Mozart: Serenade No. 10 "Gran Partita" & Divertimenti, K. 21

This recording was nominated for the 2000 Grammy Award for "Best Small Ensemble Performance (with or without Conductor)."
There hasn't been a violist with as big a name as Yuri Bashmet since the days of William Primrose. Bashmet has taken the classical world by storm, and like Primrose, he has greatly expanded the repertoire for his instrument. Bashmet has commissioned many works from prominent composers and has also made some compelling arrangements which serve as vehicles for his ensemble, Moscow Soloists.
His arrangement of the Brahms Clarinet Quintet is quite original. Rather than simply playing the clarinet part on the viola, Bashmet pulls a solo part out of the five parts, thus re-arranging Brahms' original hierarchy of instrumentation. The result is almost a different piece, but no less compelling. The Moscow Soloists give a romantic yet distinctly Russian performance, utilizing rubato and sound color in a way that makes the piece even more rhapsodic.
In Alexander Tchaikovsky's arrangement of the Shostakovich 13th String Quartet, the solo viola is more integrated into the string texture. Shostakovich's late works have the hard edge of death written into them, and Bashmet masterfully enhances this effect by coaxing his orchestra to create brittle, uncompromising sounds. The movement is not without its beautiful sections, but the pervading emotion is that of painful grief.

Stravinsky, I.: Rite of Spring / Strauss, R.: Don Juan / Til

Can a performer make a composition sound better than it really is? Peter Serkin is one who surely can. He’s a marvellous pianist, and plays everything on this disc with an uncanny sensitivity to tone, nuance and overall shaping. He is also an enthusiastic champion of living composers. All these nine works were written for Serkin, seven for a 1989-90 recital tour consisting entirely of specially commissioned compositions. Other pieces by Peter Lieberson frame the present collection, while the work he wrote for the tour occupies the central position; this American composer has long been the pianist’s close friend. Breeze of Delight, from Lieberson’s Fantasy Pieces, works minor miracles with the sorts of gestures and harmonic language familiar from John Ireland. Other compositions – including some of Lieberson’s – still end up seeming more the result of craft and occasionally remarkable ingenuity exacted on tired, if generally dissonant, materials and borrowed forms than the product of compulsive invention: Oliver Knussen’s Variations, for example, or Alexander Goehr’s … in real time I, which gives the disc its title. Leon Kirchner’s often turbulent, cunning Interlude suggests the hand of an underrated master. But even in this case, the responsibility for turning prose into poetry could, as elsewhere, have really been Serkin’s astonishing talent.

Performance: 5 (out of 5), Sound: 4 (out of 5)

-- Keith Potter, BBC Music Magazine

This disc received the 1997 Gramophone award for "Best Orchestral Recording."

This disc received the 1997 Grammy Award for "Best Classical Engineered Recording." It was also nominated for the Award for "Best Classical Album."
This disk presents a vivid picture of Aaron Copland's growth in the decade from his arrival to the creation of his early masterpieces. The 1924 'Organ Symphony' shows the enfant terrible throwing crashing dissonance and jazzy accents around with such high spirits that conductor Walter Damrosch told the premiere audience "if a young man can write like that at twenty-three within five years he will be ready to commit murder." The 1929 'Dance Symphony' recycles music from a never-staged ballet, which accounts for its somewhat episodic nature, while the 'Short Symphony' of 1933, modest in dimension and taut in structure, reveals a dramatic increase in the composer's powers, a development first signaled by the 1930 'Piano Variations,' arranged by Copland in 1957 as the 'Orchestral Variations.'
Leonard Slatkin and the Saint Louis Symphony are old and trusted hands with Copland's music, having recorded nearly all of the major orchestral works for RCA and EMI. These performances are right on, full of energy catching the young composer's heady mix of French color and American attitude. The recording is excellent, having both atmosphere and punch, with the featured organ captured impactfully in Christ Church Cathedral, Saint Louis.

Serge Baudo, a very find and under-appreciated conductor of the French repertoire, led a studio recording from 1978 with Claude Dormoy, Michèle Command and Gabriel Bacquier... [It] was highly praised at the time of its release and should be re-released. It is the only commercial recording of the wonderful Bacquier as Golaud, and Michèle Command was a beguiling as Mélisande.

-- Jeffrey Sarver, MusicWeb International

The comparison here is between two very mature artists, always taking the broader view, and two very young artists out to extract the maximum from every detail. When reviewing the Barenboims (on HMV) way back in 1968, I remember being enchanted by the sheer beauty and speaking quality of so much in their playing, especially in the F major Sonata, yet sometimes worried by quite so much elasticity in phrasing. Jacqueline du Pré uses more vibrato than Piatigorsky in the interests of expression and her cantabile often comes across with more radiance as a result. Balance is finely judged by the acutely sensitive Barenboim: never does the piano dominate the low-voiced cello. Listening to them anew I felt that this is how Brahms might have liked to hear both sonatas played on one of his several visits to sunny Italy. Piatigorsky and Rubinstein are by no means tied to the metronome either, but because less concerned with detailed nuance, they convey more of the underlying solidarity of backbone—and perhaps the composer's North German seriousness, too. In the E minor work their slightly faster tempo for the first and last movements helps to suggest a stronger sense of direction. Piatigorsky's tone is very mellow even though less luminous than Jacqueline du Pré's. Rubinstein is marvellously sturdy for one considerably more than double Barenboim's age, but at this point I come to the crux of the matter. I sometimes wondered if he was fully aware of his own sturdiness, since the balance so often goes against the cello. It would make dull reading to cite chapter and verse, though nearly every movement in both works includes an example save the finale of the E minor work, where the counterpoint is finely matched. As so often, it's a roundabouts and swings situation when it comes to making a clear-cut recommendation. The best way out, of course, is to buy both versions.

