Classical Music

Classical Music

This album is a reissue of the Chandos label's 1988 recording of Dvorák’s Cello Concerto in B minor and the Konzertstück for Cello and Orchestra by Dohnányi, performed by the London Symphony Orchestra and Sir Charles Mackerras, with Raphael Wallfisch the featured soloist.

The Cello Concerto in B minor by Dvorák has become one of his most popular works, and perhaps the most popular concerto ever written for the instrument. He was asked to write this piece by a friend of Wagner, the cellist Hanuš Wihan. Initially reluctant, Dvorák stated that the cello was indeed a fine orchestral instrument but totally insufficient for a solo concerto. Fortunately, he changed his mind upon hearing Victor Herbert’s Second Cello Concerto performed in concert, in 1894. The resulting Cello Concerto is richly inventive, full of deep feeling, and perfectly fitted to the cello. Dvorák combined his experience as an orchestral player with an understanding of the cello’s distinct textural qualities to produce a grand and emotionally intense work, one of his finest achievements.

Ernst von Dohnányi was highly acclaimed as a pianist-composer, and widely regarded during his lifetime as a successor to Liszt. As a composer, however, he had more in common with Brahms than with Liszt, despite his Hungarian heritage, and his creative output was not limited to the piano. His Konzertstück in D major is in fact a full-scale cello concerto, in three interconnected parts. A lyrical rhapsody, it begins quietly, the cello emerging out of the orchestra and seeming to sing, until parting with a sense of regret at the end.

Recorded in: St Jude on the Hill, Hampstead, London 4-5 July 1988 Producer(s) Brian Couzens Sound Engineer(s) Ralph Couzens Janet Middlebrook (Assistant)

Chandos presents Volume 2 in its series of solo piano works by Chopin, played by the French-Canadian pianist Louis Lortie. Recording exclusively for Chandos, Lortie is recognized as one of the finest interpreters of Chopin today. He first recorded Chopin's Etudes for Chandos more than twenty years ago; the disc was named as one of the '50 great performances by superlative pianists' by BBC Music.

Volume 1 of his current Chopin series also has received excellent reviews: the magazine Pianist wrote, “He is a pianist of our time when it comes to speed, energy and an unfussy approach to Chopin. His way of playing is like a sharply cut steel sculpture, super elegant and with not one single smudge.” And in the words of International Piano: “These are full-blooded and eloquent performances, an auspicious start to what looks likely to become one of the finest of Chopin surveys.”

One of JS Bach’s most famous and loved masterpieces with the Portland Baroque Orchestra conducted by Monica Huggett. The double-CD package includes full texts and translations. (Avie)

Following his extraordinary, critically acclaimed recording of concertos by Martinu, Hindemith, and Honegger, the charismatic Johannes Moser returns with a stunning new release, featuring two of the most distinguished 20th century cello concertos. Both works were originally composed for the great Mstislav Rostropovich. Shostakovich's Cello Concerto No. 1 was premiered in October 1959, and is characterized by vitality, humor and virtuosity. Britten's "Symphony for Cello and Orchestra" op 68 was premiered in 1964, with Rostropovich once again as soloist. This new recording continues Moser's stunning exploration of 20th century cello concertos while at the same time building upon his masterful interpretations of cello sonatas by the same featured composers, Shostakovich and Britten.

Classical Music

The Iron Lady tells the compelling story of Margaret Thatcher (Meryl Streep), a woman who smashed through the barriers of gender and class to be heard in a male - dominated world. The story concerns power, the price that is paid for power, and is a surprising and intimate portrait of an extraordinary and complex woman. Directed by Phyllida Lloyd.

Best known for his many film scores, Thomas Newman is one of the more respected and recognized composers for modern film. He has scored over fifty feature films in a career which spans nearly three decades. Newman has received a total of ten Academy Award nominations on such diverse scores as Road To Perdition, Finding Nemo, Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events and Steven Soderbergh’s The Good German. He has won two Grammy Awards, an Emmy and has been nominated for a Golden Globe.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Colorful, original, whimsical, and adventuresome, this collection of musical short stories from one of America’s most diverse composers has something to please every ear.



