Although Liszt’s thirteen symphonic poems exist in two-piano transcriptions prepared by the composer himself, it was his Czech student August Stradal (1860–1930) who was to transcribe them for solo piano – versions which demand almost superhuman virtuosity. As the late Malcolm MacDonald writes in his booklet essay, Stradal’s versions ‘transform these revolutionary orchestral compositions into viable and effective piano works, faithfully preserving their masterly musical substance’. A Fanfare review of Volume One in this series had high praise for Risto-Matti Marin’s pianism: ‘One marvels at the stamina that can keep such a plethora of detail in place with such relentless élan; at his narrative shaping, which can turn up an already withering heat, so to speak, at climactic moments; at his overarching persuasiveness’. Risto-Matti Marin, who earned his doctoral degree from the Sibelius Academy in 2010, has recorded many internationally acclaimed solo piano albums, and several others of chamber music, his catalogue extending from the cornerstones of Classical/Romantic piano repertoire to rare original works, transcriptions and contemporary music. In addition to his work as a recitalist and chamber musician, he lectures on piano music and teaches in Finland and abroad.

In the 1970s LP cycles of Liszt’s transcriptions of Beethoven symphonies exercised some fascination. Those first forays by Cyprien Katsaris have been emulated by a fair few pianists since then.

August Stradal, whose life overlapped with that of the composer by some 26 years, has done a similar service for Liszt in making thoroughly grown-up versions of Liszt’s thirteen tone poems. Stradal was not the first – Malcolm Macdonald in his extended liner essay mentions that Carl Tausig prepared solo versions of eleven of the twelve works but some of these have been lost and what survives lacks the worked-through finesse and burly grandeur of Stradal’s efforts. Liszt made his own two piano version of these works but Stradal’s inspired efforts open the door to a much wider constituency. It is interesting to note that the orchestral versions themselves were prepared by Joachim Raff from Liszt’s piano manuscripts.

If you have already been drawn to Risto’s earlier Toccata volume then you will have acquired this one long before this review appears. Others dipping their toes into the cycle cannot fail to come away from the experience impressed.

The diminutive Orpheus drips self-absorbed romance and ominous atmosphere. Much of this mood-concentrated music exercises a sort of hypnosis on the listener – try the sustained slow-swirling introduction to Tasso. Hamlet establishes a similar spell. It has plenty of gloomy clouds but also grumbles, cascades and raves with Mephisto fury. In these aspects it is redolent of Malediction and Totentanz. Contrast the poetry with the Francesca da Rimini-style storms that follow. Risto is not short on panache as we can hear in the often resplendent final pages of these works. Hungaria follows Tasso. Alongside its struttingly rustic chivalry even the bombast works well. The shrill bagpipe whistle at the end of the poem comes off far more splendidly than it has any right to do from a ‘mere’ piano.

I am not at all sure that these solo versions do not work better as pieces of music than the orchestral editions which in Haitink’s (Philips) hands often had my attention drifting. Masur (EMI) was better as was Solti (Decca) but even they struggled.

Roll on Risto’s cycle of the Stradal Bruckner symphony arrangements. Stradal’s version of Bruckner 8 played by Risto is something I would very much like to hear. I can live in hope.

Meantime keep scanning the skies for vol. 3 of this eminent Liszt entry.

-- Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International

Of the three pianist-composers represented here as composers only Levitzki and Friedman have an extensive recorded legacy as executants. By comparison Gabrilowitsch, who also conducted the Detroit Symphony, seems to have been neglected when it came to the recording studio. Levitzki commanded his own series on Naxos (Volume 1 ~ Volume 2 ~ Volume 3) while the same label also celebrated Friedman with similar splendor (Volume 1 ~ Volume 2 ~ Volume 3 ~ Volume 4).

Trust Toccata Classics to approach these three names from one of the golden ages of pianism from an unaccustomed angle. All three wrote piano music under the nurturing that being a great world-touring pianist brings. Levitzki's haughty Valse de concert - one of many waltzes from his pen - has plenty of sentimental fancy in play. There's a touching Valse in A Major, a slow motion swirling Arabesque Valsante and a nice Valse Tzigane. The dance theme continues with a Meissen china Gavotte, a trilling and tear-unfocused Enchanted Nymph and a Dance of the Doll that bears the stamp of ragtime.

There's not a lot of Gabrilowitsch but it is classy. The Romance is touching and perfumed with a romance that sweeps along in Chopin-like grandeur. A deliberate pulse is often favored and this seems to imply cool calculation rather than anything impulsive. The Gavotte, rather like the one by Levitzki, has a predictably antique surface. The Feuillet is successful - a vehicle for the finer emotions; nothing cheap and nothing melodramatic.

