In these mostly unaccompanied Irish folk songs, Robert Shaw is freed from the concerns of an orchestral accompaniment and able to focus on refined choral singing, showcasing why he will be remembered as one of the great choral conductors of all time. A well-blended choir often sounds thin; a full-voiced choir, as in the wobble-fest of many an opera chorus, rarely blends. Shaw's chorale, however, here displays the full-voiced and beautifully blended singing that was its hallmark, and Alice Parker's arrangements go far to celebrate this ensemble's strengths.
The artful mixing of a pure Irish-tenor sound with a resonant bass sound makes "Avenging and Bright" one of this disc's high points. In "Johnny, I Hardly Knew You," the whole rich palette of the chorale's sounds combine to create a stirring, carefully paced dramatic tableau. In several of the selections, Parker incorporates the Irish harp to gentle, inobtrusive effect, nowhere more affectingly than in "My Gentle Harp" (sung to the tune of "Londonderry Air"). Of the several fine soloists heard on this recording, Raymond Murcell stands out for his exceptionally attractive solo in the rollicking drinking song, "To Ladies' Eyes."

MENDELSSOHN: SCOTTISH & ITALIA

HOLST: THE PLANETS ORMANDY

Complete Track List:

1. Deep Peace
2. My Song
3. Largo
4. For Free
5. By The Stream
6. Innisfree
7. Golden Rain
8. Flower
9. Swan, The
10. Delgado
11. If It's Magic
12. Aria
13. Ave Verum

One of Horowitz's most interesting discs - these sonatas form a link between C.P.E. Bach, the Sturm und Drang of Haydn, and Beethoven's dramatic style.

"A mere mechanician, strong in runs of thirds, but without a pennyworth of feeling or taste". Mozart's extremely harsh judgement on the playing of Clementi, against whom the Emperor Leopold II pitted him in a famous keyboard duel, plus recollections of his purely educational music, has resulted in an almost total shunning of his 64 piano sonatas. But Beethoven, who possessed a large number of them, esteemed them very highly; and to anyone not already knowing them the three remarkable works on this disc will certainly come as a shock. AP was absolutely right in suspecting that Clementi was "one of the greatest of neglected masters".

The present three sonatas, dating from between 1784 and 1788, form as it were a link between C. P. E. Bach (whose wildness they share, as witness all the finales), the Sturm und Drang of Haydn, and Beethoven's dramatic style. The first movement in each case is striking—ominous in the F 'minor, movingly expressive in the F sharp minor, while the G minor has a highly dramatic short Largo leading to a fiery Allegro in the middle of which there is, after an abrupt key-jolt, a recollection in tranquillity of the opening. I recommend also the lovely Lento of the F sharp minor.

Horowitz plays these with great tonal sensitivity and great rhythmic vitality; and though the sound is a trifle harsh in forte and a bit boxy in general, the 1955 recording stands up well. This was always one of Horowitz's most interesting discs, and it should not be missed by those who do not already have it.

-- Gramophone [9/1974, reviewing Op. 32 no 2, Op. 14 no 3, and Op. 26 no 2 on LP]

Firkusny's performances are revelatory, not only of the stature of this music and his love for it, but of a deeply musical pianism... The recording is all that one could wish for.'

Martinu's piano music is rarely heard in recitals and none of it is represented in the domestic catalogue at present. Up to a point, I suppose, this is understandable: on paper it must often look like an alternation of bafflingly plain, even empty pages with others filled to bursting with almost machine-like, pre-minimalist toccata figures. In performance it is nothing at all like that, as Firkusny demonstrates. The toccata figures are often a metaphor for sheer exuberance, as in one or two of the Etudes, where (they alternate with overtly Czech and infectiously high-spirited Polkas) Martinu's happiness at the end of the Second World War and the prospect (vain, alas) of returning to Czechoslovakia is clearly expressed. But in a work like the Fantasie a Toccata (both sections are complex fantasies, both are toccatas) the energy is feverish, disturbed, anxious, and it is no surprise to learn from Firkusny's affectionate note accompanying this recording that the work was written while he and the composer were trying to escape from occupied France in 1940.

