Also available on Blu-ray

Mariss Jansons is one of the most influential conductors of our age. In 2012 the charismatic Latvian musician conducted his second New Year Concert in Vienna, an honour that very few conductors have enjoyed. For the present documentary portrait, the film maker Robert Neumüller observed Jansons at work in Amsterdam, Riga, St Petersburg, Vienna and Salzburg. The film shows Jansons working with his various orchestras, including rehearsals for the 2012 New Year Concert, and also explores his private life, resulting in a number of fascinating insights into Jansons’ artistic development and philosophy. By way of a bonus, this release features a complete performance of Mahler’s Second Symphony with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra under Mariss Jansons.

Subtitles: G, E, F, Sp, Chin, Kor
Booklet: E, G, F
No. of Discs: 2
Run time: 145 minutes
Disc Format: DVD
Picture: NTSC, 16:9
Audio: PCM Stereo, PCM 5.1
Region Code: 0 (worldwide)

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.

Thrilling flights of fancy abound from violinist Arabella Steinbacher in Fantasies, Rhapsodies and Daydreams Spectacular virtuoso playing, bravura passagework and show-stopping melodies are balanced with wistful lyricism and sublime tone painting in this irresistible programme of perennial favourites, played with elan by the violinist Arabella Steinbacher with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo, conducted by Lawrence Foster in this new release from Pentatone.

From the high jinks and outrageous showmanship of Franz Waxman's Carmen Fantasie and Pablo de Sarasate's Zigeunerweisen, to the fearsome technical demands of Ravel's Tzigane and the exquisite refinement of Saint-Saens' Havanaise and Introduction et Rondo capriccioso, this album harks back to an earlier era of violin playing.

REVIEW:

Were someone to ask me to suggest a disc to introduce them to the violin, I might well steer them in the direction of this one. I rather like the way she pushes on in the central section of The Lark Ascending, and it cleverly elides into the beginning of Saint-Saens's Havanaise. This, the Introduction and Rondo capriccio, and Ravel's Tzigane are given excellent performances. The standout performance comes with the Meditation from Massanet's Thais, done with breathtaking beauty, a turn-on for any newcomer to the violin.

– Gramophone

[Symphony] "my ultimate recommendation goes not to Nonesuch's success, but to the moving recording on Koch Schwann - this is heartfelt music-making, pure and simple, that succeeds admirably in conveying the sorrow of these aptly named songs. Koch also provide better value for money with their inclusion of the very approachable Three Pieces in Old Style" [Totus tuus] "It's a simple, fetching, unaccompanied motet, written for Pope John Paul's visit to Poland" (Gramophone)

(4-CD box set) The Chicago Symphonies is a magnificent four-CD boxed set by Wadada Leo Smith's Great Lakes Quartet. Each disc includes one of the four symphonies composed by Wadada Leo Smith for this quartet. The first three symphonies, "Gold Symphony," "Diamond Symphony" and "Pearl Symphony," are performed by Wadada Leo Smith with saxophonist/flutist Henry Threadill, bassist John Lindberg and drummer Jack DeJohnette whereas the fourth, "Sapphire Symphony - The Presidents and Their Visions of America," features Smith with saxophonist Jonathon Haffner, Lindberg and DeJohnette. The idea of a symphony composed for a quartet was first presented by Don Cherry on his classic recording Symphony For Improvisers in 1966 but Wadada Leo Smith has brought this idea to the present day and broadened it to include social and political into the creative space. The Chicago Symphonies celebrate the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians and the historical development of creative music in Chicago starting with Louis Armstrong and through Sun Ra onto the AACM as well as, in the case of "Sapphire Symphony," Abraham Lincoln and Baraka Hussein Obama