I was less impressed with the Friedman arrangements. The four offered up seem prettified and of them only the Couperin, with its grace-note delights and ice-palace fantasy, holds the attention. The disc concludes with no fewer than eleven original works by Friedman. The four Preludes are impressive: No. 1: subtle with delicately chiming dissonances and a sleepy sign-off; No. 2: alive with swirling activity; No. 3: bell-tower Rachmaninov echoes but too short-breathed and No. 4: a quick pulsed and capricious brevity. The selection of Études include a trillingly liquid charmer (No.1 ), an exercise in rapid tremolo (No. 2), a luxuriously emotional essay presented in velvet (No. 4), a sentimental Allegro, con abandono (No. 9), a Godowsky-style study in decorative intricacy, a stormy tempest of the heart, very much in the Rachmaninovian manner (No. 11); likewise the final one (No. 16).

This very well-packed CD is further evidence that Toccata continues to enrich the classical listening experience with unexpected perspectives. Where Toccata lead others may follow. Not everything from these three contemporaries has striking musical substance but there is much to impress and where it does not impress it certainly delights.

– MusicWeb International (Rob Barnett)

This series is the first to attempt documenting the highlights of Leo Ornstein's career. On this release Arsentiy Kharitonov plays all 17 waltzes, varying from the sexily languorous to the boldly tempestuous. Fanfare praised volume one saying, "This is a distinguished and fascinating start to what should prove to be an important series of recordings."

Classical Music

A dark and fantastic imagination engaged.

Lees was born in Manchuria but his family moved to San Francisco when he was only eighteen months old. He became an American citizen in 1931. His teachers included Halsey Stevens, Ingolf Dahl and George Antheil. There are five symphonies, the Fourth of which, Memorial Candles, is on Naxos. Lees has written many other works including a slew of concertos. I should mention the ones for horn and violin. His Third Piano Concerto was recently premiered by Ian Hobson in Florida. Hobson has also recorded his Fourth Piano Sonata and Second Piano Concerto on Albany.

Lees' Toccata inhabits a world of dissonant angularity parallel with that of the Ramey works also on Toccata - a sort of feral pianola effect. The Six Ornamental Etudes are more varied in effect than the Ramey sequences. From that viewpoint Lees's imaginative palette is more capacious. The first of the Three Preludes is an essay in grand swirling defiance. The second is sombre with a discordant filigree for the right hand. The third has the all the pell-mell pianola torque of the Toccata on the first track. The single movement Sonata Breve is serious and dark-browed. There is an element of fantasy here but always tempered by danger. The three movements of Odyssey are respectively from 1971, 1986 and 2005. The first was written for John Ogdon and is angular in a way that often suggests Shostakovich. The second Odyssey movement is full of brooding and discordant outbursts and purposeful surly energy. This is also felt in a few jazzy passages along the way. It was commissioned by the US Information Agency. The final Odyssey is the most recent and has the feel of a journey into a threatening and fantastic land with vistas of unearthly beauty along the way. For all its angularity and occasional dissonance this is a fascinating piece of mercurial mood-swings and descriptive Lisztian power. Mention of Ogdon earlier on reminds me that the torrential power of some of Lees' writing as represented on this disc might almost have been cousins to the Ogdon-propelled Mennin Piano Concerto once recorded on CRI.

Toccata issued its second Ramey volume in the same month as this Benjamin Lees recital.

Lees engages a dark and fantastic imagination.

-- Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International

The other three pieces have all received previous recordings but that doesn’t lessen the interest when they are presented as persuasively as they are here by Stanislav Khristenko. The Piano Sonata No.4 dates from 1948 and is a four-movement work of powerfully contained expression. The conjunction, in the slow movement, of both extrovert and more interior gestures is amplified by Krenek’s precise application of sonorous incident – brief but telling – amidst a generally refined tonal color. Marked con passione this is the work’s core but the Rondo offers a rather whimsical example of Krenek’s sort-of modified Boogie patterns with the Jazz references powerfully engaged. His ear for the vernacular was, after all, long practiced. The finale is a Minuet, perhaps surprisingly – perhaps that’s the point – and its variations, one or two a touch crepuscular, or withdrawn, mark a telling way to end the sonata.

The George Washington Variations, Op.120 followed two years later, the result of a commission from a wealthy Los Angeles businessman for his daughter. This genial and clever set of variations takes in the ballroom and subjects its material to deconstruction and reconstruction, as the notes suggest, with much playfulness. Washington’s Grand March is a central focus, and subject to pithy and witty examples of lightly applied atonalism, jazz-hinting rhythms and much more. Playfully ironic in places it in no way outstays its thirteen-minute length. The brief two-minute Prelude packs quite a punch for so short a piece. As Peter Tregear notes in his excellent booklet, the application of twelve-tone is accomplished here with the utmost of lyricism.

