Complementing his highly praised Naxos series of Turina' piano music, Jordi Maso Acute joins Eva Leo Acute to present Turina's two violin sonatas.

Includes sonata(s) by Dietrich Buxtehude. Soloists: John Holloway (Violin), Ursula Weiss, Jaap ter Linden, Mogens Rasmussen, Lars Ulrik Mortensen.

Benjamin Britten was throughout his life drawn to folk-song, possessing a special gift for wordsetting and vocal writing. This second disc of the complete folk song arrangements focuses on the orchestral versions and the volumes for guitar and harp.

John Rutter's own recording of his beloved Requiem--with his Cambridge Singers on Collegium--already has been reissued on a CD that includes the Magnificat. That performance, in its setting for choir and orchestra, remains the Requiem of choice, although this new version--with Rutter as recording producer--offers a first-rate rendition of the composer's alternative chamber arrangement of the Requiem along with several rarely-heard--or never-before-recorded--choral and organ works. The Clare College Choir, with whom Rutter has a history both during his days as a music student and later as the choir's director, gives the kind of technically solid and interpretively meaningful performance that we would expect, considering the composer's hands-on involvement and well-known concern for accuracy, both musical and sonic. Like Caroline Ashton on Rutter's Collegium disc, Clare's Elin Manahan Thomas delivers the soprano solos with a clear, ringing, effortlessly natural quality, and the choir is a model of responsiveness and sensitivity in phrasing and dynamics, preserving ideal balance across registers and among vocal sections.


The reason Rutter fans will have to have this is for the premieres and for the handful of rarely-heard organ works--and any listeners who believe this composer to be rather predictable and one-sided in style will find numerous surprises to jar their impressions. Two of the premieres--the anthems Arise, shine and Come down, O Love divine--show a more complex Rutter, whose harmonic style and concept of textual development takes us into richer and far more intellectually/musically challenging territory than we're used to, a nod both to Howells and to Britten. The organ pieces--both for solo (Toccata in seven) and duet (Variations on an Easter theme)--show a thorough command of the idiom and are laced with Rutter's usual catchy rhythms and inventive melodic twists. One of the highlights is the anthem for choir and flute, Musica Dei domum, with its beautiful instrumental solo and organlike choral utterances. The sound, from Berkshire, England's Douai Abbey, provides ideal space and resonance for these eminently singable--and listenable--pieces, works that belong in the collection of every true lover of choral music. [4/26/2003]
--David Vernier, ClassicsToday.com

Listen to the Naxos Podcast to learn more about this release

Described by Opera News as “an important addition to the American operatic canon,” Sister Carrie takes as its themes the lure of money and social standing. Robert Aldridge’s inventive score is richly melodic and unapologetically tonal. Herschel Garfein’s libretto is based on Theodore Dreiser’s groundbreaking 1900 novel, which depicts a small-town girl’s tortuous path to fame and her lover’s abject descent into despair. Aldridge and Garfein’s Elmer Gantry was a two-time Grammy Award winner. Here, the lead roles are played by Mezzo-soprano Adriana Zabala, baritone Keith Phares, tenor Matt Morgan, and soprano Alisa Suzanne Jordheim.

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REVIEW:

Robert Aldrige’s Sister Carrie is obviously one of the most important additions to America’s present day operatic repertoire. The music is purely tonal and traditionally consists of solo arias, duets and ensembles, it general tenure remaining in the world of mainstream popular opera. Based on the novel by Theodore Dreiser, the plot, too complex to detail here, examines the need for women in the early 20th-Century to use anything — sexual attractions being a good starting point — if they want to climb the social scale, not concerning themselves too much who they hurt on the way up.

In the part of Carrie, the American mezzo Adriana Zabala sings with a dramatic intensity that is ideal for this ‘nothing will stop me’ girl. Keith Phares, as the ill-fated Hurstwood, has a warm baritone voice, and his two joined arias as the central point in the second act are deeply moving. As a foil the light tenor of Matt Morgan makes an ideal Charlie Drouet, who has the good fortune of escaping her clutches. In the cameo role of the socialite, Mrs. Vance, Ariana Douglas, is outstanding, with Alisa Suzzane Jordheim as a vibrant actress, Lola Sterling. Presumably recorded ‘live’ at the opera’s premiere in Milwaukee last October, the balance between singers and orchestra is very well handled, the recording creating an effect of a small venue. There are no stage noises, and thankfully no audience applause during or at the end of acts.

