Strasfogel, I.: Franz Schreker Book / Scherzo No. 1 / Schrek

FRANCK: Symphony in D minor / RESPIGHI: Pines of Rome

BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 6 / Choral Fantasy / BRAHMS: Double

Apart from his high-profile concert activities, Franz Konwitschny was inseparably associated with the foundation and development of the new Eterna label. Between 1959 and 1961 Eterna issued all Beethoven’s and Schumann’s symphonies in the then innovative stereo format. Like all of Konwitschny’s late recordings, these gramophone records are now sought-after collector’s items that offer interpretations of lasting significance. One such notable document of the great maestro is the present recording of Johannes Brahms’s First Symphony, made in June 1962 only weeks before Konwitschny’s death. The producer of this recording, Dieter-Gerhardt Worm, praises “the coherence and euphony of the interpretation. Konwitschny does nothing subjectively, he interprets the work. When I played Konwitschny the recording in hospital before his last concert tour, tears of joy rolled down his face.” Worm, who worked on most of Konwitschny’s recordings as a young production manager for the Eterna label, remembers the focused studio work and the immense artistic importance of the conductor: “As a conductor, he was always one of the greatest for me. What he did as a Bruckner conductor, for instance, was incredible. Konwitschny was more than a musician to whom one could say anything; he was someone who knew instinctively how to apply what he had learnt and integrate it into his conducting gestures.”

Carl Conducts … Classical Festival Favourites

This new release is Daniel Behle’s Ode to his Birthplace. Life is never boring with this musician. He is one of those multitalented German tenors, and is equally at home in the concert hall, at a recital or in the opera house, from the Baroque to the twenty-first century. As a Hamburger born and bred, he loves his home city.l And there are plenty of arias and songs for classical tenors that express that love. This programmatic album puts Daniel Behle’s emotions into perspective, reflecting on a strong affinity with the North of Germany with all the passion a tenor can muster. When asked what how Hamburg sounds to him, Behle responds, “The ideal of freedom, so often sung about, is what makes Hamburg what it is. When you come to Hamburg you get the feeling: The world is at my feet. You take a deep breath and life is good. That’s what Hamburg sounds like.”

BRAHMS, J.: Violin Concerto / TCHAIKOVSKY, P.I.: Symphony No

A leading ensemble of period performance practice, Concerto Koln has been acknowledged for their rediscovery of musical rarities. Regardless, the ensemble still views the Baroque as being shaped by two driving forces- Bach and Handel. For this release, parts of three masterpieces have been coupled for the first time: Bach’s “Brandenburg Concerto,” No. 5 and No. 1 of his Orchestral Suites along with Handel’s “Water Music.” Artistic Director Lorenzo Alpert explains the symbiotic nature of this release: “Our intensive engagement over the last 30 years with composers, music theorists and contemporaries from the time of Bach and Handel… opens up new vistas for us as we approach the works of these two great masters… What a joy to recreate a sound that seemed lost forever!”

Mozart: Ouvertüren

Haydn: Symphonies Nos. 93, 94 & 103

SYMPHONIA DOMESTICA SACD

SYMPHONY NO. 9

Stravinsky, I.: Concerto for Piano and Wind Instruments / Zi

Die berühmten Ouvertüren

The melodrama, a genre in which a spoken text is declaimed over a musical accompaniment, was a popular form in the nineteenth century, but it failed to thrive in the twentieth. While performances of Strauss' 1897 setting of Tennyson's narrative poem "Enoch Arden" remain rare, it has aged well, and performances as fine as this are a testimony to its viability and its continuing ability to move the listener. Tennyson tells an achingly poignant story of three children, the two boys both growing to adulthood in love with the young woman, with delicacy and restraint. Strauss matches the story with a reserved but expressive piano accompaniment that supports and never overwhelms the narrative. Emanuel Ax plays with grace and deep feeling, but the focus falls on Patrick Stewart's brilliant and powerful performance. His subtle and nuanced telling is far more effective than an overtly impassioned one would have been, and the naturalness of his reading is hugely compelling and moving. Ax closes the album with two short piano pieces that Strauss wrote when he was still in his teens; they serve as a moving and cathartic epilogue to the melodrama. This extraordinary performance of Enoch Arden should be of strong interest to anyone intrigued by the mystery of the relationship between music and poetry.

-- Stephen Eddins, AllMusic.com

The main question for collectors familiar with Toscanini's 1941-42 Philadelphia Orchestra recordings concerns how this newly remastered edition (compiled from "original sources", according to Sony/BMG) compares to earlier ones. To my ears, the recordings sound better than ever. Andreas Meyer's transfers reveal a wider spectrum of low, middle, and high-range frequencies as well as more noticeable surface noise, while a few previous instances of pitch waver now are fixed. Loud climaxes that once emerged powdery and diffuse gain considerable definition and color, as Respighi's Roman Festivals and Debussy's Iberia bear out. The boost in dynamic range reinforces the Philadelphia string section's characteristically lush sonority, yet at the same time underlines occasionally scrappy moments like the cross rhythms at the outset of the Tchaikovsky Pathétique's march movement or the overly rushed Mendelssohn Overture and Wedding March from A Midsummer Night's Dream.

The Debussy La Mer and Berlioz Queen Mab Scherzo match the point and delicacy of Toscanini's later NBC Symphony studio versions, albeit with a little more warmth, animation, and tonal shading, despite the inferior sonics. By contrast, Strauss' Death and Transfiguration seems relatively ordinary when you consider the extraordinary rhythmic focus and polyphonic delineation distinguishing the Maestro's great 1952 NBC reading.

