These works share the common key of E flat major but represent two very different stages in the composer’s life. The Piano Concerto "No. 0," WoO 4, was written when Beethoven was 13 years old and is one of his earliest works. With the orchestral score lost, this extant version for piano solo written in Beethoven’s hand includes the tutti sections reduced for piano. The radiant ‘Emperor’ Concerto shows the 38-year-old Beethoven at the peak of his creative powers, and remains a glorious example of his spirit triumphing over life’s adversities.

REVIEW:

Boris Giltburg’s recording of Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto is offered with a scintillating twist, the ‘other’ E-flat concerto composed when the composer was 13. This brings Giltburg’s Beethoven concerto cycle to a close, his ebullience and physicality the reverse of plain-speaking, brilliantly partnered by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic under Vasily Petrenko.

Given such forces this is never simply ‘another’ Emperor, but one boldly and exuberantly conceived. Giltburg makes you listen with new ears to one of the most familiar and greatly loved works in the repertoire. The Piano Concerto No 0 (played in Beethoven’s original piano reduction) may be a protracted jeu d’esprit, but Giltburg’s relish of its tonic, virtuoso aplomb sets the pulse racing. Naxos soundworld is of an exceptional clarity and focus.

-- International Piano

Excellent performances of the Emperor and the rarely heard Concerto No. 0. The sound reproduction on this Naxos CD is vivid and well balanced. Those looking for an excellent performance of the Emperor and who are attracted to its lesser coupling, will certainly find this a most rewarding disc.

-- MusicWeb International

Not only do you get performances to rank with the best, but also a bonus of the splendidly played Rondo.

Beethoven’s first two piano concertos share an abundance of lyric and virtuosic qualities. Concerto No. 1 in C major is expansive and richly orchestrated with a sublime slow movement that is tender and ardent, and a finale full of inventive humor. Concerto No. 2 in B flat major marries energy with elegance, reserving poetic breadth for its slow movement and quirky wit for the finale. Also included is the jovial Rondo, WoO 6, which Beethoven originally intended to be the finale of Concerto No. 2.

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REVIEWS:

Here’s a very promising start to what I assume will be a new Beethoven piano concerto cycle, featuring performances not otherwise included in Naxos’ “complete” Beethoven box. Boris Giltburg plays both works with the youthful panache that they require–the kind that makes you forget about any formal issues and just revel in the virtuoso passagework and good tunes. The standard for comparison in this coupling is Argerich/Sinopoli on DG–you might think an unmatchable team, at least pianistically, but Giltburg more than holds his own. Indeed, in Concerto No. 2 he matches Argerich’s fleet timing in the finale (and other movements) almost exactly, and in the First Concerto he’s even a bit quicker, all without sacrificing subtleties of touch, dynamics and phrasing for mere velocity.

Of course there are difference–welcome ones too. In the first concerto, Giltburg adds a couple of minutes to the central Largo, producing a genuine specimen of that particular tempo designation. His legato playing is beautifully sustained, making this early example of Beethovenian lyricism a real gem. Petrenko accompanies with real flair, proving himself a true partner in both concerto first movements. It’s so much more satisfying to have a real conductor working with a gifted soloist, rather than the single-person-at-the-keyboard approach so frequently offered these days. There’s just no substitute for full-time orchestral guidance. Giltburg also includes the original “Concerto No. 2 finale version” of the Rondo WoO 6, a considerable bonus, as are his intelligent and detailed booklet notes. Fine playing, fine conducting, fine engineering–in short, a really fine release generally.

– ClassicsToday (David Hurwitz)

Giltburg is a subtle artist who, despite his all-encompassing technique, rarely, if ever, engages in virtuosic grandstanding, preferring instead to interpret the music for maximum artistic yield. Nor does he employ radical or eccentric interpretive approaches. Yet, his performances are never bland but rather quite individual, typically rich in nuance and meaningful detail, and containing insights missing in other versions. His accounts of the two concertos feature well-chosen dynamics, main lines and inner voices perfectly balanced, and judicious tempos. In addition, he realizes these are the works of a youthful Beethoven, not of the mature, profound and serious-minded master of the three concertos that followed. Thus, he points up their lighter, more vivacious characteristics, his dynamics appropriately less weighty and his pacing never too relaxed.

Not only do you get performances to rank with the best, but also a bonus of the splendidly played Rondo.

– MusicWeb International

Classical Music

This Signum Classics release presents four orchestral works by leading Chinese composer Xiaogang Ye, performed by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Dane Lam. Recorded in February 2024 at Liverpool Philharmonic Hall, the album features The Backyard of the Village alongside two concertante works: The Memories of Mount Jing Gang with violist Diyang Mei, and My Faraway Nanjing with cellist Guy Johnston, plus the overture The Loquat in Five Colors. Ye's music blends contemporary orchestral writing with Chinese history, landscape, and cultural memory, reflecting his distinctive international voice.

Classical Music

Vasily Petrenko (b. 1976) has been leading the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra since September 2006 and has recently extended his contract until at least 2015. His work on Merseyside has been drawing many very enthusiastic notices, including several on MusicWeb International. However, until now, with the exception of his recording of Sir John Tavener’s recent Requiem (see review) I’ve not heard any of his performances. If this thrilling disc is anything to go by then I’ve been missing something.