– David's Review Corner (David Denton)

Liszt’s Etudes d’execution transcendante enshrine the spirit of High Romanticism, embodying extremes of expressive drama and technical virtuosity. His encyclopedic approach to technique is shown at its most dazzling in this cycle, heard here in the 1852 revision which Liszt himself declared ‘the only authentic one.’ Integration of musical and technical elements is absolute, and the music’s narratives are supported by dramatic physicality, an orchestral richness of sonority, and an exceptional coloristic quality. The young Moscow-born Israeli pianist Boris Giltburg is lauded across the globe as a deeply sensitive, insightful and compelling musician. Born in 1984 in Moscow, he moved to Tel Aviv at an early age, studying with his mother and then with Arie Vardi. He went on to win numerous awards, most recently the Second Prize at the Rubinstein Competition in 2011, and in 2013 he won First Prize at the Queen Elisabeth Competition, catapulting his career to a new level.



REVIEW:

Boris Giltburg is a phenomenon. The music seems to ooze from every pore of his being, and he makes us think anew about what we are listening to. I renewed acquaintance with favored recordings from my collection (Ashkenazy, Berezovsky, Berman, Gekic, Kempf, Kultyshev, Strelchenko, Trifonov), but this one stands out for its ability to challenge the mind when thinking about Liszt’s magnificent opus.

– American Record Guide

Seattle Symphony’s first holiday album embraces works composed specifically for Christmas as well as other pieces that convey a universal message of peace, love and hope—the essence of humanity’s highest aspirations. Music Director Gerard Schwarz asked two composers, the Symphony’s Composer in Residence Samuel Jones and Seattle Symphony Principal Oboe Ben Hausmann, to “make the music their own” by scoring several of the pieces to retain the unaffected simplicity of these well-known Christmas and concert works. Schwarz joined them in this task, arranging or editing several of the pieces, with the resulting works celebrating the remarkable artistry of the musicians of the Orchestra. In these new settings, recorded entirely in Benaroya Hall, the music emerges with honest, untarnished beauty.

Recording of the Month

Ferdinand Ries was Beethoven’s student, close friend and biographer, but until quite recently was very much one of those composers living in the shadow of his Bonn master, rather than as the gifted and prolific composer he in fact was.

American pianist, author and educator Susan Kagan has explored the music of those composers associated with Beethoven and his musical scene. In fact she has researched the music of Archduke Rudolph – Beethoven’s composition student for more than twenty years – for her Ph.D. This was subsequently published by Pendragon Press back in 1988. More recently she has almost single-handedly championed the cause of Ries’s piano music, with five CDs of his Sonatas and Sonatinas on the Naxos label.

Kagan explains: ‘Ries studied piano with Beethoven (both were natives of Bonn, Germany) and was entrusted by him with such work as making transcriptions and piano arrangements, and copying orchestral parts of Beethoven’s new works. Ries moved to England in 1813, married an Englishwoman, and had a successful career touring as a virtuoso concert pianist. At the same time he was composing prodigiously and virtually everything he wrote was published. His thorough knowledge of Beethoven’s music undoubtedly helped shape Ries’s style, but his piano sonatas, from 1809 on, show an adventurous turn toward an expressive keyboard style anticipating that of the first generation of Romantic piano composers – Mendelssohn, Chopin, and Schumann. His gift for melody is like Schubert’s, and he is ever inventive in creating and developing beautiful themes. While his symphonies and concertos are ‘public’ works, intended for large audiences and concert halls, the piano sonatas are his most personally-expressive works, revealing an individual outlook on a genre of music cultivated by that great triumvirate of the Classical period – Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven.’

Ries also composed eighteen violin sonatas, which were brought out by Bonn music-publisher, Simrock, who also published much of Beethoven’s music. On this latest release from Naxos, Kagan is joined by violinist and fellow-American Eric Grossman, in an exploration of three of Ries’s violin sonatas, two from his op. 8 set, and his op. 19, all world-première recordings. However, unlike the piano sonatas, which have been released as part of a series of volumes, by starting here with a well-chosen selection from the eighteen extant examples, it gives the record company the option of releasing further violin sonatas in the future, or just letting this present single CD speak on behalf of the other fifteen.

It is interesting that the opening movements of the Sonata in F, Op. 8 No. 1, recorded first, and the Sonata in C minor, Op. 8 No. 2 that follows, have more than just a passing acquaintance with movements by Beethoven himself. While the latter first movement is very reminiscent of the corresponding movement from Beethoven’s Piano Sonata in the same key, Op. 10 No. 3, the F major Sonata opens in a pastoral vein, with a main theme which immediately hints at Beethoven’s ‘Spring’ Sonata for violin and piano in the same key. Rather than reinforcing the idea that Ries is merely mimicking his teacher – what follows, in both of Ries’s sonatas, after the initial ‘homage to Ludwig’, really does confirm that the younger composer has an individual voice, and subsequently embarks on quite a different musical journey from his master.

