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Cilea: Adriana Lecouvreur / Levine, Scotto, Domingo

CBS Masterworks

$39.99 Jul 30, 2008

If Maurizio Arena's lively and sympathetic account of Adriana Lecouvreur for RCA demonstrates that the opera still has stageworthy potential, and not just as a vehicle for an old-fashioned prima donna (for to tell the truth his donna, Raina Kabaivanska, is a rather small-scale Adriana, the voice not always under perfect control), James Levine's sumptuous CBS reading makes an even stronger case for it, and his donna is decidedly prima. It is Levine's Adriana Lecouvreur as much as Renata Scotto's, indeed, and some listeners may find his affectionate moulding of the score, his underlining of its every expressive detail and his leisurely speeds (he adds a full 15 minutes to Arena's timing) rather over-done.

His approach strikes me as an admirable one, rooted in a real love for the score (he has a distinct talent for making you think again about supposedly second-rate Italian operas: he is a first-rate conductor of Zandonai, for example) and in great consideration for his singers. I suspect that Kabaivanska would have made more of the title-role with support from Levine's supple phrasing, so well attuned to the way Cilea's phrases lie for the voice and to a singer's need to breathe, to approach a climactic note at the voice's own pace. Scotto certainly responds to this, and makes a part that might have seemed a size too large for her (there are one or two brief moments of strain) thoroughly her own, with a range that extends from caressed murmur to splendidly melodramatic hauteur.

Domingo is in ardent voice and fills out the rather thinly sketched Maurizio admirably (Arena's elegant tenor, Alberto Cupido, is rather over-parted) and both baritones, Milnes for Levine and Arena's Attilio d'Orazi make a sympathetic figure of the soft-hearted Michonnet. Obraztsova's fans will not mind too much that she makes the haughty Princesse de Bouillon sound like Azucena or Ulrica (one quite expects her to offer balefully to tell Adriana's fortune) but Arena's Alexandrina Milcheva, a very similar Slavonic voice, does much the same. nut this opera stands or falls on whether the soprano can convince you that she is both a grande dame and touchingly vulnerable, and on whether the conductor realizes how much more than an accompanist he needs to be (Cilea was a cunning builder of dramatic tension, and an imaginative orchestrator). On both counts this set succeeds finely, and it is beautifully recorded.

-- Gramophone [3/1990]

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Cilea: Adriana Lecouvreur / Levine, Scotto, Domingo
CBS Masterworks Jul 2008
CD
$39.99

Sondheim: Sweeney Todd / Henschel, Stone, Schirmer

BR Klassik

$29.99 Jan 29, 2013

SONDHEIM Sweeney Todd • Ulf Schirmer, cond; Mark Stone ( Sweeney Todd ); Jane Henschel ( Mrs. Lovett ); Gregg Baker ( Anthony Hope ); Rebecca Bottone ( Johanna ); Jonathan Best ( Judge Turpin ); Adrian Dwyer ( Beadle Bamford ); Diana DiMarzio ( Beggar Woman ); Ronald Samm ( Pirelli ); Pascal Charbonneau ( Tobias ); Bavarian R Ch; Munich R O • BR 900316 (2 CDs: 123:59) Live: Munich 5/6/2012

Composer-librettist Stephen Sondheim maintains that Sweeney Todd is not an opera, and so does the annotator for the present release. Nevertheless, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (its full title), since it premiered on Broadway in 1979, has been revived by several opera companies, including the New York City Opera, the Houston Grand Opera, and the Chicago Lyric Opera. Why? Musically, it is highly sophisticated, and operatic voices are not wasted on it. Furthermore, with its larger-than-life dramatic themes, including mistaken identity, lust, vengeance, obsession, madness, and murder, how more operatic could a theatrical work be?

There have been several recordings of this work, including the unforgettable original cast recording on RCA with Len Cariou in the title role, and Angela Lansbury in the role of Mrs. Lovett, his cheerfully amoral partner in crime. That version will never be eclipsed, but each new recording adds a welcome new perspective. The one reviewed here, recorded in the Munich’s Prinzregententheater, is the most operatic yet, even more than the one with the New York Philharmonic which features singers such as Heidi Grant Murphy (Johanna), John Aler (Beadle Bamford), and Paul Plishka (Judge Turpin). This time around, we have legitimate operatic singers in all of the main roles; only DiMarzio appears not to be a “classical” musician per se. In other words, here we have an ensemble of acting singers, as opposed to singing actors such as Cariou, Lansbury, George Hearn, Patti LuPone, and Michael Cerveris, who all have made major contributions to this opera’s . . . I mean, musical’s performance history.

It turns out fairly well. I was immediately pulled in by Ulf Schirmer’s conducting, which is tense, taut, and stylish. In fact, you might not hear a better conducted Sweeney Todd anywhere. The Bavarian Radio Choir also adds much to the success of this performance. Although their diction is less clear than that of English-speaking ensembles who have recorded this music, their dramatic involvement is high, as is their musicianship.

This is an actual performance. Apparently the time, funds, or energy to correct the inevitable live lapses was unavailable, and thus we have oddities such as Henschel at one point rechristening Beadle Bamford as “Beadle Rumford.” A few memory lapses are covered professionally, but will leave those who know the show well asking, “What did (s)he just sing?” These issues are minor, though.

