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]

Crusell, B.H.: Clarinet Quartets (Complete)

REVIEWS:

John Corigliano's Second Symphony won the 2001 Pulitzer Prize, not that most listeners will care or should care. It's an arrangement for string orchestra of the 1996 String Quartet, a work in five-movement arch form similar to Bartók's Fourth Quartet, in which related pairs of movements balance on either side of a central "night music" fulcrum. As might be expected from a composer acknowledged for his brilliant orchestration, this arrangement is no mere transcription; instead it takes advantage of the full resources of the modern string orchestra and ranges stylistically from the exquisite melody that opens the final Postlude to the avant-garde atmospherics of the opening and central Night Music. This isn't easy music to take by any means, but it is extremely well written and consistently engaging in a dark and gloomy sort of way. The fourth movement, an intriguing lopsided fugue, is especially imaginative.

With The Mannheim Rocket we're on more familiar ground, and the sparks really fly. This "collage" piece takes us on an orchestral ride through musical history, with references to a multitude of famous German composers, including Mozart and Wagner, all seamlessly integrated into a highly colored orchestral fabric. It's great fun and it comes as something of a relief after the intensity of the Second Symphony. A great deal of that intensity comes from the excellent performances by the Helsinki Philharmonic under John Storgards. Although this orchestra is not well-known for its string section, recent recordings under Segerstam (Sibelius) and now this new one reveal an amazing richness and body to the sound, to say nothing of virtuosity in what must be very difficult music. Ondine's sonics do the musicians proud as well, being exceptionally lifelike and offering a drop-dead silent backdrop to the Symphony's frequent moments of extreme quietude. Challenging music, perhaps, but a challenge met with complete confidence and success.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

John Corigliano has enjoyed one of the most successful careers of any American composer of his generation. Now in his mid sixties, he began more than 40 years ago as a talented scion of the Barber-Bernstein axis, producing works characterized by ingratiating showmanship and lyrical warmth. But that was during the 1960s, when accessible lyricism could relegate one to the American aesthetic equivalent of Siberia. Not temperamentally suited to an impoverished life spent beating his head against the wall in the name of artistic “truth,” Corigliano assessed the musical climate and calculated how he might turn his talents to profitable use. What he arrived at during the mid 1970s was an unabashed eclecticism: rather than renounce the neo-Romanticism that was his birthright, he surrounded it with virtually every new compositional “ism,” including extended instrumental usages, aleatoric techniques, atonality, exotic multiculturalism, quotations from earlier music, surrealistic soundscapes of the sort associated with György Ligeti and Jacob Druckman, and, later, touches of minimalism. This placed him within the movement Druckman termed “The New Romanticism,” referring to those composers who felt that the innovative techniques that emerged after WW II needed to be placed in the service of poetic or expressive aesthetic objectives. While the term “New Romanticism” never really took hold, the approach itself has proven to be one of the more fruitful compositional movements of the late 20th century, and includes most of those figures who are neither die-hard serialists, die-hard traditionalists, minimalists, or explorers of the more recent postmodern tributaries. It is probably safe to say that Corigliano stands today as the most celebrated exponent of this approach, having earned the most prestigious awards and commissions available to the American composer, even including an Academy Award for his soundtrack to the film The Red Violin.

Initially, Corigliano’s work in this vein was characterized by a sort of manic “kitchen-sinkism,” with incongruous elements of all kinds thrown together to produce dazzling entertainment spectacles that flattered the audience’s desire to appreciate “new music” relatively painlessly. But during the course of the past 30 years or so, he has matured as a creative artist, and seems in his recent major works to be aiming toward deeper levels of expression. This is not to suggest that Corigliano has joined those composers for whom music is a revelation of one’s “inner heart and soul”; rather, he is one of those who prefer to present a “show,” and probably always will be. But some of his recent “shows” have been more serious in their aesthetic content.

These reflections are prompted by this remarkable new release: a Finnish production devoted to first recordings of two of Corigliano’s most recent compositions, in performances by the Helsinki Philharmonic, conducted by John Storgårds, who has been active throughout Scandinavia as a violinist as well as conductor. As I listened to these two pieces, the Symphony No. 2 (2000) and The Mannheim Rocket (2001), it occurred to me that Corigliano’s approach has moved toward that pursued by Dominick Argento, who uses music to develop “concepts” rather than to bare his “heart and soul.” In fact, although it is a third again as long, Corigliano’s Symphony No. 2 is remarkably similar in impact to Argento’s In Praise of Music (1977). Both works are designed to illustrate intriguing concepts, both fulfill them with remarkable ingenuity and in a way that is clearly perceptible to the attentive listener, while both produce a sense of satisfaction that is more intellectual—though aesthetic—than visceral.