Of the violin sonatas as a whole, Kagan continues: ‘(They) are models of the Viennese Classical sonata style established by Mozart: most are in three movements, with first movements in sonata-allegro form, lyrical slow movements in ternary (ABA) form, and rondo finales. Like Mozart, Ries divides the material to provide equal interest for both instruments.’ The Sonata in F largely adheres to this pattern, though is, in fact, a four-movement work, with a sprightly Scherzo and Trio in the tonic minor (F minor) following the opening ‘Allegro ma non troppo’, before a conventional, though short slow movement, leads to the finale, with its essentially rustic theme. However, this soon contrasts with the central episode, where staccato triplets evolve into a vigorous fugato section (like a fugue, but not fully played-out), and something which, according to Kagan in her compact, yet succinct and informative sleeve-notes, is an unusual event in Ries’s music, where polyphonic writing is ‘generally avoided’.

The characteristic dotted rhythms and robust dynamics of the ‘Allegro con spirito’ that open the Sonata in C minor, imbue it initially with an almost martial character, but this soon turns lyrical, in which vein the ensuing ‘Adagio cantabile’ slow movement continues, and which also then acts as the perfect aperitif to the lightness of the closing rondo, with its staccato texture and preponderance of rapid repeated notes.

The so-named Grande Sonata in F minor, while the shortest of the three works on the CD, is nevertheless conceived in large scale, both with regards structure and content, and with its key, and the dramatic insistence of the opening movement’s main theme, link it in character to Beethoven’s ‘Appassionata’ piano sonata, written some five years earlier. Unlike Beethoven’s work, Ries’s sonata begins with a short and poignant ‘Largo espressivo’ introduction – not unlike the opening of Beethoven’s earlier ‘Pathétique’ sonata, but providing nowhere near as dramatic a lead-in. Ries maintains the feverish mood of the ‘Allegro agitato’ throughout, despite the occasional sections away from the over-arching minor tonality, and the movement’s calmly-understated close. The following slow movement, in a gentle triple measure, and in the relative major key (A flat major), has a simple charm and eloquence that makes it extremely endearing and pleasing on the ear, but with sufficient contrast within, to hold the listener’s attention throughout. The overall playful mood of the final rondo also has more than enough variety, both rhythmically and melodically in its main theme and episodes, to sustain it, with some real fireworks in the central episode. The music has a decidedly Schubertian feel, both thematically, and in Ries’s use of tonality, where more remote keys figure, and there is often a characteristic shift from major to minor and back. Yet again Ries chooses to finish like a lamb, rather than a lion – something Beethoven does in the opening movement of his ‘Appassionata’, but not in the work’s tumultuous and clattering coda to the finale.

Whichever way you look at this latest Ries CD from Naxos, you will surely not be disappointed. The playing, positioning and recording are first-rate, and the three pieces recorded are charming, entertaining and with a good feel for motivic development. Whether they form part of a more extended investigation into the composer’s repertoire for violin and piano, or remain just a one-off sampler, at the bargain price offered, they are simply too good to miss.

– Philip R Buttall, MusicWeb International

In his first decade in Vienna, Beethoven seems to have been preoccupied with music for wind instruments. The best-known example is his Quintet in E flat major, Op. 16, which he arranged at the same time for piano quartet. He also wrote music for dances and settings of folk songs, and reflected the public’s interest in automata by writing for musical clock. The Napoleonic wars were mirrored in Beethoven’s music of the period, especially in his military compositions such as a series of Marches and the Equali, scored for trombones, which were later played at his funeral. The Naxos Beethoven Complete Edition 90-album boxed set (8.500250) features a host of fragments, sketches, drafts, arrangements, transcriptions and reconstructions. Following Sergio Gallo’s Piano Pieces and Fragments (8.574131) and the Fine Arts Quartet’s Fugues and Rarities for String Quartet (8.574051) albums, this new release includes many lesser-known works that will attract connoisseurs and completists, and casual listeners as well.

Valery Gavrilin was one of the most colorful and significant Russian composers of the second half of the 20th century. He was only 25 when he composed 'The Russian Notebook,' a 'poem of love and death' crafted in a new musical language that doesn't employ folk melodies but does use folkloric texts, and with a virtuosic vocal part. These stylized tunes are combined with rich melodies to form a haunting cycle heard here in a 2018 orchestration. The ten numbers from the ballet 'Anyuta' are lively, melodious and touchingly beautiful. Yuri Serov has toured across over 35 countries and has recorded more than 70 albums for record labels across the world. Serov is chief conductor of the Volgograd Philharmonic Orchestra and the St. Petersburg Mussorgsky Youth Symphony Orchestra, and is the author of many articles and essays on music.