SCHICKELE A Year in the Catskills. Gardens 1. What Did You Do Today at Jeffrey’s House 2. Dream Dances 3. Diversions • Blair Wind Qnt members; 1,2 Melissa Rose (pn); 3 Felix Wang (vc) • NAXOS 8.559687 (52:03)


The Blair Wind Quintet is a faculty ensemble of the Blair School of Music of Vanderbilt University. Though a woodwind player myself, I am not familiar with their work, so this release, the second on which this ensemble appears, is a pleasant introduction to these fine musicians. Their performances here are mostly solo and in smaller groupings, with only the title work, A Year in the Catskills, played by the whole quintet. This last is one of a trio of works for resident ensembles funded by the Blair Commissioning Project. Peter Schickele’s quintet was joined by a piano trio from Susan Botti and a string quartet by György Kurtág; one can but imagine what a wildly incongruent faculty recital that could have made.


Schickele is, of course, best known in his persona of the researcher and exhumer of works by “the youngest and oddest of J. S. Bach’s 20-odd children.” Since 1965, the year of his first public concert, he has created a body of entertaining musical parodies of familiar musical forms for his fictional P. D. Q. Bach. There is another aspect of the composer, though, as many will know. Under his own name, he composes concert works for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensembles, and vocalists, as well as scores for film, theater, and television. This disc presents a nice sampling of pieces for wind instruments, written over a 46-year period. They cross boundaries of genre and style with consummate skill, and are uniformly clever, lightweight, and charming. Even when fleetingly serious, they are never more than melancholy. They are more often humorous. In fact, minus the more obvious burlesquing that goes on in a P. D. Q. Bach pastiche, his serious works sound remarkably akin to his comedic bread and butter. The unexpected instrumental colors are a bit more subdued, the odd cadence more integrated, and the stylistic incongruities less outrageous. What is played for laughs when acting The Professor is quirky and playful in the realm of the serious composer, but the singular identity can never be in question.


Consider the four seasonal portraits of A Year in the Catskills (2009), presented in Baroque canons and a fantasy, and rounded out with a fifth movement called “Fast Driving,” which bebops the listener back to more modern urban surroundings. Or What Did You Do Today at Jeffrey’s House? (1988) for horn and piano, which remembers childhood games (one is relieved to learn, given his compositional credits for O! Calcutta! ) with a piano-stride parade and a boogie-woogie carnival with dancing bears framing a very brief compulsory nap. Finally, there is Dream Dances (1988), a suite for flute, oboe, and cello, which juxtaposes a not very Baroque minuet and sarabande with a jitterbug, a demented French gallop, and a waltz that only needs John Ferrante and some silly lyrics to become one of the Diverse Ayres on Sundrie Notions.


The two remaining earlier works give some idea of where Schickele might have headed if the fictional “minimeister of Wein-am-Rhein” had not been such a huge success. In these we hear a composer still working in academia, creating works that reflect seriously (well, all right, more seriously) on relatively contemporary styles. Gardens (1968) for oboe and piano is an atmospheric triptych with overtones of Messiaen, though this is more obvious in New York Philharmonic oboist Joseph Robinson’s recording on Cala. Diversions (1963) for oboe, clarinet, and bassoon channels neoclassical Stravinsky in portraits of the bath, a game of billiards, and a New York bar. It is all very engaging, and wonderfully presented by musicians and engineers. Naxos has a winner here, and I hope we hear more from the Blair Wind Quintet. Meanwhile, woodwind fanciers are hereby alerted to a must-buy release.


FANFARE: Ronald E. Grames


-----------

It is a good and joyful thing to see a nice collection of Peter Schickele’s concert music. Not that he is unduly famous for his P.D.Q. Bach character, but as a composer of serious music he shines as one of the most original voices of his generation. Schickele has not invented a new wheel, rather he has managed to take traditional musical gestures and season them with his own invention with the skill of a master chef. This collection of chamber music, deftly rendered by members of the faculty of Vanderbilt’s Blair School of Music, is a showcase of the composer’s unique wit and creativity.

