Classical Music

Classical Music

Recorded in: Rosslyn Hill Chapel, Hampstead, London 1 January 1982 & 1 January 1983 Producer(s) James Burnett Sound Engineer(s) Robert Auger

Brahms, J.: 11 Zigeunerlieder / Quartets - Opp. 31, 112 / Sc

SAMTLICHE CHORWERKE

Brahms: Violin Concerto & Violin Sonata No. 3

Maxim Vengerov now confronts - and conquers - one of the supreme challenges all great violinists must face: The Brahms violin concerto. This beautiful, virtuosic work has defined careers from Heifetz to Perlman. Vengerov's turn has come, and his rich, burnished tone and impassioned phrasing make this one of the standout concerto CDs of the year. The soulful partnership of Vengerov and Barenboim (one of his most important mentors) is also a strong selling point.

Johannes Brahms (1833-1897): Symphony No. 1 in C Minor, opus 68; Variations on a Theme by Joseph Haydn in B flat major, opus 56a. Performed by the BRT (Belgian Radio and Television) Philharmonic Orchestra, Brussels, conducted by Alexander Rahbari. Recorded in 1989 in Brussels. First published by Naxos as 8.550278 in 1990.

Brahms: Symphony No. 3 in F Major, Op. 90 & Symphony No. 3 i

The set of ten Hungarian dances opens with the famous G minor dance, followed by a D minor dance, with a central D major episode, and a third in D minor, with a lively D major middle section. The fourth dance, in F sharp minor, is of a more expressive cast, leading to a more passionate companion in the same key. The sixth of the set, in D flat major, frames a slower C sharp minor section in livelier outer sections, leading to the rhythmic seventh dance and an eighth in A minor in the rhythm of the first. A dance in E minor is succeeded by the final rapid E major that rounds of the work. The sixteen Waltzes that form Opus 39 were written in Vienna in 1864 and published two years later with a dedication to the critic Eduard Hanslick, who welcomed such an unexpected gift from a serious, North German composer, who might have been supposed incapable of such Viennese abandon. If the great symphonies of Brahms continue the tradition of Schubert, they may be imagined as a tribute to the city where the compose was now to make his home. The original version seems to be that for piano duet, a form that had an immediate popular commercial attraction and would have provided Hanslick with music to share with young ladies of his acquaintance, with whom he was accustomed to play duets. The Waltzes are in a simpler and shorter form than the slightly more complex Hungarian Dances. Idil Biret born in Ankara, Idil Biret began piano lessons at the age of three. She displayed an outstanding gift for music and graduated from the Paris Conservatoire with three first prizes when she was fifteen. She studied piano with Alfred Cortot and Wilhelm Kempff, and composition with Nadia Boulanger. Since the age of sixteen Idil Biret has performed in concerts around the world, playing with major orchestras under the direction of conductors such as Monteux, Boult, Kempe, Sargent, de Burgos, Pritchard, Groves and Mackerras. She has participated in the festivals of Montreal, Persepolis, Royan, La Rochelle, Athens, Berlin, Gstaad and Istanbul. She was also invited to perform at the 85th birthday celebration of Wilhelm Backhaus and at the 90th birthday celebration of Wilhelm Kempff. Idil Biret received the Lily Boulanger Memorial Fund Award (1954/1964), the Harriet Cohen/Dinu Lipatti Gold Medal (1959) and the Polish Artistic Merit Award (1974) and was named Chevalier de l'Ordre du M�rite in 1976.

BRAHMS: Symphony No. 4 / Tragic Overture

BRAHMS: Piano Trio No. 3 / Trio in A Major

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

BRAHMS: Variations, Opp. 9, 24 & 35

BRAHMS: String Sextets Nos. 1 and 2

David Shifrin, clarinet; Chamber Music Northwest. Delos DE 3066 [Quintet].