Corigliano’s Symphony No. 2, winner of the 2001 Pulitzer Prize, was first performed by the Boston Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Seiji Ozawa. Comprising five substantial movements lasting some 45 minutes, it is a revision and adaptation for string orchestra of his 1996 String Quartet. The first movement begins in near inaudibility, as disparate threads of sound eerily coalesce into cluster textures, then achieve a sense of concord, before gradually dwindling away. The second movement is a dissonant scherzo in which wild, slashing gestures surround a “trio” passage of gentle serenity. The third movement, a mysterious and terrifying nocturne inspired by a night in Morocco, is the lengthiest and most impressive movement of the work. This is followed by a most unlikely fugue, relatively active, but not contrapuntal in the conventional sense, and quite dissonant. It, too, achieves repose in a central oasis. The final movement begins darkly, with some microtonal textures, and builds to a climax of intense severity before subsiding into mystery, ending the symphony as it began.

Despite the evocativeness of the concepts on which the work is based and the imaginativeness of the musical treatment, the symphony is quite demanding of the listener, largely because of the long duration and slow rate of activity of each movement and the nearly complete absence of tonal melodic contours and regular rhythmic pulse. In fact, knowing the way Corigliano offers his work in multiple packagings, I suspect that at least some of these movements—especially the central Nocturne—will be authorized for individual performance. Indeed, they may be more effective in such short doses than joined together in full-length form.

Corigliano composed The Mannheim Rocket for the National Theater Orchestra of Mannheim. The title refers to the familiar device developed by the early symphonic composers who flourished in Mannheim, Germany, during the 18th century, whereby a movement is launched by a theme in rapid ascent (e.g., the fourth movement of Mozart’s 40th Symphony). However, Corigliano joins this musical meaning with a more literal, yet fanciful, concept, suggesting a space vehicle gradually ascending through musical history until it reaches a timeless ether before making its inevitable descent. Corigliano fulfills this intriguing notion through an ingenious application of evocative imagery combined with the cleverest and most effective use of quotation-collage I can recall having heard. The result suggests such pieces as Honegger’s Pacific 231 and Villa-Lobos’s Little Train of the Caipira, but in 2001 style. The listener who takes the trouble to understand and follow the program as it plays out will be rewarded by a brilliant 10-minute tour-de-force of pictorial orchestral imagery. Both works are performed with the astounding proficiency and polish we have come to expect from the major—and some of the minor—Finnish orchestras. The sound quality of the recording is notably superb

--Walter Simmons, Fanfare

Christmas in Ainola
Christmas Carols by Jean Sibelius and other Christmas songs

Hynninen, Groop, Tapiola Choir, etc.

Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
1. En etsi valtaa loistoa, op. 1 / We Ask For Nothing Rich Or Rare 3:25
2. On hanget korkeat nietokset, op. 1 / The Shining Snows Are Driven High 2:28
3. Jo joutuu ilta, op. 1 Christmas Carol / O'er Hill And Dale 2:06
4. Joulu saapuu portin luo, op. 1 / Now Stands Yule at the Snowy Gate 1:46
5. Tervehtii jo meitä, op.1 / Now is Christmas Coming 2:46
6. Joululaulu (Nyt seimelle pienoisen lapsen) 2:15
7. Andante festivo 4:17

Leevi Madetoja (1887-1947)
8. Arkihuolesi kaikki heitä / Cast Off Thy Everyday Cares 1:49
9. Enkelien joululaulu (Ylistäkää Jumalaa, taivas ja maa) 1:56

Piae Cantiones
10. Ecce novum gaudium 1:53
11. Angelus emittitur 1:59

Luther
12. Enkeli taivaan lausui näin / From Heaven Above 2:42

Trad.
13. Maa on niin kaunis / The Earth is Beautiful 2:21

Piae Cantiones
14. Psallat scholarum concio 1:46
15. Ave maris stella 1:55

Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
16-17. Sonatina op.80
16. Andantino (4:28)
17. Lento-Allegretto-Vivace (3:56)

Trad.
18. Kuului laulu enkelten / Angels, from the Realms of Glory 2:14

Otto Kotilainen (1868 - 1936)
19. Kun joulu on / At Christmastide 2:35

Trad.
20. Joulupuu on rakennettu / The Christmas Tree 1:31
21. No onkos tullut kesä / Is It Suddenly Summer? 1:18