I’m more concerned about two other points. One is the lack of (black, very black) humor in this production. For example, I can’t understand why, in “A Little Priest,” the wonderfully uncomfortable pun about a meat pie made from a general (“With or without his privates?”) has been removed. This is a grim show, still there is much about it that can be very funny, and allowing it to be so makes the gore and horror even more effective. As the original Mrs. Lovett, Angela Lansbury was charming and endearing; she might bake you into a meat pie, but you couldn’t stay angry with her for long! Henschel can’t inspire that kind of affection, and she makes it clear that her murderous instincts were present even before opportunity allowed them to come out. The other thing that concerns me is the way in which some of the big dramatic moments are almost thrown away. Todd’s aborted murder of Judge Turpin (interrupted by Anthony’s untimely arrival) should be a big moment, but it isn’t. Similarly, soon after, in Todd’s “Epiphany,” we should feel his mind crack and his murderous rage insanely swell to encompass all of mankind, not just the Judge, but Mark Stone is not that fine an actor, the direction is too hurried, and one of the show’s most Brechtian moments doesn’t come off. The last segment of the show, with its string of murders and its Grand Guignol effects, moves forward jerkily, sometimes grinding to a halt, and sometimes not pausing long enough to make its points. On Broadway, Harold Prince would have fixed these miscalculations, but, at least as I am hearing them on CD, they were not addressed in Munich’s Prinzregententheater.

All of the singing itself is very fine. One curiosity is a baritone Anthony; Gregg Baker’s voice is darker than Mark Stone’s. Anthony is supposed to be an inexperienced sailor, newly arrived in London, and the early scenes between him and Todd feel strange, because the voice relationships have been inverted from the original production. I really missed hearing a tenor’s voice soar into “Johanna,” one of Sondheim’s most rapturous love songs. Also, the multinational cast presents a variety of accents. In 1979, Cariou had almost no accent at all, while Lansbury made the most of hers. Here, we have the reverse: a cockney Todd in Baker, and a Mrs. Lovett of no particular nationality or region in Henschel. Someday, there will be a production of this work in which everyone gets on the same page with dialects.

So, if you want an operatic Sweeney Todd , or a fresh look at it, this new recording will satisfy. It has many enjoyable moments, but a few unfortunate ones as well. If you do not know this show at all, however, the Broadway cast recording—still in print, thank goodness!—is the only place to begin. This show is one of the masterpieces of American musical theater, and absolutely needs to be heard.

FANFARE: Raymond Tuttle

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Sondheim: Sweeney Todd / Henschel, Stone, Schirmer
BR Klassik Jan 2013
CD
$29.99

Gluck: Orfeo & Euridice / Orlinski, Dreisig, Said, Plewniak, Il Giardino d'Amore

ERATO

$18.36 Aug 09, 2024

Orfeo in Gluck's opera Orfeo & Euridice has become a signature role for Jakub Józef Orlinski on stages around the world. Now the countertenor embodies the mythical Greek bard in a recording that for him is the realization of a dream. Made in his native Warsaw, it is conducted by the dynamic Stefan Plewniak and the instrumentalists and chorus are drawn from his ensemble Il Giardino d'Amore. The roles of Orfeo's wife Euridice and the god Amore are taken by two further rising stars of the opera and concert stage: the sopranos Elsa Dreisig and Fatma Said. Orlinski has acted as producer, casting director, and, with Stefan Plewniak, joint artistic director of the recording.

"One of my great dreams as a student was to sing the role of Orfeo," says Orlinski, "and now I've been lucky enough to perform Orfeo & Euridice in different settings... Working on those different versions I achieved my very own interpretation. I knew that I would love to create my own personal version of the piece, to record my dream role, expressing myself in the way I wanted... I had a clear vision of what I wanted to do with it and how. The most important thing for me as a musician is to have great collaborators, and I couldn't imagine a better team. Everyone was so willing to make the most of every single take during our long recording sessions. I am really grateful that I can work with people with so much passion... And now I invite you to follow Orfeo on his journey and listen to what the power of love can do."

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Gluck: Orfeo & Euridice / Orlinski, Dreisig, Said, Plewniak, Il Giardino d'Amore
ERATO Aug 2024
CD
$18.36

Meyerbeer Robert Le Diable / Oren, Ciofi, Hymel, Relyea, Poplavskaya, Courjal [blu-ray]

Opus Arte

Blu-Ray

$45.99 Jul 30, 2013

MEYERBEER Robert le Diable & • Daniel Oren, cond; Marina Poplavskaya (Alice); Patrizia Ciofi (Isabelle); Bryan Hymel (Robert); John Relyea (Bertram); Jean-François Borras (Raimbaut); Nicolas Courjal (Alberti); Royal Opera Ch & O • OPUS ARTE 7121 (Blu-ray: 211:00+11:00) Live: Covent Garden 12/15/2012

& The Legacy of Robert le Diable

So, it seems I am playing the mop-up role again. James Altena has reviewed the DVD version of this Covent Garden video in the previous issue of Fanfare. I have here the Blu-ray version. Altena gives this production of Robert le Diable a favorable review, with which I generally agree, but we have some differences, which I will get to in a few moments. First, let me say that, as usual, the Opus Arte Blu-ray disc provides finely detailed video resolution and in this case, satisfying state of the art sound in both PCM stereo and HD surround formats. We are undergoing another major change in media formats with video and you would be wise to hop on board sooner rather than later.