The barer pages spring to life in performances like Chinese flowers dropped into water. One of Martinu's most characteristic voices, perhaps his very essence, is a music of intensely pure lyricism made from astonishingly few notes. It is heard at its lightest and most ingratiating in Les ritournelles, a sequence of slight but charming lyrical studies; it emerges momentarily and hauntedly amidst the turbulence of the Fantasie a Toccata; the Etudes and Polkas reveal it to be rooted in memories of Czech folk-music. Rooted, but not really derived: the brief scene from Julietta (Firkusny's own transcription, he often played it to Martinu when they were newly arrived exiles in New York) is saturated in that lyricism, but one would not describe the piece' as 'folksy', nor as simple; it has a passionate eloquence.

Both manners are present in the Sonata, Martinu's last keyboard work, the lyricism exquisitely delicate, the motoric elements achieving a grand almost Beethovenian rhetoric in the finale. Firkusny's performances are revelatory, not only of the stature of this music and his love for it, but of a deeply musical pianism (he studied with Schnabel … and Janacek), the clarity of his left-hand technique, in particular, is a marvel. The recording is all that one could wish for.

-- Michael Oliver, Gramophone [12/1989]

*** This title is a reissue of a Japanese release with liner notes in Japanese. ***

HUIZAR: SYMPHONIES 1-4, SURCO,

Track Listing
1. Why Women Go Wrong
2. Nothing But a Rat
3. Jersey Belle Blues
4. Loveless Blues, The
5. I'm Just Dumb
6. Get Yourself Together
7. Crowing Rooster Blues
8. That's Love
9. Somebody's Got to Go
10. Lazy Woman Blues
11. Chicago Blues
12. I Did All I Could
13. In Love Again
14. Last Call, The
15. Rambler's Blues
16. Baby, Remember Me
17. He's a Jelly Roll Baker
18. When You Feel Low Down
19. Victim of Love, The
20. Watch Shorty

Recorded at RCA Recording Studios, Chicago from 1939 to 1944. Includes liner notes by Billy Altman.

Digitally remastered by Jay Newland (June 1992, BMG Studios, New York City).

All songs written by Lonnie Johnson.

Personnel: Lonnie Johnson (vocals, guitar); Joshua Altheimer, Lil Armstrong, Blind John Davis (piano).

Liner Note Author: Billy Altman.

Recording information: 11/02/1939-12/14/1944.

Illustrator: Jacqueline Murphy.

This 20-song collection covers 1930s and '40s material in which Johnson primarily performs blues tunes, doing salty, sassy, mournful, and suggestive numbers in a distinctive, memorable fashion. His vocals on "Rambler's Blues," "In Love Again," the title cut, and several others, are framed by brilliant, creative playing and excellent support from such pianists as Blind John Davis, Lil Hardin Armstrong, and Joshua Altheimer. This is tight, intuitive music in which Johnson set the tone and dominated the songs. If you're unaware of Lonnie Johnson's brilliant blues material, here's an excellent introduction.

*** This title is a reissue of a Japanese release with liner notes in Japanese. ***

This double-CD set from RCA Japan (courtesy of Arkivmusic.com's on-demand reprint program) preserves what presumably is the best of Mieczyslaw Horszowski's December 9 and 11, 1987 Casals Hall Tokyo recitals, along with the encores from each date. Listen blindly and you'd guess that an older yet quite well preserved and highly experienced pianist was at work, someone between 60 or 75. Try the 95-years-young Horszowski, who's on top form.

True, he doesn't exactly sprint through the Chopin B minor Scherzo's outer sections as he did back in 1940, but he makes a virtue out of necessity by leisurely unfolding and consistently sustaining the music's polyphonic interest. This also holds true for the C-sharp minor Polonaise. The A-flat Impromptu amounts to a bel canto masterclass, while Horszowski requires only dabs of pedal to project the Mozart K. 332 sonata's first movement to such texturally differentiated effect.