I’ve long thought that Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dances ranks among his finest works but this new recording really made me sit up and take fresh notice. For that Petrenko and his orchestra must take a huge amount of credit. However, the quality of the recording itself also has much to do with it. I can only describe the sound on this CD as stunning. By chance, immediately before I put this new Avie disc in my player I’d been listening to Vladimir Ashkenazy’s 1983 Decca recording of Symphonic Dances and The Isle of the Dead. Those are extremely fine performances, splendidly recorded by Decca in the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. On that disc the sound is warm, yet very clear and there’s a good deal of space round the orchestra – I strongly suspect the orchestra was set out on the auditorium floor in the empty Concertgebouw. This Avie recording offers a very different experience for the sound is closer – though not oppressively so – and very present.

Producer John Fraser and Engineer David A. Pigott have produced here one of the best recordings of a symphony orchestra that I’ve heard in a very long time. The orchestra is, as I said, very present yet very natural also. The recording offers a wide side-to-side perspective and also very good front-to-back definition. There’s an abundance of detail to hear – the percussion thrillingly reported and the brass impressive without ever sounding domineering – yet without any sense of artificial spotlighting of sections or individual instruments. With a satisfyingly rich bass foundation and an impressive dynamic range this recording presents the orchestra in a most exciting and very musical way. The sound has terrific definition, not least in the quiet passages, and packs a real punch at climaxes. Best of all, the recording lets you hear just how impressive the performances are. For the orchestra there are few hiding places in Symphonic Dances, especially when the sound is as clear and detailed as this, but the RLPO are consistently sure-footed.

The quality of the recording and Petrenko’s care over balance got my attention from the first bars of Symphonic Dances. The very opening is light, crisp and delicate after which the bold string chords have a most impressive weight. Petrenko drives the music forward with vigour but never overplays his hand. The saxophone solo (from 3:26) is lovingly phrased, imparting just the right feeling of wistful nostalgia. In the succeeding passage (to 5:46) there’s some excellent woodwind playing – and not for the last time on this disc, either. When the strings take up the melody it sings gloriously – and between them Petrenko and the engineers balance the accompaniment of harp and piano perfectly. The eventual return to the movement’s opening material is at first suspenseful and then very exciting. Rachmaninov’s self-quotation from his First Symphony is warmly delivered but without any over-indulgence.

If I have a small criticism it concerns the brevity of the gaps between the movements. There’s a mere two seconds between the first and second dances – the Ashkenazy disc has some six seconds – and only three seconds between the second and third movements. Just a little more time would have been welcome. The second movement is a spectral, awkward waltz: in the memorable phrase of annotator Anthony Bateman “Evening has brought its ghosts”. Petrenko shapes the music with great imagination, conjuring up for this listener at least an image of a dimly lit and faded ballroom that has rather gone to seed. The RLPO strings play splendidly, with plenty of body to their tone – and their woodwind colleagues offer equally fine playing. Petrenko is alive to all the nuances and subtle inflections of Rachmaninov’s music. His is a colourful and well-imagined reading and he draws really responsive playing from his orchestra. Among many details that I relished is the nutty tone of the violas between 7:05 and 7:23 followed by the sound of really hushed violins and a doleful bassoon.

Once Petrenko reaches the main material of the third dance his reading has abundant energy but, rightly, there’s more than a sense of foreboding as well. As a sample of the impressive way in which soft passages are handled, sample the rather sinister passage introduced by the bass clarinet (5:04). Shortly afterwards (6:60 – 9:55) the long, brooding string paragraph, in which the RLPO players excel, is surely Rachmaninov revisiting his Second Symphony but with a melancholy air, knowing that those days are gone for ever. In the last five or six minutes Petrenko urges his players on to an exciting yet darkly-tinged conclusion. In these pages the tambourine, tam-tam and xylophone contributions are magnificently caught by the microphones and the dramatic last few bars bring a superb performance of the work to a tumultuous conclusion.

Recently, I was greatly taken with a live performance of The Isle of the Dead conducted by Evgeny Svetlanov (see review). I found that reading enthralling but its very expansiveness probably courts controversy and will not be to all tastes. Petrenko’s reading is more mainstream, if I may put it that way, in terms of pacing. His account, at 20:58. lasts for almost the same time as Ashkenazy’s (20:52) and is similar in length to several other recordings on my shelves. Mind you, it is salutary to note that the composer’s own 1929 recording with the Philadelphia Orchestra lasts a “mere” 18:05 and even after eighty years that recording still sounds well – and packs a real interpretative punch!

Petrenko isn’t in the Svetlanov league when it comes to expansiveness but his interpretation is still full of brooding power – and his performance affords better playing than we hear on the Svetlanov disc and, as you’d expect, comes in much better sound. This Liverpool account establishes a very potent atmosphere right from the outset. There’s dark grandeur in the playing – and in Petrenko’s conception of the work. As in Symphonic Dances the excellence of the sound supports Petrenko’s balancing of the orchestra magnificently. Between 7:22 and 7:44, for example, the balance between the cello tune and the woodwind decoration round it is outstandingly successful. Later on (8:04 – 9:40) the ear is impressed mightily by sonorous brass, pounding timpani and weighty strings.

Petrenko builds the piece to an impressive and potent central climax, thrillingly reported by the recording, but the way he winds the tension down in the following bars is just as noteworthy. Later on, he invests the urgent, surging string passage (11:23 - 12:59) with real ardour and the main climax of the piece (around 15:30) is shattering in its intensity. As Charon, the boatman, rows back across the Styx from the Isle, his work done for now, the opening music returns and Petrenko controls the sombre conclusion very effectively.