Sofya Melikyan's fascinating album has as it's inspiration the great Ricardo Vi�es, composer and pianist, champion of young progressive composers (he was Satie's favorite performer of his music), whose friends included among others Picasso, Gide, Colette, Cocteau. Cocteau said of him "Vi�es does not play, he elucidates". To define Vi�es "the shining light of contemporary art", as Adolfo Salazar described him in 1918 as the pianist of the French avant-garde is absolutely correct, albeit quite inadequate at the same time. Like his compatriots Granados and Malats, he was a student of de B�riot, and taking First Prize in piano at the Paris Conservatoire in 1894 followed by his first recital at the Salle Pleyel on 21 February 1895 marked the launch of a career that, over the course of four decades, would prove to be as frenetic as it was thrilling. Vi�es's insatiable curiosity for so-called 'modern music' and his ever restless temperament, always eager to discover neglected repertoire of the present day and to present it to the public as well as music from the past, became apparent very early on, as in his recital of 18 April 1898 at the Salle �rard, at which he gave the premiere of the Menuet antique by one of his first and greatest friends in Paris, Maurice Ravel, or in his historic cycle of four concerts that he would give in the same hall between March and April 1905 devoted to 'Keyboard music from it's origins to the present day'.

Classical Music

DON QUIXOTE

SATIE: AVANT-DERNIERES PENSEES

Peter Boyer is one of the most frequently performed American orchestral composers of his generation, widely admired not least for his GRAMMY®-nominated Ellis Island: The Dream of America (Naxos 8.559246). The composer writes, “The five works included on this recording represent a cross-section of my orchestral music. Three Olympians reflects my interest in mythology and history. Often I have received invitations to compose music for celebratory concerts, and three of the works included here – Silver Fanfare, Festivities and Celebration Overture – were created for such occasions.” Symphony No. 1 is a lyrical and rhythmically charged work, dedicated to the memory of Leonard Bernstein.

In 2008, Carolin Widmann, Jörg Widmann, Nicolas Altstaedt and Alexander Lonquich performed Olivier Messiaen's Quartet for the end of time for violin, clarinet, cello and piano with the seriousness of spirit and subtle understatement that the work requires. Composed in 1940 in a German prisoner-of-war camp, Messiaen here reached a pinnacle of his composing career at the age of just 31. In this work he conveys to his listeners his spiritual interpretation of (musical) time and plays of colour. With these four exceptional chamber musicians, all masters of their art, the Salzburg Festival was treated to an exemplary performance of this work.

POLISH CHRISTMAS CAROLS

HEWITT Medley Overture. New Medley Overture. New Federal Overture. CARR Federal Overture. REINAGLE Miscellaneous Overture. Occasional Overture . Overture in G • Patrick Gallois, cond; Jyväskylä Snf Finlandia • NAXOS 8.559654 (68: 25)


Most readers will never have heard of these composers. In fact, I rather suspect that most collectors attracted to this release, The 18th-Century American Overture , will be so more out of historical curiosity than out of any prior knowledge of the music itself. Benjamin Carr (1768–1831) and James Hewitt (1770–1827) were both English-born and educated. Carr, who studied organ with Charles Wesley and composition with Samuel Arnold, the first great cataloger and editor of Handel’s music, was a prolific publisher, a driving force in the development of a music establishment in Philadelphia, and one of the founders of the Musical Fund Society. Hewitt, who made the questionable claim that he had played violin in London under the direction of Haydn, was similarly engaged in New York, where he bought an earlier publishing concern from Carr, and later in Boston, where he was a conductor, arranger, publisher, and of course composer. Scots-born Alexander Reinagle was a contemporary of Carr in Philadelphia, where he established a concert series and was involved in the theatrical life of the city. He was a favorite composer of George Washington, who not only attended many of Reinagle’s concerts, but arranged for Reinagle to give piano lessons to his adopted daughter, Nelly Custis.


I mention the credentials of the three composers, as one would otherwise never attribute these works to musicians of any serious standing. Of course, when listening to the initial track, the Hewitt Medley Overture , one may well assume that a disc of Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 20 had been substituted. But wait a bit, for soon after follow quotes of reels, marches, and patriotic songs like Yankee Doodle . In many of these, transitions are minimal, and there is little or no attempt to create a coherent flow. Tunes are occasionally cut off in mid-phrase to make way for the next, and the sublime and the trivial reside incongruously together. These then are pops concert entertainments of their day, compendiums of common tunes that would be recognized by the audience, packaged occasionally with the latest works from Europe. (The Mozart piano concerto premiered but 13 years before its appropriation here.) Some, like Carr’s Federal Overture , have a political purpose, with La Marseillaise running roughshod over some English tunes, followed by Oh Dear, What Can the Matter Be? and Philip Phile’s Presidential March , now better known as The Itsy-Bitsy Spider . The intent would not have been lost on his audience in 1794. Others by Reinagle, the pragmatic man of the theater, lack pretensions musical or political, and are full of lively dance tunes.