Robert le Diable was one of the most popular operas of the 19th century, not only in France, but throughout the world. If we take a bit less enthusiastic a view today, it still should be with the appreciation that this is a fine operatic work which fully deserves a place in the standard repertoire. Here, as Altena says, we have probably the best recording of it to date, whether on audio or video. It does not come without flaws, however. This production has been criticized, especially in the British press, for its nontraditional, even cartoonish, sets: multicolored plastic horses for the knights, a cut-out cardboard castle for the princess Isabelle, a bar with red-checked tablecloths, and a lighted framework suggesting a simple frame church. In the final scene Robert is tempted to enter the dragon’s mouth to hell by dear old dad, while his doting step-sister Alice sits amongst fleecy clouds trying to entice him to the path of righteousness. Like Altena, I find all of this rather innocuous, even mildly entertaining. The story being told still comes through loud and clear with all its dramatic integrity maintained. The dance of the licentious nuns however, reportedly a major highlight in Paris, is a bit of a disappointment here. With their diaphanous white costumes we can’t even tell they are nuns, and they are made to look and act like escapees from Night of the Living Dead.

Considering all of the changes in cast for this production at the Royal Opera House in London, the singers that finally do appear are quite good. Bryan Hymel, as Robert, smudges a coloratura run or two, which original choice Juan Diego Flórez would have sung more cleanly, but Hymel sings very well here, and his dramatic ability is well beyond anything we could expect from Flórez. Patrizia Ciofi, a last-minute replacement, is a fine singer, and takes the vocal honors in this cast. Her coloratura is performed impeccably, and I do not hear a hint of the acidity in her top range reported by Altena. Ciofi is a major operatic star, lovely and well-cast here. It is baffling to me that she continues to be snubbed by the Metropolitan Opera. Russian soprano Marina Poplavskaya also always sings very well, as I have noted before, but lacks charisma on stage. Here, cast as the loving step-sister Alice, the epitome of good, I found myself rooting for Robert to step into the dragon’s mouth. Maybe it’s just me. Robert, like Hamlet, never really decides anything; the clock runs out, like at a football game. I guess we can all be relieved there are no last-minute turnovers. I was disappointed in bass John Relyea. Not only is he not the successor to Samuel Ramey in these roles, he lacks the vibrant low register to really carry this work as it should be sung. Twenty years ago Ramey would have eaten this role alive; sadly, we have no one comparable today.

I am also a bit perplexed by Altena’s favorable advocacy of the booklet notes. If the booklet writer is discussing literary values or grand themes pertaining to all the Meyerbeer operas, he is most probably addressing the work of librettist Eugene Scribe rather than composer Meyerbeer himself. I find all this intellectual analysis a bit pretentious and overblown; Scribe, like all librettists, was just looking for good stories, he was not contemplating writing Paradise Lost. This one is a good story, despite our perhaps more jaded 21st-century perspective, with quite good music to match. Recommended.

FANFARE: Bill White

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Meyerbeer Robert Le Diable / Oren, Ciofi, Hymel, Relyea, Poplavskaya, Courjal [blu-ray]
Opus Arte Jul 2013
Blu-Ray
$45.99

Rossini: L'italiana In Algeri / Zedda, Pizzolato, Regazzo, Brownlee

Naxos

$29.99 May 25, 2010

There is no want for recordings of this opera, and several are terrific: Jennifer Larmore/Raul Gimenez (Teldec); Horne/Alva (Opera d'Oro); Horne/Ramey (Erato); Baltsa/Raimondi (DG). But there's always room for another if it's good, and this new release, recorded at the 2008 Wildbad Rossini Festival, is excellent--and the least expensive of them all.

The star here is Lawrence Brownlee, the superb coloratura-lyric tenor who is giving Juan Diego Florez a run for his money. Warm of tone, stylish, accurate, rhythmically impeccable, fearless of high notes, involved with the text, and capable of marvelous patter (his first-act duet with Mustafa is a gem), Brownlee is the best Lindoro on disc. He is given both of his arias, which he dispatches nimbly and naturally.

Almost as fine (behind only Samuel Ramey) is Lorenzo Regazzo's Mustafa, here portrayed not as a buffoon but as a man smitten and naive to the wiles of women. The voice is appealing, dark, and round-toned, and he sings the coloratura and patter handily. I like that he doesn't growl and yelp like most basses do in this role; he may be a tyrannical character but he's in a position of power and distinction. The other two low men's voices are equally good: Giulio Mastrototaro's Haly is colorful and self-assured, and Bruno De Simone's is the best Taddeo on disc. He has the Rossini style down pat and sings with impeccable diction. He doesn't sound young, but that's hardly an issue. Both men are fine in ensembles.

Marianna Pizzolato is a far lighter mezzo than we normally hear in this role. I guess in keeping with underplaying Mustafa's foolishness, we avoid having an Isabella who sounds as if she could conquer Algiers singlehandedly--as, say, Baltsa and Horne could. Pizzolato is more in the Teresa Berganza class (although the voice is not as lovely); there are no booming low notes, but she commands the role on her own terms. There's little to argue with vocally--she has the technique down pat--and she has a good sense of fun as well. Ruth Gonzales as Mustafa's poor, fed-up wife, Elvira, can be slightly shrill but is mostly an excellent part of the ensemble, and mezzo Elsa Giannoulidou holds up her end as Zulma.