Commissioned by the Blair Quintet, A Year in the Catskills was brand new at the time of this recording. It is a picturesque work; full of the kind of interesting twists of melody that make Schickele’s music so fascinating. He is prone to shifting one or two notes in a tune by a semitone here or a semitone there to make what could sound quite ordinary into something that is unique and quirky.

The brief triptych Gardens, for oboe and piano is a study in colors. One of Schickele’s outstanding features is his ability to say so much in a very short time. I wouldn’t call him a miniaturist, but he can get his point across with little fuss. Such are these elegant little pieces that depict a garden at the three parts of the day. Jared Hauser plays with a sweet unforced tone, and is sensitively accompanied by pianist Melissa Rose.

What Did You Do Today at Jeffrey’s House? is a bit of nostalgia based on memories of the composer’s playtime with a childhood friend. These are whimsical pieces, pulling from a number of styles including a rollicking boogie-woogie ending. Scored for horn and piano, Leslie Norton and Melissa Rose find all the charm of these brief episodes. I can’t say that I was completely in love with the pieces themselves, as they came across to these ears as a bit contrived.

The outstanding work in this recital is the lovely set of Dream Dances. Scored for flute, oboe and cello, Schickele combines the old and the new by creating a suite that is reminiscent of a Baroque partita, but just for fun he throws in the semi-modern by replacing the Courrant with a Jitterbug and the Allemande with a Waltz. It is pretty much genius really, and Jane Kirschner, Jared Hauser and Felix Wang deliver an elegant performance full of wit.

Diversions, scored for oboe, clarinet and bassoon are again whimsical, and depict three specific scenes, a hot bath, a billiard game, and a New York bar. Although I felt that the composer captured his scenes well, I can’t say that I was particularly moved by these little snapshots, in spite of their being very well played.

Peter Schickele is reported to be one of the most performed composers in America, and it is easy to see why. The term accessible gets too much airplay, but his music is almost always captivating, mainly due to his double ability to color within the lines while choosing shades that don’t come from just any box of crayons. A good listen.

Colorful, original, whimsical, and adventuresome, this collection of musical short stories from one of America’s most diverse composers has something to please every ear.


-- Kevin Sutton, MusicWeb International

Ned Rorem' clarity of emotional expression is perfectly suited to the 'breathy gold' of the flute.

Classical Music

“Devine’s harpsichord Goldbergs can stand among the best in a crowded field.” - Phillip Kennicot, Gramophone – September, 2011

=====

Harpsichord versions of J.S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations don’t seem to roll off the presses in quite the same quantities as piano versions these days, but this is still a hotly competitive field for any new entry. Just to pick on two good examples, I’ve been having a listen to Masaaki Suzuki’s recording on the BIS label, as well as making comparisons with another fairly recent harpsichord recording by Aapo Häkkinen on the Alba label (see review). Suzuki has plenty of drive and energy, going for brisk tempi and crisp articulation which keeps everything going with plenty of zip – something you may or may not want in your Goldbergs, but is good to have around if you are in the mood. Häkkinen is frequently more reserved in tempo, and more inclined to introduce a rubato flexibility into his musical narrative.

It’s a terrible thing to make sweeping generalisations, but Steven Devine falls somewhere in between these two players. He has a fairly flexible approach, using a certain amount of rubato to bring out the shapes of phrases but not distorting melodic lines in the process, and certainly not applying as much freedom as Häkkinen. Nor does he drive the music as hard as Suzuki. Tempi are decently forward moving without being tumultuous, and Devine’s articulation is clear without being overly picky, with a nice legato effect. Ornamentation is certainly not extreme, with a few extra passing notes here and there – certainly not exceeding the bounds of acceptable convention. There was only one point which made me check my references: Variatio 6 is played with a slightly odd semi-triplet rhythm, a sort of tum-ti-tum-ti effect, but not quite explicitly, and not quite all the time. Devine writes useful booklet notes about the history and some of the forms in this piece, but doesn’t go into his own interpretative choices when recording the work – probably not necessary when going for what is essentially an uncontroversial reading.