Each of them, whatever the musical merit, gives insight into the culture of the new republic. These seven overtures are all that remain of many such works produced in America in the last two decades of the 18th century, and these have only survived in published piano reductions, or string parts without wind parts or score. The reconstructions were done by musicologist Bertil van Boer, professor of music history and theory at Western Washington University in Bellingham. He explains the historical background, and the detective work done in preparing the reconstruction, in his amusing and informative insert notes. Van Boer’s specialty is Scandinavian music of the 18th century, which explains, perhaps, the provenance of the recording. The Jyväskylä Sinfonia Finlandia is not an ensemble whose work often finds its way to these shores. Fanfare critics have reviewed only two releases: a disc of works by Rautavaara and another of Finnish tangos. That is about as broad a range as any ensemble I know. Now add obscure American popular potpourris to the mix. Who does their programming?


Whatever the story behind the recordings, kudos to van Boer, conductor Patrick Gallois, and the adaptable musicians of the orchestra for rescuing these curiosities and bringing them to our attention. The execution is polished and enthusiastic. The engineering is top-drawer. No one will mistake anything other than the Mozart quotes for great music, but the overtures are amusing, and this release adds an important tile to the mosaic of American music.


FANFARE: Ronald E. Grames


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This is another issue in the Naxos “American Classics” series. Even if you are doubtful about the relevance of the word “Classics” these Overtures most certainly are, and go out of their way to be, American. Each is in the form of a “Medley Overture”, a collection of popular tunes linked together with greater or lesser skill. Although this device originated in London the examples here are all intended to further particular political views at a time of intense debate in America between Federalists and Republicans. All of this is explained in the fascinating leaflet notes by Bertil van Boer who has also reconstructed these works, in some cases from limited evidence.

The tunes included in these Overtures almost invariably include “Yankee Doodle” and a large helping of Scottish and Irish tunes, presumably appealing especially to those coming from those countries. Other tunes used include the “Marseillaise”, William Shield’s “The Ploughboy”, “Oh dear, what can the matter be”, and, most surprising of all, the opening tutti from Mozart’s Piano Concerto No 20 in D minor. The results are clearly of considerable historical interest even if musically to describe them even as second rate might seem an exaggeration of their qualities. However unless you insist on nothing but the best, as did a relation of mine whose entire reading of fiction consisted of “Ulysses” and “War and Peace”, there is much to enjoy here. This is due more than a little to the sprightly performances and clear recording but I think is primarily due to the very appealing self-confidence and ingenuous swagger of the music itself. Despite the political messages that their music is apparently intended to send, the three composers represented here were all British in origin – Reinagle from Scotland and Carr and Hewitt from England. These Overtures have much in common with the music of such composers as Michael Kelly, Charles Dibdin and Steven Storace. Hewitt is best known for a wonderfully naïve Sonata describing the Battle of Trenton, and the works by him on this disc are little more advanced musically. However like all the rest they have charm and curiosity value in abundance. Maybe it is overstating the case to describe them as “American Classics” but this is certainly a disc that I find almost always generates a contented smile in this listener at least.

-- John Sheppard, MusicWeb International

Missouri-based choir Kantorei of Kansas City and their director Chris Munce return to Resonus Classics with a sparkling recording of carols and motets for Christmas. With a compelling programme of Renaissance and contemporary works for the festive season that presents the Christmas story and the journey to Bethlehem, including a number of world premiere recording. Kantorei explores rarely heard works by Renaissance composers such as Giovanni Bassano, Melchior Vulpius, Jakob Reiner and Blasius Amon combined with contemporary composers including Matthew Culloton, Ivo Antognini, R. Douglas Helvering and Kim André Arnesen among others.

• Two startlingly original works from one of the most influential figures in contemporary music. De Profundis has been described as a 'melodramatic oratorio' for speaking pianist.

