Liszt: Symphonic Poems

Rachmaninoff: Piano Concertos Nos. 2 & 3

Bach: Concertos for 2 & 3 Pianos

STRAUSS: EIN HELDENLEBEN, DON

Recorded 1947-1958.

Boulez is not a 'tender' conductor; nor would he wish to be found one. But, as I said before, again and again he provides a revelation of the 'meaning' of a particular passage—simply by playing it exactly as it stands: not so simply, by his apparent ability to convey the intentions of the composer's creative mind. Two final examples: the hollow bang on the bass drum in the second scene, during Wozzeck's hallucination; and the celesta/harp trickle, with other motifs exactly poised against it, while Marie in Scene 3 falls into a reverie. Each tells marvellously.

-- Gramophone [2/1967, reviewing the LP release]

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Berry [is] perhaps the best Wozzeck on record... [Boulez] is very good at nail-biting suspense and lucid clarification of complex textures...

-- Gramophone [2/1989]

Mendelssohn: Songs Without Words - Variations serieuses - Ch

Unusually subtle performances. Johnson and Lipovsek are freer with rubato than most and, aided by an atmospheric recording, make use of half-lights in their coloring of the music.

With the exception of The Nursery, Mussorgsky's songs have traditionally been the province of male singers. The dark and uncompromising subject matter of his other cycles would seem to call for equally dark-voiced singers and it is no surprise that the major sets of his songs to date have come from a pair of implacable basses, Boris Christoff (EMI, 8/89) and Aage Haugland (Chandos, 4/95). The women, however, are starting to make their mark. Last year Eva Podles offered a recital disc that included The Nursery and the Songs and Dances of Death and now Marjana Lipovsek has recorded all three of the cycles, making a substantial addition to the handful of Mussorgsky recordings by female voices that we have already.

This new disc offers the best-known songs in unusually subtle performances, mainly thanks to the influence of the accompanist, Graham Johnson. He and Lipovsek are freer with rubato than most of their rivals and, aided by an atmospheric recording, regularly make use of half-lights in their colouring of the music. Lipovsek's mezzo is also richer and steadier than most of the Russian female voices heard in this repertoire in the past. For The Nursery she lightens her tone very effectively, taking the songs in higher keys than other mezzos. A comparison with Margaret Price's recording, reissued last year as part of a two-disc set, shows two singers at opposite extremes: Price is clear-toned and rhythmically exact, Lipovsek affectionate and flexible. Price sees the songs through the eyes of a naughty little brat who is rebelling against a strict nurse, whereas Lipovsek's child sounds quite a bit younger, a wide-eyed infant, who gets quite tearful when he is told off.

-- Gramophone [9/1996]

Weiss is very much the lutenist’s Bach, and if his music is less contrapuntally rich than that of his more famous contemporary, it is nonetheless full of harmonic daring. These large-scale sonatas are fiendishly demanding, and while Kirchhof’s performances are not absolutely flawless, he plays with considerable bravura and musicianship. Some may find the sound of his breathing intrusive, but then it’s reassuring to know there’s a human being behind all that digital technology.

-- Kate Bolton, BBC Music Magazine

This is the kind of record that you want to be sent for review as often as possible, to go back to play from the beginning once you've reached the end, to send to any aspiring singer who wants to learn about the first principles of singing. Ileana Cotrubas teaches you anew the importance of legato, of words, of evenly produced tone, of attention to detail, and of how to wed the four together into intelligent interpretations. Indeed each of these performances is at once an example of superb singing qua singing, but at the same time an account of the aria in hand that reveals the character's situation, while encompassing the particular style needed for a particular composer.

Over and above that is Cotrubas's peculiarly individual utterance... It makes her Gilda in Rigoletto touching and vulnerable. Note, too, how the coloratura is here part of the expression of Gilda's joy... The Leonora of Forza del destino finds Cotrubas striking out into new territory, and securely occupying it. Again she has the measure of a character's situation, the cry of "Fatalita" more desperate at each repeat.

-- Gramophone [6/1977, reviewing the Cotrubas selections]

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This is the second of two recitals which mark the welcome return of Renata Scotto to the recording studios. Her strong and touching performance as Ciô-Ciô-Sàn in Barbirolli's Madarna Butterfly (HMV Angel SLS927, 9/67) is now nine years old, and since then she has been rather lost to view by the record-buying public. She was unlucky to come upon the scene at a time when EMI were casting Callas, and Decca Tebaldi, in roles which Scotto might have taken, some of which she did in fact sing for DG in recordings that never quite achieved comparable popularity in this country. Then in the last ten years it has been the fresh, bright tones of Mirella Freni and the velvety ones of Montserrat Caballé that have taken the attention. But all the time Scotto has been giving great pleasure in the opera houses, developing from a singer whose charm and accomplishments were evident when we first heard her, over twenty years ago, into a mature, highly expressive artist of real distinction.

The previous record (CBS 76407, 11/75) presented her in arias of the verismo school, and in these she gave performances sufficiently heartfelt yet nobly restrained to call to mind a great predecessor, Claudia Muzio. This is so again in the present Verdi recital, which contains an intensely moving account of "Addio del passato" from La Traviata, the aria associated most of all with Muzio. The first of the arias from I Vespri Siciliani recalls her also, with its expressive breathing and its slow chromatic scale falling like a sigh. We know from the start of this recital, too, that it is a mature and genuine artist whom we are about to hear, one able to convey the underlying strength of feeling in the lively cabaletta of the extract from La Battaglia di Legnano. With the Nabucco aria it is a new, formidable character that we hear, startlingly vivid as she exclaims with cunning pride how little they know of Abigail's heart. And then, how much we know of Desdemona's when such anxiety overshadows her phrases as in Scotto's performance of the great scene from Otello.

Faults of course there are in this recital, particularly in the rather hard tone of several of the high notes. I still wouldn't be without it!

-- Gramophone [8/1976, reviewing the Scotto selections]

SCHUBERT: SYMPHONIES NO 4 & 8

Rubinstein Collection, Vol. 65: Brahms: Piano Quartets Nos.

BOHEME

SCARLATTI & CAGE SONATAS

Are you tired of your classically minded friends laughing at you when you mispronounce the names of renowned, long-expired European composers? Do you think the Three Tenors are the latest teenage boy band? Well, those well-educated friends of yours still won't cut you much slack for purchasing CLASSICAL HITS, but at least you'll feel like you've dipped your toe into the deep waters of classical music. CLASSICAL HITS is very clearly a compilation designed for the newcomer, as it's made up almost exclusively of compositions that have somehow managed to sneak into the popular consciousness over the years through a variety of means, such as "Pie Jesu," "O Solo Mio," and "Nessun Dorma." There are a bunch of ringers here as well, mostly ersatz-classical soundtrack themes in an orchestral mode, such as John Williams's theme from STAR WARS: THE PHANTOM MENACE. For the uninitiated, it's a start.