Classical Music

REVIEW:

The Finnish Brass Symphony, directed by Hannu Lintu, has recorded a masterful survey of music by countryman Einojuhani Rautavaara. Spanning more than 45 years of the composer's work, the album functions as something of a compendium of themes that Rautavaara has returned to time and again in his music, from the dodecaphonic experiments of the Wind Octet to his ongoing fascination with angels. In this performance of 1981's Playgrounds for Angels, it becomes unclear if the playgrounds belong entirely to terrifying otherworldly beings or to these instrumentalists, whose superb ensemble skills definitely qualify them as supernaturally talented. 1953's A Requiem in our Time has been recorded at least four times, most memorably--until now--on a BIS disc with Brass Partout. The bold strokes and brash colors of this work are reflected in the more rare Soldier's Mass from 1968, whose "In Hora Mortis" movement presages the shimmering intensity of Rautavaara's later works.

A few shorter compositions round out the collection. Originally written as a compulsory piece for a trumpet competition, the Tarantará must have struck fear into the hearts of those brass players--in Rautavaara's hands, the instrument is nothing short of a wild animal that shrieks, growls, and leaps all over the register with dizzying speed. The extraordinary trumpeter Pasi Pirinen makes it all seem easy. The fanfare written for Finland's 75th independence anniversary is a mere 37 seconds long: blink twice, and you miss it entirely. The most recent composition, 1998's Hymnus for trumpet and organ, ably performed by Deborah Calland and Barry Millington, completes the survey. Kudos to Ondine for a marvelous recording.

--Anastasia Tsioulcas, ClassicsToday.com

Aleksis Kivi, who died in 1872 at the age of only 38, is Finland's national writer, the first notable author of plays, poetry and novels in the Finnihs language.

The magical world of Einojuhani Rautavaara is one that evokes other realms. Angels figure particularly heavily, especially those angels that deal with death and destruction. As Rautavaara himself says, “My angels are not those like in the altarpieces of Raphael...my angels are powerful.”

As well as with angels, many mystics have been preoccupied with the language of the birds (Messiaen in music, but think also of Saint Francis of Assisi preaching to the birds). One of the most popular Finnish works of recent years has been the Cantus arcticus, for prerecorded bird sounds and orchestra. It is a hugely impressive three-movement soundscape marked by a timeless feel and by beautiful, glowing lines. The taped birds could easily have sounded like a cheap effect, so it is telling that they emerge as an integral part of the work’s emotional vocabulary. Segerstam’s performance is excellent, as one would expect from this fine musician.

The very title Autumn Gardens seems to invite comparison with Takemitsu—all we need is a descending flock of the birds from the Cantus arcticus. It is certainly easy on the ear, so much so that the acerbic, percussive dissonances of the third movement of the First Piano Concerto come as something of a relief. Gothóni is an excellent pianist here; his way with some rhythms makes me suggest he has links to jazz. Back to pure atmosphere for the Clarinet Concerto, though—truly excellently played by Stoltzmann.

The second disc begins with an Adagio celeste for string orchestra. The strings of the Belgian National Orchestra play really sumptuously in this gently pulsating score; the much more abrasive Flute Concerto excerpt that follows (complete with agile low bassoon and menacing percussion) acts as a necessary corrective, although it is not long before it, too, shows its delicate side.

True and False Unicorn is a reminder of Rautavaara’s stature as a composer of choral works. The second movement, “Young Sagittarius,” is full of delightfully light rhythmic play, as is In the shade of the willow. Anadyomene , subtitled “Adoration of Aphrodite,” evokes more of a sense of the massive, using expansive, coloristic writing and including moments of real light.

The final work, Angels and Visitations , has a deliberately ambiguous title. “Visitations” may indeed refer to the Annunciation, but it may equally invoke something more sinister. Climaxes, therefore, tend towards the darkly hued. There are shades of Sibelius during the course of the piece, but Rautavaara transforms the material so that it glows in a most un-Sibelian way. This tense score (with its Pétrouchka -like mêlée of sounds) is one of the most impressive on either disc here, and is an apt way to close.

Although other companies are championing the Rautavaara cause, most notably Naxos, Ondine has a certain authority. Both sides of Rautavaara’s personality—the meltingly beautiful and the near violent—are given a chance to make their mark here.

-- Fanfare

Here we have one of the greatest living composers working in the full inspiration of his mature style, performed and recorded with world-class passion and intensity. It really doesn't get any better. Before the Icons began life as a piano suite in 1955. In creating this orchestral version Rautavaara separated some of the individual numbers with interludes for string orchestra ("Prayers") and added a concluding "Amen". The music is wide-ranging and thoroughly approachable, though never cloying or cheap. Most of the "icon" movements feature the sound of bells as a unifying timbre, though the music isn't at all "churchly" in a conventional sense. It's a moving, even noble work, though it does have its lighter moments (the third movement: "Two Village Saints").