The National Symphony Orchestra will presents the complete sinfonias of George Walker. "The National Symphony Orchestra's unprecedented digital recording cycle offers an opportunity to experience my father's compositional evolution in context for the first time. Peter Laki's text, Frank Schramm's photography, and, of course, the committed artistry of Maestro Noseda and the musicians make a compelling argument for this music's enduring significance." (Gregory Walker, son of George Walker)

Classical Music

Rolf Riehm is... an unconventional artist. Before him, nobody has ever sensualized in music such a complex cosmos of philosophical reflections, historical facts, myths, fairytales, memories, scientific arguments, the sublime and the trivial, current sociopolitical findings, very personal ingredients and contributions.' - Bernd Leukert. In a letter to Guy Braunstein, soloist at the world premiere, Riehm describes “Shifting” for violin and orchestra as 'a huge, sweeping melody. For me, it is like a river that continually gains new strength from the downhill slope of its landscape – the landscape here is the expressivity which gives impetus to the "melody" and drives it forward, "…moltissimo appassionato…". The third section is nothing other than a single suspension extended to almost five minutes. And then shortly before the end: no more restrictions, no excessive pressures, only free movement. This is the true beginning of the piece!' Riehm sees his composition “Archipel Remix” for orchestra with electronic playbacks as an 'archipelago, a complex of islands, consisting of differently sized islands. The piece starts at the beginning and ends at the end, unsurprisingly, but I want to avoid [the natural passage of time]. Hence the metaphor of the archipelago and the type of designation.' - Marion Saxer & Rolf Riehm)

What happens if the composer and the listener are the same person? This is exactly what Jo Kondo’s way of composing implies. If the composer is to be nothing but a curious listener, he must be able to surprise himself. He must rid himself of all prior knowledge or intention. Born in Tokyo in 1947, Jo Kondo was influenced throughout his entire education almost exclusively by traditional Western art music. Like so many of his Western colleagues, he feels this to be both a limitation and the greatest challenge to the creative process. “The music one grows up with is like a cage one has to break out of.” The type of improvisation that Jo Kondo employs is only loosely related to improvisation as it is commonly understood. Kondo does not improvise using an instrument, but with music paper, note by note. “I write down the first note, which can be anything, and then I try to listen to it again and again in my head until the second note appears. Then I write it down, and then I listen to these two notes again and again until the third note comes up. And then, repeating this process, I always go back to the top of the music to find the next note. That means that when I have 150 notes already in succession on my paper, I find number 151 by going back to the top of the piece and listening through from the top to the 150th note to find the next note. That’s what I mean by improvisation.” - Jo Kondo All of Jo Kondo’s pieces have been written using this method. The result is a completely linear music that avoids any kind of obvious phrasing, melody, or motivic development, permitting the individual note to retain “its own entity of life”. Since even a musical line can endanger this fragile autonomy, Kondo distributes the notes among the various instrumental parts. This “hocket” technique, which has been used since the thirteenth century, demands enormous rhythmic virtuosity from the performers to avoid disrupting the organic unity of the extremely fragmented line. Thus, there is space left for the listener to create his own phrasing out of it.

MAHLER Symphony No. 4 • Phillipe Herreweghe, cond; Rosemary Joshua (sop); Champs-Elysée O • OUTHERE LPH 001 (53:28)


Mahler’s symphonies are a relative newcomer to the period-instrument movement: Roger Norrington’s Hänssler disc is the only alternative to this new one. The main divergence between these historically informed versions and all of the others is the issue of vibrato, particularly in the strings: Both of the orchestras employ little if any; Herreweghe’s string players also use gut strings.


Some listeners may feel, as I do, that there is an astringent tone in the string sound (though that is a positive boon in the second movement’s scordatura passages); this is partially offset by the clarity and directness of the sound as a whole, both instrumentally and in the audio production (provided by the masterly Andreas Neubronner). Detail is exemplary and natural, surpassing most of the competition, SACDs included.


Herreweghe, while happy to enumerate the differences in sound provided by his period orchestra, rightly notes that “we are only too aware of one blatant fact: the essential is elsewhere.” Quite so. In matters of tempo, I have no argument. The first three movements are crisply articulated, with care taken to observe the sometimes deceptively complex tempo changes. The third movement is particularly successful, where the natural balance between winds and strings that Herreweghe mentions in his program note is especially effective. There is enough warmth in the string tone to establish the peaceful opening feeling, while there is ample power in the winds to negotiate the minor-mode darkness and the arrival at heaven’s gates.