This is a fine recording made using a superb instrument by Colin Booth, indeed, the one seen pictured on the cover for this release. The microphones are placed close, but the lack of mechanical noise and the fine sonority of the harpsichord mean you can be close up and intimate without feeling assaulted by upper harmonics. There are some lovely effects in this piece, and the points at which the parts cross in the two-manual variations such as Variatio 8 are particularly distinguished here. Even after extensive listening it is however tricky to know where to place this recording amongst the pantheon. I have a nostalgia-tinted affection for Trevor Pinnock on the Archiv label, though even his fine recording can sound a bit ‘chunky’ these days. While I still like Aapo Häkkinen I accept his more obvious pulling around of the phrasing can sound a little mannered in places, and certainly by comparison with Steven Devine. The Alba recording is a little more respectful in terms of distance though and is ultimately a less fatiguing listen. Häkkinen’s Joel Katzman instrument also has a thrumming/ringing quality which I can take for long periods. The Booth instrument is a little more nasal in tone, though by no means unattractive. Both recordings are almost identical in terms of overall timing by the way.

It’s only when you start casting the net wider and encounter desperately pedestrian sounding recordings like that of Shin-ichiro Nakano on the Meister Music label that you come to appreciate the quality of these performances. There are also plenty of intolerably jangly ones around, but we’re still spoilt for choice. For every also-ran there’s another fine version, such as Ketil Haugsand on the Simax label, and the ancient and stately Wanda Landowska makes her own views on the piece more than emphatically clear despite an antique recording. All I can say is that Steve Devine’s recording of the Goldberg Variations is certainly amongst the best, making all of the crucial musical points very effectively and with plenty of expressive breathing room. There’s nothing stodgy about his playing, but neither is it lightweight and ephemeral. I can’t say it’s revelatory, but I doubt there are any of these left to come, at least, not on harpsichord. If you already have a much loved harpsichord version of this great work on your shelves then this might not push it aside, although you might by chance have one of the dodgy ones and not know what you are missing. Bearing this in mind by all means give this recording a try – you certainly won’t be disappointed.

- Dominy Clements, MusicWeb International

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.

A swift and nimble account of Beethoven's 2nd Concerto paired with a fiery Bach D minor Concerto, showing how Gould could be far more animated live than in the studio.

The "Fourth Programme" of Sony Classical's Glenn Gould Edition contributes to the Beethoven deluge with a swift and nimble account of the Second Concerto, recorded live in Leningrad in 1957 (SMK52686). Ladislav Slovak conducts, and the coupling is a fiery Bach D minor Concerto—which is far more animated than Gould's studio version under Bernstein.

-- Gramophone [11/1993]


The [Beethoven] Second Concerto, which to my knowledge has only previously been released on Melodiya, is something very unique. Not only is the recording taken from a live concert (Gould gave up public performance in 1964), but it presents playing of consummate artistry in a work that often receives condescending attention from critics. But be warned—the orchestral playing, especially the strings, is dreadful. It is Gould's spontaneity in colouring the writing in different registers, in treating fast passages with an unmannered expressivity (where most pianists rattle off figurations)— in a word, his 'musicality'—that make this a memorable reading. There may be no real sense of peace in the Adagio, where Gould's sensuous use of piano tone is much to the fore, but the finale has an infectious humour that demonstrates how different was his playing in concert, as opposed to the recording studio.

-- Gramophone [9/1986]
reviewing the Beethoven concerto on LP, issued as part of CBS Masterworks 39036

Scored for as few as three marimbas or as many as a hundred percussion instruments plus celesta, harp and piano, these five striking works by contemporary American composers abound in fascinating rhythms, ingenious combinations and juxtapositions.