A Tapestry of Life (2007) has four movements lasting a bit more than 24 minutes. The second piece, "Halcyon Days", is stunningly lovely, while the concluding "Final Polonaise" builds to a powerful, ominous close. Each of the four movements is well contrasted and expressively affecting. It's great to have the opportunity to hear this music while it's still new, and as mentioned above the performance by the Helsinki Philharmonic under Leif Segerstam is first rate. If you care even mildly about contemporary music, or just good classical music, you owe it to yourself to hear this disc.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

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RAUTAVAARA Before the Icons. A Tapestry of Life • Leif Segerstam, cond; Helsinki PO • ONDINE 1149-2 (49:37)


I have to tell you, at the outset of this review, that I moved to this CD immediately after reading Jack Reilly’s book The Harmony of Bill Evans, Vol. 2 (reviewed elsewhere in this issue) and listening to the accompanying CD, and that I found a great many similarities—more so than differences.


Einojuhan Rautavaara, who many probably do not know is the son of one of the greatest Mozart sopranos of the early 20th century (Aulikki, who sang the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro on the old Glyndebourne recording conducted by Fritz Busch), has always written music in an amorphic style in which mood is as important as form. These works are no exception, and by doing so he allies his sparse melodic structures to the very sort of underlying density in chord progressions that were the heart of Bill Evans’s jazz pieces.


Before the Icons spans a full half-century of composition. Rautavaara wrote a set of six impressions on Byzantine icons for piano in 1955, immediately planned to orchestrate them, but did not get around to it until 2005! At that time, he wrote three “prayers” to go between the icons, scored for strings to reflect the voice of the individual. Some of the iconic pieces are agitated, powerful music, particularly the first ( The Death of the Mother of God ) and last ( Archangel Michael Fighting the Antichrist ), but not always, while the prayers are gentle and reflective. As usual, it’s a fascinating piece, and if he hadn’t revealed its genesis, one would have a hard time imaging a half-century between its two parts.


A Tapestry of Life is based on various poems or stories that influenced him. Again, as the music is impressionistic, it transcends the words to produce a feeling rather than a narrative. “Stars Swarming” was inspired by a poem by Edith Södergran, a surrealistic nightly vision where stars keep falling in the garden until the lawn is full of splinters. “Halcyon Days” uses the simple, monotonous repetition of a triplet, which gives rise to a slowly ascending cantabile melody (shades of Bill Evans again). Rautavaara’s coloristic effects derive from his very French-based style of orchestration overlaid on his Finnish musical sensibilities.


I’ve been a fan of Leif Segerstam since the early 1970s and saw him conduct both La Bohème at the Metropolitan Opera and his own works with the Cincinnati Symphony. For the life of me, I don’t understand why he is so undervalued (or, more often, ignored) as a conductor, as I consider him one of the greatest of the 20th century, but particularly in this music he gives his best because his own sensibilities are very close to Rautavaara’s. I urge you to get this record. It is a wonderful souvenir of both composer and conductor.


FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

This is a hybrid Super Audio CD playable on both regular and Super Audio CD players.


This is a stunning disc. Rautavaara continues to operate at the peak of his form, despite suffering a serious heart attack in mid-composition of Book of Visions that kept him hospitalized for six months. It's a remarkable work in four movements (or "tales") lasting some 40 minutes. Each tale has a tantalizing title (Night, Fire, Love, and Fate) vague enough to leave the specifics to the listener's imagination, but full of musical possibilities that Rautavaara seizes with relish. You might call this new work a "Four Lemminkäinen Legends" for the new millennium, since as always that indefinable Finnish sensibility is quite audibly present but is always expressed in the composer's own personal idiom. The music is gorgeous: evocative, mysterious, luminously scored, and extremely well-crafted--and it practically goes without saying that dedicatee Mikko Franck does a spectacular job conducting this premiere. This is a major statement, make no mistake.

Rautavaara's First Symphony has often been revised, from a four-movement original, down to two movements, and back up to the present three, which, as the composer notes, provides a more balanced sequence than previously. It was written when Prokofiev and Shostakovich were major influences, but with the passing of time the lyricism of the first movement now seems fully characteristic of Rautavaara. Adagio Celeste is yet another example (there are many in Rautavaara) of how music based on a 12-note theme can still be very beautiful and approachable. In this regard he recalls Swiss composer Frank Martin. It's a lovely work scored for small orchestra (the "string orchestra" designation on the tray card is incorrect). Once again the performances of this work and the symphony are all that anyone could ask, and the sonics, whether in stereo or multichannel formats, are fully up to the quality of the interpretations. A knockout, not to be missed!

