Classical Music

Includes work(s) by Franz Xaver Gruber, various composers. Soloist: Florian Pagitsch.

Ninety-one years and a turn of century later, Alban Berg's String Quartet Op. 3 no longer shocks as it once did, but rather sounds more and more like an accessible piece of finely wrought chamber music. That's not to say it contains stretches of "Hum-um-umable melody" (to quote Sondheim's Merrily We Roll Along), but with careful and repeated listening the ear discerns motifs and harmonic patterns where formerly there seemed naught but noise. Such revelations are greatly aided by the Leipzig String Quartet's generously romantic approach both to this and to the Lyric Suite. Its warm legato and passionate phrasing humanize and romanticize Berg's highly personal masterpieces, both created in connection with love affairs. This is in marked contrast to the Galimir Quartet's strident and angular performances on Vanguard, which place Berg more firmly in the epoch of the Second Viennese School. But the Leipzigers are capable of much fierce energy too, especially in the more explosive moments of the Lyric Suite, which they play with fearless alacrity.


The disc also includes Webern's brief (even for him) Three Pieces for String Quartet, featuring the ethereal singing of Christiane Oelze in the second piece, a setting of one of the composer's poems. At two minutes and ten seconds, it's over before you realize it, but even the much longer Berg works have this effect, thanks to the stunning Leipzig Quartet performances, recorded in top-drawer sound by MDG.
--Victor Carr Jr., ClassicsToday.com

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

When Musica Alta Ripa recorded Jean-Marie Leclair’s Trio Sonatas op. 4 in January 1992 and released them on LP in 1993, this debut album became a sought-after premiere release. Since even then the MDG sound engineers were working with the latest digital technology, this production from Nordkirchen Castle’s Baroque Festive Hall could be transferred to disc and digital without a hitch and with the finest room nuances. Leclair was one of the best violinists of his time. The story is told that he had to compete in a musical duel with Locatelli in Kassel- then a most highly popular form of musical entertainment. The chronicler describes his “devilish” playing, contrasting it with the “angelic” style of his Italianrival. His trio sonatas suggest familiarity with the Italian school but also draw on entirely independent French traditions and shine with ingenious inventions and harmonic refinements. The virtuoso and composer Leclair was repeatedly drawn to Paris, where he would play the role of the victim in one of crime history’s greatest mysteries. His murder in October 1764 was never solved. Musica Alta Ripa has worked with MDG for many years, successfully establishing itself as one of the most sought-after early music ensembles. The ensemble’s recordings have earned many international awards, and the vibrant joy of these performances is a source of pure listening fun.

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.
Recording information: Ehem. Ackerhaus Abtei Marienmünster (09/25/2008-09/26/2008); Ehem. Ackerhaus Abtei Marienmünster (02/03/2009-02/04/2009).

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

The first Brahms concerto is a touchstone for each and every pianist. Until now nobody had dared to record the concerto on a historical grand piano with an orchestra performing on historical instruments. On his solo recordings Hardy Rittner has already conquered the Brahms Olympus on various occasions. He is joined by the brilliantly arrayed l'arte del mondo orchestra under the conductor Werner Ehrhardt. The result: a great risk - in a live performance - has become a great recording.

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

Classical Music

Ben van Oosten numbers among today's best-known organ virtuosos. His complete recordings of the organ works of Marcel Dupré, Louis Vierne, and Charles-Marie Widor are nothing short of legendary. It is thus not surprising that his invitation for a portrait of the grand Stahlhuth/Jann organ in Luxembourg's Dude-lange resulted in a "Festival of French Organ Music." This full CD program extending over almost eighty minutes captures a fascinating performance on a his-torical instrument of supreme tonal beauty.

LOUIS FERDINAND Andante with Variations, op. 4. Piano Quartet, op. 5. Larghetto with Variations, op. 11 • Tr Parnassus; Thomas Selditz (va); Stanislau Anishchanka (db) • MDG 303 1549 (71:49)


You might say that the Trio Parnassus owns the music of Prince Louis Ferdinand, at least his chamber music for small ensemble—piano trios, quartets, and one quintet (op. 11, listed above) with the same scoring as Schubert’s “Trout” Quintet. Titled “Complete Piano Trios, Vol. 3,” the present volume, in fact, has no trios at all; the “complete trios” is more accurately a compilation of most of his chamber music. At present, the Trio Parnassus appears to be alone in recording any of the rather small but worthy corpus of music composed by Louis Ferdinand. (The unfortunate Prince, killed in battle in 1805 at the age of 34, completed a total of just 13 opuses, of which 10 are chamber works with piano.)


The Trio Parnassus has made a vital contribution to the discovery and performance of many forgotten musical treasures from the 19th century, including works by Hummel, Bargiel, Scharwenka, and Rheinberger. Prince Louis Ferdinand, a highly talented and accomplished pianist/composer whose teacher was Jan Ladislav Dussek, certainly deserves inclusion in such a group. He was admired by none other than Beethoven, who, after hearing him play, called him a “true musician” and dedicated his Third Piano Concerto to him.


Louis Ferdinand had a gift for writing attractive melodies, and also a fertile imagination when it came to varying them. Variation movements are common in his œuvre, and although he follows the traditional style of variations—increasing rhythmic figuration and tempo, and including a minor key variation, e.g.—there are often surprises, especially since his harmonic writing at times anticipates the music of Schubert and Schumann. His music—especially the piano parts—is technically difficult and brilliant, no doubt intended to demonstrate the virtuosity of the composer.