In a way I wish the disc had ended there; the piece that’s placed last would have been a more satisfying opener, I believe. The Rock is a youthful work but a significant achievement nonetheless by the twenty-year-old composer. Apparently Tchaikovsky admired the piece and it’s not hard to see why for the scoring is attractive and the invention is strong. For much of its course the nature of the music is much lighter than that of the other two works on the disc. Petrenko conducts with grace and affection but also does the powerful stretches towards the end very well. In the first few minutes the principal flute, Cormac Henry, has a lot of demanding solo work and he shines under the spotlight that Rachmaninov trains on him. Another example of finesse that caught my ear was the exquisite passage of string tremolandi between 7:04 and 7:39 – it’s details such as this that puts the stamp of distinction on this release. As a piece The Rock may not be the equal of the other works on this disc but it has many attractions and it receives a very fine performance here.

As I hope I’ve conveyed, this is an exceptional disc in every way. It’s one that I’ve enjoyed enormously but I also admire it greatly as an achievement both on the part of the musicians and of the engineers. If you’ve wondered why so much fuss is being made about the work that Vasily Petrenko is doing with the RLPO then this superb CD should provide the answer. Already, in early February, this disc is on my shortlist of Recordings of the Year.

One final thought. Could Avie be persuaded to record this team in Rachmaninov’s Second Symphony? If Petrenko and the RLPO could recapture in a recording of that great, sweeping symphony the form shown on this disc then the result would be a serious challenge to the longstanding hegemony of André Previn’s 1973 recording with the LSO (EMI). Meanwhile, don’t wait to see if that disc appears. Buy this one – now! I doubt you’ll regret it and I hope it will excite you as much as it has excited me.

-- John Quinn, MusicWeb International

Quite an achievement.

If you have heard the Durham Concerto or the zanily named Boom of the Tingling Strings you will know that since departing Deep Purple in 2002 Jon Lord has been gripped by classical composing. The earliest stirrings of this hunger go back to the 1969 and his Concerto for Group and Orchestra. It was premiered, filmed and recorded live at the Royal Albert Hall with Deep Purple and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Sir Malcolm Arnold. The next year the BBC commissioned The Gemini Suite. In 1974 Sarabande followed and in 1997 came Lord’s solo CD Pictured Within.
 
To Notice Such Things is clearly a very personal and affecting portrait of Lord’s friendship with John Mortimer, CBE, QC (1923–2009). It traces its origins to the affectionate stage show, Mortimer’s Miscellany. The title of the score is from the Thomas Hardy poem Afterwards which ended the show. The first movement, As I Walked Out One Evening is from the W.H. Auden poem and relates to the music that opened the revue. At Court picks up on Mortimer’s days as the darling of the combative anti-establishment in the 1960s and 1970s. Turville Heath is where Mortimer lived and we are told that the movement gives an impression of Mortimer in his beloved garden. In extreme old age his legs began to fail him. Stick Dance is said to portray our hero’s appreciation of a female companion jiving while Mortimer leans on his walking stick. Mortimer chose the dormouse to figure in his coat of arms. The Winter of a Dormouse is an attempt to describe Sir John's final months. It’s an affectionate and poignant farewell. The friendship throughout is echoed in the flute which voices Sir John. Lord is reflected in the solo piano role. These figures are played by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra’s principal flautist Cormac Henry and by the composer’s piano.

Counter-intuitively As I Walked Out One Evening has all the warm vernal freshness of the morning of the world. This is coupled with a peculiarly English contentment – an ecstasy in being there. The language is caught between the pastoral Vaughan Williams of the 1910s and 1920s and the Copland counterpart. At Court is part lightly serene and partly rushing cut-and-thrust carried by the flute with brusquely joyous strings. Turville Heath hints at a Gallic-Delian influence although the presence of the self-effacingly supportive piano pulls the rug out from under the comparison. This movement could easily join the host of short piano and orchestra miniatures by Bax, Milford and Armstrong Gibbs. Towards its close the gentle muse dances with an innocent smile. In Stick Dance there is a Shostakovich-like caustic serration to the string writing though this does relent to make way for curvaceous gliding and dancing of the flute. The Winter of a Dormouse touches on desolation but from its chilly shores the flute sings, invoking and reviving the delights of years gone by and of the changes wrought by the passage of the years. Interesting how the flute line remains succulent in tone but it is now more pensive. The flute solo curves down a gentle gradient into silence. Afterwards is the final movement for piano and orchestra though the flute also plays its part. The writing has a distinctly Finzian poignant reflective quality - the drowsy heat-haze of a summer’s eclogue into which this sweetly tempered work fades.

The other four tracks are occupied by short pieces. Evening Song is for piano, alto flute, french horn and orchestra. Starting out as one of the pieces in Lord’s Pictured Within, it lays convincing claim to the sentimental congeries entwining that ideal English sunset. This is a place in space and time where contemplation is by itself fully satisfying. The solo violin part reminded me of Finzi’s Severn Rhapsody. For Example is a piece for string orchestra and flute. Its origins lie in a small piano piece dedicated to Lord’s friends the Trondheim Soloists and their Artistic Director and Principal Cellist, Øyvind Gimse. It’s a pensive essay with just that tincture of Grieg – a composer who was one of Lord’s earliest favourites. Air on the Blue String is for flute and strings –a contented essay with a few gently stern moments to provide backbone. This too had its genesis in a piano solo. The disc ends with Jeremy Irons’ undemonstrative reading of Hardy’s melancholic-fatalistic poem, Afterwards. The poem registers with even more depth. It is clothed with Jon Lord’s piano line which provides a symbiotic modest commentary.