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Classical Music

Triple Feature.

This recording features the twelve-tone opera Kaivos (The Mine) by Einojuhani Rautavaara who also wrote the libretto (sung in Finnish). The opera in three acts tells the story of an uprising by mine workers somewhere in Europe at the end of the 1950s.

Rautavaara wrote this, his first opera, from 1957-62 and today considers it, "perhaps the best opera I have ever written, a real thriller whose underlying theme - that a human being defines himself through his choices - is nevertheless universal."

This CD release represents a real highlight in the work's exceptional history: the opera's underlying thematic allusions to the 1956 Hungarian uprising impeded a staged performance in Finland, a neighboring country of the then Soviet Union. Instead, a TV production was broadcast in 1963, making it the first Finnish Television opera. The present recording was made in connection with the premier live concert performance of the opera in Tampere (Finland) in September 2010, featuring the same cast.

Conductor Robert Trevino’s fourth album release on Ondine is focused on the late works of composer Einojuhani Rautavaara (1928–2016), one of Finland’s most celebrated composers after Sibelius and known worldwide for his Neo-Romantic, even mystic compositions. Together with violinist Simone Lamsma and the Malmö Symphony Orchestra the artists are presenting four final orchestral works by the celebrated composer.

Two of the works are world première recordings. In his late period, Rautavaara received several communications from the world’s leading violinists requesting him to write works for them. He was able to oblige them, creating several extensive works featuring solo violin. Fantasia (2015) for violin and orchestra is a work of soft Neo-Romantic harmonies and soaring melodic lines. In 2014, Rautavaara was asked to write a new Violin Concerto. This commission resulted in Deux Sérénades for violin and orchestra which remained unfinished at Rautavaara’s death: the second movement was sketched out, but only its beginning was orchestrated. Kalevi Aho, an accomplished composer of symphonies and concertos who studied composition with Rautavaara at the turn of the 1970s, fleshed out the orchestration in 2018. Lost Landscapes (2005/15) was originally written as a violin sonata, but Rautavaara began orchestrating the work in 2013. The first movement was premiered at the contemporary music festival at Tanglewood in July 2015, but the full premiere of the work took place in Malmö in March 2021, with Simone Lamsma as soloist. In the Beginning (2015) is a concise overture-type work commissioned for a concert opener. The titles of his works were important for the composer, forming part of the ‘aura’ of the work and often even constituting the initial impulse for writing the piece in the first place.

REVIEWS:

There is a transcendent intensity to Rautavaara’s music which is heightened by this writing for strings. All of the music here is relatively recent, the earliest from 2005, but here rearranged for these forces. Lost Landscapes, Fantasia, In the Beginning and Deux Serenades (completed by Kalevi Aho, after the composer’s death) are the four works here. Music to be immersed in and a fitting presentation of some of Rautavaara’s last work.

-- Lark Reviews

All these violin concertante works are attractive, but they are also all rather similar, and there is a preponderance of slow music. So they are best not listened to all at the same time. In the Beginning is different: it shows another side of the composer and perhaps has the best music on the disc.

We have a cosmopolitan team here. The soloist, Simone Lamsma is Dutch, has performed widely and already made a number of recordings. Robert Trevino is American and is a rising star. The Malmö Symphony Orchestra is one of Sweden’s leading orchestras. They all provide assured performances. The recording is sympathetic and the booklet informative. The Fantasia and Deux Sérénades have each been recorded by their commissioners but coupled with different composers, so the Rautavaara fan will find this the most convenient way to collect these works.

-- MusicWeb International

Ondine continues its long-term collaboration with Einojuhani Rautavaara, the Latvian Radio Choir, and Sigvards Klava by presenting the world premiere recording of Rautavaara’s Missa a cappella. Being praised by Gramophone as an outstanding body of singers, the Latvian Radio Choir is one of the top chamber choirs in Europe. This is the choir’s follow-up disc to their highly successful recording of Rachmaninov's All-Night Vigil.

A MusicWeb International Recording of the Month!

Steadfast Ondine have here gathered four world premiere recordings of works by Finnish contemporary composer Rautavaara. In the 1970s and early 1980s I associated him with the thornier groves of avant-garde dissonance as evidenced by the Third Symphony. In fact, time and again, I have been reminded that Rautavaara reaches out to many listeners beyond any narrow elite. His early Cantus Arcticus (1972) is miraculously accessible. A concert late last year also underscored the same message. The BBC Philharmonic under Carlos Miguel Prieto in MediaCity Salford played his Symphony No. 7 Angel of Light. This is a surgingly and phantasmally lyrical three-quarter hour work belonging among the last century's melodic treasures, close to Silvestrov's Symphony No. 5, the symphonies of Alla Pavlova and Ned Rorem's Lions.