Alberto Zedda, an old hand who can occasionally be more scholarly than entertaining, is at his best: zippy tempos prevail (in fact, the finale to Act 1 is faster than I've ever heard it--a remarkable example of how well rehearsed the performance is); vocal lines are ornamented wisely (not the old fashioned way, with big high notes at the end of arias and scenes, but rather within the numbers themselves); and the opera comes across as charming.

This work can seem like hectoring and can be somewhat cruel; the choice of singers, tempos, and overall outlook makes it concentrate on the love story and the peculiarities of East meeting West. The Transylvania State Philharmonic Choir, Cluj is superb, singing at times at a whisper very accurately and offering real personality, and the Virtuosi Brunensis plays with vigor. The recording is fine, with voices always audible and well-balanced. If you're in need of a L'Italiana, this one will please you, particularly at half the price of the others; otherwise the Larmore/Teldec release is the best cast, overall.

--Robert Levine, ClassicsToday.com

It took me only a few seconds of listening to realise that there was likely to be something special about this recording. The Overture is so well known and often played, but here it comes up with the kind of invigorating freshness and brightness that brings an immediate grin to your face. Partly this is due to the use of the recent critical edition by Azio Corghi, whose changes of flute to piccolo in the allegro section, and detailed changes of phrasing throughout are entirely for the better, but it is due even more to the sheer rhythmic grace and suppleness of the playing. Alberto Zedda may have been nearly 80 when this recording was made but you would never guess it from the results. The orchestra sounds to be of an appropriate size for the work – not on historic instruments, I understand, but certainly historically informed - and it has been recorded in an acoustic which appropriately feels like the kind of medium-sized opera-house that Rossini would have expected.

Apart from Lawrence Brownlee the cast is not as starry as other versions of the work, but what is much more important is that the majority of the soloists are native speakers of Italian and all have clearly been thoroughly rehearsed together as an ensemble. Brownlee sings with grace and manliness - an uncommon quality in this role. Bruno de Simone and Lorenzo Regazzo have voices which are clearly distinguishable from each other and both are masters of Rossini’s writing for comic basses. The ladies are perhaps less individual, Marianna Pizzolato in particular lacking the kind of vivid characterisation that we find in recordings with, say, Marilyn Horne or Jennifer Larmore. Nonetheless she sings with great beauty where required, and at all times communicates the dramatic situation to the audience. It is indeed this quality of communication which makes the recording special. There is no sense of a routine run-through; instead there is the freshness of apparent new discovery.

This is wholly appropriate as L’Italiana in Algeri was written when the composer was only twenty-one. He had written nine operas before it but here reveals himself for the first time as a complete master of writing for the stage and one determined to make this clear to the audience. The special merit of this performance is that the performers are clearly working as an ensemble. It was recorded at live performances but the only significant adverse effects are very occasional moments of ragged ensemble and the brief applause at the end of some, but not all, numbers. On the other hand the very positive effect is the palpable sense of involvement in the performance from everyone involved.

Naxos have recorded a number of Rossini operas at the Wildbad Festival already, but this is by some way the best I have heard so far. No libretto is included with the set and that on their website is in Italian only. There is however a detailed and helpfully cued synopsis which is some consolation - although in a comic opera you really do need to be able to understand all the words to appreciate it as the composer intended.

-- John Sheppard, MusicWeb International

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Rossini: L'italiana In Algeri / Zedda, Pizzolato, Regazzo, Brownlee
Naxos May 2010
CD
$29.99

LITTLE GIRL BLUE

ESSENTIAL JAZZ CLASS

$13.08 Sep 20, 2024

Limited Edtion - Includes 16-page booklet. Little Girl Blue was Nina Simone's debut album and first studio recording ever. Recorded when she was 25 years old, it was a tremendous success and led to a fabulous career that would produce more than 80 studio sessions. It contains such perennial classics as "I Loves You Porgy" and "My Baby Just Cares for Me". THE COMPLETE ALBUM + 9 BONUS TRACKS - CD EDITION - 20 TRACKS - TT: 74:26 - LIMITED EDITION - INCLUDES 16-PAGE BOOKLET

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LITTLE GIRL BLUE
ESSENTIAL JAZZ CLASS Sep 2024
CD
$13.08

Josquin Desprez: Missa Ave Maris Stella; Marian Motets

CPO

$18.99 Jan 31, 2012

Simplicity, purity and clarity.

This music was composed early in Josquin’s career when he was singing in the Sistine Chapel and while the cult of devotion to the Blessed Mother was at its height.

The simplicity, purity and clarity of the singing here is immediately apparent from the opening track, in which four of the eight singers used throughout sing the Vespers motet “Ave Maria” from which the themes of this paraphrase Mass are derived. Tuning is exquisite and the blend of voices unimpeachable. The difference in texture between the motets, when four or five singers are employed to sing each part, and the Ordinary of the Mass when two voices double up each of the four lines, creates a welcome variety in the density of sound. Special mention must be made of the lead Diskant (countertenor) Franz Vitzthum who soars without strain. If I have any criticism of the singing here, it is that the bass Ulfried Staber has a touch of the groaner - I could do with a little more sap in his tone - but in general Manfred Cordes has gathered here some of the finest exponents of European Early Music.

