Sibelius: Complete Violin and Piano Music, Vol. 1

Shostakovich, D.: Piano Trio No. 2 / Piano Quintet, Op. 57

Ernest Pingoud (1887-1942) is one of those names one encounters in footnotes, or in the more comprehensive musical dictionaries. The Gramophone Database contains no entry for him other than this worthy new disc, and I am not aware of any previous recordings of his music, even from Finland (to where he emigrated from Russia in 1918). In his day, he was considered one of Finland’s leading modernists, with Vaino Rautio and Aarre Merikanto, so consequently had to endure sustained indifference. He eventually threw himself under a train.

His style as exhibited in these five tone-poems (only Fetich, 1917, and Le chant de l’espace – “The song of space”, 1931-8 – really live up to the “symphonic poem” billing; the others are too small in scale) is frankly not particularly distinctive, and can be summed up as a mish-mash of Strauss and Scriabin orchestrated by Prokofiev. Resonances of other composers abound, not least of Russian contemporaries but also Finns such as Melartin in Le prophete (1921) and Fetich, and early Sibelius in Flambeaux eteints (“Extinguished torches”, 1919). Fetich is by some way the best of them, skittish and excitable by turns but compelling overall, unlike Le chant de l’espace which is overblown and structurally flaccid. Le prophete, Chantecler (1919) and the rather engaging Flambeaux eteints lie variously in between. Sakari Oramo produces exemplary performances, faithfully recorded. One for the specialists.

-- Gramophone [2/1998]

KUUSISTO, Pekka: Strings Attached

Madetoja, L.: Lieder (Complete), Vol. 1 - Opp. 2, 9, 16, 18,

Kurtag, G.: Kafka-Fragmente (Kafka Fragments)

KARITA MATTILA - KAIPAINEN, ME

REVIEW:

Alex Ross's enthusiastic review will have appeared by the time the reader sees this. Why a recent release of music by a still-young contemporary in so prestigious a place? Because Kaija Saariaho is a composer of remarkable originality and quality three of whose works, and splendid examples they are, appear beautifully performed on a technically superb CD. Can recording serve a better cause? (One tries besides, and belatedly, to dilute the harm a since-departed reviewer inflicted. His snide remarks looked, from where I sat, like vandalism. My editor talked me into withdrawing a "Critics' Corner" objection. I should have held out.) Another reason for this CHOF follow-up looks through a side door to San Diego. I review in this issue an excellent CRI CD, entitled Sonor Ensemble. Rand Steiger's new-music group operates out of the University of California at San Diego, whose music department has grown in less than three decades to world prominence. For example, the British composer Brian Ferneyhough, whom I mention specifically because he was at one time Saariaho's mentor, has been teaching there since 1987. The plot thickens: the two orchestral pieces, Du cristal and ... à la fumée, the composer's first efforts on this scale, came about as a result of a year's stay at San Diego. Nymphéa too has a West Coast connection in that the San Francisco-based Kronos requested its creation.

Producer-engineer Joseph Magee brings us one of the better-sounding orchestral recordings I've lately heard. (The reader requires a good, wide-range sound system to fully savor its pleasures.) Saariaho's orchestral sonorities, reflecting her unique investigations into electronically generated sound, strike me as remarkably fine tone-paintings, all the more remarkable for their being the composer's first large-scale essays for other than computer-assisted ensemble. As to Nymphéa, the string quartet with electronics, the focal point is now IRCAM in Paris, which has long since proved a force in new directions in acoustic-electronic combinations and the computer's unstoppable, unpredictable role. None of this is to suggest, on the one hand, that Saariaho is destined to stand on the pantheon's highest pedestal—she may or may not—or, on the other, that one somehow hedges his bet in honoring a recording of a young modern's music in less than terms absolute ecstasy. Rather, I salute both an ideal application of recording's role and a powerful talent.

-- Mike Silverton, Fanfare

This album may come to be viewed as a classic Janáček recital.

Lars Vogt’s new solo piano release is dedicated to the piano works of Leoš Janáček (1854–1928), one of the most original voices among the 20th century composers. This album includes three of the composer’s most well-known and most extensive solo piano works. These works by Janacek are marked by deep melancholy and passion. They manifest the composer's rich inner world through a musical language that remains to be timeless. Lars Vogt has established himself as one of the leading musicians of his generation. Born in the German town of Düren in 1970, he first came to public attention when he won second prize at the 1990 Leeds International Piano Competition and has enjoyed a varied career for over twenty-five years. His versatility as an artist ranges from the music of Bach, Mozart and Beethoven, to the romantics Schumann, Brahms, Grieg, Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov, to contemporary works such as the Lutoslawski concerto.