Rubáiyát (2015) is a song-cycle using verse from Edward Fitzgerald's translation/realization of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam (1048–1131). We are fortunate to hear Gerald Finley singing it in its orchestral version. His voice is clear yet lush of tone. He sings across an incessantly inventive and beckoning orchestral arioso. His enunciation is sharply focused and while his 'line' is usually independent of the accompaniment he puts across the poetry's carpe diem philosophy with eloquence. Rautavaara does not shy from word and line repetition and grasps the opportunities provided by the most famous (least neglected) verses. The work begins with an abrupt plunge ‘in media res' and, as if further to emphasise the message, ends abruptly, without grace line or flourish, on the words 'O make haste'.

Verses have been popular with composers. Apart from Bantock's three-hour setting there are the song-cycle by Liza Lehmann, Arthur Foote's Character Pieces after Omar Khayyám, Robert Blum's Symphony No. 1 Omar Khayyám for orchestra and baritone, Lex van Delden's Omar Khayyám cantata, works by Charles Cadman, Henry Houseley, and in the 1970s, Alan Hovhaness's Rubaiyat for narrator, accordion and orchestra. There are also smaller-scale contributions from Hindemith and Penderecki.

Into the Heart of Light (Canto V - 2012) is the latest installment in the composer's series of works for string orchestra. The first of the Cantos dates from the 1960s. This glowingly confident example of lofty melodic writing for massed strings reaches across to the angelic ecstasy of the Seventh Symphony.

Balada (2014) sets texts by Lorca. It's a substantial piece for tenor, mixed choir and orchestra. On this occasion Mika Pohjonen is the soloist. The work was premiered in Madrid in May 2015. Its burning fervour injects a flaming drama which is put across with muscular commitment by both choir and orchestra. The music moves in approximately the same universe as the more demonstrative moments in John Tavener's big choral-orchestral works as well as recalling Szymanowski's Third Symphony Song of the Night and Barber's Prayers of Kierkegaard. As usual my intention here is to give some flavour of what you will hear, not to imply any lack of originality.

The Four Songs from the opera Rasputin are arrangements by the composer for mixed choir and orchestra. No doubt we will hear the whole opera before too long; the sooner the better. It's certainly a fruitful subject and story. The massed choral effect is redolent from time to time of Sibelius's Kullervo. The orchestral tissue gleams, shines and glitters around the plangent and awed singing. There's a touch of Mussorgsky's voice of the people here.

The notes by Kimmo Korhonen and a typically fine recording, lacking nothing in impact and subtlety, serve to complement some glorious music-making. This will make converts and have them exploring Ondine's already bejewelled Rautavaara pages.

– MusicWeb International (Rob Barnett)

The most wonderful thing about Rautavaara's songs is that no matter what the technical basis of his compositional method, he understands that "song" means an evocative text set to a singable melody. You may not go away humming all of the tunes here, particularly in the brief, powerful, and oddly disturbing cycle God's Way (to poems by Bo Setterlind), but there's no questioning the fundamental rightness of Rautavaara's reaction to the words, or his ability to project his feelings into an expressive vocal line. That's not something to be taken for granted nowadays, when grateful and effective writing for the voice is no longer the basis of most composers' techniques, whether writing for people or for instruments.

The remaining four sets of songs on this disc all employ texts of the highest quality, by Shakespeare (in English, by the way), Rilke, and Finnish poet Aleksis Kivi. The Rilke settings are particularly moving, nowhere more so than The Lovers, whose third song, "Woman Loving", ought to be a recital classic by now. The three songs taken from the opera Aleksis Kivi also deserve to find a life of their own away from the larger work. They stand among the most hauntingly beautiful of Rautavaara's latest creations. Baritone Gabriel Suovanen sings all of this music with warm tone and great musical intelligence, and he couldn't be better accompanied than by Segerstam and the Helsinki Philharmonic. Ideally balanced sound rounds out this most enticing picture of Rautavaara's generously lyrical art.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Let's start with the "filler", because it's a very interesting one. Rautavaara's The Fiddlers originally was composed as a piano suite, as played here, and later arranged for string orchestra. For this performance, a fine one by Paavali Jumppanen, Pekka Kuusisto offers solo violin versions of the original folk tunes that Rautavaara selected for his suite. The result is fascinating; the tunes are about what you'd expect--robust, folk-fiddle melodies--but Rautavaara extracts a vast amount of variety and emotional nuance from them, using the basic material in often surprising ways. Check out the second tune, Kopsin Jonas, for example, as it enters evocatively in the bass over a swirling treble ostinato. Great stuff!