Johann Strauss (1804-1849)
22. Radetzky-marssi / Radetzky March 2:42

Tapiola Choir (1)
Jorma Hynninen, baritone (1)
Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra (1)
Raimo Sirkiä, tenor (2,19)
Jyväskylä Sinfonia (2,19)
Ritva-Liisa Korhonen, soprano (3)
Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra (3)
Chamber Choir Kampin laulu (4,5,9-13,20,21)
Pertti Eerola, organ (4,5,12,13)
Jubilate Choir (6)
Virtuosi di Kuhmo (7)
Monica Groop, mezzosoprano (8)

Turku Castle Chamber Choir (14,15)
Yoshiko Arai, violin (16,17)
Eero Heinonen, piano (16,17)
Marita Viitasalo, piano (22)

Jorma Panula, conductor (1)
Pertti Pekkanen, conductor (2,19)
Kyösti Haatanen, conductor (3)
Timo Lehtovaara, conductor (4,5,9-13,20,21)
Astrid Riska, conductor (6)
Peter Csaba, conductor (7)
Markus Lehtinen, conductor (8)
Heikki Seppänen, conductor
Erkki Pohjola, conductor
[ 56:00 ]

1. Tuo armon valkokyyhky 2:13
2. En etsi valtaa, loistoa 3:18
3. Nyt seimelle pienoisen lapsen 1:47
4. Joulun kellot (Hiljaa, hiljaa helkkyellen) 2:10
5. Kautta tyynen vienon yön 1:25
6. Tuikkikaa, oi joulun tähtöset 1:58
7. Ja neitsyt pikku poijuttansa 1:36
8. Rauhanruhtinas 1:34
9. Joulu tullut on 1:48
10. Joulupuu on rakennettu 2:14
11. Kun joulu on 2:40
12. Enkelien joululaulu 1:25
13. Seimeen syntynyt 2:05
14. Arkihuolesi kaikki heitä 1:30
15. Joulun kellot 3:11
16. Tulemme, Jeesus, pienoises 3:06
17. Joululaulu (Jeesuslapsi suloinen) 1:53
18. Jouluhymni 2:20
19. Olen löytänyt sen 3:14
20. Ilouutinen 2:44
21. Heinillä härkien kaukalon 2:29
22. Maa on niin kaunis 2:55
23. Jouluyö, juhlayö 2:51
24. Rukous 3:47
25. Jouluilta 3:09
26. Det är en ros utsprungen 4:15

[ 65:38 ]

Helsinki Chamber Choir (Finnish Radio Chamber Choir)
Johanna Rusanen, soprano
Timo Nuoranne, conductor

One of the most beautiful of records; if the repertoire appeals it will be pretty useless to await a better performance or production of it than this.

REVIEW:

One of the most beautiful of records; if the repertoire appeals it will be pretty useless to await a better performance or production of it than this.

There are tenors who not only could but would scream any guitarist into inaudibility. Ian Partridge is not one of them, indeed I would never hope to hear a gentler, more affecting style applied to the repertoire concerned. I was not familiar with the Finnish guitarist Jukka Savijoki, but I know now that he is among the most sensitive of accompanists, as well as a soloist of great skill, style and artistry.

Much of the record's program is indeed written for solo guitar, exploited with great skill by Britten and a little less expectedly, but no less convincingly, by Lennox Berkeley. The combined skills of both performers and writers (whether composing or arranging) offer continuous delight to any listener who is not positively antipathetic to the repertoire concerned. Or perhaps even if he is, but is prepared to be won over by the shared magic of the combined performers and composers.

The magic is conveyed by a faultless recording and helped along by a most informative booklet. The spelling of the ''dear'' who was shot is, I believe, quite correct: not the animal, but the loved human, in a sense that survives, still, in the now rather dated usage ''my dear''.

-- Gramophone [1/1993]

The second album in Lars Vogt’s Johannes Brahms concerto series with the Royal Northern Sinfonia includes Brahms’ 2nd Piano Concerto combined with a solo piano work, Handel Variations Op. 24, which was dedicated to Clara Schumann by the composer. Brahms’ Piano Concerto No. 2 is a romantic 4-movement concerto written two decades after its predecessor and one of the cornerstones in the concerto repertoire. This remarkable opus with a great number of beautiful solo passages and with a duration of over 45 minutes has been interpreted by numerous pianists since its premiere in 1881. In this album, Vogt performs the concerto conducting from the keyboard. Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel Op. 24 for solo piano were written by the young composer in his late 20s. This work, which includes some technically demanding passages for the pianists, reveals Brahms’ profound interest in the work of the great masters of the Baroque era which served as a source of inspiration in the composer’s creative work. This set of 25 variations and a fugue shows Brahms as a great successor to the tradition of piano variations exemplified by Mozart and Beethoven.