Classical Music

Classical Music

"Grigolo made a triumphant Covent Garden debut...He balances Italianate ardour with style and intelligence...and his good looks and energetic acting make him an appealing stage figure." - The Daily Telegraph

"He's got everything the role demands - a voice that flows, terrific looks, an instinctive sense of theatre. He's entirely credible as a 20 year old uncontrollably in love and everything he does seems natural, from his impetuous first appearance in the Aimens courtyard, to his chilling shriek of despair at Manon's death." - The Guardian

"In his Covent Garden debut, rising star Vittorio Grigolo wins the audience's hearts with his good looks, ardent singing and an eager demeanour that takes on the full tragic dimension of Chevalier des Grieux's predicament." - The Stage

"More than matching Netrebko for passion and control was the Des Grieux of the young Italian tenor Vittorio Grigolo, making his debut at Covent Garden. The thunderous ovation he received at curtain call suggested that the audience sensed the birth of a star." - The Evening Standard

"Vittorio Grigolo's dashing and thrillingly sung Chevalier des Grieux, his seductive middle voice covered to beautiful effect in the many subito shadings in mezza voce." - The Independent

"The voice was ablaze, mobile in dynamics like Des Grieux's heart, able to soar and sob alike without the slightest strain. The house loved him." - The Times

These days, Roy Harris is remembered as the composer of a famous 3^rd Symphony, who wrote a lot of other Symphonies, but whose other music is hardly known, let alone heard. There is a school of thought which believes that beyond the 3^rd Symphony most of his work isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. Certainly there appears to be a lack of self-criticism on Harris’s part which allowed less well constructed and written works out into the public arena. Works such as the Concerto for Piano, Clarinet and String Quartet, op.2 (1927), String Quartet No.3, Four Preludes and Fugues (1937), Violin Sonata (1941) and the chamber cantata Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight (1953), not to mention the orchestral works When Johnny Comes Marching Home: An American Overture (1934), the Violin Concerto (1949) and the 1^st (1933) and 7^th (1955) Symphonies show a composer of real stature. The chamber works could so easily be programmed but they’re not and our not hearing them is our loss, and a significant loss at that.

None of the pieces on this disk could be claimed to be major works but there are some very attractive and interesting things nonetheless. The two sets of American Ballads use folk-tunes, such as The Streets of Laredo and When Johnny Comes Marching Home, and are delightful suites with some nice quirky turns of phrase. In feel they are reminiscent of Barber’s Excursions for piano and would enrich any recital of modernish piano music. The early Sonata is a tersely argued work in four succinct movements, and it’s easy to see why the original scherzo wouldn’t have fitted into Harris’s scheme of things. The Piano Suite is another strong work; the first movement is bold and brassy, demonstrative and forthright, the middle movement pensive and the finale a French flavoured gigue.

For the rest we have six miniatures. The Toccata contains elements of both the headlong rush you’d expect from such a work, and short reflective interludes. The Variations on an American Folksong, True Love Don’t Weep starts in a most serious manner, becomes lighter then just as you think it’s going somewhere it stops! Untitled is, I believe, the earliest piece we know by Harris and it’s very strange, questing and angular, almost tuneless and imbued with an otherworldly feel. Little Suite is fun, this could almost be a teaching piece. A Happy Piece for Shirley is a delightful tribute. Orchestrations, a strange title for a solo piano piece, especially from someone as adept at orchestration as Harris, is very serious and profound.

Whilst most of these works have been recorded before, it’s good to have them collected together on one disk, and although none of them can claim pretensions to be a lost masterpiece, they are more than mere chippings off the block of genius. The performances have an air of authority about them and the recording is clean and clear. The notes, if not exhaustive, are helpful. Essential for anyone investigating the Symphonies which Naxos is in the process of recording and there are works here which pianists should be investigating when seeking something piquant for their recitals.

-- Bob Briggs, MusicWeb International

This recording of Mozart’s Mass in C minor features Harry Christophers in his role as Artistic Director and conductor of the Handel and Haydn Society - America’s oldest continuously performing orchestra and chorus. Mozart’s Mass in C minor needs little introduction - one of the best-known and most widely performed of the composer’s mass settings, it is generally considered to be one of his greatest works and, as such, is often referred to as the ‘Great Mass’. It is a remarkable union of musical vision and religious text and draws on Mozart’s skill for drama that made his operatic works such a phenomenal success.

Neeme Järvi has been recording for Chandos for several decades now, especially with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, with which he has made more than 100 CDs. Many of these recordings have received tremendous critical acclaim and include several Gramophone Award Winners.