Rautavaara has composed very little for violin and piano, or (in the case of Variétude) for solo violin. There are mostly occasional works, but they are no less finely crafted for that. The excitingly brief Dithyrambos and Notturno e danza deliver what their titles suggest, while the other pieces are all nostalgic mood-pieces, often very beautiful. The major work here is Lost Landscapes, a four-movement violin sonata in all but name, with each movement offering a portrait of one of the composer's youthful haunts: Tanglewood, Ascona, Rainergasse 11, Vienna, and West 23rd Street, NY.

Kuusisto, as we have every reason to expect, plays very well, with plenty of color in his tone; and as already suggested, Jumppanen also does an excellent job, whether as accompanist or taking over the spotlight. The sonics are generally excellent, well balanced, and perhaps just a bit bright in the violin's upper register. Ondine's Rautavaara recordings really are major additions to the contemporary music scene. This one is no exception.

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Rautavaara, E.: Symphonies Nos. 1-3

The passing away of Einojuhani Rautavaara (1928–2016), one of the most performed Finnish composers after Sibelius, left a deep void in the field of Finnish contemporary music. This new album by cellist Tanja Tetzlaff and pianist Gunilla Süssmann includes Rautavaara’s rarely heard works written for cello and piano. The cornerstone of Rautavaara’s cello chamber music are the three sonatas. The earliest of the sonatas was written in 1969 and contains Baroque influences. Prior to this, the composer had already written Two Preludes and Fugues for cello and piano in 1955 firmly rooted in the Neo-Classical tradition as a young student. Soon after completing his solo cello sonata, the composer started writing his Neo-Romantic Sonata for Cello and Piano No. 1. However, the work was left unfinished and completed almost 30 years later, in 2001. Cello Sonata No. 2, completed in 1991, is much different in style, more modern and edgy, but based on a work written for a cello music competition in 1975. Polska (1977) for two cellos and piano is based on a folk tune from Rantasalmi. The origin of this work is connected to the genesis of Rautavaara’s first published opus, Fiddlers (Pelimannit) from the early 1950s. Song of My Heart (Sydämeni laulu) is the composer’s transcription from an aria included in his opera Aleksis Kivi (1995–96). In 2000, Rautavaara arranged the piece for cello, and fittingly for this funereal piece dedicated it to the memory of Estonian composer Lepo Sumera.

REVIEW:

As a mind-blowing display of technical accomplishment, I can only offer my congratulations to Tanja Tetzlaff who has a gorgeous Guadagnini cello of 1776 and an outstanding long-term piano partner in Gunilla Sussmann. Very good recorded quality and most highly recommended.

– David's Review Corner (David Denton)

Conductor Robert Trevino’s new album release on Ondine – after a successful debut with a complete Beethoven symphony cycle – features six orchestral pieces by Maurice Ravel (1875–1937), one of the most famous Basque composers, played by the Basque National Orchestra. Born in a small town in France very close to the Spanish border, Ravel spent most of his life in Paris. However, he was extremely proud of his Basque background having absorbed himself to the culture already as a child, and many elements of Basque music can be found in his compositions. In this historic release, we can finally hear Ravel’s orchestral music being interpreted by Basque musicians in the form of the Basque National Orchestra. These performances on some of the most fantastic orchestral scores of the 20th Century also shed light to the Basque influences in Ravel’s music.

REVIEW:

This is one terrific album! Put aside your expectations of how Ravel’s music should sound based on prior experience of it as played by world-class orchestras such as the Berlin Philharmonic (Boulez), Concertgebouw (Haitink), Boston Symphony (Ozawa), London Symphony (Abbado), or Montreal Symphony (Dutoit). Only the French National under Martinon offers a unique and distinctive (i.e. “French”) sound, but even that ensemble boasts a polished refinement that is far and away different from the wonderfully rustic timbres of the Basque National Orchestra.

Under the direction of conductor Robert Trevino, this band from San Sebastián in the Basque Country (which straddles the border between France and Spain) conjures an exotic affect most apparent in Ravel’s Spanish-influenced works, particularly in Rapsodie espagnole: the dream-state of the opening Prélude à la nuit rightly seduces here, while the closing Feria delightfully invokes a castanet-playing flamenco dancer. In Trevino’s hands Alborada del gracioso evokes the orchestra-sized guitar Ravel envisioned.

