Vocal
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Mahler: Das Lied von der Erde (new version)
Pergolesi: Stabat mater; Salve Regina; Orfeo
No one has described Pergolesi’s vocal works more splendidly and with more understanding than the philosopher and pedagogue Jean-Jacques Rousseau, author of the Dictionnaire de musique that was extremely widespread in the 19th century, when he wrote: "Here everything contributes to deepening the effect of the text: the harmony serves only to shape it more forcefully, the accompaniment embellishes it without distorting it. In a word, the whole work of art simultaneously communicates one melody to the ear and only one idea to the mind.“ This CD offers 3 Masterpieces recorded by the long time Duo Regina Klepper and Martina Borst, accompanied by the Bamberg String Quartet.
Canciones Españolas
After the successful album release “Slavonic Souls” (Capriccio C5039) the Vienna State Opera Singer Zoryana Kushpler, accompanied on the piano by her partner and twin sister Olena, offer a rich recital of famous Spanish songs by the likes of Granados, de Falla, Mompou, Rodrigo and Montsalvage, including some choice rarities by these composers. Born in Lvov, Ukraine, Ms. Kushpler made her debut at the Wiener Staatsoper in 2007 as Adelaide in Richard Strauss’s Arabella. She has also been heard there in the operas of Tchaikovsky, Verdi, Puccini, Offenbach and Johann Strauss.
Alarm Will Sound Presents Modernists
REVIEWS:
The 23 members of Alarm Will Sound perform the provocative pieces playfully, inviting all sides of the modernism debate to lighten up and listen. Each work composed for the ensemble is easily digestible, running under seven minutes. Wolfgang Rihm’s Will Sound delivers in trickily spaced bursts, mostly centered around a sinewy saxophone line. The ensemble’s percussionists are in particularly fine form, rattling and skipping through unintuitive and complex rhythms.
– NPR
The comic portrait of screaming human faces on the album's cover poses a rhetorical question: Do we honestly still need to act scared by this modernist stuff? Over the course of their set, the Alarm Will Sound players and conductor Alan Pierson respond to this prompt by delivering pure modern-classical fun. The six pieces they’ve chosen speak different structural languages, though each one shares a desire to bring across a sense of wildness that is exuberant at heart.
– Pitchfork
Dvorak: Symphony No. 5; In Nature's Realm; Scherzo Capriccioso
Telemann: Harmonischer Gottes-Dienst, Vol. 6
Wild Songs
The Eleanor Hovda Collection
HOVDA Onyx. Song in High Grasses. Snapdragon. Leaning Into and Away. Ariadne Music. Coastal Traces Tidepools 1. Shenai Sky. Record of an Ocean Cliff. Crossings in a Mountain Dream. Glacier Track. Glosses Glacier. Beginnings. Coastal Traces Tidepools 2. Borealis Music. Boundaries. Cymbalmusic: Centerflow/Trail II. Journey Music. Lemniscates. Regions. Jo Ha Kyu. Ikima. Breathing The Proclamation: excepts. Dancing in Place. Spring Music with Wind. 40 Million Gallons of Music • Prism Players; Libby Van Cleve (ob, English horn, shenai); Jack Vees (el gtr, b gtr); Eleanor Hovda (pn, cymbals, shakuhachi); Relache; Cassatt Qrt; California EAR Unit; Jan Weller, David Gilbert (fl); Elizabeth Panzer (hp); Lee Humphries (pn); et al. • INNOVA 808 (4 CDs: 4:20:03)
I’ve written about Eleanor Hovda (1940–2009) in these pages before; indeed, in the program notes for this release I’m quoted at length. For that I’m honored, because I feel she is a major composer in need of a certain rescue now. She died of cancer far too young; she forsook positions in the Ivy League and New York artistic life for grassroots arts administering in her native and beloved Minnesota; she wrote music that, despite genuine complexity, often looked simple or naïve in score. In short, by life and aesthetic choices she herself made, and by the cards dealt her over which she had no control, she was marginalized in the broader culture of American music. But we still need her.
Parts of this comprehensive collection were originally released by O.O. Discs and I reviewed some of it in Fanfare 22:4; I’d urge interested readers to check this review out in the online archive, as it goes into much more technical detail about the music than I will here. The second disc, Coastal Traces , is more of an extended collective improvisation for dance featuring Libby Van Cleve, double reeds; Jack Vees, guitars; and Hovda on piano interior. But the other three discs consist of more clearly defined pieces, even though they still have the composer’s trademark openness.
I now think of Hovda to some degree as the American Scelsi. By that I mean there’s an emphasis on pure sound as an expressive medium, shaped at the macro and micro level to bring out what Wallace Stevens called “the beauty of inflections.” There’s also a mystical/spiritual bent, but it’s never overbearing. Unlike Scelsi’s, Hovda’s music is often fragile, gentle, and delicate. As a result, when it really rips loose, it carries a shocking impact. I now feel that she’s an example of what I call “sonic charisma,” a capacity to take basic sonic materials that should be simplistic, facile, messy, and then imbue them with such authenticity that you can’t resist them. (Christian Wolff is another such composer in my book.)