I usually prefer a deployment of voices currently frowned upon by the purists such as the Tallis Scholars employ, whereby there are more voices, some women, per part, singing at a higher pitch - but in this case, the warmth, phrasing and musicality of the vocalists here entirely convinces me.

The musical forms employed by Josquin are surprisingly varied: there are homophonic passages of stark simplicity alternating with complex polyrhythmic patterns and intricate melismata. Despite this complexity, the singers’ exemplary diction permits the liturgical text to emerge clearly. Cordes’ direction is free, flexible and fluid; no heavy-handed bar-beating here.

Lovely though the Mass is, my favourite track here remains the first motet: the upward sweep of the opening phrase and the ensuing canon are enchanting in their simplicity, then the heavenly Ur-melody is sustained right through to the transcendent close, “O mater Dei, memento mei. Amen”.

The sound engineering is admirable; just the right amount of air and space around the voices. The gold packaging is very attractive. The booklet provides Latin texts with German and English translations and a code to permit identification of which singers are singing what; unfortunately the notes tell you nothing about the music, only about the history and development of the Marian cult.

-- Ralph Moore, MusicWeb International

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Josquin Desprez: Missa Ave Maris Stella; Marian Motets
CPO Jan 2012
CD
$18.99

What Sweeter Music: Songs & Carols for Christmas / Tenebrae

Signum Classics

$19.99 Jan 01, 2009

Nigel Short and his choir of professional singers, Tenebrae, made their debut on disc with a CD of music for Advent and Christmas, released in 2002, entitled The Dream of Herod (SIGCD046). They return to seasonal music with this CD, most of which is brand new, though a few tracks were recorded a while ago.

The programme is divided, broadly, into three categories. Quite a number of items are modern arrangements of old favourites. Nigel Short himself contributes very pleasing arrangements of Quem Pastores? and Away in a Manger. Both of these are not only effective but seem also to evidence affection for the original carols. Though some may feel the performance of Away in a Manger is rather on the slow side there’s no denying the chaste purity of the setting and the unnamed solo soprano who sings verse one does so exquisitely. Jonathan Rathbone’s arrangement of Silent Night is also very welcome, encasing the familiar tune in slow-moving close harmonies. While enjoying these and other new arrangements of old standards, however, it’s good to find that, just like his descants for popular congregational carols, the arrangements by Sir David Willcocks of Quelle est cette odeur agreeable? and Tomorrow Shall be my Dancing Day more than stand the test of time.

Mention of Sir David in a Christmas context inevitably leads one to the name of John Rutter. In fact I believe that Sir David was instrumental in starting Rutter off on his immensely successful career by championing Nativity Carol, one of his very earliest Christmas pieces, which he wrote while still a Cambridge undergraduate. Here it is once more, beautifully sung by Tenebrae. Incidentally, though one very often hears it accompanied by orchestra I prefer it with a gentle organ accompaniment - as here - since that reinforces the intimacy of this lovely little carol. Nigel Short has chosen two more Rutter carols, both of which I think are among Rutter’s finest. He and his expert choir give exquisite, controlled performances of What Sweeter Music? and There is a Flower, though I have to say that the former is taken a bit slowly for my taste - I seem to recall that Rutter himself, in his own recording, was just a touch swifter, to the music’s advantage. There is a Flower opens and closes with a solo voice. Previously, in my experience, this has been a treble or soprano but here the solo is allotted to a baritone. Though the singer does well I don’t think the choice quite works; when sung by a male voice the melody - and the words - rather loses the pure innocence that a high voice can bring.

The Rutter items fall into the second category of offerings in this programme: original compositions. We also find Tavener’s The Lamb and Howells’s A Spotless Rose. Both are beautifully done but, though I greatly admire both settings, I do feel that their near-ubiquity in programmes such as this is in danger of devaluing them and making them seem routine. I acknowledge that both are popular items - deservedly so - and that popularity sells discs but it would be nice if choirs remembered that Howells in particular wrote several other fine Christmas settings. By comparison, Adrian Peacock’s Veni, veni is scarcely well known but I hope its exposure here will encourage other choirs to investigate it for it is a good piece that grows in excitement from almost nothing until it reaches an abrupt end.

But if I had to single out one piece deserving of wide currency then I’d unhesitatingly nominate Jonathan Rathbone’s The Oxen. In the booklet Nigel Short describes this as a “ravishing setting” and he’s spot on in that judgement. Rathbone takes Thomas Hardy’s poem and clothes it in wonderful, luminous close harmonies that move gently and slowly. This hushed setting for unaccompanied voices struck me as a superb response to the poem and when I played the disc for the first time I replayed this item immediately on hearing it. I just regret that it’s followed immediately on the disc by the necessarily boisterous Gaudete, which rather breaks the spell that Rathbone has cast.

The third category of music in the programme accommodates the lighter, secular pieces. Jingle Bells is presented in a clever, jazzy arrangement and Nigel Short’s version of We Wish You a Merry Christmas is also effective. Best of the three items in this category, I think, is Andrew Carter’s The Twelve Days of Christmas. This is ingenious and entertaining, though I’ll reserve judgement on the farmyard noises that the singers contribute, presumably at Carter’s behest.

Tenebrae perform these three secular items with evident relish and, indeed, the technical accomplishment that’s in evidence throughout this recital is of the highest order. They bring an effortless excellence to all their singing and deliver the entire programme with supreme professionalism and a good deal of commitment. I can see this disc giving a lot of pleasure this Christmas; I shall certainly be listening to it with great enjoyment during the Festive Season.

