STAMITZ, C.: Clarinet Concertos, Vol. 1

Although John Stainer borrowed some ideas from Bach's Passions for setting his "meditation" on the Crucifixion of Christ, unfortunately the manner of the work's opening wasn't one of them. Instead of engaging the audience/congregation and setting the mood with a strong choral statement, Stainer opted to begin with many minutes of recitative and solo singing, occasionally punctuated by some very staid, musically unremarkable choral interjections. What should be a profoundly moving, serious scene is introduced with no solid musico/dramatic context, and the actual musical ideas--especially the meandering melodies--are common rather than exceptional. I realize that this work has long held a place of great reverence by many singers and congregations, but this is due more to its being tailor-made for regular parish church choirs and organists (and we can always use more of those kinds of pieces!) than for its musical depth or sophistication.

Whatever the case, millions of people love Stainer's Crucifixion--or more accurately, most love it for its one shining moment, the chorus God so loved the world, and rightly so, for these famous words from John 3: 16, 17 never have been more affecting or effectively rendered in music. Somehow, even though the rest of the work sounds stylistically dated in its predictable late-Romantic harmony, melodramatic expression, and often quaint language ("Fling wide the gates, for the Saviour waits" is one of the cornier phrases), this chorus holds up even today and stands on its own as a small masterpiece.

Not surprisingly, Timothy Brown and his first-rate Clare College Choir (along with organist Stephen Farr) deliver very fine performances, sounding as if they truly are among those who love this work (and the complementary Guildford Cathedral acoustics also are an asset). Tenor James Gilchrist is less convincing, his expression often overly mannered--although, given the nature of the music he has to work with, I suppose we can't blame him! Likewise, bass Simon Bailey tries hard to find something musically profound in his solos, but in the process his wide vibrato becomes distracting. In sum, this Crucifixion is as good as the one recorded by the Peterborough Cathedral Choir on Resonance, and, dare I say it, if you like this work, you'll find what you're looking for here.

--David Vernier, ClassicsToday.com

William Henry Squire was Britain's leading cellist from the late 1890's to the late 1920's and a prolific artist in the early recording era. He composed a series of exquisite miniatures for the instrument, the finest of which are collected here for the first time. They were written largely between the ages of 18 and 33, often with specific audiences in mind - whether Promenade Concerts, recital platform or grade examinations - and include his signature pieces, Serenade, Op. 15 and his enigmatic tribute to Dvorak, the Chansonnette, Op. 22. Five of the twenty have never before been recorded.

Review:

William Henry Squire was Britain’s leading cellist from the late 1890s to the late 1920s and a prolific artist in the early recording era. He composed a series of exquisite miniatures for the cello, the best of which are collected here for the first time. They were written largely between the ages of 18 and 33, often with specific audiences in mind—whether Promenade Concerts, recital platform or grade examinations—and include his signature piece, Sérénade, and his enigmatic tribute to Dvorák, Chansonnette. Five of the 20 have never before been recorded so this really is quite a discovery, and quite an achievement for young cellist, Oliver Gledhill.

– Classic FM

One of the giants of music-making in the 19th century, Louis Spohr excelled as a composer, violin virtuoso, conductor and teacher. His concertos for the violin demonstrate a Romantic temperament framed in a Classical style, but he was equally adept in smaller forms. The ‘Duets for Two Violins, Op. 67’ reveal a perfect sense of architecture, the two instruments frequently exchanging roles, as well as a majestic command of melody. The ‘Duet, WoO 21,’ written when Spohr was just 12 years old, is one of his earliest surviving compositions. The multi-faceted performer and teacher, Jameson Cooper, was born in Sheffield, England. He studied at the Royal Northern College of Music, at the Aspen Music Festival with Dorothy DeLay and Masao Kawasaki, and later with Roland and Almita Vamos. He holds master’s degrees in violin performance and in orchestral conducting from Kent State University. As a founding member of the Euclid Quartet, Cooper has won numerous prizes and performed to high acclaim throughout the US. James Dickinson studied both in the UK and the US. After graduating from the Royal Northern College of Music, Dickenson left the UK to lead the Degas Quartet in the US. With this quartet, Dickenson gave concerts all over the US, in Carnegie Hall and at the Aspen Music Festival, and held various residencies in over ten universities.