The Bach Fifth English Suite is full-bodied and virile yet sensitively delineated (the Prélude's effortlessly conversational flow between hands, each of the Passepied's bouncy, delightfully ambidextrous qualities). Perhaps the fountain of youth kicks in strongest with the two Villa-Lobos miniatures, served up with red-blooded élan. The encores abound with memorable moments. Horszowski plays the Op. 25 No. 2 Etude's opening statement as if he were kneading the triplet passagework into a seamless legato line, yet upon its reiteration he lightens the tone and mostly eschews the pedal.

Force and finesse are the yin and yang elements that anchor the three Nocturnes. The elusive yet palpable give and take of Horszowski's rubato in the B minor Op. 33 No. 4 Mazurka is easier for to you hear than for me to describe. Horszowski played Mendelssohn's Spinning Song on both concerts; the second version is more fluent and relaxed. He also repeated the Mozart sonata's Adagio, or, more accurately, sang it out in full operatic splendor. The slightly distant microphone placement accurately depicts Horszowski's tone from the perspective of an audience member sitting in the best seat of the house. Notes in Japanese only.

--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

Music and lyrics by Jerry Herman.

Principal cast includes: Pearl Bailey (Mrs. Dolly Gallagher Levi), Cab Calloway (Horace Vandergelder), Emily Yancy, Chris Calloway, Winston DeWitt Hemsley, Sherri Peaches Brewer, Mabel King, Morgan Freeman, Roger Lawson.

Recorded November 17, 1967.

Reiner's 1960 recording of Haydn's symphonies remains astonishingly fresh and vigorous.

Haydn’s Symphony No. 88, with its balance of elegance and rustic charm, is an exhilarating work and Reiner’s 1960 recording of it remains astonishingly fresh and vigorous. His performances of Symphonies Nos. 95 and 101, recorded only two months before he died, are no less exciting. The tragic mood of the C minor Symphony (No. 95) is well caught and there is great intensity in the quieter music. The sound is generally spacious and well-balanced.

-- Nicholas Rast, BBC Music Magazine

"To explorers of the byways of 18th-century music, Guy Touvron’s recording of trumpet concertos by Johann Melchior Molter can be thoroughly recommended."

-- BBC Music Magazine, Deborah Calland

Johann Molter was a prodigious composer of trumpet concertos in the first half of the eighteenth century. He spent his musical life moving between his base, Karlsruhe, and Italy, where he obviously absorbed the baroque influences of the time. He was an inventive and capable composer, and although these concertos are very much alike they are each enjoyable if taken singly. The allegros have vitality and slow movements are agreeable, sometimes serene, sometimes moving on at a gentle, walking gait. The Andantes of the double concertos are for strings alone, to give their highly stressed soloists a chance for a breather before returning to the fray in the finales. MWVIV.10 is the exception, offering instead a charming interlude, scored for woodwind, to make a foil for the florid trumpet writing in the outer movements. And make no mistake about it, Molter knows just how to make his paired trumpets sound brilliantly ear-tickling. The solo concertos all bring solo participation in central movements, exploiting the high clarino range lyrically—most of the writing throughout is stratospheric. The playing here is superbly secure and stylish.

Jorg Faerber and his Wurttembergers provide alertly sympathetic accompaniments and they make the Andantes sing gracefully, within a wholly sympathetic acoustic. Of course, modern trumpets are used, and so there is none of that throttled effect which too often afflicts trumpeters using older instruments.

-- Ivan March, Gramophone [5/1993]

"The gem of this disc is the Wieniawski concerto, with which Heifetz not only created a sensation on his American debut at the age of 16 but which he was the first to record. A virtuoso work par excellence, it affords him infinite opportunities to display his phenomenal brilliance, impeccable intonation and (in the Romanze) beautiful phrasing and soulfully emotional tone—which, as all violinists observe with fascination, owes much to his individual fingerings. The tuttis in this work have been somewhat cut, but that is of little consequence in a purely solo vehicle like this. The perfection of his rapid spiccato bowing in the finale is enough to make mere mortal string players despair. The recording still sounds well after nearly 40 years."

-- Lionel Salter, Gramophone [11/1992]

*** This title is a reissue of a Japanese release with liner notes in Japanese. ***