Although the coming "Bach Year" has many labels and listeners focused on the formidable legacy of Johann Sebastian, perhaps we also should take this time to more actively explore the work of a contemporary who not only was a friend (he was godfather to Bach's son, C.P.E.), but whose music was specifically admired by J.S. and even had some measure of influence in Bach's own work. Georg Philipp Telemann not only was prolific, he wrote for nearly every musical genre, from instrumental concertos and orchestral pieces to solo keyboard and vocal works to cantatas and oratorios to opera. He wrote a really terrific set of 12 solo violin Fantaisies--nowhere near the monumental masterpieces of Bach's Sonatas and Partitas, but skillfully written and eminently engaging--that were virtually ignored by major violinists until Andrew Manze's superb recording on Harmonia Mundi a few years ago. And now we have this outstanding recording of Overtures--which essentially are orchestral suites à la Handel or Bach--that immediately will convince any doubters and please those who already know that Telemann was a master composer of the first rank. This is music you can listen to over and over without the slightest shadowy intrusion of boredom. It's almost as if Telemann consciously incorporated the best of French, Italian, and German styles into one, not forgetting to include the stately gait and elegant melodic character of Handelian dance in some of the movements. And as good as the music is, the playing on this CD is as good as it gets. Although the instruments are modern, the playing style is as articulate, clean, and detailed as that of the best period orchestras. The bassoon and oboe soloists deserve special praise. [12/10/1999] --David Vernier, ClassicsToday.com

RACHMANINOFF Preludes (complete) • Eldar Nebolsin (pn) • NAXOS 8.570327 (77: 44)


The technical and musical demands of the Rachmaninoff preludes are legion. A partial catalog might include: the ability to negotiate massive chords, sensitively voiced and often in quick succession; seamless arpeggios; perfect thirds, sixths, and other double-note figurations; a wide variety of attack and release strategies; the most delicate, leggierissimo fioratura; infinitely calibrated effects of crescendo, diminuendo, accelerando , and meno mosso ; intelligent rubato; and perhaps above all, the ability to launch and sustain a singing line. To these requirements might be added some suggestion of that special attribute (of which Rachmaninoff himself was the unexcelled exemplar) namely, the ability to suggest aural planes—a vivid foreground, mid-distance, and background—capable of revealing the most complex textures to the listener. Happily, this new recording reveals Eldar Nebolsin as a pianist equal to these demands.


After encountering Ashkenazy’s recording of these pieces from the mid 1970s (Decca 475 8238), I find Nebolsin’s interpretations are a breath of fresh air. Each piece unfolds as a miniature drama with its own unique character, lending the entire set great variety of mood—from serene tranquility, to ebullient joy, to the most crushing sadness. Nothing in these interpretations suggests the routine. Nebolsin is hypersensitive to each of Rachmaninoff’s articulation indications, pedal markings, and dynamic subtleties. And while the performances are thoughtful, they never sound fussy. In every instance, one has the feeling that this bouquet of late-Romantic expression emanates directly from the pianist’s heart.


The highest compliment that may be paid Nebolsin’s technique is that, in its complete subordination to the music, one is simply never aware of it. His sound is always beautiful, whether in the transparency of the most massive fortissimos or in the rainbow of subtly contrasted pianissimos. If the soaring op. 23/2 takes flight effortlessly, its fierce left-hand figurations never obtrude on the ebb and flow of exultant musical substance. The exquisite op. 23/10 breathes all the freshness of dew on delicate blossoms opening to the morning sun; the voice leading is simply gorgeous. The great B-Minor Prelude (op. 32/10) begins with a heart-rending sadness, so immobilized and still that the subsequent chordal section assumes an awesome grandeur of uncanny power and eloquence.


The recording was made in Westleton, Suffok, U.K., this past January and is, in all technical aspects, commendable. One hopes that, despite the inevitable vicissitudes of career-building, this 33-year-old pianist will continue to exhibit this degree of instrumental prowess in the service of a sensitive and deeply artistic musicality. Highly recommended.