The final piece is Krenek’s completion of Schubert’s Sonata in C major, D840, which he wrote in 1921, just less than a century after Schubert had left it a torso. The first two movements had been completed as had the trio of the Menuetto and the first 272 bars of the finale. It was the pianist Eduard Erdmann, a prominent musician then and later, who encouraged Krenek to take Schubert more seriously. In time he came to understand and share Erdmann’s enthusiasm and undertook a study of the composer’s work. His completion of the sonata is a valuable sidelight to his interests at the time and also of his application of compositional process. As Krenek wrote: ‘in both unfinished movements the thematic material was completely established…so Schubert was [not] still composing by proxy, as it were, but I had only to use my knowledge of, and feeling form Schubert’s style and technique in order to supply what he might have done. I think I did a fairly creditable job.’ He noted that the finale might have been longer had Schubert actually gone through with it.

Given the quality of this inaugural volume we can look forward to the second volume with confidence.

– MusicWeb International (Jonathan Woolf)

This recording of music by Ernest Krenek follows on from Toccata Classics’ wildly successful recording, in two albums, of his complete piano concertos. It covers almost half a century of his compositions, and shows the sheer range of his creativity. There are early piano fugues written for his teacher, Franz Schreker, via elegant fin de siècle Viennese lyricism to a relaxed application of Schoenberg’s dodecaphonic technique- often enlivened with a surprising degree of charm and a knowing sense of humor. The Ernst Krenek Ensemble is joined here by three of the finest lieder singers currently active, Laura Aikin, Bernarda Fink, and Florian Boesch. The Ernst Krenek Ensemble has set itself the task of introducing Ernst Krenek’s important and extensive chamber music oeuvre to the programmes of international concert halls, although its repertoire also includes works by composers such as Schubert and Beethoven, who provided Krenek with important stimulus. Its musicians delve with special curiosity into Krenek’s less familiar works and reveal the many colorful facets of his substantial output. Concerts have taken the ensemble throughout Europe and the USA.

Korngold’s music for Shakespeare’s comedy Much Ado about Nothing, premiered in Vienna in 1920, enjoyed instant success and soon spread around the world. But the music has not been heard as Korngold intended since the 1st production. For this recording, made in conjunction with a staged US premiere, Korngold’s complete score was reconstructed from the original Viennese materials and is played here by the chamber-orchestral forces for which it was written.

REVIEW:

This is indeed a worthy and welcome addition to the Korngold discography. At long last we have a further complete performance of the composer’s delightful incidental music to Shakespeare’s comedy. It joins the sequence recorded by Ondine with John Storgards conducting. The music was first performed in Vienna’s Schönbrunn Palace when Korngold was just 21. It was very successful and the composer would later go on to adapt the music for various chamber ensembles and as an orchestral suite. Now we have the music as it was performed at Schönbrunn together with choice dramatic overlays including Balthasar’s Song, ‘Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more; Men were deceivers ever’, Beatrice’s soliloquy as she yields to love, and the two sets of lovers’ happy uniting in the final wedding scene.

The orchestra is the same size and specification as that at Schönbrunn with a string quartet rather than a string section so that proper balances with all the other instruments can be assured. With the string quartet are: solo flute/piccolo, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, trumpet and trombone with two horns, a piano, harmonium, harp and three percussionists plus solo timpanist. The original parts were available so that each player could replicate the bowings and articulations used in Vienna. Furthermore, all the composer’s own recordings of the work were made available too, so questions of tempo and portamento could be addressed. Conductor John Mauceri was a very apt choice for he has had much experience conducting Korngold and is a stalwart champion of film music, an asset that might well be regarded as not being far removed from the spirit of this work – in fact the March of the Watch could be considered a pre-echo of Korngold’s Sherwood Forest scenes from his The Adventures of Robin Hood. Mauceri also contributes the erudite notes for this album.

Korngold’s conception works very well in his chosen ensemble. It points up the comedy and irony such as that in March of the Watch and in the dreamy romanticism of the Garden Music. All those intimate glistening string-harp-and-harmonium figures, and rippling piano arpeggios, suggest birdsong and flowers nodding in zephyr breezes. It’s all in gentle romantic waltz time, plus the contrastingly intense almost Mahlerian Funeral Music. Although I would have thought it unnecessary, five of the pieces that have dialogue are repeated again in purely instrumental dress.