This is a well presented, recorded and annotated album and one that will please those who respond to Finzian pastoral melancholy. Quite an achievement.

-- Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International

Simon Trpceski's recording of Rachmaninov's Piano Concertos Nos. 2 and 3 was one of the most acclaimed and best-selling classical releases of 2010. His frequent collaborations with Vasily Petrenko and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra are justly celebrated. Together they complete the not final cover art Rachmaninov canon with this highly-anticipated follow up of Concertos Nos. 1 and 4, and the Paganini Rhapsody. Rachmaninov Concertos 2 and 3 made the Top 10 of Billboard's Classical Chart and won a Diapason d'or de l'année. Trpceski will support the sequel with extensive touring and CD signings at which he regularly attracts hundreds of fans. What the critics are saying: "If you want to fall in love afresh with Rachmaninov's most popular piano concertos, go and get this disc right now" - Classic FM Magazine Editor's Choice "The great thing about these performances ... is not merely that he can deliver these formidable virtuoso showpieces with vigor and technical polish ... It's that he makes you hear beyond the glitter to the dimly flickering musical inspiration beneath ... Trpceski turns these potentially garish creations into something serious and emotionally urgent." - San Francisco Chronicle "an impressive achievement ... committed performances and excellent sound." - BBC Music Magazine "the chemistry between conductor, orchestra and soloist is magical." - Minnesota Public Radio "Avie can certainly congratulate itself on having backed a winner ... Trpceski was born to perform this music, and Petrenko to conduct it." - The Daily Telegraph (UK), Classical CD of the Week Daily Telegraph Classical CD of the Week: 'utterly compelling.' ClassicalSource.com: 'particularly fine ... scintillating ... a notable release' Yorkshire Post: 'dazzingly brilliant ... stunning'

The playing throughout is sensitive and glowing in this meditative and glistening work that recalls Vaughan Williams and Hovhaness.

The composer Jon Lord rose to fame in the 1970s as a member of Deep Purple. Celebrity collaborations between the group and Malcolm Arnold included Concerto for Group and Orchestra written and scored by John Lord and conducted by Malcolm Arnold. Lord has over the intervening years increasingly extended his reputation into the classical field. The Durham Concerto is the latest and most ambitious example to date. In this he is not alone, witness the various classical pieces by Paul McCartney - the latest being Ecce Cor Meum and the orchestral work Seven by Tony Banks of Genesis – a work recorded on Naxos. All are individual in their own way but a sign that some musicians with a rock-popular reputation felt the siren call of classical eternity even if we ignore the blurring of ‘boundaries’ represented by the work of Frank Zappa, Soft Machine and Tangerine Dream.

At the most meagre level this is a beautifully packaged delightful musical souvenir of Durham University's 175th anniversary in 2007. The concept might remind you of John Scott’s Colchester Symphony but this is in fact a seriously-intentioned extended orchestral suite of six movements grouped in pairs.

At the start long-held Tallis-like string chords speak out of the mists of antiquity. This is music that takes a slow-shifting shading from Hovhaness. The glistening murmur forms a backdrop to meditative solos from the wind instruments. Then at 3.10 comes Ruth Palmer's Lark-like violin solo speaking as a fragile human voice against the downward remorseless tread of time. Given the accent of this first movement it is some surprise that Lord was not among those pop-contemporary world musicians interviewed for Tony Palmer’s recent RVW film-biography. As this movement, entitled Cathedral at Dawn, rises to its peak it is the notable ecstasy of Vaughan Williams that is most closely echoed.

The composer's Hammond organ is featured in four of the six movements. It ushers in the second (Durham Awakes) with its atmospheric solo for Northumbrian Pipes. The pipes are played by that doyenne of the instrument Kathryn Tickell. Matthew Barley's solo cello acts as orator and encourager in this Copland-inflected music but ancient and melancholically serene voices from the Pipes – unable to escape celtic connections - and the solo violin are there too. The Hammond also intercedes at several points. This movement proves a fine example of the successful interweave of pipes, cello and violin.

Those first two movements form Part 1: Morning. Then comes Afternoon in the shape of another two movements. The first reflects the spiritual journey of St Cuthbert and the physical journey of his mortal remains to interment in the Cathedral. It communicates as a slow revelatory sunset much in the same atmosphere as the Dawn. This is followed by the equally introspective, cello-led From Prebends Bridge. Here the composer had in mind the view from the Bridge and the innumerable people who have stood and taken in that view down a thousand years.

The cello solo once or twice seems rather meandering before it gathers itself for a more direct and emotionally hard-hitting address. The music here reminded me of the Elgar concerto, Rubbra's Soliloquy and Holst's Invocation. Then comes a much needed rowdy movement in which students on a rag day and a miners gala meet head on. The brassy whoops here reminded me of Arnold. Again Lord's Hammond is to the fore, lending dynamism to its usual watery discourse - it's the nature of the instrument. There's plenty of forward pulse here and the orchestra have fun with the pizzicato writing. The Arnold accent appears strongly at 4:12 onwards with something of the Commonwealth Christmas Overture to be heard as well as a nicely burred and brassy Gaudeamus Igitur at 6:21. History takes hold again at the end of the movement and those sustained string chords reassert the long view. The Pipes invoke the sorrowing melancholy of heritage morphing without break into the long meditative finale: Durham Nocturne.

