5.1 DTS
Subtitles: EN/FR/GE (Except Henry V with EN only)
Region Code: 0 (Worldwide)
Running Time: 663 mins

Includes work(s) by Jacques Offenbach. Ensemble: Cologne West German Radio Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: Gerhard Oskamp. Soloist: Guido Schiefen.

2020 release. Guitarist Gerard Cousins's Escape features arrangements for solo guitar of Philip Glass's best known music. Appropriately, Cousins starts with a flowing account of 'Opening', the first track from Glass's iconic 1983 album Glassworks, designed to introduce the public to the composer's music. Cousins follows the mood with four tracks from Glass's piano pieces Metamorphosis, the second of which, 'Metamorphosis No.2', became the basis for the piece 'Escape!' from the Oscar-nominated score to The Hours. The album concludes with 'Knee Play 2' from Glass's 1976 opera Einstein on the Beach, a landmark of 20th century theater, and finally 'Truman Sleeps' from Glass's Golden Globe-winning score to The Truman Show.