Critical consensus singles out the Schubert "Great" C major symphony as the prize of the Toscanini/Philadelphia series, and I couldn't agree more. The fire and drive typifying the conductor's 1953 NBC performance is present in a suaver, more massively contoured orchestral context, with notable tempo adjustments such as the subtly effected first-movement transitions and, in the finale, a striking holdback on the unison C-naturals (measures 1058 and on).

I also should make special mention of the first-chair soloists, particularly oboist Marcel Tabuteau's faultless, elegant phrasing and Mason Jones' mellifluous horn work in the Schubert second movement. Whereas RCA's deleted complete Toscanini Edition spread the Philadelphia recordings across four CDs, here everything comfortably fits on three. Obviously this set recommends itself to all Toscanini admirers.

--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

This 2010 release coincides with the 100th anniversary of the premiere of Elgar’s Concerto for Violin in B minor. In this performance, Nikolaj Znaider plays the Guarnerius “del Gesu” 1741 violin, which Fritz Kreisler (to whom the concerto was dedicated) played in the concerto’s 1910 premiere in London, with Elgar conducting.

Winter Classics (Klassische Musik zum Kuscheln)

Isaac Stern changed the world he lived in, both as a violinist of dazzling virtuosity and immense soul, and as a tireless, joyous humanitarian. Even among people who know little of classical music, his name is synonymous with the highest quality and the most generous spirit. In a career that stretched over half a century, Stern made definitive recordings of the great canon of Western music for the violin, from towering concertos to the most beguiling of encores. His repertoire encompassed everything from Baroque chamber works to the most challenging music of his own time, all transformed by incomparable artistry and a unique musical spirit. Artists featured in this set include Yo-Yo Ma, Pinchas Zukerman, Pablo Casals, Jean-Pierre Rampal, Mstislav Rostropovich, Daniel Barenboim and Emanuel Ax as well as Eugene Ormandy conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra and Leonard Bernstein conducting the New York Philharmonic.

There have been many recordings of the three great Tchaikovsky ballets by the same conductor, and Slatkin’s recordings typically get overlooked in any discussion of them. This is a pity, because his versions are uniformly superb, beautifully engineered, and wholly idiomatic. Is it because no one regards the Saint Louis Symphony as the major orchestra it is? Is it Slatkin himself, a splendid conductor who hasn’t ever gotten the respect he surely deserves based on the excellence of his discography? I don’t know and I don’t care. Now you can get all three ballets in this budget box, and even if you have other performances in your collection, you’d be foolish not to listen.

Each of these performances has outstanding features. The Nutcracker reveals Slatkin’s deft hand with Tchaikovsky’s most colorful score, and evokes a genuine fairytale atmosphere. The big transformation scene in act one really glitters, while the famous dances in act two have all the necessary energy and character. Sleeping Beauty, the greatest ballet of the three, if not necessarily the most popular, has plenty of the requisite drama and lyrical impetus plus that genuine, hard to define, balletic lilt, while Swan Lake simply has never been better done. Check out Slatkin’s handling of the finale, with its intelligent treatment of Tchaikovsky’s ridiculously overscored percussion parts (sound clip). Has the music ever sounded clearer and more honestly triumphant? I don’t think so. Get this.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

HANDEL GREAT HITS

This new release is the soundtrack from the motion picture, Bach in Brazil. The story is inspired by true events, and follows retired German music teacher Marten Brueckling as he travels to Brazil to collect a sheet of original Bach manuscript, but ends up teaching music to children in a juvenile detention center. The tracks on this release are enchanting arrangements of Bach’s best loved melodies, mixed with Brazilian flair. “Our aim in Bach in Brazil is to bring Bach’s melodies to life with Brazilian rhythms and instrumentations, rather like Marten Brueckling in the film gaining a new perspective on his life from the children and the Brazilian feeling for life.”

Discover Film Classics explores the great film themes from composer such as Arvo Part, Beethoven, Wagner and Barber, from classic films like “Amelie,” “A Clockwork Orange,” and “Platoon.”; The Discover Series from Berlin Classic aims to make classics popular, firing people up about the music presented, regardless of musical taste.; Rather than focusing on complete works, this series focuses on individual pieces that have rewritten our musical history.

Handel: Water Music Suites Nos. 1 & 2 - Music for the Royal

The album entitled Message from G that was released in 1979 on the MPS label embodies more than any other the visionary creativity of the composer and pianist Friedrich Gulda. On the album, he traces the paths of the great masters- Bach, Mozart and Debussy, whose work he plays- works which then provide him with the most diverse of inspirations for his own compositions, long before classical music opened up to other influences. “My aim in remastering “Message from G” was not to change anything in the recordings of the three concerts of 1978; not to adapt them to today’s listening habits or to modify them; on the contrary, the aim was to capture that special beauty of musicality and tone and to achieve a sound as close to the original recordings as possible. To that end, the master tape was comprehensively reworked: on the one hand by careful selection and the finest calibration of the tape equipment and the subsequent signal chain, and on the other hand by making very sensitive adjustments to the frequency range and the amplitude level. The theoretical basis for this was, among other things, an original vinyl disc that I used frequently for comparison purposes. We worked exclusively with analogue technology to produce the re-release…” (Producer’s comment, Christoph Stickel, July 2015)