Naxos
Naxos, the world's leading classical music label, is known for recording exciting new repertoire with exceptional talent. The label has one of the largest and fastest growing catalogues of unduplicated repertoire available anywhere with state-of-the-art sound and consumer-friendly prices. The catalogue includes classical music CDs and DVDs as well as other genres such as jazz, new age and educational.
4217 products
Stravinsky: The Firebird / Idil Biret
Dvorak: Stabat Mater / Brewer, Simpson, Aler, Gao, Et Al
Saint-Saëns: Cello Sonatas no 1 & 2, etc / Kliegel, et al
SAINT-SAËNS Cello Sonatas: No. 1 in c; No. 2 in F. Suite for Cello and Piano • Maria Kliegel (vc); François-Joël Thiollier (pn) • NAXOS 8.557880 (77:32)
It has been previously noted that Saint-Saëns’s four major works for cello were composed more or less in tandem pairs. 1872–73 saw the twin births of the C-Minor Sonata, op. 32, and the A-Minor Concerto, op. 33. The composer was approaching 40 at the time; yet for a man who lived to 86, these may still be regarded as fairly early works. Not until nearly 30 years later did Saint-Saëns turn again to the cello, this time composing in reverse order the D-Minor Concerto, op. 119, in 1902, followed in 1905 by the Sonata in F Major, op. 123.
My only grumble about Jamie Walton’s Saint-Saëns CD (reviewed in 29:6) was that had he omitted “The Swan” movement from The Carnival of the Animals , there would have been just enough room on the disc to include the Second Sonata, thereby giving us all four of the composer’s major works for cello on a single disc. It turns out that in writing that review, I overlooked the even earlier, but hardly insignificant, 1862 Suite for Cello and Piano, op. 16, which, at 23 minutes’ duration, is even longer than the First Sonata and certainly qualifies as a “major” work.
With the current release, cellist Maria Kliegel and pianist François-Joël Thiollier fill in the blanks, offering us, along with the C-Minor Sonata, the earlier Suite and the later F-Major Sonata, both of which were absent from Walton’s entry. The juxtaposition of these works on the same disc affords us the opportunity to hear for ourselves the evolution, both professional and personal, of a man whose interior life may have been more complex than received opinion about him has otherwise led us to believe.
The five-movement Suite makes no pretense to a refracted antique or neo-Baroque style—as some of the composer’s early works do—despite note writer Keith Anderson’s assertion that its Prelude loosely resembles the arpeggio Praeludium of Bach’s G-Major Solo Cello Suite. Saint-Saëns’s Suite is an ardent, effusive romantic outpouring that has more in common with the young, though never youthful, Brahms than it has with anything from an earlier time.
The C-Minor Sonata, though coming 10 years after the Suite, is all surface Sturm und Drang somewhat reminiscent of Mendelssohn. It was works such as this that earned Saint-Saëns his reputation as an arch-conservative in thrall to German models and aesthetics.
The F-Major Sonata, written when he was 70, has clearly evolved away from the composer’s earlier, more immediately recognizable profile. Though still adhering to the principles of sonata form, the piece has about it a more through-composed feeling that is carried forward by a gorgeous rippling piano part rather in the manner of the composer’s own student, Fauré. More significant, however, is the genuine expressiveness and depth of the music, which clearly belie the notion that Saint-Saëns was but an extremely gifted tunesmith and facile craftsman with an uncanny instinct for writing music devoid of any meaningful substance.
Maria Kliegel can be heard in a wide range of repertoire that she has recorded for Naxos; with over 50 entries in their catalog, she is perhaps the company’s leading “stable” cellist, a term that unfortunately carries certain uncomplimentary connotations. Be assured that in Kliegel’s case they are not deserved, for she is a fantastic player with solid technique, spot-on intonation, and robust tone, which she projects with a great deal of confidence and authority. If her delivery is not quite as smooth and refined as that of the aforementioned Jamie Walton, my sense is that she wants us to perceive Saint-Saëns as both more serious and more substantive than he is often taken to be.
François-Joël Thiollier has also recorded extensively for Naxos, having made a specialty of the French piano repertoire. His partnering with Kliegel is a natural. For the excellent performances, fine sound, budget price, and smart programming, I’m inclined to call this disc indispensable for lovers of chamber music for cello and piano.
FANFARE: Jerry Dubins
Ireland: Violin Sonatas Nos. 1 & 2 - Cello Sonata
Guarnieri: Choros, Vol. 2 / Tibiriçá, São Paulo Symphony
In his Choros, Guarnieri wrote music that conjures up the landscape and essence of Brazil. These very personal concertos reveal the composer’s refined instrumental combinations and elegant contrapuntal writing, while their dance rhythms are vivacious, drawing on the baião, maracatu and embolada. The Chorosin this second volume represent all stages of Guarnieri’s compositional development. Also included is the delightful and inventive Florde Tremembé, an early work with choro-like features. The first volume is also available on Naxos.