FANFARE: Patrick Rucker

This fine disc makes a superb introduction to Frank Bridge's orchestral music. The performance of Enter Spring has greater clarity and rhythmic spring than Richard Hickox's recent Chandos version, and in The Sea, James Judd offers the most exciting finale on CD. In the first movement, though, Charles Groves' interpretation (EMI) remains the most focused and shapely of phrase. The two shorter works, the impressionistic Summer and the charming Two Poems, have plenty of atmosphere and spirit. The New Zealand Symphony's lean sonority suits the music well--Bridge never was much given to Romantic fuzziness--and Naxos provides clean, impactful sonics. If I don't have much else to say it's because there's no need to. This is simply well conducted, well played, and well recorded, and an excellent bargain. [9/9/2004]--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Classical Music

A top-quality conclusion to a series which has given some brilliant and idiosyncratic music.

This disc is announced as the final instalment of Gilbert Rowland’s Naxos cycle of the complete Sonatas for Harpsichord by Padre Antonio Soler. I haven’t heard all of the earlier volumes, so I won’t attempt any kind of comprehensive statement about the project as a whole, but my impression, for what it’s worth, is that the series has got better and better as it has gone on. I agree with Patrick Waller (see his review of Volume 12) that the recorded sound has improved in later volumes; it was rather clattery and echoing on some of the early discs, but there are certainly no problems with the sound on this final volume. My sense is also that Gilbert Rowland has come to sound more and more at home with the music, his playing increasingly relaxed, his phrasing more flexible and his range of tonal colours more various. Whether or not these (remembered) impressions are correct, what I can say with some confidence is that this final disc is full of exciting and exhilarating music, played with considerable panache.

Spanish musical traditions are, of course, a central element in Soler’s harpsichord music; traditional Spanish dance rhythms are very clearly audible in the almost seven minutes of the central allegro (marked ‘assai spiritoso’) of Sonata 66, played here with sympathetic (and technically assured) flair; Spanish idioms are also very much to the fore in the opening Cantabile of Sonata 60. At times (as in Sonata 76) the influence of Domenico Scarlatti, Soler’s erstwhile teacher is evident. But Soler clearly listened rather more widely - at times the music prompts one to think of C.P.E. Bach.

Elsewhere, Soler’s fugues would satisfy all but the most pedantically rigorous of Germanic theorists. The fugal third movement of Sonata 66 is a delight, though some of its modulations might perhaps upset that hypothetical pedantic theorist; surely even he (or she?) would find little to complain about in the ‘intento a 4’ which closes Sonata 68, beautifully worked out and technically very accomplished.

But if Soler could be ‘correct’, he could also be somewhat shocking. The allegro in 6/8 of Sonata 60 is full of unexpected leaps and begins with some unconventional harmonies (“almost Bartókian” says Rowland in his characteristically useful booklet notes) that even now retain some of their power to startle.

Rowland responds to the range of this music and, on this disc at any rate, plays it with real innerness. At times here, as on some of the earlier volumes, I wondered whether one or two of the pieces might not work better still on the organ, but that is a quibble which shouldn’t detract from our gratitude to Rowland and to Naxos for the completion of this substantial project. I believe that the only sonatas by Soler which were ever published during the Eighteenth Century were those which appeared as XXVII Sonatas para clave, published around 1796 by Richard Birchall of London. So there is an aptness in the choice of a British (Rowland was born in Glasgow) harpsichordist as the protagonist for this series. In this final disc he plays a two manual instrument by Andrew Wooderson, made in 2005 and modelled on 1750 instrument from the Goermans workshop in Paris – and with its bright (but not excessively so) sound and clear articulation it enables Rowland to do something like full justice to this engaging music.

-- Glyn Pursglove, MusicWeb International

Australian composer John Antill is best remembered for his exuberant, outstandingly successful and ever-popular ballet Corroboree. Drawing on material Antill notated in 1913 at an Aboriginal Corroboree in Botany Bay.

Includes symphony(ies) by Sergio Rendine. Ensemble: Andorra National Chamber Orchestra. Conductor: Marzio Conti.

The Vieuxtemps violin concertos offer a feast for violinists (and listeners) who are attuned to their special charms and have an affinity for Romantic concertos. Misha Keylin scores on both counts. He's a Russian-born, Juilliard-trained American whose traversal of these works for Naxos is capped by this installment of the final three. The Fifth is the most popular of them all, with splendid recordings by Heifetz and Grumiaux, and Keylin's is right up there with them, and better engineered too. He's somewhere between Heifetz's supercharged virtuosity and Grumiaux's slightly understated elegance, combining both of those essential qualities. The Fifth is an oddly constructed work in three movements, the first being three times longer than the other two. While Keylin excels in that dramatic first movement, the sheer poetry of his Adagio and the brilliant tonal qualities he demonstrates in the fiery brief last movement make his performance especially memorable.