-----

REVIEWS:

Together with the Royal Northern Sinfonia, Lars Vogt–in his fifth year heading the orchestra across the shore from Newcastle–got to record the Brahms piano concertos for Ondine. Anyone who reads a chamber orchestra’s and Brahms’ name on the same CD cover and might briefly flinch, fearing undernourished, pseudo-historically informed performances with an economically expedient small band–conducted from the piano at that (another couple thousands in savings!)–need not worry.

Yes, this performance of the B-flat major concerto is notably a child of our times: It is svelte Brahms and transparent too, but still with plenty of muscle, which isn’t on display throughout, but comes to the fore where needed. Compared to the kind of Brahms from even just a few decades ago, this is purged of some excess and trimmed of fat, but it comes to a healthy halt before turning anorexic.

In and of itself that’s hardly enough to compete with the innumerable splendid performances out there, historic and more recent. Buchbinder/Harnoncourt sounds more traditional and celebrates Brahms with the (expected?) breadth–and very tastefully at that. The Northern Sinfonia can’t touch the wonderfully dark sound of the Czech Philharmonic with Ivan Moravec under Jirí Belohlávek, which sounds like an old oak chest smells. But then, no other orchestra can. The way Eugen Jochum custom-tailors the Berlin Philharmonic’s playing around that of his soloist, Emil Gilels, also remains unsurpassed.

But it speaks to Vogt–who doesn’t shy away from a robust and stern touch in the outer movements–and his Sinfonia that no amount of comparison makes this recording appear any less attractive. The fresh-sounding orchestra has a natural forward drive but isn’t hectic or jittery. Nor do you hear any exaggerations or the type of self-consciously unsubtle “nuance” that often passes for interpretation these days. This recording–as does that of Marc-André Hamelin with Andrew Litton, to mention a recent and also excellent account–goes to show that good playing without ostentatious fingerprints need not end up sounding anonymous.

In the olden LP and CD days, the Handel Variations on this disc might have been considered the filler. In the streaming-age, playtime has become meaningless–and in any case, this isn’t an afterthought; interpretively, it might well be considered the lead attraction. There is a certain voracity with which Vogt bites into the piece, with a huge bandwidth of attack: from buttery soft to glassy hard. Gentle and gruff touches coexist peacefully; similarly, there are pompous and wildly colorful moments to be had. You can almost hear an orchestra perform behind it. This is more attention-grabbing (in the best sense) than the articulate sheen of the magnificent-yet-slightly-forgettable Murray Perahia (Sony), yet more coherently done than the wild-and-wilful Olga Kern’s take (Harmonia Mundi). In fact, it might just be the new reference alongside Jonathan Plowright (BIS), Leon Fleisher (Sony), and Garrick Ohlsson (Hyperion).

– ClassicsToday (Jens F. Laurson)

Vogt’s approach is robust, shapely and highly rhythmical. He mitigates Brahms’s habitual textural thickness by refusing to pedal through staccato passages. Together with the orchestra, a marvellous plasticity of line is maintained throughout. This pliant rubato is the bedrock of their realisation of the music’s passionate ardour and vast sense of space. What a pleasure to encounter Brahms, so often interpreted as relentlessly earnest, here captured with his eyes brimming with joy.

– Gramophone

REVIEW:

As her career broadens and her artistry deepens, the Finnish mezzo-soprano Monica Groop shows herself to be a discriminating selector of pianists as well as of repertoire. Having worked with András Schiff and Rudolf Jansen (for Schubert), she is now partnered by Alexei Lubimov, whose strongly defined playing propels her into the ardent heart of the Zigeunerlieder for her new Brahms recital. Groop and Lubimov choose vividly contrasting tempos which heighten the red-blooded volatility both artists find in these songs. Throughout the disc it is the fervour and energy of Brahms’s writing which draws most from their performances: the impatience and indignation of ‘Des liebsten Schwur’, as Groop’s voice leaps high, and the passionate dialogue of ‘Von ewiger Liebe’.

-- Hilary Finch, BBC Music Magazine

BRAHMS: DIE SCH?NE MAGALONE H

Ondine celebrates Beethoven’s 250th anniversary of birth by re-issuing Olli Mustonen’s Beethoven cycle with the Tapiola Sinfonietta. The three volumes were originally released in three separate volumes from 2007-2009. Mustonen, described by The Sunday Times as “living dream of pianism”, is known for delivering fresh and visionary approach to standard works – this is evident in these masterful recordings of Beethoven’s concertos. Mustonen is a particularly fitting exponent for Beethoven’s music as the composer himself was also both visionary and revolutionary in his approach to tradition. The recording of Piano Concerto No. 1 includes Mustonen’s own cadenzas. Beethoven’s own Piano Concerto arrangement of his Violin Concerto is also featured – one of Mustonen’s signature pieces.