SPOHR Violin Concertos: No. 6 in g; No. 8 in a, “In modo di scena cantante”; No. 11 in G • Simone Lamsma (vn); Patrick Gallois, cond; Snf Finlandia Jyväskylä • NAXOS 8.570528 (70:18)


Louis Spohr, once considered to hold a place among the greatest composers of his era, subsequently fell into a gray oblivion, only to be resurrected several times during the 20th century. Although his compositional output might have been more encompassing than those of many of his fellow violinist-composers, he may for practical purposes remain in contention principally for the honor of being one of the greatest of them rather than one of the greatest of composers in general.


Ulf Hoelscher, Christian Fröhlich, and the Sinfonie-orchester Berlin made a survey on cpo of Spohr’s concertos, and now perhaps Naxos has undertaken to do so as well. Simone Lamsma brings together Concerto No. 6 with two others, Nos. 8 and 11, that the booklet notes by Keith Warsop, chairman of the Spohr Society of Great Britain (www.spohr-society.org.uk), identifies as among the composer’s four masterpieces in the genre: the Seventh, Eighth, Ninth, and 11th. (Warsop contends that violinists play only the Eighth nowadays, but only a generation or two ago, the perhaps even more imposing Ninth still held the stage, if not alongside it, then close behind.)


The Sixth Concerto’s first movement contains some of the mystery and drama that set Spohr apart from earlier violinist-composers like Viotti, to whose idiomatic violinistic passagework he lent a personal vibrancy and chromatic melancholy that set it above mere gymnastics. The slow movement, as the opening movement and finale of the Eighth would do, incorporates recitative, while the finale, Alla spagnola, sets actual Spanish melodies that, according to Warsop, Spohr heard sung by a soldier in the Napoleonic wars against a strummed background. Simone Lamsma plays Spohr with authority—with technical aplomb and a silken, slender sound that recall Heifetz’s. She sparkles in the higher registers (on her 1709 Tononi—remember that Heifetz played a Tononi early on) and sounds throaty in the lower ones: such unobtrusive muscularity, coupled with silvery violinistic solidity, makes her a credible exponent of Spohr’s music. The recorded sound sets her in the midst of the orchestral sound rather than aggressively in front of it.


The Eighth Concerto, written for Italian audiences, depends more heavily on Italianate forms and procedures. It’s soaring aria-like slow movement, its showy finale, and, most of all, its extended first movement recitative—all three encrusted with breathtaking ornamentation—provide a violinist with an ideal showcase. Heifetz, like Ethel Merman, could belt a tune in a way that defied audiences not to listen, and he played this Concerto, cutting down the tuttis, as he often did, with irresistible authority. Spohr denigrated Paganini’s manner of producing staccato off the string, and though Heifetz’s flying staccato, which he claimed to have had difficulty mastering, became one of his trademarks, he could electrify audiences with Spohr’s more solid staccatos on the string, so many passages of which adorn this Concerto. Albert Spalding’s recording of the work appealed to many who may have considered Heifetz’s a bit over the top, but it’s hardly as visceral; and, more recently, neither Uto Ughi (Dynamic 522, 31:1) nor Hilary Hahn (Deutsche Grammophon 000718802, 30:3) could recreate that magic. Though not nearly as confident as Heifetz, Lamsma still generates high voltage in, for example, the slow movement’s fast episode, and she plays with congenial sensitivity in the Adagio’s main sections. And unlike Heifetz, who succumbed to the temptation to add thirds to the last movement’s passages (as his teacher, Auer, did in Tchaikovsky’s cadenza to his Violin Concerto), she makes a case for it even while playing it straight. The Sixth Concerto’s misterioso returns enhanced in the 11th, which begins with an Adagio introduction that, if it’s not the Wolf’s Glen scene, may be the closest thing violinists have, and that introduces a main theme that postures squarely but stylishly as do some of Schumann’s melodic ideas. Warsop suggests that this Concerto might profitably be revived; it’s lucky that a sympathetic violinist like Lamsma has done so. Here’s a worthy counterpart to Bruch’s concertos (listeners might notice a similarity between the style of writing for the violin in Spohr’s concertos and in the first movement of Bruch’s Third) and a worthy champion. Listeners and would-be aficionados of Spohr may still find it a sort of stumbling block to full admiration that so many of Spohr’s harmonic turns and violinistic passages sound all too familiar—the 11th Concerto’s finale, for example, suggests, however obliquely, the Duo, op. 67/2. Violinist-composers have a notoriously hard time not following their fingers’ lead.