-- Gramophone [7/1977, comparing the Brahms Cello Sonatas as played by Piatigorsky and Rubinstein with the recording by Du Pré and Barenboim]

Strauss: Don Quixote - Don Juan

Selections recorded July 2, 1997 and June 30, 1998.
For this 100th-birthday collection of the music of George Gershwin, conductor Michael Tilson Thomas combined Gershwin's own "Catfish Row" suite from 'Porgy and Bess'--rather than the better-known suite from the opera by Robert Russell Bennett--with four songs. It was this assemblage which Thomas performed at the 1998 gala opening concert of Carnegie Hall. With him on that evening, and in recording this program, were singers Audra McDonald and Brian Stokes Mitchell, stars of the original production of the musical 'Ragtime' on Broadway.
The remainder of the collection provides an ample, well-performed selection of Gershwin's non-'Rhapsody in Blue' orchestral music. (For that 'Rhapsody' from Thomas, you'll need the album NEW WORLD JAZZ with the New World Symphony, also on RCA Victor.) Thomas and Garrick Ohlsson provide sparkling pianism for the 'Second Rhapsody' and 'Concerto in F' respectively, and the San Francisco Symphony is in fine form throughout.

The longer the modern era lasts, the older “New Music” grows, and the more versatile it becomes. Upon closer listening, one quickly becomes aware of the many byways and backroads of the genre, in addition to the principal trends, and one composer who trod his own path decisively, with great success, is Gottfried von Einem. Since his breakthrough with the premiere of his opera Dantons Tod (the death of Danton) at the Salzburg Festival in 1947, through to the composer’s death in 1996, many of his works have been performed on the international music stage, as witness recordings featuring the likes of Böhm, Karajan and George Szell on this label. However, everyone knows that for a composer to continue to develop his artistic skills he needs more than glittering premieres, and so the Orfeo label is delighted to mark the 100th birthday of the composer born in 1918 by releasing, alongside other new recordings of his works from its catalogue, a retrospective of von Einem’s work featuring the very best performers of today.

The earliest work on this new release is the choral work with orchestra Stundenlied, which originates from a highly interesting cultural and historical source: a collaboration with the playwright Bertolt Brecht who from 1949 lived in the German Democratic Republic. The story of Christ’s passion is witnessed and presented in a popular, naive way as a dreadful event and brilliantly depicted by von Einem using simple and stringent compositional means to produce a work that is haunting and authoritative, performed here by the Singverein and Philharmonic Orchestra of Vienna under Franz Welser-Möst.

PERGOLESI: STABAT MATER, SALVE

Import Hybrid-SACD pressing.

Classical Music

Classical Music

MOZART: SYMPHONIES NO 36 & 39

Rachmaninov: Symphony No. 2 - Vocalise

The fact that these works have, until now, remained unrecorded perhaps bears witness to the fact that the discrimination confronted by Alice Mary Smith over a hundred years ago has still not been entirely eradicated. Smith wrote by far the greatest number of orchestral works of any ninteenth-century British woman composer and the success of her orchestral and choral works gave rise to a heated discussion as to whether a woman could ever compose a work of greatness. Her finely crafted and inventive music is the story of a wife and mother battling against prejudice and, in the eyes of her contemporaries at least, succeeding.

This portrait CD provides insight into the sensitive and exciting sound aesthetics of the composer Malika Kishino. Nature and beauty constitute the main points of reference of her oeuvre. Japanese culture and it's aesthetics leave a mark on Kishino's music, yet it is futile to look for anything reminiscent of the traditional music of her home country. Nature, especially optical and visual phenomena or physical states, are an inspiration for the structure and character of her works which she herself describes as "sound organisms". "Rayons Cr�pusculaires", for example, refers to a radial light phenomenon that shows particularly in the spatial arrangement of this composition. Three groups of musicians stand facing loudspeakers which reverberate the sounds modified by live electronics back into the room. The work which was recorded specifically for this CD is a "complex acoustic event which not only sets the space in motion but also sharpens one's hearing with regard to special tonal qualities" (Michael Struck-Schloen). Meanwhile the currents of the water and it's changing states of matter are the starting points for "Sensitive Chaos". This examination becomes more or less audible in the form of dripping sounds which later turn into more flowing structures. Another topic is the menace to nature: Kishino dedicated the choral piece "Prayer / Inori" to the memory of the catastrophe of Fukushima.