But it’s not only the overtly Spanish-styled works that succeed in this collection; Trevino and his forces also ideally capture the plangent tones of Pavane pour une infante défunte, as well as the luxurious delirium of La valse. Even Boléro holds the attention here, as the Basque musicians play with a freshness that belies the work’s warhorse status. Trevino’s powerful reading of Ravel’s early and rarely programmed Une barque sur l’océan is a welcome bonus.

Ondine’s vivid, wide-ranging recording draws you directly into the performances, making this release a must-have for seasoned Ravelians and newcomers alike.

– ClassicsToday.com (10/10; Victor Carr Jr.)

Robert Trevino’s first album together the Basque National Orchestra featuring orchestral works by the great French-Basque composer Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) received an excellent response. The program in this second volume is perhaps more ‘French’ in nature, but the Basque orchestra is giving dazzling performances of these works by their own national composer. While the first album was focused on some of Ravel’s most popular orchestral works, this album includes some rarities, including Ma mère l’Oye (Mother Goose) in its complete ballet version, as well as one world première recording: Pierre Boulez’s orchestration of Ravel’s World War I-era piano work, Frontispice.

REVIEW:

Can we ever have enough Ravel? Certainly not when the performances are this good. For the second disc in his traversal of Ravel’s orchestral works, Robert Trevino and the Basque National Orchestra offer an enticing mix of familiar and unfamiliar items. You get an aptly crystalline performance of the elusive Valses nobles et sentimentales, fortified by an appealing lightness of rhythm, followed by the zillionth version of the unkillable Menuet antique. Frontispice, a tiny “avant-garde” work originally written for piano five-hands, and here orchestrated by Pierre Boulez, comes off sounding very much like, well, Pierre Boulez. So now we know where he got much of his own inspiration.

The Shéhérazade Overture, Ravel’s first big orchestral work, seldom gets played and the reasons aren’t surprising. It’s long (14 minutes here), kind of formless, and lacking in memorable ideas, but of course the orchestration is marvelous and it’s good to have such a vivid new recording and performance. Finally, there’s the complete Mother Goose ballet, one of Ravel’s major masterpieces. This version is gorgeous, nicely flowing in the main numbers, and full of atmosphere in the evocative interludes between them. Trevino wisely refuses to sentimentalize the concluding “Fairy Garden,” which sounds so much more touching for just that reason. In short, this is a lovely, interesting program that offers far more than the “same old Ravel.” It’s a keeper.

-- ClassicsToday.com (David Hurwitz)

Ravel, M.: Gaspard De La Nuit / Miroirs / Jeux D'Eau

Ondine is pleased to announce the first release with Austrian violinist Benjamin Schmid with a performance of Reger’s Violin Concerto and the Chaconne for Solo Violin. This release invites to listen to a captivating performance of Reger’s Violin Concerto, a hugely charming big romantic work with broad sentimental gestures.

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy the National Symphony Orchestra presented a new work by Peter Lieberson called "Remembering JFK," an orchestral piece with movie star Richard Dreyfuss narrating excerpts from Kennedy's speeches. This CD includes that and previously unreleased pieces from Kennedy's 1961 Inaugural Concert. That concert includes Leonard Bernstein's "Fanfare for the Inauguration of John F. Kennedy" and "Symphonic Dances from 'West Side Story.' " Also included is George Gershwin's "Concerto in F."

After recordings of Beethoven’s complete symphonies; two Ravel albums; one Rautavaara album; and the award-winning album ‘Americascapes’; Robert Treviño now turns his focus on the symphonic poems by Ottorino Respighi (1879–1936).Together with the Orchestra Nazionale Sinfonica della RAI; Robert Treviño presents the composer’s famous Roman Trilogy; an exciting orchestral masterpiece culminating in the triumphant Pines of Rome.

Respighi's fascination with the Eternal City is nowhere better expressed than in the three symphonic poems that make up the so-called Roman Trilogy. He had rarely taken on works of such proportions and his most recent large-scale orchestral work, the Sinfonia Drammatica, dating from 1914, still reveals the lasting influence of Brahms and Franck. But just one year later, he finally shook off the shackles of late 19th-century Romanticism, and offered a first glimpse of the remarkable use of color that would soon become a hallmark of his orchestral writing.

REVIEW:

Respighi’s three tone poems, collectively known as the “Roman Trilogy,” have been popular since their premieres, and there is no shortage of recordings. However, here is one that is worth consideration from a rising conductor and a major orchestra that is not recorded as often as it ought to be. This is absolutely infectious fun, and the performances are fully in the spirit of these evergreen favorites. Here is a release that will make one remember what it was they loved about this music in the first place.