The printed timing of the last movement—6: 41—sent up a red flag. Mahler’s own piano roll of the movement was timed at 7:19, and Yvonne Kenny’s recording (once available on Pickwick) is breathless in the extreme; most recordings time out between eight and 10 minutes (Norrington’s is 8:37). Luckily, this proved to be a typo, and Herreweghe accompanies the fresh-sounding and exquisitely characterful Rosemary Joshua at a sensible 8:41 (the total time, as listed in the headnote, is correct).


All together, this is an excellent recording. I prefer it to the Norrington, mostly due to the latter’s characteristically over-hasty tempos and to the less ingratiating sound of his orchestra. Herreweghe’s own attention to Mahler’s sound world (his Wunderhorn disc was reviewed in Fanfare 30:3) has once again paid a handsome dividend.


FANFARE: Christopher Abbot

Like Korngold, Herrmann was a consummate movie composer: his only Symphony -inventive, soundly constructed, always eventful and excitingly scored - successfully taps a harmonically tangy, neoromantic vein reminiscent of Barber at his best... The Devil & Daniel Webster (Suite) was assembled shortly after the film's score won it's Oscar... Herrmann treats several New England folk-tunes to his own special brand of orchestral wizardry. The score is both a gentle, sepia-tinted portrait of rustic Americana and a wickedly endearing account of Mr Scratch's devilish interventions... The 1943 berceuse For the Fallen, is a brief, but poignant lament for the soldiers killed in action... James Sedares and the NZSO are on top form throughout this valuable addition to Koch's concert works by acclaimed film composers" (Gramophone)

Cappelletti and Bamert's coupling is salutary in what little remains to apologize for in Respighi's music when played with real opulence and virtuosity. The fact is that the Concerto belies it's name: both have shrewdly perceived that Respighi's use of modality enables him to explore both early music and folklore... The lushness sounds much more natural in the context of a late-romantic violin concerto, with a big and bold performance of rich and dramatic gesture. Cappelletti, a striking and accomplished soloist, makes the most of the finale's punch and vigour, but also of the musing beauty of the slow movement. I now prefer this (version)... "romantic warmth is also a feature of Barra's Poema (suite), Respighi in neo-baroque lush harmonies with a baroque-size orchestra" (Gramophone)

Classical Music

Director: Humphrey Burton

Recorded live at the Wiener Musikvereinssaal, 1986, 1987, 1988 and 1990.

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: PCM Stereo 2.0 / DTS 5.1
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Booklet notes: English, German, French
Running time: 166 mins
No. of DVDs: 2 (DVD 9 + DVD 5)

In the mid 1980s, Unitel began recording a complete cycle of Sibelius symphonies with Leonard Bernstein and the Vienna Philharmonic. Bernstein´s death in 1990 unfortuantely cut short this project after the release of Symphonies Nos. 1, 2, 5 and 7. Recorded live at Vienna´s Musikverein, these ecstatic performances were the object of stellar reviews. On this double-disc set, Bernstein´s unique and by now legendary interpretations of Sibelius are released for the first time on DVD.

Schumann: Symphonies Nos. 2 and 3

DVORÁK Symphony No. 9, “From the New World.” SUK Pohádka, op. 16 • Bertrand de Billy, cond; Vienna RSO • OEHMS 745 (72:09)

There seems to be a never-ending river of recordings of Antonin Dvorák’s Symphony “From the New World.” This particular stream flows down the Danube from Vienna to upset my notion that I’d heard all that might be done with a work deservedly known as this composer’s masterpiece. I have accumulated more than a few recordings of it: LPs by Arturo Toscanini with the NBC SO and Rafael Kubelík and the VP; CDs by Alexander Titov and St. Petersburg’s O “New Philharmony,” Pavel Urbanek and the PFO, and Marin Alsop and the BSO. These recordings span over a half-century, exposing the diligent listener to shifts in orchestral styles and gradual improvement in recording technique. The most recent, by the Vienna RSO under Bertrand de Billy, is either the culmination of these trends and developments, or merely the most recent (an Oblomovian paradox, depending on how you look at it). De Billy’s reading has its own fascinations.

For some time I had come to view Urbanek and the PFO’s traditional reading my fave, until Alsop’s version, also in the grand tradition, with the BSO took the top spot on my list. This reranking was mostly owing to improvements in recording sophistication. Now, along comes Billy—pronounced Bee-Yee, as in Puilly (or Pwee-Yee) Fuissé—who is willing to take some unorthodox risks in his interpretation, and I find myself weakening. Fickle is the heart of the record reviewer (Ovid).