Despite its name, Chamber Music Northwest is an assembly of New York regulars. They offer a subdued rather than searing account of the Clarinet Quintet, with leisurely tempos and a feeling more of point-to-point navigation through the score than of a single, seamless utterance. The ensemble is excellent, with sisters Ani and Ida Kavafian quite remarkably well matched on violin, their unisons, octaves and thirds uncannily together. The fluid, singing quality of Shifrin’s playing is admirable, and he shows an interpretive restraint in keeping with his view that the clarinet part should not be treated as a solo, but as one strand among five. The recording, made in March 1989, is intimate and highly satisfying. – Ted Libbey, author of The NPR Guide to Building a Classical CD Collection.

Brahms: Piano Sonatas Nos. 1 & 2

It would be hard to imagine more amiable performances of these two strongly characterized Brahms works...intense as well as warm, plainly derived from long experience performing this music in concert... The romanticism of the Nash approach comes out particularly strongly in the opening Andante of the Horn Trio, with the horn soloist, Frank Lloyd, producing exceptionally rich, braying tone to remind one of Dennis Brain. After relaxed accounts of the first three movements the galloping finale is then given with great panache, conveying more fun than the more virtuoso reading from Ashkenazy, Perlman and Tuckwell. Thanks partly to the CRD recording, the Nash performances are made to sound satisfyingly beefy, almost orchestral, though some may find the full-bodied sound a degree too reverberant, with the piano rather in front of the strings. The disc can be strongly recommended, particularly as this is the only available coupling of these two works.

-- Edward Greenfield, Gramophone

Brahms: Piano Pieces, Op. 76 - Rhapsodies, Op. 79 - Fantasie

Brahms: Intermezzi, Op. 117 / Piano Pieces, Opp. 118-119

Brahms: Four-Hand Piano Music, Vol. 2

Brahms: Four-Hand Piano Music, Vol. 1

It's good to report Naxos again sweeping aside the competition not only in price, but in the quality of both performance and recording as well. Not that Brahms's organ works have received quite as much exposure on CD as one would have expected. The 11 Chorale Preludes, Brahms's swan-song (the cynics would describe it as a deathbed conversion), for all their popularity are elusive works attempting a synthesis between the essentially functional chorale prelude form and the intimate, personal language of an impromptu. They may well be "a high point in German Romantic organ literature" (to quote Parkins's own note) but their curious blend of impersonal formality and deep emotion renders really satisfying performances something of a rarity.

Robert Parkins hits the nail absolutely on the head. He paces each one perfectly, the second "Herzlich tut mich verlangen (No. 9) seems almost to float on air while "0 Welt, ich muss dich lassen" (No. 3) avoids any hint of self-indulgence in its heartfelt statement of impending death, Of course this excellent instrument helps. Registrations have to be subtle rather than obtrusive with a strong bias towards unadorned eight-foot tone. Parkins chooses his stops with care and sensitivity—the gentle caressing of a Tremulant throughout "Schmiicke dich, o liebe Seele" (No. 5) transforms a pleasant sound into a ravishing one.

The whole disc (the four early works fare equally well) is a significant addition to the recorded literature of both the organ and Brahms.

-- Gramophone [12/1994]

Classical Music

Includes work(s) by Johannes Brahms.

Brahms: Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 77

In the late 1850s, Brahms was doing a number of things involving symphonies and pianos. He was having a heck of a time getting his first symphony to fly, and while working on a D minor sonata for 2 pianos, he decided to turn that work into a symphony. However, finding the pianistic ideas intractable, he ended up with his Piano Concerto No. 1. A few years later, he embarked on a multi-movement "symphony serenade" for small orchestra, which was published in 1860 as the Serenade No. 1 in D major, along with its companion, No. 2 in A major.
Despite the initial notion that these might be proto-symphonies, they are relaxed, genial works, well suited to the name "serenade." Brahms also published them in four-hand piano scores, an arrangement to which they adapt quite nicely. They sound wonderfully fresh here, given invigorating performances by the German piano team of Silke-Thora Matthies and Christian Kohn.