-- AllMusic,com (James Manheim)

RESPIGHI Concerto in modo misolidio 1. Fountains of Rome • Sakari Oramo, cond; 1 Olli Mustonen (pn); Finnish RSO • ONDINE 1165 (53:53)


Sakari Oramo and his Finnish forces give us a sensitive if not outstandingly atmospheric performance of the earliest of Respighi’s Roman trilogy, the Fountains of Rome of 1916. The big moments are somewhat hampered by a lack of string power. The violins do not contribute as much as they should to the climax of the third movement (“Fontana di Trevi al meriggio”) and, unfortunately, the success of these Roman tone poems lies in balancing the weight of the fortissimos against the quiet passages of impressionistic introspection. The latter are meltingly played, with details like the distant church bells in the “Fontana di Villa Medici” perfectly balanced.


The main work on this disc is a rarity. Completed in 1925 and premiered in New York under Mengelberg, the Concerto in Mixolydian Mode is a large-scale Romantic piano concerto imbued with medieval church harmonies. Much of the first movement sounds like an extended fantasia on Debussy’s Engulfed Cathedral , beginning as it does with a chorale in full chords stated by the soloist. (The theme is based on the traditional introit for the Mass of Ascension Day.) The mixolydian mode is close to the major scale—only a flattened seventh differentiates them—and the piano’s first entry avoids that note, sounding for all intents and purposes to be in a major key. Gradually, modal harmony creeps in as the composer’s evocation of an earlier era is established.


Respighi’s concept of medieval times was, let us say, the polar opposite of Pasolini’s bawdy, earthbound vision; the composer envisaged the period as one of grandeur and ecclesiastical solemnity. These are the overriding characteristics of the lengthy first and second movements, which work their way through a number of musical episodes at an unhurried pace. In the second movement, the piano part becomes increasingly decorative, adding a glittering veneer to the basically sedate proceedings. Momentum is finally achieved in the passacaglia finale, but for all their lushness and lyricism it is probably the lack of impetus in the first two movements (totaling 27 minutes) that keeps Respighi’s concerto out of the repertoire. His Concerto Gregoriano for violin and orchestra of 1922, similarly based on ancient church modes, is more successful, though it too has its longeurs, while his 25-minute Toccata for piano and orchestra (1928)—another piano concerto in all but name—is saved by its spectacular final movement.


I have no wish to write this work off, however. There is a case to be made for it, and these musicians make that case convincingly. Olli Mustonen plays with uncharacteristic legato . Listen to his limpid interpretation of the first movement’s closing solo (around 15:30); this is certainly not the pianist who pecks his way through Beethoven. His lightness of touch in the passagework of the finale is a delight. This is very much a concerto where soloist and orchestra work as a partnership, and under Oramo the Finnish RSO contributes strong and often subtle support. The sound is clear and vivid. Previous recordings by Tozer and Scherbakov have been praised, but I cannot imagine them being superior in any way to this one. Recommended as a disc that could easily grow on you.


FANFARE: Phillip Scott


Respighi was proud of his Concerto in modo misolidio, and rightly so. It's a beautiful work, full of attractive melodies and effective writing for the soloist, and it deserves more exposure on the concert stage than it gets. This is hands down the best performance it has received thus far on disc. It's so typical that Mustonen (rather like Leopold Stokowski), who can be so perverse in his performances of the standard repertoire, offers such a faithful rendering of the piano part when confronted with a novelty item. This isn't to suggest that his performance lacks imagination or spirit: just the opposite. However, Respighi gives the soloist so much to do (much of the part is written on three staves) that there's certainly less room to fool around gratuitously, and so Mustonen doesn't.

The main competition in this work comes from Tozer/Downes on Chandos, a good performance that nonetheless sounds more than a touch stodgy next to this one. It takes some five minutes longer, almost all of it the central slow movement and concluding passacaglia. Mustonen and Sakari Oramo's extra energy in these movements pays huge dividends, effectively belying any view of the work as pretty but formally ungainly and lacking excitement. This is certainly the version to choose to get to know the concerto, particularly if you're coming to it for the very first time.

Only the coupling prevents this disc from getting the very highest rating. Actually, this is an excellent performance of Fountains of Rome, very well played, and glitteringly captured by the engineers. But there are many such, and it's a skimpy disc-mate, bringing total playing time only to 53 minutes. It would have been so much nicer to have some more neglected Respighi--my vote would have gone to a new version of Metamorphoseon, which shares a similar aesthetic to that of the piano concerto, or perhaps even the similarly modal Concerto gregoriano for violin. Still, as the finest version available of the main item, this disc will be self-recommending to Respighi fans (and piano buffs too).