-- John Quinn, MusicWeb International

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What Sweeter Music: Songs & Carols for Christmas / Tenebrae
Signum Classics Jan 2009
CD
$19.99

The Romantic Piano Concerto Vol 2 / Michael Ponti

Vox

$29.99 Jan 01, 1992

This is one of seven volumes that represent the art some of the performing virtuoso-playing composers of the Romantic tradition. The notes tell us that each volume attempts stylistically to integrate composers who belonged to the same milieu and enjoyed professional relationships with each other.

Moscheles' Concerto, Op. 58 is said to be one of his finest works, showing the classical influences of Beethoven, Schubert and Chopin. From the opening of the Allegro moderato one can be forgiven for thinking you are listening to an orchestral score composed by Mendelssohn. However the piano lines have more of a Saint-Saëns ring about them. Bold statements punctuate gently-flowing passages with lightweight orchestral involvement. The Adagio contains recitative-like figures with background tremolos that eventually lead into an Allegro agitato. This movement skips along with a bright theme that is extemporised and builds to a suitable coda and rousing close.

Hiller's compositions are largely forgotten now but in his day his works reached the concert hall. His piano impromptu Zur Gitarre was played by Clara Schumann. His Concerto, Op. 69 contains some lovely melodies and has for too long been neglected, a point the CD notes confirm. Hiller premiered the work as soloist in Amsterdam (1856). It was performed in the presence of royalty nine years later, so we must assume that the work enjoyed a certain degree of popularity. This was one of the first piano concertos to utilise the key of F-sharp Minor and is full of ideas also original for the time. A Moderato movement opens the piece with an energetic main theme (without introduction) and use of alternating octaves - a device copied by d'Albert 28 years later. The emotional Andante espressivo is filled with ravishingly romantic melodies. It has a feeling of Liszt about it. A purposeful Allegro con fuoco closes the concerto.

Henry Litolff was taken as a pupil for the composer Moscheles. The older man declared Litolff so good that a public performance was arranged which he gave at the age of fourteen. Later as a proficient pianist, Litolff undertook concert tours on the continent and wrote his Concerto Sinfonique about 1846. Berlioz monitored his progress and referred to Litolff "as one of our best composers", praising his knowledge, inspiration, mobility of melodic style, and excellence of orchestration. At 39 minutes it is a long concerto and with a four movement structure broke new ground. There is freshness to this composition that gives me the impression of sprightly youthful eagerness. Why this amazing work is not better known I can't guess, but it would be ideal for part of a Proms programme.

An Allegro provides a majestic opening, with accelerating energy and an introduction of two principal ideas. In the Scherzo a Beethovenian hunting scene comes to mind, with echoes of the Ninth. The piano part complements the orchestra-dominated main theme. A peaceful Andante conveys a lyrical mood of relaxing charm, the piano syncopating a flowing horn melody. A bold Furioso moves with urgency before it breaks into a trumpet-led rendering of the Dutch National song "Wein Neerlands". The song weaves in and out of the movement before virtuosity brings the piece to an energetic close.

Carl Reinecke is usually remembered for the cadenzas he wrote to other composers' classic concertos rather than for his own compositions. This is despite the fact that he was a prolific writer of around 300 works. His writing is not as demonstrative as the other composers in this set: there is more of a relaxed feel to this concerto. Reinecke made his debut as a violinist at 11 but toured Europe as a pianist, before turning to the education of others. Reinecke settled in Leipzig where he became professor of piano and composition at the Conservatorium.

In Reinecke's Concerto the Allegro is a good vehicle for virtuosity, but there is practically no partnership with the orchestra. In the Adagio, sincerity of purpose is given with its meandering theme. A bold statement from the strings opens the Finale Allegro and rippling measures maintain momentum throughout the movement.

Mendelssohn's Capriccio brilliant is well known and needs little introduction. Written as a fantasia for piano and orchestra it is constructed on four themes - introductory theme, fortissimo theme, pianissimo theme, and piano theme. It is here played with sensitivity and purpose.

Rheinberger is better known for his organ compositions rather than the writing of orchestral works. He studied under Lachner and became an intimate friend of Schubert, yet his music is often linked with Brahms.

His Concerto deviates in its opening Moderato from the Beethoven pattern by dispensing with the orchestral exposition and replacing it with a short preludial statement; the piano entering with the main idea and acting as a dominant force. An Adagio follows with lyrical delicacy and appealing musical ideas. The orchestra contributes with important thematic and colouristic contributions throughout. A piano solo opens the Allegro energico with a flourishing statement and running into a fast-flowing theme before returning to the heroic idea of the first movement.

This set contains rarely recorded works of the lesser-known composers who provided a valuable contribution to the development of music through the 19th Century. The notes make interesting reading and give useful historical information. Descriptions of the works could have been fuller and more detailed.

Michael Ponti plays with considerable dexterity, and handles both powerful and sensitive passages with considerable skill. The orchestras play competently under knowledgeable conductors.

The analogue recordings of the '70s are clear without the extraneous noise that can show up in CD transfers of this period. They are pleasantly balanced for concerto recording with the piano placed nicely forward on the sound-stage. In the Reinecke concerto, a slight metallic timbre is noticed with the piano. A slight lack of dynamic range causes some detail of the orchestra to be hidden but this is not an obtrusive problem. There is no obvious mismatching in the acoustics or microphone placements between the different venues (not given).