I hope we will hear more of Lord's classical compositions including the suite for strings, Disguises (2004) and the piano concerto Boom of the Tingling Strings (2003). Both are due out from EMI later in 2008. What else remains to be recorded?

The concept of the present piece and the use of an 'ethnic' instrument recall, as an idea, Shaun Davey's works – especially The Relief of Derry Symphony and The Brendan Voyage.

The playing throughout the Durham Concerto is sensitive and glowing with much accomplished and thoughtful work for the solo instruments. The recording produces an almost tangible effect without embracing an in-your-face pop balance.

Here is an extended work of continuity across six substantial movements. The predominant meditative character will instantly mesh with those who love John Barry’s Beyondness of Things, Tavener and Vaughan Williams.

-- Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International

The English composer David Hackbridge Johnson has been, until now, one of the best-kept secrets in music. He has built up a huge catalogue of works completely unknown even within the classical world. learning the orchestra from the inside, as a player, he has developed a confident and powerful language inherited in part from Brian, Copland, Janacek, Rubbra, Sibelius, Simpson, Tippett and other such masters. As these three pieces show, his music is capable of bold strokes of color and gripping dramatic gestures, expressed with a natural sense of symphonic architecture. Amazingly, he had heard almost none of his orchestral pieces before this recording was made in December, 2016. Paul Mann is a regular guest-conductor with many orchestras throughout Europe, the USA, Australia and the Far East. He is well known for his collaboration with the legendary rock group Deep Purple. This is the sixth recording for Toccata Classics.

The recording is one of the most important of the 300+ that Toccata Classics has released, in terms both of its extraordinary ‘back-story’ and the quality of the music itself. The English composer Steve Elcock (b. 1957) has been writing music since his teens but, with virtually no contacts in the musical world, told no one what he was doing- and thus has evolved a compelling symphonic style entirely his own. It combines virtuoso orchestral writing with a sense of momentum that has its roots in the Nordic-British tradition of Sibelius, Nielsen, Simpson, Brian and similar figures. His Third Symphony is a vast canvas generating fierce energy and titanic violence, leavened at times by a sardonic sense of humor. Choses renversees par le temps ou la destruction is a dark symphonic triptych where fragile beauty is constantly at threat from the forces of ignorance. The breezy, buoyant Festive Overture has a Waltonian swagger that barrels on with relentless jollity.

Classical Music

British composer Peter Racine Fricker was one of the first to be heavily influenced by the early 20th century masters Bartok, Stravinsky, and Schoenberg, and his style is an assimilation of these influences combined with his own very distinct musical voice. Fricker’s compositional catalog exceeds 160 works, and includes all genres except for staged opera.

The Vision of Judgement performance presented here is conducted by Charles Groves, and features the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. It was broadcast on BBC on October 14, 1980. Symphony No. 5 for Organ and Orchestra features Gillian Weir on organ, as well as the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Colin Davis. It aired on the BBC on May 5, 1976, and was performed live from the festival hall.

1944 saw the premiere of the ballet Fancy Free, 25-year old Leonard Bernstein’s first major composition as well as the first in a string of scores for the stage and film. In order to celebrate the centennial of Bernstein’s birth in 1918, Christian Lindberg has gathered music from five different productions spanning a period of 13 years – from Fancy Free to the iconic musical West Side Story, premiered in 1957. The disc is bookended by the sparkling and witty Overture to Candide and Three Dance Episodes from the musical On the Town. Also included is the substantial Symphonic Suite from ‘On the Waterfront’, developed by Bernstein from the score he wrote for Elia Kazan’s classic film. The drama of this tale of love and betrayal set amid the docks of Hoboken in New Jersey is brought out by Bernstein’s music, which seethes with dramatic tension. Making its first appearance on BIS in these flamboyant and life-enhancing scores, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra clearly relishes the opportunity to let its collective hair down. The players are egged on by Lindberg, known for his ability to energize both orchestras and audiences.

REVIEW:

The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic put on such a good show throughout this disc. The Symphonic Dances from West Side Story find them rounding corners that challenge the very best big bands. The all-dancing aspects of the disc do Bernstein’s struttin’ NYC style proud.

– Gramophone

There are several descriptive scores in William Alwyn’s prolific output, including The Moor of Venice Dramatic Overture which examines the turbulent central character in Shakespeare’s Othello. The Serenade and the orchestral version of Seven Irish Tunes receive première recordings here, both covering a wide range of moods. Following his acclaimed recording of the Concerto Grosso No. 1 (Naxos 8.570704), David Lloyd-Jones here completes the set, the second of which is scored for strings, and concluding with the Concerto Grosso No. 3 which is a tribute to Sir Henry Wood.

Growing up as I did in the New England prep-school tradition, I had the opportunity to sing in some half-dozen Gilbert and Sullivan operettas (we did one every year), and saw many more in local productions in and around Connecticut. I remember particularly memorable productions of Iolanthe and Patience (dragoons on motorcycles), but at one time or another I had the good fortune to see or act in most of these pieces, some on multiple occasions. Although Gilbert's verbal wit does not export well, at least according to my friends on the continent, Sullivan's tunes remain some of the finest and most memorable ever to grace operetta. I'll take him over those Viennese schlockmeisters any day, though Offenbach is another story entirely.