Naxos’s program of Spohr concertos deserves a hearing for the young soloist’s’ bravado tempered with sensibility as well as for the orchestra’s generally sympathetic and competent accompaniment. But above all, it stands out for its version of the once famous Gesangszene , as it’s often called, perhaps the best after Heifetz’s—and, with Lamsma’s personal approach, a creditable alternative. Many violinists don’t have a sufficiently strong personality to project Spohr’s; Lamsma already does. An urgently recommended Want List candidate.


FANFARE: Robert Maxham

Beethoven's friend Louis Spohr was one of the most significant symphonists of his day and his nine works in the genre divide fairly evenly into those which follow classical traditions and four which have titles. Symphony No. 4 in F major, Op. 86 is subtitled Die Weihe der Tone (The Consecration of Sound) and is a programmatic work, based on an eponymous poem by Carl Pfeiffer, that offers both a novel symphonic form and a powerful musical narrative. Spohr was also a hugely influential figure in the development of German opera, as the two overtures clearly demonstrate.

Louis Spohr's innovative approach to symphonic writing began with the programmatic Symphony No. 4 (8555398) and was further broadened by Symphony No. 7 in C major, Op. 121 which he subtitled "The Earthly and Divine in Human Life". Jettisoning traditional symphonic form, this work is in effect a daring symphonic poem in three movements with a small orchestra representing the "divine" and the full orchestra the "earthly". The more traditional Symphony No. 8 in G major, Op. 137 - enshrining both tragic lament and sweet serenade - enables us to compare Spohr the innovator with Spohr the formalist.

Louis Spohr was seen in his day as a worthy successor to Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven and completed his Third Symphony whilst at the apex of his personal and professional life. This is reflected in a forward-looking, confident and compelling work which sublimely balances mood and atmosphere, including a passionate Larghetto and a joyous, life-affirming Finale. In his Sixth Symphony, Spohr drew inspiration for each movement from a different musical era; from the music of Bach and Handel in the first movement through to the finale "The Very Latest Period", a lively and sardonic satire on what Spohr felt to be the superficial and flashy compositional style of the time.

Composed in London, Spohr's Second Symphony was received with real enthusiasm at its premiere, the audience responding to the work's tasteful Haydn-esque flourishes, wide emotional palette and delightful writing for wind instruments. Written in 1850, a year after the re-imposition of authoritarian rule in Germany, Symphony No. 9 "The Seasons" is no mere programmatic work but a symbolic journey from the winter darkness of political oppression through the "Garden of Eden" imagery of Spring and the vibrant colors of Summer, ending with Autumn whose positive finale is a celebration of the composer's belief in the political rebirth of Germany.

Virtuoso violinist, conductor and composer, Louis Spohr wrote ten completed symphonies. The first five demonstrate a remarkable creative growth inaugurated by Symphony No. 1 of 1811 which took the music of Spohr’s idol, Mozart, as a model. Whilst retaining individuality, classical precedents infuse it with festive vitality. “Truly beautiful and masterly” was Robert Schumann’s judgement of Symphony No. 5 in C minor, a work both expansively melodic and quintessentially Romantic – and possibly Spohr’s greatest symphonic statement.

SPOHR: String Quintets Nos. 5 and 6

SPOHR: String Quintet No. 7 / String Sextet, Op. 140 / Potpo

SPOHR: Music for Violin and Harp, Vol. 2

SPOHR: Clarinet Concertos Nos. 2 and 4 / Fantasia, Op. 81

SPOHR: Clarinet Concertos Nos. 1 and 3 / Potpourri, Op. 80