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

- Series of award-winning recordings by the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and conductor Nicholas Collon continue with a new album of orchestral works by Richard Strauss (1864-1949). This release includes Strauss' longest and final major orchestral work, the Alpine Symphony together with Four Songs, Op. 27 sung by soprano Louise Alder, one of the most in demand singers today.

- "Passionately played by the Tapiola Sinfonietta, under Janne Nisonen's direction, these skillfully-crafted works emerge as noble rediscoveries," wrote the BBC Music Magazine on the second volume in the ongoing Ferdinand Ries (1784-1838) complete symphony cycle by the Tapiola Sinfonietta and conductor Janne Nisonen. This Vol. 3 includes two delightful symphonies written at the height of the composer's creative period when the influence of his composition teacher Beethoven was less evident in the composer's symphonic writing.

Second instalment in the ongoing complete Ferdinand Ries (1784-1838) symphony cycle by Tapiola Sinfonietta and conductor Janne Nisonen includes the composer's Symphonies Nos. 4 and 5. Often remembered in music history as Beethoven's 'right hand', these new recordings by the Tapiola Sinfonietta reveal a major symphonist. The first volume in the series has received oustanding reviews in the German music press.

Composer Rodion Shchedrin (1932-2025) was one of the leading figures of post-war Soviet music. This album by the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra and conductor Olli Mustonen brings together four of his works, including music from his ballet The Lady with the Lapdog, as well as a viola concerto, Concerto dolce, performed by Lawrence Power, one of the greatest violists of our time. Rodion Shchedrin passed away while this album - a monument to the unique friendship and artistic collaboration that Olli Mustonen and Rodion Shchedrin cultivated over the course of three decades - was in preparation.

REVIEWS:

The Third Symphony was...favored by Karajan in the 1950s. It was the product of a composer in his sixties writing in his Normandy home at Vasterival. It was premiered by the Boston SO and Koussevitsky on 24 October 1930. The thud and thunder of the first movement contrasts with the pastoral melancholy meditation of the Adagio. This is followed by the fairground pleasantry of the Vivace and the massive fountains of exultation of the last movement. No wonder the audience - whose applause forms part of the track - greeted this performance with such warmth.

Le Festin is here given complete across 21 tracks. You are likely to enjoy this music - if you do already know it - if you already number Ravel's Ma Mère l'Oye and Debussy's Prélude a l'après midi d'un faune among your favorites. It has the magical elegance of the Ravel and the sultriness of the Debussy. Add to this the motorized thunder of Roussel's last two symphonies. It is superbly recorded - listen to the whispering distant gold of the violins in The Ants Dance in a Circle (tr. 16). The instrumental howls in the Funeral of the Gadfly (tr. 24) are memorable. Also in the same movement how similar some of the writing is to Ravel's dawn rustlings in Rapsodie espagnole. Those gentle rustles from the tam-tam suggest Ma Mère l'Oye. Eschenbach heartbreakingly captures the valedictory melancholy of Night falling on the deserted garden but brings out the solace too. This makes for an easy full price choice - poetically done in every aspect.

– Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International

The liner notes for this release make the argument that French modernist Albert Roussel was the greatest composer of his time. It is an argument Christoph Eschenbach and the Orchestre de Paris do much to advance in these live performances. Coupling Le Festin de l'araignée from 1912 and the Symphony No. 3 from 1930, Eschenbach and the Parisian orchestra give Roussel's music the kind of clear-eyed, strong-willed performances that make the most of the composer's best features. Though distinctly of its prewar time, Le Festin de l'araignée nevertheless sounds brightly colorful, lightly ironic, and surprisingly inventive in this smoothly polished and vigorously rhythmic performance. The postwar Third Symphony sounds both of and above its time here, its angular themes, gleaming colors, and muscular rhythms brilliantly brought out by the German conductor and the French orchestra. If Eschenbach and the Parisian musicians' racing finale for the symphony, with its relentless polyrhythms, doesn't get your heart pumping, consult a doctor immediately. Recorded in vibrant live sound complete with appreciative applause, these performances may well convince the listener that Roussel is indeed underrated.

– James Leonard, All Music Guide

Rubinstein & Moszkowski: Piano Concertos

This release is the world premiere recording of Estonia's first major work in art music in it's original score and sung in Estonian. Rudolf Tobias (1873-1918) is widely celebrated in Estonia as the 'father of Estonian music' and considered as the first Estonian composer to have obtained a degree in composing after completing his studies at the St Petersburg Conservatoire. In this recording the composer's magnum opus, Joonas (Jonah Oratorio) is performed by a first-class Estonian line up led by the award-winning ensembles Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, Tallinn Chamber Orchestra and conductor Tonu Kaljuste.