-- Raymond Walker, MusicWeb International

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The Romantic Piano Concerto Vol 2 / Michael Ponti
Vox Jan 1992
CD
$29.99

The Most Happy Fella: 1992 Broadway Cast

Sony Masterworks

$11.98 Jun 09, 1992

A chamber version of the big bustling 1956 folk opera by Frank Loesser, this revival of The Most Happy Fella opened on February 13, 1992 at the Booth Theatre, on Broadway. In spite of stellar performances by its cast – led by Spiro Malas as big-hearted Napa Valley vintner Tony; Sophie Hayden as Rosabella, his mail-order bride; Charles Pistone as Joe, the foreman whose picture Tony has sent instead of his own to lure Rosabella; and Liz Larsen as Cleo, Rosabella’s friend – and enthusiastic reviews, the show failed to find an audience and closed after playing 229 performances. Loesser’s robust score survives in this well nigh perfect recording, the first in stereo.

Music and lyrics written by Frank Loesser.
Principal cast includes: Spiro Malas (Tony); Sophie Hayden (Rosabella); Claudia Catania (Marie); Buddy Crutchfield (Ciccio); Tad Ingram (Postman); Liz Larsen (Cleo); Mark Lotito (Pasquale); Bill Nabel (Giuseppe); Charles Pistone (Joe); Scott Waara (Herman).
Recorded at BMG Studio A, New York, New York on March 23, 1992.

Tracklist:
1. Prelude 1:13
2. Ooh, My Feet 2:15
3. I Know How It Is 4:33
4. Somebody, Somewhere 2:12
5. The Most Happy Fella 3:52
6. Standing on the Corner 2:40
7. A Long Time Ago 1:56
8. Joey, Joey, Joey 3:38
9. Rosabella 2:38
10. Abbondanza 1:39
11. Sposalizio 2:41
12. Benvenuta 3:04
13. Aren't You Glad 2:46
14. Don't Cry 3:25
15. Fresno Beauties 3:13
16. Love and Kindness 2:10
17. Happy to Make Your Acquaintance 3:56
18. Big 'D' 5:01
19. How Beautiful the Days 3:09
20. Warm All Over 2:15
21. I Like Everybody 1:46
22. My Heart Is So Full of You 3:11
23. Mama, Mama 2:49
24. Song of a Summer Night 2:54
25. Please Let Me Tell You 1:27
26. I Made a Fist 1:05
27. Finale 2:15

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The Most Happy Fella: 1992 Broadway Cast
Sony Masterworks Jun 1992
CD
$11.98

Portman: The Little Prince

Sony Masterworks

$15.98 Mar 29, 2005

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s beloved book has been with us for more than 60 years, a staple of French language classes in the English-speaking world, and of the night stands of young people of the more philosophical sort. It’s an elusive story, easier to feel than to explain, and it takes a light touch to translate it, to say nothing of adapting it for another medium. (Others have tried.) This new “children’s opera” has been performed in Houston and in New York City, and televised by the BBC. It is the latter studio production that has been simultaneously released by Sony Classical on DVD and CD. Oxford-educated Rachel Portman has been writing film scores since the early 1980s; these include The Cider House Rules, Sense and Sensibility, The Human Stain, and the Emmy-winning Emma. Unlike many of her contemporaries, she prefers acoustic instruments to electronics, and her scores are warm, emotional, and human. She was a good choice for The Little Prince. The libretto was prepared by Nicholas Wright, who more or less managed to retain the original’s flavor without too much saccharine. (Lines such as “Anything essential is invisible to the eye” and “Eyes are blind, look only with your heart” are bound to get the cynics groaning, however.) Thousands of children were auditioned for the title role and for the ensemble. (This process is featured in a 13-minute “Blue Peter” special, which is a bonus on the DVD.) Maria Bjørnson’s sets and costumes are faithful to Saint-Exupéry’s vision.

Although The Little Prince is not an instant classic, it’s heartening proof that integrity and sensitivity still exist in the music business. Portman’s music is touching, and it is of the proper scale for the story. One must remark, however, that her score is not ideally varied over the course of the opera, and that her experience as a film composer is more noticeable than her skill as a composer for the voice. Kudos to her anyway for not talking down to her potential audience, and for not cheapening the material with “pop” inflections. Indeed, what Poulenc or Britten might have done with this story—and it would have been a natural for them—is not so different from what Portman has done, within her own style. Again, her score perfectly captures the book’s childlike wonder and—for the lack of a better phrase—its tough sweetness.

The casting seems perfect. In the title role, serious little Joseph McManners looks and sings like an angel, but there’s not a trace of specious cuteness or sentimentality in his portrayal. But really, it would be invidious to single him out, given the warm and dedicated performances by Teddy Tahu Rhodes, White, Garrett, and others. (Aled Jones, himself an accomplished boy soprano in days gone by, sings the brief role of the Drunkard.) All soloists have perfect diction, rendering the libretto unnecessary. (The chorus doesn’t enunciate quite that well, unfortunately.) Francesca Zambello’s direction stays out of the way of the story, enhancing its simplicity and creating a space in which one’s imagination can fly.