REVIEW:
This release, the second of two, contains Guarnieri’s Choros for clarinet (1956), piano (1956), cello (1961) and viola (1975). All four abound in high-spirited dancelike passages with syncopated Latin rhythms, alternating with music of pastoral lyricism, and usually end in a celebratory, carnival atmosphere.
The later pair, for strings, are slightly more modernist: the composer even employs a 12-tone row in the viola concerto, but his lightness of touch and Brazilian exuberance are not affected (Guarnieri hated 12-tone music and penned articles about how unnatural he found it – then wrote some to prove he could!) The program also contains an early work for chamber orchestra, Flor de Tremembé (1937), which is jazzy with echoes of Gershwin.
This disc is even more fun than Volume 1. The musicians are absolutely at home with Guarnieri’s idiom: Roberto Tibiriçá’s tempos are spot on, the soloists are terrific, the sound first rate. This Choros for Clarinet should be as popular as the Clarinet Concerto by Copland (who, incidentally, was the composer’s friend and benefactor in the US).
--Limelight (Phillip Scott)
Rossini: Il Signor Bruschino / Desderi, Codeluppi, Et Al
Paganini: Violin Concertos Nos. 1 & 2
Tyberg: Symphony No 2, Piano Sonata No 2 / Bidini, Falletta, Buffalo
TYBERG Symphony No. 2. Piano Sonata No. 21 • 1Fabio Bidini (pn); JoAnn Falletta, cond; Buffalo PO • NAXOS 8.572822 (74: 47)
I defy the average educated listener not to call out the name of Anton Bruckner within seconds of the start of Marcel Tyberg’s Second Symphony. The cut of the melodies, the rhythms, the sectional construction, and the scoring are utterly characteristic of the Viennese master—who died in 1896, three years after Tyberg was born. Most curious. That impression continues throughout the first movement, and off and on (but mostly on) throughout the entire symphony. Indeed, the thing that is least Brucknerian about Tyberg’s symphony, which was composed in 1927, is that it is barely 42 minutes long. (To be fair, there’s a bit of Korngold as the symphony reaches its conclusion.) In other words, Tyberg concludes his movements just when Bruckner would have been getting his second wind. I am astonished that Bruckner’s name does not come up once in the entirety of Edward Yadzinski’s booklet note. Perhaps he thought mentioning it would have been the epitome of obviousness. I’m not really suggesting that Tyberg’s Second is on a par with Bruckner’s symphonies—at times it sounds a little awkwardly put together, and too terse—but it is a fascinating, fascinating near miss, and really very enjoyable, and if this disc doesn’t get wide exposure, at least because Tyberg’s unknown symphony is so doggedly familiar (!), then there is no justice in the world. Falletta and the Buffalo Philharmonic play the heck out of it, by the way, and Naxos’s engineering is lustrous.
The Piano Sonata No. 2 is no less fine. Bruckner wrote no piano sonatas, I believe, but Brahms completed three of them, and there are times when Tyberg’s sturdy, 33-minute sonata sounds as if it is aiming to be “Brahms’s Fourth.” The hyper-masculine opening gesture, for example, and the feminine response that it receives, would hardly be out of place in Brahms. Other influences appear in this sonata, however, including, strangely enough, Szymanowski. Again, call this music derivative if you like, but there’s no escaping that Tyberg’s lack of innovation is not dull but really rather delightful, given the attractiveness of the material. Pianist Bidini makes a very good case for it, playing it with plenty of romantic temperament, and with steely wrists and fingers.
I missed Naxos’s earlier Tyberg release (8.572236) in which his Third Symphony is paired with his Piano Trio. Jerry Dubins and Robert Markow both welcomed it strongly; in fact, it made the latter reviewer’s Want List in 2011. There also was a feature article in Fanfare 34: 2 in which Falletta discussed Tyberg. To make a long story short, Tyberg, who had a Jewish relative several generations back, was a victim of the Nazis and died in 1944. He spent his young years in Vienna, but around the time of the Second Symphony, he relocated to what today is part of Italy. Shortly before his deportation, he entrusted his music manuscripts to a friend, and they were passed on to that friend’s son, who ended up in Buffalo. After spending years trying to interest various conductors in Tyberg’s scores, he finally attracted Falletta’s attention. She recognized the music’s worth, and if a Tyberg revival is in the works, we can thank her, and the efforts of the Marcel Tyberg Musical Legacy Fund of the Foundation for Jewish Philanthropies in Buffalo.
Knowing that I have a tendency to be excitable, I don’t want to overdo my praise for this music or for this release, but glorioski, this is enjoyable stuff.