The Sixth and Seventh concertos date from Vieuxtemps' last year, 1881, but there are few valedictory qualities to be found in them. The Sixth is a delightful confection pervaded by a light-hearted spirit and teeming with fetching melodies. The longest movement is the first, an Allegro moderato from which drama is largely excluded, the soloist given the requisite virtuoso fiddling duties but within a lyrical context. Keylin's relaxed phrasing and his rich but sugar-free tone make the most of the beauties of the Pastorale, and he's alive to the rhythmic subtleties that make the Siciliano movement so enticing. The Seventh Concerto is made of sterner virtuoso stuff, as in the coda to the first movement, where Keylin never makes anything approaching a strained or ugly sound, and he sails through the final Allegro vivo without appearing to break a sweat. Throughout the disc, Keylin's technical facility is allied to real feeling for the music, without which these works can strain interest.


It's not just a one-man show, either. Both conductors and orchestras provide first-rate support (Yuasa and the Arnhem Philharmonic in the Seventh and Mogrelia and the Slovak Radio band in the other two), and the engineering captures the performances with admirable realism. At the Naxos price, this is a steal. [9/6/2003]
--Dan Davis, ClassicsToday.com

All tracks have been digitally mastered using 24-bit technology.

BrundibAr is part of an inspiring human legacy. Hans KrAsa' beautiful children' opera, performed 55 times at the Terezin concentration camp, stands as a memorial to it's original performers, the child inmates of Terezin. Tony Kushner' acclaimed new English.

Liszt Complete Piano Music, Vol. 20: Gnomenreigen, Waldesrau

GINASTERA String Quartets: No. 1; No. 2; No. 3 1 • Ens? Qrt; Lucy Shelton (sop) 1 • NAXOS 8.570780 (73:31 Text and Translation)


More than most, Ginastera’s compositional output may be divided into three stylistic periods. His early works, using an impressionist language, were nationalistic in influence and drew heavily on Argentine dance rhythms. During his middle period, he expanded the scope of his tonality while remaining attached to his Hispanic roots, and in his late works he turned to contemporary avant-garde idioms. In my view, his best work comes from the middle period: the brilliant Harp Concerto and the succinct Variaciones concertantes. He was more individual than in his early impressionistic mode, and paradoxically more individual than he was to become after he adopted the standard stylistic traits of the 1960s and 1970s. His first two string quartets date from the beginning and end of that middle period.


Ginastera’s quartets demand a high level of virtuosity from the performers. Extreme dynamics, high harmonics, and syncopated rhythms requiring tight ensemble appear throughout. The First Quartet of 1948 is notable for its light-footed Scherzo ( vivacissimo ), its atmospheric slow movement ( calmo e poetico ), and a vigorous, stamping finale ( allegramente rustico ).


A similar wispy Scherzo movement occurs in the Second Quartet (1958, rev. 1968), but there it is deconstructed. In five movements, the Second Quartet contains an “extra” movement built from a series of cadenzas from each of the instruments ( libero e rapsodico ), before plunging into its own modernized version of a dance-inflected finale. The first movement presents a 12-tone theme, the first use of that technique in the composer’s work.


By the time of the Third Quartet, Ginastera had left his previous formal procedures behind. He introduced a soprano soloist, as did Schoenberg in his Second Quartet—a precedent of which the status-conscious Argentine composer was well aware. He set texts by Jiménez, Lorca, and Alberti, illuminating the soprano’s vocalizing and occasional spoken declamation with a series of ingenious string effects. The imagery and atmosphere of the poems dictate the musical form, so the task for the musicians is to reproduce specific moods, on top of the considerable technical challenges.


Previous recordings of all three quartets exist, though only one currently available brings them together on a single CD: the Cuarteto Latinoamericano (on Élan). I have not heard that disc, but I have the Latinoamericano recording of Quartet No. 1 in a mixed program from the same label (which may or may not be the same performance): they bring genuine excitement and tight ensemble to the piece, but are equally matched by the Ens? on this new release.


The original performers of the Third Quartet, Benita Valente and the Juilliard Quartet, recorded the work for the Bridge label in an interesting mixed recital that is well worth hearing for the couplings by Harbison and Wernick. Valente sings with great control and understanding, but the recording was made some 27 years after the event, by which time her voice had lost much of its bloom.


On the new disc, Lucy Shelton is a revelation: she brings pure tone and a wide range of vocal color to her interpretation. (Valente is more convincing in the relatively few spoken passages.) The U.S.-based Ens? Quartet plays with warmth and unanimity, meeting all the technical and interpretive hurdles with apparent ease. Naxos’s sound is excellent, the timing is generous, and a translation of the poetry is provided, making this CD the version of choice, regardless of price.