The performances are consistently imaginative and committed, and make the case for the music persuasively. Some of the recordings are more “archival” than others, but I’d never for a second preclude their inclusion because of some hiss or ambient noise. The works range from the exceptional oboe work Jo Ha Kyu (thrillingly performed by Libby Van Cleve) to the Cassatt Quartet’s glasslike rendition of Lemniscates to what sounds like a vast Tibetan tantric ritual in 40 Million Gallons of Music (in fact the real story is just as wild, as the piece is a sonic exploration of a giant underground water storage tank in Fayetteville, Arkansas, recorded just after 9/11). Hopefully that gives some idea of the range. As a grand bonus, the scores for works on three of the four discs are viewable on your computer as pdfs (as are extended program notes for the entire set). One senses both how free and how precise the composer was; her craft is evident in these striking scores in her own hand. Though there is one score, Cymbalmusic, whose graphic approach is incredibly beautiful and imaginatively focused, in all the scores one sees a magical touch at work, mixing scribbling doodles with more traditional notation.
A final word of thanks and recognition to Philip Blackburn and the entire Innova organization, as this is yet another of the incredibly important rescue operations they’re performing for composers who might otherwise slip through the cracks (I think of their great Henry Brant series, for example). Every music library in America, for example, should have this collection. Bravo; it gives us all a little faith in lean times. And this is unquestionably on the next Want List.
FANFARE: Robert Carl
Boccherini: Stabat Mater - String Quartet, Op. 41, No. 1
Grundman: A Mortuis Resurgere (The Resurrection of Christ) / Cordón, Brodsky Quartet
The Brodsky Quartet is joined by soprano Susana Cordón in the premiere recording of the chamber oratorio A Mortuis Resurgere by the contemporary Spanish composer Jorge Grundman (b. 1961). Featuring Mr. Grundman’s trademark contemplative harmonies and expressive writing, this work of remarkable accessibility tells the story of the Resurrection of Christ. This multi-faceted artist and humanitarian is also a professor of acoustics, a writer and co-founder of the Non Profit Music Chamber Orchestra.
Crazy / I Furiosi
They may look like a pop, rock, or crossover group, but don't be fooled! I FURIOSI is the hottest new baroque ensemble on the scene, reinventing the traditional classical music experience, and we are happy to announce the release of their commercial debut CD, CRAZY. CRAZY is an exciting and diverse program of musical pieces whose premise is either insanity itself, or is the product of the disturbed mind of the composer. The album matches unparalleled performances with, painstakingly crafted program notes that provide insight into both the composer's own vision, however twisted, and the broad social themes of their day. The program which includes masterworks by some of the greatest composers of the 16th-18th century is concluded in contrast by a beautifully haunting rendition of Suzanne by master song writer Leonard Cohen's Suzanne.
In developing its programming, I FURIOSI worked diligently to craft themes linked to current events, to provide contemporary audiences with an insight into historical themes that are entertaining as well as educational. The detailed liner notes provide insight behind the selection of each track.
Thuille: Selected Songs / Trekel, Höll
Ludwig Thuille was one of the leading operatic composers of the Munich School. Despite his lifelong friendship with Richard Strauss, Thuille remained a lesser-known Austrian composer during his short life and career.
Ginastera: Música de Cámera y Cançiones
Baroque Music - Handel, G.F. / Corrette, M. / Lalande, M.-R.
Ecce Novum Gaudium / La Rossignol
This album is divided into three parts, the Annunciation, the Nativity and the Feast. The program begins and ends with two songs of oral tradition played on bagpipes and with Ciaramelli, instruments which have become synonymous with Christmas. All of the pieces from this album came from books and ancient manuscripts.
Fare la nina ma - Christmas Music of the Italian Baroque
Haydn: Scottish And Welsh Songs, Etc / Taylor, Et Al
Includes work(s) by Franz Joseph Haydn. Ensemble: Munich Piano Trio. Soloist: James Taylor (tenor).
Dmitri Hvorostovsky Sings Tchaikovsky
Recording information: Mosfilm Studio, Moscow, Russia.
Movimentos: Widmungen
Beyond Romance – Songs by Ben Bierman
Liederabend 1968 / Arroyo, Hokanson
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REVIEW:
American soprano Martina Arroyo is much acclaimed as an opera singer, especially in the Verdi repertory. Here is a rare opportunity to hear her in recital at the 1968 Schwetzingen Festival.
– American Record Guide
Berg & Zemlinsky: Lieder
Luthers Lieder / Berniu, Bresgott, Kammerchor Stuttgart, Athesinus Consort Berlin
For the 500th anniversary of the Reformation a collection of all 35 hymns by Luther is being released on a double CD for the first time. The Lutheran hymns in choral settings and chorale cantatas from the 16th century to the present day (including works by Praetorius, Scheidt, Bach, Mendelssohn, Jennefelt, and Schwemmer) are performed by the Kammerchor Stuttgart under the direction of Frieder Bernius and the Athesinus Consort Berlin conducted by Klaus-Martin Bresgott. These choral settings are complemented by chorale arrangements for organ. Margot Kassmann, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Markus Meckel, Judith Zander, and others have offered extensive liner notes with meditations on the selected hymns, and Johann Hinrich Claussen, Cultural Officer of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany, has provided a knowledgeable forward.
Wolf: Italienisches Liederbuch
Reger: Orchestral Songs / Buhl, Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz
In order to take a respite and, in his own worlds, “to recuperate,” from his own compositions, Max Reger frequently engaged in “piece work,” in which he would arrange works by other composers. This release includes Reger’s original work 5 Orchestral Songs, as well as Reger’s arrangements of songs for voice and orchestra from Edvard Grieg, Johannes Brahms, Hugo Wolf, and Franz Schubert. Conductor Gregor Buhl has made his mark as an opera conductor. He also frequently performs on the concert stage with the Radio Symphony Orchestras of Berlin, Hamburg, and Leizip, and the Helsinki Philharmonic.