This is his second Chandos recording with the Residentie Orchestra The Hague, of which he is chief conductor. The first, of Bruckner’s Fifth Symphony (CHSA5080) was released in April to excellent acclaim. Gramophone wrote: ‘Järvi is too good a musician not to take his players with him. Indeed the Dutch musicians display a certain daredevil nonchalance as they breeze their way through the epic 635-bar finale.’

Mahler’s Seventh Symphony is perhaps the least well known of all Mahler’s symphonies. Its five movements were written over a period of two years, 1904 – 05, and scored and revised in 1906. The symphony has no programme, but the two serenade movements were influenced by the German romanticism of the poetry of Eichendorff, and elements of the fairytale, the macabre, and the sentimental permeate these movements.

Even though the symphony is imbued with a richness of melody, and bold and original harmonies, it is perhaps the most enigmatic of all Mahler’s symphonies. It begins with a striking funeral march, which develops into a powerful allegro, though the music is at the same time full of ‘dream-like’ elements. These dream-like fantasy elements pervade the serenade movements, which are separated by an exciting central scherzo, and the symphony ends with a vigorously contrapuntal finale. Perhaps the symphony can be seen as a journey from darkness to light, from the B minor gloom of the beginning, to the blaze of C major at the end. The journey is fascinating and very rewarding.

Fragmentary, kaleidoscopic, hallucinatory … creates a wonderfully atmospheric sense of colliding realities.

REVIEWS:

3411070.az_CORIGLIANO_Violin_Concerto.html

CORIGLIANO Violin Concerto, “The Red Violin 1.” Phantasmagoria: Suite from The Ghosts of Versailles • JoAnn Falletta, cond; Buffalo Phil O; 1 Michael Ludwig (vn) • NAXOS 8559671 (61:02)

John Corigliano composed the score to The Red Violin, which turned out to be a masterpiece in its own right. Then, in 1997, with work on the score already completed while shooting on the film continued, Corigliano composed a new, 17-minute piece he called The Red Violin: Chaconne for Violin and Orchestra based on the chaconne progression he’d written for the film. But Corigliano wasn’t done with his Chaconne. Not wishing it to remain a stand-alone piece like Chausson’s Poème , Ravel’s Tzigane , or Beethoven’s Romances, he decided to write three new movements, using the Chaconne as the first movement of a substantive, nearly 40-minute-long violin concerto. And that is what we have here on this disc.

The violin the soloist here, Michael Ludwig, plays, is an 18th-century Lorenzo Storioni, from which the violinist draws a tone that is both liquid and penetrating. One could argue that Corigliano’s concerto is owned by Joshua Bell, for he has been more closely associated with it and more directly involved with the composer than Ludwig, or, for that matter, anyone else. Still, much as I appreciate Bell’s playing in general, I feel there are moments in this piece where he applies the schmaltz a little too thickly. Ludwig resists that temptation, and I think the concerto emerges the better for it.

From the opening of Corigliano’s Phantasmagoria , a suite extracted from the composer’s largely successful opera The Ghosts of Versailles , you’d never guess that this creepy, slithery music sets the stage for what is essentially a “comedy.” As a work detached from its literary references and stage setting, Phantasmagoria becomes a virtuoso showpiece for orchestra. The piece seems to divide into two approximately equal halves. Much of the first half is busy, bustling, noisy, and nutty; the second half, from 13:03 to the end, is calmer, more lyrical, and takes on the feeling of fate accepted, which it is in the opera as Marie is beheaded a second time and reunited with Beaumarchais in Paradise.

Strongly recommended.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

The Buffalo Philharmonic plays throughout with confident assurance under JoAnn Falletta’s baton. Assuming these are live performances ensemble and accuracy in these highly complex scores is excellent. In the spirit of even-handed fairness I should say I have read reviews of this disc elsewhere which make a point of praising the engineering reckoning it to be of award-winning standard. I cannot share that view but as with so many aspects of music; it is all a matter of taste. The Concerto is a very impressive work and one written with a great deal of care and love by John Corigliano – a wonderful tribute to his father. This Corigliano Concerto is right up there and hopefully its appearance on the Naxos with the benefits of distribution and affordability that brings will ensure many more music-lovers will get to hear this powerful and compelling work.

-- Nick Barnard, MusicWeb International

Classical Music