There have been a number of recordings of Korngold’s purely orchestral suite from Much Ado About Nothing. Of these I would unhesitatingly recommend Caspar Richter’s 2002 reading originally released on CD DCA 1131. This is not only because it included, for the first time, the enchanting Garden Music but also for the other items on this album which had great appeal especially Korngold’s divine Abschiedlieder Songs  (Songs of Farewell). A delight for committed Korngold fans.

-- MusicWeb International (Aan Lace)

John Joubert celebrates his 90th irthday on March 20th, 2017 - this release marks that occasion! Joubert was born in Cape Town in 1927 but settled in Britain after arriving as a student in 1946 and has become a stalwart of British musical life. His organ music, recorded here as part of the birthday celebrations, ranges from the miniature to the monumental. It often reflects Bach's influence, and always demonstrates the balance of craftsmanship and honesty of expression that has assured Joubert's place in the affection of his audiences. The booklet notes here are contributed by the composer himself and the organist, Tom Winpenny. Winpenny recorded the album on the mighty organ of St. Albans Cathedral. Winpenny is the Assistant Master of the Music at St. Albans Cathedral. Previously, he was sub-organist at St. Paul's Cathedral and during this time he performed for many major state occasions.

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 second volume in pianist Stephen Gutman’s three-disc survey of Rameau’s complete keyboard music begins with the composer’s harpsichord transcriptions of the ballet music from his opera Les Indes galantes, heard in what appears to be their first recording on a modern concert grand. Gutman’s booklet notes present detailed analyses of how Rameau carefully went about his business of “de-orchestration”. Happily, Gutman does not feel the need to flesh out the keyboard writing, and makes expressive points through tone color, subtle dynamic contrasts, and articulation. Discreet agogic stresses help to point up a melodic phrase or give appropriate weight to a bass note when needed, as in the Vivement movement, or in the sophisticated accentuation of the ascending imitative arpeggios in the final pair of Gavottes.

The Third Suite receives an equally commanding performance, and its virtues can be illuminated through comparative listening. For example, in the second-movement variation set Les niais de Sologne, Jill Crossland’s recent recording focuses on the right-hand melody as the phrases fall into generic four- and eight-bar patterns. Robert Casadesus’ strong legato left-hand presence adds more linear tension to the mix. By contrast, Gutman anchors his right-hand legato line with the left-hand counterpoint played in a detached yet tellingly inflected manner that gives shape to implied cross-rhythmic patterns.

The concluding Les Cyclopes fuses incisive brilliance and refinement, while Gutman’s transcription of the B-flat concerto is a model of poised fingerwork and tonal application. Nor do the relatively modest demands of the concluding Gavotte and the Menuet en rondeau (the latter lasts just half a minute, not four minutes as inaccurately noted on the back cover) lack for understated elegance. What is more, Toccata Classics’ engineering captures Gutman’s warm timbre in an ambience akin to an intimate room suitable for both instrument and repertoire. A lovely disc in every way, and I look forward to this cycle’s imminent completion.

-- Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

The Scottish musician Helen Hopekirk (1856-1945) was regarded as one of the major concert pianists of her generation. She also made a lasting contribution as a piano teacher in Boston, Mass., after her emigration in 1897. As a composer, she forged an intriguing path by turning to the music of her native country as the wellspring of her creativity. The early pieces can sound like Brahms in the Highlands, and her later works marry Debussyan Impressionism with Hebridean folk-music, to evocative, touching and exhilarating effect. This is the first album dedicated to Hopekirk's music. Gary Steigerwalt, who is writing a biography of Helen Hopekirk, recently retired as a professor on the music faculty of Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Massachusets, where he taught for 35 years. He gave the first performance in over a century of her Concertstuck with the Mount Holyoke College Symphony Orchestra in 2015.

This is the fourth CD in a seven-CD series presenting all of Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst's compositions for the first time. It contains some of his most important compositions: an early Concertino with a melancholy slow movement and charming waltz finale; the fiendishly difficult Concerto that had a deep influence not only on Liszt's Piano Sonata but also on concertos by Brahms and Sibelius; and the late String Quartet, with echoes of Beethoven and Mendelssohn and an inwardness, charm and energy all of it's own.

Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst (1812-65) was one of the leading musicians of his day, a friend of Berlioz, Chopin, Liszt and Mendelssohn, and for Joseph Joachim 'the greatest violinist I ever heard'. But the popular encore pieces by which Ernst is remembered today represent only a fraction of his output. This fifth CD - in series of seven presenting all his compositions for the first time - shows his mastery on large and small scale: the Polonaise and Variations on a Dutch Air are grand and brilliant compositions for the concert hall, and the sparkling operatic miniatures and tender arrangements are altogether more intimate.