This third volume, five-disc set of early 1950s Amadeus Quartet high-quality radio recordings is dedicated to works of its eponym. These previously unreleased recordings from the archives of the RIAS feature eight of Mozart’s ten great string quartets, complemented by recordings of his four great string quintets with second violist Cecil Aronowitz. Also included is the recording of Mozart's clarinet quintet with Heinrich Geuser, one of the leading clarinetists of his time.

WERGO publishes the live recording of the concert given at the occasion of Dieter Schnebel's 70th birthday on 14 March 2000 in the Universitat der Kunste Berlin. The composer himself appreciates this recording very much: "This performance was very carefully rehearsed, very much in the spirit of the piece, and took place in an impressive and poetic staging in the Hochschule’s modern theater. Every time I hear the very fine recording again, I am overcome again and filled with special gratitude." "Orchestra", a symphonic score for mobile musicians, expects an improvisation-like playing that is nonetheless sensitive to sound and imaginatively shaped – but also resistance, withdrawal, assertion, and agreement.

Classical Music

Richard Hickox conducts the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in the second volume of Leighton's orchestral works. BBC Music Magazine wrote of volume 1, "Hickox directs superbly paced and eloquent performances of this fine music." Volume 2 presents two large-scale orchestral works, Symphony No.2 'Sinfonia Mistica', which receives its first recording; coupled with Te Deum Laudamus in its orchestrated version. One of the most successful British composers of the latter half of the twentieth century, Kenneth Leighton's lifelong musical relationship with the human voice, exemplified in the two works of this recording, began as a chorister in the choir of Wakefield Cathedral as a young boy. It was to impact greatly on his writing. Over the course of his life he wrote almost continually for the voice, absorbing vocal lines in all settings. It provided an excellent vehicle for some of his most lyrical and expressive writing. Leighton wrote three numbered symphonies. Symphony No.2 was composed in 1974 as a direct response to the death of his month, and Leighton referred to the work as a 'meditation on the subject of death.' Composed over six movements and approaching an hour in length Sinfonia Mistica contains some of Leighton's most personal and reactionary music, being at various times angry and emotional, yet serene and thoughtful. While he describes the symphony as a 'requiem' the conventional texts for this service are not employed, instead he used texts by John Donne, George Herbert and Henry King, poets who have been a constant source of inspiration to British composers. The original setting of Te Deum was written for choir and organ, but two years after its completion, Leighton received a request from the Oxford Bach Choir for an orchestral version of the work, which was completed in 1966. Scored for chorus and full orchestra it is an imaginative setting of what is a liturgical text of praise, and written in honour of St Cecilia. This climatic work contains some of Leighton's most enduring and significant music. Chandos has received widespread appreciation for embarking on this revelatory new orchestral series. Volume 3 will be released in spring 2009. Also available: Volume 1: CHAN 10461

Michaels Reise Um Die Erde (Michael's Journey Around the World) is the second act of the opera Donnerstag (Thursday) from the seven-part opera cycle Licht (Light) by Karlheinz Stockhausen. It is a cosmic world theatre in which three protagonists set the tone: Michael as Prince of Angels who appears in human shape to lead mankind to God; Eva as Power of Love and Life; Lucifer as a fallen angel and adversary. To each of these three figures has been assigned a characterizing melody (a musical "formula"), which unfolds through the musical action of the entire opera cycle. In 2008, the ensemble musikFabrik performed Michaels Reise Um Die Erde twice at the The�tre Bobigny in Paris to great acclaim from the press and public alike. Wergo captured these live performances for release in the label's edition musikFabrik series.

Released in July 1940, 'The Sea Hawk' was Korngold's last swashbuckler, and is arguably the finest film ever made in the genre. Certainly it is one of Errol Flynn's greatest films, and had a lavish budget for its time of 1.7m. One of the most difficult assignments of Korngold's career, it required a score of extraordinary length and complexity. The music was superbly multi-layered and thematically complex, literally sweeping the film along and matching its extraordinary visuals. Composition began just two days after the filming had been completed: in a special projection room equipped with a piano, Korngold had the reels of film run for him repeatedly while he improvised his music on the piano to the running footage. Later, he would then complete a full, annotated piano score. His training in the late symphonic traditions served him well. This recording has been very much a personal project for Rumon Gamba who comments, 'as with the rest of the Chandos Film series I very much wanted to keep the music limited to a single disc, instead of being dogged reconstruction of the complete score, including every single cue - some being just a quick trumpet figure or drum roll. I felt it was more important to represent the symphonic sweep of the score which is one of this film's greatest strengths'. Gamba has created a comprehensive 'suite' of six 'movements' that follows the action chronologically and only leaves out some insignificant cues and general repetitions. He continues, 'I believe that hearing Korngold's score in this manner will make for a wonderful listening experience representative of the narrative and in keeping with the spirit of this marvellous picture'. The BBC Philharmonic performs these scores with a symphonic precision and energy familiar with the first volume of Korngold's film music, released in 2005. Reviewing Volume 1, 'Music from the Movies' observed that 'Chandos has been doing great things in the film score re-recording world over recent years...With this release, however, they break new ground...this Chandos CD is for me the crowning achievement so far of what was already an impressive addition to the Golden Age film music'.