The dedication of the Trio Parnassus, aided by excellent collaborators, is evident in the high quality of its performance. The ensemble is precise and the intonation of the strings is spot on. I have commented before on the outstanding work of the pianist, Chia Chou, who in addition to handling the demands of the virtuoso piano-writing with seeming ease, also knows when to fade into the background and leave the spotlight to his colleagues. His playing has polish and refinement as well as brilliance.


MDG once again demonstrates the success of its excellent technique in producing a recording using “the natural acoustics of specially chosen concert halls.” The balance among the instruments is perfect, and the sound is warm and vivid. In sum, this is most attractive music, put together with inspiration and skill. Strongly recommended.


FANFARE: Susan Kagan

Classical Music

WIDMANN String Quartets: No. 1; No. 2, “Choral Quartet”; No. 3, “Hunting Quartet”; No. 4; No. 5, “Attempt at the Fugue” 1 • Leipzig Str Qrt; Juliane Banse (sop) 1 • MDG 307 1531 (76:44)


Born in 1973, Jörg Widmann has two careers: as a clarinetist, he teaches at the Freiburg College of Music, performs regularly, and has recorded music by Beethoven, Brahms, Harald Genzmer, and Wolfgang Rihm; as a composer who studied under Rihm, Wilfried Hiller, and Hans Werner Henze, his works are piling up European prizes with remarkable frequency. In the latter role, Widmann exhibits an interesting postmodern (if that word still has any relevance) conceptualism. These five compact, one-movement string quartets, for example, though composed over a period of years (1997–2005), when combined suggest the macro-structure of a single quartet—that is, the individual quartets serve the function of an “introduction,” “largo,” “scherzo,” “andante/passacaglia,” and “finale: quasi-fugue,” respectively. Whether or not Widmann had this scheme in mind from the very beginning is hard to say, but there is internal evidence that unifies and enhances their relationship, thematically and dramatically.


One of the conceptual features of Widmann’s music is a fluid blending of historical sounds and styles. The Quartet No. 3, for instance, takes its nickname from the familiar “hunting” rhythm adapted, in this case, from one of Robert Schumann’s Papillons , which gradually unravels into a more contemporary fabric of melodic fragments and disrupted rhythms (Widmann calls it “splinterizing” and “skeletalizing” the form). Quartet No. 2 is a reflection on death influenced by Haydn’s Seven Last Words of Christ ; some of the sparse music is recognizable (mournful chords that could be direct quotes) and some indistinct (non-pitched timbral effects), but the effect, while engaging, is more scene painting than movement towards a musical or emotional resolution. The Quartet No. 4 offers a walking bass line and ascending and descending patterns along with chiaroscuro textures; the sounds grow more mysterious as they drift away from the passacaglia’s theme, being somewhat reminiscent of George Rochberg’s interplay of harmonic references in his string quartets. The Quartet No. 5, longest of the sequence and the only one with a vocal component à la Schoenberg’s Second Quartet, deconstructs fugal strategies into episodes of contrasting shapes and tempos, offering close echoes of (if not actual quotes from) the Grosse Fugue and Art of Fugue . As for No. 1, it rises from silence with small Webernesque gestures, turns vigorous and frisky, is interrupted by silences, but builds to a convincing conclusion.


Widmann’s quartets are attractive, thought provoking, and well conceived, and I believe they actually work better when heard together as a connected entity than standing alone, where the occasional missteps, such as the clichéd shouts in No. 3 and the familiarity of material in No. 5, would be isolated and magnified. The benefit of having them on a single disc is the ability to choose which way you’d like to experience them.


FANFARE: Art Lange

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.
Personnel: Christian Zacharias (piano).
Recording information: Métropole Lausanne (06/25/2008-06/28/2008).

"We have now reached Volume 5 of MDG’s estimable series of Mozart piano concertos with Christian Zacharias, the first such SACD series to my knowledge and a highly worthy effort... Zacharias’s articulation is spectacular in these pieces, just the right amount of separation between the notes in the faster passages, and an almost organ-like style of playing that allows the melodies to truly soar with a seamless and unobtrusive melisma. The sound is fabulous, the best on any Mozart concerto series so far, and is recommendable without hesitation." -- Steven Ritter, Audiophile Audition

Classical Music

What a debut! The Scherzo in E flat minor is the first exsisiting composition by Johannes Brahms, and its gloom and bizarre character go beyond even the no-joking-matter models set by Chopin.

Hardy Rittner has recorded this rarity on the fourth installment of his historical Brahms series – for the first time on a 240-centimeter Ignaz Bösendorfer grand piano from 1846. The biting tone of this instrument immediately gets under the skin and forms an exciting contrast to the two J. B. Streicher grand pianos.

The two Rhapsodies op. 79 get things going. Brahms would not have been Brahms if he had not composed these pieces with a compelling formal logic. The second rhapsody bears the heading “Molto passionato,” and Hardy Rittner conjures magnificent passion out of the Streicher grand piano from 1868.

In the Piano Pieces op. 76 he spreads out a multicolored kaleidoscope ranging from melancholy to graceful charm and from dancy mirth to eerie gloom - it all is there and can be experienced with special immediacy on this historical instrument.

Brahms composed sixteen waltzes as his ticket to Viennese musical society and dedicated them to the feared critic Eduard Hanslick. This tactic paid off. Hanslick became Brahms’s most glowing admirer.

Rittner shows why this was so: simple on the surface, these exquisitely crafted waltzes create their own special cosmos of expressive colors with a wonderfully catchy tune, a racy Hungarian piece, and other masterful intricacies in three-four time.