All of which is a long way of saying that Pineapple Poll, Charles Mackerras' balletic answer to Gaîté Parisienne, is a masterpiece of musical pastiche, and a delicious treat for anyone who just wants to relax and revel in delicious melodies, dressed up in "bright as a shiny new penny" orchestration.

Mackerras himself recorded "Poll" at least twice, for EMI and later for Decca in the early digital days, and both performances are splendid, as might be expected. But so is this one. It's every bit as rhythmically infectious, exceptionally well played, and brilliantly recorded. David Lloyd-Jones' vivacious take on the Irish Symphony provides a very substantial bonus, making this new release a prime recommendation if you want to hear Sullivan's major orchestral work alongside many of his best tunes, but without the voices. Marvellous!

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

The Twelfth is not Shostakovich's best symphony, but it's not as bad as its detractors would have us believe. The first two movements in particular are effectively structured and, respectively, cinematically exciting and quite atmospheric. The finale, especially its coda, is so telling an example of Socialist Realist triumph that it can only be accepted as a parody; and played without apology, as here, it works very well. Indeed, Vasily Petrenko leads a first movement that beats just about everyone in terms of sheer excitement, and the same holds true of the transitional third movement, "Aurora". As for that problematic finale, it has an appealing lightness (before the coda) that avoids any impression of facile note-spinning. If you don't like this symphony, give this performance a shot. It may change your mind.

The Sixth is far less troublesome, but Petrenko's vision is no less probing. At nearly 20 minutes the first movement is very slow, but wholly gripping. Petrenko takes the scherzo dazzlingly fast, but paces the finale moderately to give it the necessary weight (without sacrificing the music's irony and wit). Through it all the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic plays splendidly, and is excellently recorded. This Shostakovich series is shaping up as one of the best, make no mistake.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

This performance goes right to the top. Not since the amazing mono Ancerl recording has there been a version of this work of such intensity, such expressive urgency, and (yes, believe it or not) such incredible orchestral playing. It's impossible to praise the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic enough: they put their London colleagues to shame. The cellos and basses have a dark, tactile presence in pianissimo not heard since the old Kondrashin Melodiya recording. The horns play the daylights out of their solos in the first and third movements, while Petrenko has the violins sustaining, articulating, and phrasing the climax of the first movement with a passion and grit that's beyond praise.

Indeed, as an essay in Shostakovich conducting alone this performance deserves an honored place in every collection. Petrenko has the players digging into the second movement with unbridled ferocity at an ideally swift tempo. He ferrets out every subtle detail of scoring in the crepuscular Allegretto while never permitting the music to drag. His finale has just the right manic high spirits, and he clarifies the DSCH motive in the timpani at the end better than anyone else ever has. It's all captured in gloriously vivid, present sonics by the Naxos engineers. Thrilling, perfect, essential--a magnificent achievement and hands down the modern reference recording.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

This may not be the most harrowing version of the Eighth, but of its type it's unquestionably a great performance. Often this symphony consists of hair-raising climaxes interspersed between acres of nothingness. Not here. This symphony also is one of Shostakovich's most formally masterly and imaginative, and this performance reminds us in the most compelling way. Petrenko's flowing tempos in the first movement and passacaglia keep the music moving, not lurching, forward at all times. The 25 minutes of the first movement seem to pass by in half that time. Its opening threnody in particular has even more expressive power than usual for being phrased in long melodic arcs that never turn static.

After an aptly gawky scherzo, the toccata is as brilliant and menacing as any (with a dashingly militant central section), but it's the finale that really sets the seal on this performance. The Eighth always is a tough piece to project convincingly, but Petrenko is at his absolute best here, pacing the music perfectly and timing the climax in such a way that (for once) it doesn't sound like a less impressive recapitulation of the first movement--and this isn't because its previous occurrence is underplayed in any way. Excellent playing from all departments of the orchestra plus vividly natural engineering complete what is easily the best installment of this ongoing cycle to date.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Classical Music

Classical Music

Naxos' many highly-praised recordings of William Alwyn' music have done much to revive excitement among today' listeners for this British composer who is best known for his 200 or so film scores.

SOMM Recordings continues its championing of British music with revelatory performances of music for piano and orchestra by Dora Bright and Ruth Gipps.

Separated by six decades – Bright born in 1862, Gipps in 1921 – both women shared a prodigious talent as pianists before turning to composition. Three works – Bright’s A minor Piano Concerto and Variations for Piano and Orchestra and Gipps’ Ambarvalia receive first recordings alongside Gipps’ G minor Piano Concerto.

Admired by Liszt and George Bernard Shaw, Bright’s Piano Concerto (1892) demonstrates, says Robert Matthew-Walker in his illuminating notes, her distinctive “creative mastery and expressive character...clearly that of a composer who knows the solo instrument intimately; beautifully written, supremely well-laid out for the keyboard”. Her Variations for Piano and Orchestra (1910) “is a remarkably impressive original composition, beautifully written for the solo instrument... skilfully orchestrated, shot through with much brilliant and quietly witty writing, technically fascinating and with unobtrusive master strokes of structural originality”.

A child-prodigy pianist and composer, Ruth Gipps studied oboe with Leon Goossens, piano with Arthur Alexander and composition with Gordon Jacob at the Royal College of Music.When her performing career was thwarted by a hand injury, she went on to compose five symphonies and several concertos, including the Piano Concerto in G minor, which boasts brilliantly virtuosic writing for soloist and orchestra.