Surfing quotables in my volume of The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music , I came upon a doozie. “Dvorák’s music is a particularly happy result of the major influences on his art: Wagner, Brahms, and folk music.” It encapsulates in one sentence a perhaps century-long conflict between the followers of Brahms and Wagner—an argument between Brahms’s pure music for its own sake and Wagner’s nationalistic music in service of the state. Or, in other terms, it highlights Brahms’s adherence to the classical forms vs. Wagner’s insistence upon totally new forms. Pardon this reduction to an oversimplified view, but to give both sides their due would take volumes. De Billy has a knack for bringing out the best in both points of view, to mine the series of big emotional moments and to honor adherence to form.

In the slow second movement’s second theme (4:40 in), there are passages that remind me of Wagner’s “Forest Murmurs,” and others of his original orchestral inventions. And then (8:00 in) the horns blare forth, not with the sustained force of Siegfried’s funeral music, but with enough force to prepossess one and call Wagner to mind. Shortly (at 9:30), there is a passage that reminds me of Brahms in its precise delicacy of the woodwinds. So, listening closely, one can hear Brahms and Wagner in this Dvorák Symphony. All through the work, de Billy uses subtle reversals of emphasis, bringing from background to foreground, or playing loudly what is usually played softly. Here, I must emphasize that de Billy does not choose to make such reversals each and every time the possibility arises. He is not slavishly doctrinaire about it; rather, he seems to decide on an ad hoc basis. All of the score’s notes are represented in performance, but their presentation is subtly changed, perhaps to be ironic and introduce a postmodern flair to the performance. He’s not telling.

Which brings to mind the following notion: certain music would retain its coherence even if parts were played in reverse. In Terry Riley’s In C , any musician may enter a bar and stay as long as he/she wishes by inventing variations on the notes in the score before moving on to the next bar as long as he/she remains in the key of C; and in certain of Bach’s pieces that were written for one instrument and then adapted ( by Bach ) to suit another, and owing to the qualities of one or the other (say, the slow organ instead of a quick harpsichord, with its faster action) can require more playing time to stretch out the score, and actually wind up much slower in performance though composed of the same notes. These are just two examples of music that is so formally strong the idiosyncrasies of performance can only add to its ambiance, hence interpretation, and give the music wider emotional scope to the listener and more opportunity for playfulness to the conductor.

By playing Dvorák’s very familiar “New World” Symphony with his personal vision of how some loud passages might be better if played softly, of how with the woodwinds “backing up” the strings, some passages might be bettered by emphasizing the winds and letting the strings serve as “back up.” Employing such stratagems, de Billy brings a new spotlight to the bas-relief of the score. By shining his spotlight at slightly different angles, he creates new relationships among the shadows. It is still the same Symphony, but with slightly different emphases in the presentation, de Billy has made it new. He has traded in a tired, if venerable, old warhorse for a high-spirited young one. To add to this, the recording engineering is very, very clear and crisp. On a high-resolution system, say a good headphones rig, you can hear every damned thing; and such a recording will bring out the best in nearly all stereo rigs.

I’m only familiar with one other recording of Josef Suk’s (Dvorák’s son-in-law) symphonic suite, Fairy Tale , and that one is played by Jirí Bêlohlávek and the Czech PO (1992) for Chandos. De Billy’s elapsed time for this piece is about 29:30, and Belohlávek’s is about 30:00. This makes the difference in elapsed times about 1.5 percent and pretty indistinguishable. De Billy’s version was recorded in 2008, and, owing to whatever technological advances, profits by each individual instrument’s better definition and the complete ensemble’s better balance. Suk was a very solid composer; though it was hard for him to step outside the shadow of his father-in-law, he does. Fairy Tale has considerable charm, and de Billy, aided by the ORF (Austrian National Radio) engineers, brings it to the fore more than his predecessor managed to do.

If you are the kind of record collector who is always on alert for the analogy to a very unique wine, like an Australian Rosé made from rich Shiraz grapes, you might like this album. It contains a richly flavored Dvorák Symphony “From the New World” at its best, and a zesty and charming Pohádka , both benefitting from very fine recording engineering. Highly recommended.

FANFARE: Ilya Oblomov