REVIEW:

Mustonen plays the five concertos of a piece, not starting out with Mozartean elegance in the first two and building up to mature Beethoven somewhere in Concerto No. 3. He attacks every bar vigorously and with decisive intent. In my experience, no one since Mikhail Pletnev’s highly original and at times eccentric cycle on DG has sounded so personal in music that too often trips off the fingers with glib sameness.

My overall defense of a cycle that will strike other listeners as totally arbitrary comes down to Mustonen being a composer, not a touring pianist playing subscription concerts. These are a composer’s responses to Beethoven, and Mustonen has the fingers to express them with confident assurance and at times with dazzling flourishes. In my corner this release is one of the most refreshing of the Beethoven year.

– Fanfare

Award-winning violinist Christian Tetzlaff continues his highly successful series of chamber music recordings on Ondine continues with a new recording of Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin (BWV1001–1006) by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750). Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas have an iconic status in the violin repertoire. Yet, little is known about the background of these fascinating works. Bach’s autograph manuscript is dated in Köthen in 1720, and it is commonly considered as the year when the cycle was completed. In his booklet notes Christian Tetzlaff offers fascinating perspectives to these masterpieces. Christian Tetzlaff is considered one of the world’s leading international violinists and maintains a most extensive performing schedule. Musical America named him ‘Instrumentalist of the Year’ in 2005 and his recording of the violin concertos by Mendelssohn and Schumann, released on Ondine in 2011 (ODE 1195-2), received the ‘Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik’. Gramophone Magazine was choosing the recording of the Schumann Violin Sonatas with Lars Vogt (ODE 1205-2) as ‘Disc of the Month’ in January 2014. In addition, in 2015 ICMA awarded Christian Tetzlaff as the ‘Artist of the Year’. His recordings on Ondine with Brahms’ Trios (ODE 1271-2D) and Violin Concertos by DvorAk and Suk (1279-5) released in 2015 and 2016 earned GRAMMY nominations.

This new album by the award-winning Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir together with Tallinn Chamber Orchestra led by Risto Joost includes one of Tõnu Kõrvits’ (b. 1969) most recent works, You Are Light and Morning (Sei la luce e il mattino). Kõrvits, one of the most prominent Estonian composers of our time, has created an impressive 60-minute piece for choir and orchestra based on the poetry of 20th century Italian writer Cesare Pavese. The work was premiered by the choir and the orchestra under Risto Joost in Tallinn in June 2019 and was hailed by many as one of Kõrvits’ greatest achievements.

The Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir (the EPCC) is one of the best-known Estonian music ensembles in the world. The choir was founded in 1981 by Tõnu Kaljuste, who was its artistic director and chief conductor for twenty years. The repertoire of the choir extends from baroque to the music of the 21st century, with a special focus on the work of Estonian composers, such as Arvo Pärt, Veljo Tormis, Galina Grigorjeva, Tõnu Kõrvits and introducing their output to the world. The choir has won the Grammy Award twice and has received 15 Grammy nominations. Other awards include the Gramophone Award, the Diapason d’Or, and Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik.

REVIEW:

This is an excellent recording of an important new Estonian work. I personally don’t think that this piece quite makes it into a category of what one might describe as “great” modern music, but who cares? It’s a wonderful and committed performance, gorgeously recorded. If you think this might interest you, I believe it will not disappoint!

-- Fanfare

Zemlinsky, A. Von: Trio for Clarinet, Cello and Piano in D M

Hynninen is a strong interpreter, and his partnership with Ralf Gothoni is a formidable one. Together they explore the full dynamic and expressive range, while avoiding anything that might seem a mere performer's tour de force. The third song in the Lieder um den Tod cycle is a good example of their strength in restraint (which, perhaps one should add, has not always been their apparent policy). This is a dialogue between Death and a drunkard: Death asks the questions, the drunk replies with the tippler's invariable ''health'' (''Dein Wohl'')... Hynninen makes Death a traveler, at first an almost casual acquaintance who might well pass by, and the drunk, though tipsy, is less of a caricature. In the other songs...Hynninen brings weariness and pallor into his voice, which can still ring out with exciting power and vigor when the need arises... The recording is clear and well-balanced.

-- Gramophone [11/1992]