Gipps’ Ambarvalia is a rich, short orchestral study of Haydn-Mozart size without timpani. Making her SOMM debut, the young British pianist Samantha Ward is the soloist for Bright’s Piano Concerto and Variations for Piano and Orchestra. Murray McLachlan returns to the label for Gipps’ Piano Concerto. His “adept fingerwork and energetic” contribution to Daydreams featuring the chamber and instrumental music of Arthur Sullivan “does full justice to the scores”, declared MusicWeb International. Also making welcome first appearances on SOMM are the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and conductor Charles Peebles.

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REVIEW:

This is a valuable and rewarding disc. The standards of performance are very high throughout. I don’t think that any of the pieces are ever likely to become staples of the repertoire but their complete neglect is unjustified and they are all well worth hearing. That judgement applies especially to the Ruth Gipps concerto. Ben Connellan’s recordings present the performances in excellent sound and the essay by Robert Matthew-Walker is characteristically informative and readable.

– MusicWeb International

Listen to the Naxos Podcast to learn more about this release

Shostakovich’s two Piano Concertos span a period of almost thirty years. The youthful First Piano Concerto is a masterful example of eclecticism, its inscrutable humour and seriousness allied to virtuoso writing enhanced by the rôle for solo trumpet. Written as a birthday present for his son Maxim, the Second Piano Concerto is light-spirited with a hauntingly beautiful slow movement. With the permission of the composer’s family, Boris Giltburg has arranged the exceptionally dark, deeply personal and powerful String Quartet No. 8, thereby establishing a major Shostakovich solo piano composition.



REVIEWS:


We have no shortage of excellent versions of the two Shostakovich piano concertos, including Igoshina’s on CPO and Marc-André Hamelin’s on Hyperion. Here is another. These are big, bold, in-your-face performances that find a wider range of expression in both works than you might have believed possible. Much of the credit for this belongs to Vasily Petrenko as well, who continues his series of top-notch Shostakovich recordings for Naxos.

In the First Concerto, particularly the outer movements, Giltburg attacks the zany, theater music themes with unbridled ferocity, finding a bitter edge of desperation for all the music’s wackiness. The bright, up-front sonics and Rhys Owens’ piercing trumpet complement the approach, and there is also some remarkably precise ensemble playing from the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic strings. It’s an exhausting cliff-hanger of a performance.

Giltburg and Petrenko’s vision of the theoretically light and easy Second Piano Concerto is even more striking. From the dry, perky winds at the start to the positively cataclysmic first movement development section, this is clearly a performance that has tremendous character–one which finds plenty of menace beneath the music’s breezy, sometimes comical, sometimes sweetly romantic exterior. It makes you sit up and listen with fresh ears, truly.

The two concertos really are two short for a single disc, and finding appropriate couplings is always an issue. This is where things get really interesting. Giltburg has made transcriptions of some of Shostakovich’s music for string quartet, the Waltz third movement from the Second Quartet, and the entire Eighth Quartet. He evidently had permission from Shostakovich’s family, which means nothing, as family members are usually terrible guardians of their illustrious ancestral legacies.

The Waltz works well enough, but the Eighth Quartet is an impossible piece to transcribe for the keyboard. This is string music, plain and simple. The sustained notes in the fourth movement simply cannot be reproduced on the piano, although with clever pedaling and a sensible tempo Giltburg almost pulls it off. The savage second movement sounds positively tame here: evidently it’s much easier to push a string quartet to its limits than it is a Fazioli.

Curiously, however, it’s impossible to call the performance as such a failure. It’s quite moving in its way, and if you know the original, either as a quartet or in its chamber symphony version, you can’t help but come away with a renewed appreciation of Shostakovich’s genius for matching the music to the (original) medium. But please, let’s not have any more of these experiments. One is more than enough. A great disc.

– ClassicsToday(David Hurwitz; 10/10)

Giltburg has all the agility, power and expressive intensity Shostakovich’s piano concertos demand, plus the temperament to negotiate their mercurial shifts of mood. Every phrase is imaginatively colored or nuanced, and never out of gimmicky point making, always because he has something worth saying. And he has found like-minded partners in the RLPO and Petrenko, who not only follow and support him superbly but also respond and provoke where appropriate.

– Gramophone

What is so appealing about this record is that the Boris Giltburg has rethought the works through the prism of the composer’s experiences. The first concerto is wonderfully skittish, a series of melodic in-jokes and exchanges with the orchestra. The second concerto, determinedly frisky, is played with a reckless to-hell-with-it abandon. With devastating precision, Giltburg has interpolated between the concertos his own piano reductions of one movement of the second string quartet and the entirety of the eight quartet, contemporaneous with the two piano concertos, exposing the composer’s seditious inner thoughts. This is a constantly illuminating, almost faultless project.