REVIEW:

Pianist Lars Vogt draws the listener into the music’s inner world. Consider the two books of On an Overgrown Path. The work is a unified entity, but for Book Two, Janáček gives Italian tempo indications rather than the programmatic titles of Book One. It’s a slight shift, indicating that the Czech scenes and moods of the first book have been raised to a level that is just a bit more abstract. It’s a distinction many pianists simply plow through, but Vogt handles it masterfully. The Piano Sonata likewise has a subtle balance between inward and outward, and Vogt’s mood of uncertainty in the opening “Foreboding” movement is marvelous. That mood continues through In the Mists, where the mists are almost palpably inward as well as outward. This album may come to be viewed as a classic Janáček recital.

– AllMusicGuide.com (James Manheim)

Heinio, M.: Piano Concerto No. 6, "Hermes" / In G

HEININEN: SYMPHONY NO 3, FLORA

Haydn: Symphonies 92 (Oxford) & 99

1. Suojelusenkeli/Guardian Angel 1:48
2. Rukous/Prayer 1:42
3. Sunnuntaiaamuna/On Sunday Morning 2:24
4. Aamulaulu/Morning Song 2:02
5. Iltarukous/Evening Prayer 2:06
6. Täällä Pohjantähden alla/Under the North Star 2:40
7. Pikkulinnun ylistys/Little Bird's Adoration 0:50
8. Pyhäaamun rauha/The Peace of Sunday Morning 2:59
9. Suomalainen rukous/Finnish Prayer 2:23
10. Sången om Kristus/Song About Christ 4:03
11. Mua siipeis suojaan kätke/Hide Me Under Your Wing 1:51
12. Suvivirsi/Summer Hymn 2:44
13. On Herran templiin tulla/Going to the Lord's Temple 2:25
14. Oi Kiitos, sa Luojani armollinen/Thank You, Gracious Lord 2:39
15. Mä olen niin pienoinen/So Small Am I 2:00
16. Kanteleeni/My Kantele 2:56
17. Kellot kaikuu/The Bells Are Ringing 3:57
18. Aamurukous/Morning Prayer 2:03
19. Paimenpoika/The Shepherd Boy 2:34
20. Tähtilaulu/Star Song 1:32
21. Oi katsele lintua/O, Look at the Bird 1:56
22. Iltalaulu/Evening Song 1:38
23. Kiitos Sulle Jumalani/Thank You, My God 2:35

Tapiola Choir
Matti Vainio, organ
Sinikka Kontio (Järvinen), kantele
Matti Kontio, kantele

Kari Ala-Pöllänen, conductor
[ 55:35 ]

FILHARMONIKOT JUHLATUULELLA S

"Though he was born on the Swedish island of Gotland, Englund settled in Helsinki, where he studied and later, after a spell of study in Tanglewood with Copland, taught. On returning home after his service on the front in 1945, he burned all his wartime manuscripts and sketches, and wrote this symphony, his first orchestral piece—and a remarkably accomplished piece it is! It became known in his native country as the War Symphony, though the composer characterized it as an expression of ''a euphoric joy at having—by a sheer miracle—come through four years of hell during the Second World War alive''. The musical language has more in common with Shostakovich than any other modern composer, but it is far from derivative. The idiom is accessible and there are memorable melodic ideas. The Second Symphony is something of a discovery—the very opening bars in their evocation of nature are almost prophetic of the Tippett of The Midsummer Marriage, and the second movement with its overtones of Shostakovich and its Sibelian undercurrents is really quite powerful. It is only in the finale that he resorts to the (to my ears) rather conventional stock-in-trade Prokofiev-Shostakovich finale (there is a sequential passage that could even come out of Arnold—try track 7, 1'24'' - 1'58'' and you will see what I mean). But while I would not stake the greatest claims for either symphony, neither is as concentrated or densely argued as, say, a Tubin or Rawsthorne symphony, Englund is a real composer who knows a thing or two about musical movement and development and has a well-stocked imagination. The Estonian Symphony Orchestra under Peeter Lilje give a good account of themselves and the recording made in the Philharmonia Hall in Tallinn is very good indeed."

-- Robert Layton, Gramophone [8/1992]