FANFARE: Phillip Scott

Antonio Sacchini is one of those highly talented musicians who hover at the periphery of music history but were greatly successful in their lifetime. In the case of Sacchini an echo of his fame can be heard through the present work which has some claims to be his masterpiece. It was performed regularly at the Paris Opéra between 1787 and 1830, which is remarkable indeed and then was revived in 1843.

He was born in Florence but was taken to Naples at the age of four where he was admitted to the Conservatorio when he was ten. His teacher was Francesco Durante, who is probably more well-known today. He obviously moved about within Italy and gained recognition both as opera composer and singing teacher. One of his pupils was Nancy Storace, who among other things was Mozart’s first Susanna in Le nozze di Figaro - “The Julie Andrews of the 18th Century” as one source nicely puts it.

He then went to Stuttgart and Munich and came to London in 1772 where he remained for ten years. At first successful, he later ran into financial trouble and moved to Paris in 1781. There he became a favourite with the Queen but met opposition from parts of the musical establishment. His opera Dardanus was staged at Fontainebleau in 1785 but to his grief Œdipe lay unperformed during his lifetime. The disappointment is said to have contributed to his death. In 1787 Œdipe reached the Opéra; too late for the composer.

Listening to this recording it is easy to understand the longevity of the work. It is a highly accomplished piece of music drama, pointing forward beyond Gluck, who is the closest contemporary comparison. In fact there is a Gluckian nobility in the more reflective moments. Sacchini also has a dramatic integrity and power in the long and often intense accompanied recitatives. At his best, as in the long scene with Œdipe and Antigone in act two (CD1 tr. 14-16), he tends to overshadow even Mozart for dramatic acuity, though he can’t compete with the Salzburg master when it comes to musical invention and melodic memorability. Still he writes expressive and grateful music, as for example the singing part for Polynice in the first scene (CD1 tr. 3) and at the beginning of scene 4 (CD1 tr. 10). Antigone’s aria in act three (CD2 tr. 2), is heroic and tragic to match the text. This is a fairly long aria; mostly they are very short but his flexible style allows him to move more or less imperceptibly from recitative to aria with the orchestra a very active part, not just accompanying. In this respect he might almost be likened to late period Verdi. The writing creates a feeling of unity and cohesion, underlined here by Ryan Brown’s eager conducting. Just as in his recording of Gluck’s Orphée et Euridice (see review) he opts for swift tempos and had at least this reviewer sitting on the edge of his chair. There is such vitality and thrust in his reading that the work stands out as perhaps better than it actually is, but for my money this is an opera to set beside Gluck, Haydn and Mozart as a superb example of late 18th century music theatre. Readers should be warned though that, this being a French opera, there are some decorative elements, like scene 3 of the first act with choruses and dances. The whole opera ends in a kind of anti-climax with an eight-minute ballet sequence. All of this is superbly performed; good music but more or less superfluous.

The Opera Lafayette perform with enthusiasm and flair and Brown and producer Max Wilcox have gathered a fine line-up of soloists. Some of the smaller parts are taken by members of the chorus and among the main characters the experienced François Loup is a deeply involved Œdipe, expressive and with a rich pallet of vocal colours. His daughter Antigone is the dramatically vibrant Nathalie Paulin who is also able to express the nobility of her character. The two tenors, Tony Boutté and Robert Getchell, are excellent; especially the latter who is a model of lyric tenor singing of music from this period. He should be a likewise excellent Don Ottavio or Tamino.

The booklet gives, in the usual Naxos manner, all the information one could possibly expect within the space available and besides a good track-related synopsis we also get the French libretto. The English translation can be downloaded.

This is one of the more thrilling “finds” within the operatic genre.

-- Göran Forsling, MusicWeb International

Charm and entertainment in the company of humanity, skill and craftsmanship.

Apart from a two disc set from the Nash Ensemble on Hyperion there is surprisingly little competition for recordings of all three of the wind Sonatas that Saint-Saëns wrote in 1921. Players of the oboe, clarinet and bassoon have included the works for their own instruments on recital discs but they make a greater impact when heard as a set. The word “impact” may be misleading as they are not in any way aggressive or assertive. Rather listening to them is like being with an elderly gentleman of impeccable manners and taste, and hearing him talk in a wonderfully cultivated way of times past. Perhaps there is nothing here of enormous depth but for me at least there is the feeling of being in the company of a man of immense compositional skill and distinction who is aware that he has nothing more to prove and no obvious regrets but whose mere company still gives great pleasure.