– Norman Lebrecht

"[T]he woodwind solos [in Symphony no 3] all have an especially touching intimacy. Handley also catches the restless mood of the elegiac Lento, and sustains it with great eloquence; then helped by superb playing from the Principal Clarinet, he immediately establishes the jocular high spirits of the finale, so that when that string theme returns transformed (00'42'') it has a lighter, almost whimsical flavour. . . . The wit and delicacy of the [Fourth Symphony's] brief scherzo are winningly caught, by superbly etched wind playing, but most strikingly of all, Handley catches the light, lyrical feeling at the opening of the beautiful Mahlerian slow movement and later conveys the underlying unease which disturbs its serenity. The finale is an outrageously boisterous fugato . . . and the Liverpool orchestra present it with a combination of great vigour and enthusiastic bravado . . . . The recording is quite splendid: expansive, brilliant and with plenty of ambient colouring and atmosphere. . . . I have greatly enjoyed the virtuosity and panache of the Liverpool players." -- Ivan March, Gramophone

Vaughan Williams' Piano Concerto is a wonderful, wholly characteristic work. The fact that it ends softly probably accounts for its lack of popularity in concert, but it's been very lucky on disc. Almost all of the available versions are very good, and this one is no exception. Ashley Wass offers a scintillating account of the opening Toccata, alternately brilliant and delicate, a lovely and lyrical Romanza, and an aptly gutsy fugue and finale. Having James Judd on the podium virtually guarantees sharply focused, idiomatic accompaniments. He's one of Naxos' most reliable and interpretively characterful conductors.

The couplings are also quite appealing. The complete Wasps suite is another excellent work that you'll probably never hear in concert, at least outside of England, and more's the pity. Judd delivers a flavorsome performance. His tempo for the overture is particularly well-judged, not as slow as Boult's but not as slick and swift as some prefer. Rather, he finds a sturdy liveliness of pace and gruff good humor that comes across as quintessentially English. The Folk Song Suite and Running Set march are charming and never seem to lose their tuneful freshness, while the entire program is very well played by the RLPO. Very good sonics too. A treat for RVW fans.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Simon Trpceski and Vasily Petrenko bring a certain lightness and refinement to Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2, while at the same revealing the work's deep emotions and inherent melancholy. Trpceski's playing effuses romantic bravura in the rapid finger passages of the outer movements, while cultivating a classical elegance in the hauntingly beautiful slow movement, here sounding so similar in mood and style to Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 21 that I wonder if Rachmaninov wasn't inspired by it.

Listening to Petrenko's conducting in Concerto No. 3, I was reminded of how Rachmaninov was greatly impressed at Gustav Mahler's meticulous preparation of this concerto's orchestral accompaniment for the New York premiere. Petrenko plays up the music's emotional grandeur and symphonic utterance (a few passages bring to mind the composer's Symphony No. 2), producing a real Rachmaninov sound with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, which plays wonderfully. My only complaint comes in the finale, where the trumpet's important statement of the main theme is barely audible.

For his part Trpceski thankfully resists the temptation to treat the formidable solo part as mere "piano competition" music (as so many others have done). His playing has that rare combination of power, passion, and precision (his first-movement cadenza--the long original one--is magnificent) which, combined with his rich tone and singing line, make this one of the most moving and musical Rachmaninov Third's on disc. The recording gives the usual prominence to the piano so that we hear every note, but the orchestra has a sufficient presence as well (it doesn't exactly sound "realistic"--then again, few concerto recordings do). An excellent disc, one that will likely spend much time in your CD player.

--Victor Carr Jr, ClassicsToday.com

Violinist Augustin Hadelich is one of the fastest-rising stars of his generation. With three critically acclaimed and Billboard-charting releases on AVIE to his credit, he now delivers what promises to be one of the most important concerto recordings of the year, pairing the Violin Concertos by Jean Sibelius and Thomas Adès, the latter only the second recording of the composer's work. He is superbly supported by Hannu Lintu conducting the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. Describing his decision to couple Sibelius with Adès, Augustin says, "Programmes I like most are ones where the pieces are connected, but in a subtle way. As we listen to an apparently contrasting programme, we notice similarities--we hear phrase shapes, harmonies, rhythms, and colours in one piece that remind us of something that we heard in the other. The deep, rumbling timpani and low winds in the Sibelius concerto bridge the gap to the Adès, a work which also explores the lowest depths of the sound spectrum, creating chasms over which the violinist performs a tight-rope act. The intensely emotional first and second movements of the Sibelius, and the even more extreme and heart-wrenching second movement of the Adès, create another such connection. Both composers love playing with complex rhythms: Sibelius sticks to polyrhythms, while Adès really pushes the envelope having the solo violin and orchestra play in different meters--or even at different tempi! The dances in the last movement of the Sibelius have a counterpart in the almost tribal-sounding last movement of the Adès. There are many other such comparisons, and, in my view, combining these concertos on one recording makes each one shine in a way that they wouldn't without the other." Augustin rounds out the recording with Three Humoresques by Sibelius. The release will be supported by a major publicity and marketing campaign, and a performance of the Adès with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. critical acclaim for Augustin Hadelich "Here is a young artist with no evident limitations." - The New Yorker

John Wilson is probably best known for his light-entertainment orchestral work, especially his restorations of classic film scores – a background which, it turns out, equips him well for this anthology of British musical landscapes. Most celebrate an idealised pastoral view of rustic Avalon...George Butterworth's Two English Idylls", based on Sussex folk songs, and the title of Arnold Bax's "The Happy Forest" aptly conveying its excessively cheerful tone, which seems to derive from some pre-Wordsworthian Edenic paradise. But Vaughan Williams is the king of this domain: "The Lark Ascending" was recently voted Britain's favourite classical piece, and is airily rendered here by James Clark." - Andy Gill, The Independent

The album originally entitled 'Liverpool Pops at Home' grew out of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra's desire to put on a concert called Sounds of the City, a concert to show the richness of the musical legacy from the great musicians and composers of Liverpool.