FANFARE: Raymond Tuttle
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Marcel Tyberg’s Second Symphony sounds a bit like Bruckner for people who hate Bruckner. It features thematic material uncannily similar to Tyberg’s Austrian predecessor, only married to a more traditional, pithy approach to form. It lasts just 42 minutes, and so in comparison confirms Bruckner’s own originality, or incompetence, depending on your perspective. There’s nothing here that might make you sit up and say, “Aha, that must be Tyberg,” but it is beautifully scored, well-made music nonetheless. The Adagio is particularly lovely, basically diatonic in harmony, but with tunes that never go exactly where you expect them to. Had Tyberg survived the Second World War and written more in this vein, we might go so far as to call it “personal”.
The Piano Sonata No. 2 dwells squarely in the world of Beethoven and Brahms, but again with remarkable success. It’s a large work in four movements, and even more than in the symphony the centerpiece is an Adagio drawn on a very large scale. The finale, so often the Achilles’ heel in Romantic music, is actually the shortest movement, but full of contrast and quite satisfying, thus revealing that Tyberg’s classical sympathies go beyond mere imitation.
The sonata is very well played by Fabio Bidini, a pianist who takes its challenges in stride and shapes each movement quite effectively. As in the previous release in this series, JoAnn Falletta and the Buffalo Philharmonic take charge of the orchestral component, offering a performance of the symphony full of character and conviction. The Foundation for Jewish Philanthropies in Buffalo sponsored this recording through its Marcel Tyberg Musical Legacy Fund. That such a thing even exists is just one of those facts that makes you feel good about life, as does Tyberg’s music. Go for it.
-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com
Soprano Songs And Arias / Ana María Martínez
Includes work(s) by various composers. Ensemble: Prague Philharmonia. Conductor: Steven Mercurio. Soloist: Ana Maria Martinez.
The Best Of Paganini
The Organ Encyclopedia - Muffat: Organ Works Vol 1
Muffat, a student of Jean-Baptiste Lully, lived and composed at the cusp of a new era in European history. He stepped beyond the limitations of national character, and sought to incorporate elements of Italian and German music in his own French compositions. He was also aware of the new tonality put forth in the 'Well-Tempered Clavier' by his contemporary, J. S. Bach. Though Part I of the 'Apparatus' uses mean tuning, he was eager to experiment with the newer even temperament, which he did in Part II, so it could not be recorded on this instrument. Given the choice, however, Part I is much more interesting listening.
Zaimont: Chroma - Northern Lights
Chamber Music (Saxophone Quartet) - Ives, C. / Higdon, J. /
Higdon: All Things Majestic / Guerrero, Nashville Symphony
All Things Majestic is a four-movement suite with each movement inspired by some feature of the American landscape. There are, to be frank, lots of similar pieces by American composers, and you would be hard pressed to point to stylistic qualities that say “Higdon” as opposed to quite a few of those others, but once again there’s no denying the quality of workmanship throughout. The performances, too, do the music proud, with Roberto Diaz (viola) and James Button (oboe) the excellent soloists, and Giancarlo Guerrero leading the Nashville Symphony with unflagging enthusiasm. A beautifully produced disc, all around.
– ClassicsToday (David Hurwitz)
Zemlinsky: The Mermaid, Sinfonietta / Judd, New Zealand SO
--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com
Guitar Recital / Vladimir Gorbach
Brilliant young guitarist Vladimir Gorbach, first-prize winner of the Guitar Foundation of America’s International Concert Artist Competition in 2011, has constructed a programme to showcase the variety and versatility of his instrument. Piazzolla’s Estaciones porteñas are richly evocative seasonal portraits vested with his indelible sense of verve. Scarlatti’s inexhaustible sonatas are increasingly popular in guitar transcription, the four here showing his originality and dexterity, whilst Giuliani’s Rondoletto is full of dazzling escapades for the guitar. Vicente Asencio’s Collectici íntim is drenched in vibrant Spanish colours and rhythms.
Latin-American Music for Guitar
Schmidt-Kowalski, T.: Symphony No. 4 / Violin Concerto No. 2
Rachmaninov: Variations on a Theme of Chopin and other piano
THEMES OF THE BIG BANDS: Let's Dance! (1934-1947)
BECHET, Sidney: Spreadin' Joy (1940-1950)
GREGORIAN CHANT
Glazunov: Symphonies No 3 & 9 / Anissimov, Moscow Symphony
Laureate Series, Guitar - Denis Azabagic
Azabagic's masterful performance of Federico Moreno's 'Torroba's Sonatina' balances the works rhapsodic soul with flights of technical fancy. This young guitarist's repertorial choices are fascinating. The darkly colored tone poem 'La Catedral' by Augustín Barrios Mangoré impresses with its pious eloquence. Azabagic's playing is especially impressive in the work's surging Andante religioso second movement.
This is a most impressive recording by a startlingly talented young musician with a very promising future.
Haydn: Symphonies No 66, 67 And 68 / Bélos Drahos, Esterházy
Reger, M.: Organ Works, Vol. 3
Rachmaninov: Symphony No 2 / Anissimov, Ireland National So
HOLIDAY, Billie: Fine and Mellow (1936-1941)
MILLER, Glenn: Glen Island Special (1938-1942)