You may think that I am basing all of this on the composer’s age when he wrote them, but these Sonatas do surely have a ripe and autumnal feel. The various players here are all excellent in giving them just the right weight and manner. Any technical difficulties are succumbed without obvious effort and the balance between wind instruments and piano is just right. I hope that the artists would take it as a compliment that throughout this disc my focus was allowed to be entirely on the music rather than on any interpretative whims.

The other pieces on the disc are also worth hearing, although they are earlier and more concerned with the display possibilities of the various instruments. The Romance is a particularly lovely work, making it a matter of regret that the earlier Romance in F Op. 36 was not also included when these fine players were available.

This may not be a disc of music to challenge or surprise the listener, but it does charm and entertain, and the Sonatas go further in making the listener aware of the composer’s humanity as well as his skill and craftsmanship.

– John Sheppard, MusicWeb International

With orchestral works at the core of his output, the supreme melodic gift that distinguishes the music of Eric Coates earned him a reputation as the ‘uncrowned king of light music’. It was the London Suite that made Coates a household name, with the Cockney exuberance of its third movement, Knightsbridge, capturing the nation’s imagination as a BBC theme tune, as did the rousing march Calling All Workers. Cinderella and The Selfish Giant were inspired by his son’s bedtime stories, the latter absorbing the jazzy dance rhythms of the day. The Dambusters March was one of Coates’ last pieces, and remains one of the most iconic movie themes ever written.

The concept of Echoes was to select well-known short works-five to ten minutes in length-and to transform them for our present time.

Rossini drew a line under his hugely successful operatic career at the age of 37 and wrote little until his final years in Paris, where he became renowned for his musical salons. For these he wrote numerous short piano pieces which he jokingly called Péchés de vieillesse (Sins of Old Age): sometimes experimental miniatures that can raise a smile or touch the heart, blurring boundaries between the irreverent and the serious. Rossini’s publisher Antonio Pacini considered the composer’s late works as his most illustrious period: ‘what he composes daily is a series of masterpieces that seems as though it will never end.’ Including songs and fascinating novelties, this acclaimed complete edition contains a myriad of rarities and numerous world premiere recordings.

This remarkably original work, with its recurring quotations from the composer’s own songs, notably Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (Songs of a Wayfarer) and Des Knaben Wunderhorn (The Boy’s Magic Horn), is the perfect expression of one of Mahler’s most quoted sayings, “The symphony is a world; it must contain everything”. The opening movement, filled with sounds that Mahler remembered from his childhood, depicts “Nature’s awakening from the long sleep of winter”, and is followed by an exuberant scherzo and trio based on a Ländler. The disturbing slow movement funeral march, based on the children’s song Frère Jacques, is unlike anything that had been heard before, and the symphony concludes with music of thrilling dramatic intensity.

REVIEWS:

In the finale the brass section is given its opportunity to step forward and they really deliver the goods. The trumpets, tuba, braying horns and tam-tam are thrilling in their impact. There is no distracting applause at the end of the symphony, thank goodness, and this allows for a few seconds thought before realising what a cracking performance has just taken place.

–MusicWeb International

This is a thoughtful performance, very reined-in for the most part, though when Alsop finally lets her Baltimore forces off the leash in the closing peroration the effect is so starling that it blows you away. Earlier on, there are moments when you feel she’s held too much back, particularly in the scherzo, which is overly deliberate. But the sense of wonder of the first movement, together with the ironies of the later funeral march, are breathtakingly done, and all that hard to balance counter-point is beautifully clear.

– Guardian (UK)

With its unique combination of instruments, the Vienna Reed Quintet creates a new and refreshing sound that differs significantly from that of the conventional wind quintet. This programme opens up three very special keyboard works to these exhilarating sonorities, starting with the virtuoso dances of Rameau’s descriptively titled suite La Triomphante. Mozart’s Fantasia has all the stately grandeur of a Bach fantasia, while Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin is a tribute both to his great musical ancestor and to friends who fell during the First World War. The Vienna Reed Quintet is a first on the Austrian chamber music scene with its combination of single and double reed instruments in a chamber ensemble. With Heri Choi on oboe, Heinz-Peter Linshalm on clarinet, Alfred Reiter on saxophone, Petra Stump-Linshalm on bass clarinet and Sophie Dartigalongue on bassoon, five strong musical personalities present a fresh and unusual wind ensemble.

Featuring over 7 centuries of beautiful and sublime pieces from Bach, Mozart, Part, Tallis, Tavener, Beethoven, Barber, Charpentier, Rutter and more. The pieces cover all phases of the life, death and resurrection of Christ, making it the perfect music for any Christian holiday and easy listening year-round.