The CDs are a little longer than the DVD. Apparently there was a 90-minute limit on what could be broadcast by the BBC, so cuts amounting to a few minutes in total—nothing disfiguring—were made. I guess this means that if you fall in love with The Little Prince, you’ll want both—the DVD so you can see it all, and the CDs so you can hear it all.

Call me a pessimist, but I think The Little Prince—the book and the opera—probably is too thoughtful and too uneventful for today’s younger children, reared as they are on video games and other instant gratifications. If you know an emotionally or musically talented high schooler, however, he or she might fall in love with it. Failing that, I am sure there’s many an adult who would enjoy The Little Prince, with or without children of his or her own.

Raymond Tuttle, FANFARE

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Portman: The Little Prince
Sony Masterworks Mar 2005
CD
$15.98

The Orphans & Poe

Sono Luminus

$16.99 May 16, 2025

A transformation During the COVID-19 pandemic, when the world shut down and many lives were lost or changed forever, I experienced a serious transformation. A commitment to sobriety unleashed new creative forces. The world's new normal of quiet and introspection led me to return to a more formal branch of my musical upbringing: fully-inked acoustic music. Untethered from the backbeats and lead sheets of my career in jazz and pop music, I once again immersed myself in scores and music literature. An exciting new sense of freedom filled me with inspiration. I discovered a wellspring of patience and subsequent understanding and became obsessed with form. Hyper-focussed and pencil in hand, I wrote tirelessly from dawn until dusk. When I spoke about this newfound passion with one of the biggest supporters of my lifetime, my Dad, he told me it sounded like I had "seen the light" - a remarkable turn of events during an otherwise difficult time for us all. About the music... String Quartet No. 1 "The Orphans" (2023) The idea of writing a string quartet began to haunt me as this hallowed format can be intimidating. After what initially seemed like fruitless labor, I sidelined this ambition to work on some other music. Then one day while walking in a forest preserve in Chicago, a tune popped into my head which later developed into a promising base movement for a string quartet. Despite a failed attempt at a second movement, my confidence grew, and again inspired by nature, movements I, II and III were written with the base movement now as IV. Just when I thought the whole piece was done, the inspiration for another, shorter, livelier, and more cohesive movement came to me, and outdoors no less! Following my intuition I completely abandoned the germ of it all, the mother of this string quartet, for four of her offspring. It was an unpredictable process. Three Poe Excerpts (2022) While writing my first opera, The Bells of Fortunato, adapted from Edgar Allan Poe's The Cask of Amontillado, I became transfixed by Poe's writing. I discovered more stories of his with moments full of life and beauty that seemed to be wonderful opportunities for songs. I ended up taking a break from Fortunato to work on the songs that became Three Poe Excerpts. "Even as it Was" came first followed by "A Feeling for Which I Have No Name." These both came fairly easily and with much joy, but I wasn't satisfied with just the two. Although initially skeptical of the music that became "To the Right and Left," something told me to stay the course, and I am happy with the result. I thought the three songs could use some sort of set up, and the image of a hand opening an oversized book like in the beginning of old fairytale movies came to mind. This inspired the foreword and afterword. The Thousand Injuries (2023) A section of one of my prior works, a fantasie called Outside Motion in Stillness, gave me the idea to try my hand at an opera. I read through many plays, poems, and stories until landing on the right one. I believe there have been at least a couple of operas based on The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allen Poe, but that didn't stop me from writing my own adaptation, The Bells of Fortunato. The Carnival scene was the perfect fit for the music I had brewing. Poe's writing is wonderfully succinct and illustrative, and I found myself so intrigued that the rest of the music came without much hesitation. After a musical introduction which includes a chorus singing "nemo me impune lacesset" ("no one attacks me with impunity"), we meet our protagonist Montresor, played by a soprano, who sings the only aria from the opera. "The Thousand Injuries" informs us of her contempt for the entitled Fortunato. The musicians and the studio... I can't speak highly enough of the musicians on this album. The dedication to great performance from each individual is heard in every moment. I am truly honored to have made this with you all. I'd like to express my deepest gratitude to Doyle for assembling this dream of a string quartet to help bring "The Orphans" to life with such finesse and conviction. Thanks to Steve of SHIRK studios for the hard work, perpetual coolness, and professional atmosphere that is consistently provided. Special thanks to Matt Reed, Stu Mindeman, Margaret Casey, and Tom Palmer. All my love to Al and Ray. In memory of Tom Doherty. Rest easy Thos.

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The Orphans & Poe
Sono Luminus May 2025
CD
$16.99

NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL AN ERA: ALBUMS 1980-1984

UNIVERSAL UK

$24.99 Jun 06, 2025

NOW Music is very proud to present the second of our 'Now That's What I Call An Era' releases. 'The Albums 1980 1984' celebrates 72 iconic albums that were released between 1980 and 1984, featuring a magnificent track from each - and none of them UK hit singles! Most of the albums being highlighted produced huge hit singles that have become both synonymous with the decade and enduringly popular - but these albums are of such a high quality - forever part of the artist's legacy - that other tracks could have equally become hits - and some have become as well-loved by fans as the singles, and have for many artists always been an established part of their live shows. This 72-track 4-CD comes with a 'hardback book' that includes a 28-page booklet featuring a track-by-track guide. Essential Tracks From Iconic Albums... This 4CD set opens with a trio of tracks from stunning debuts: 'A Ray Of Sunshine' from 'Fantastic', the 1983 debut album from Wham, 'Lemon Firebrigade' from Haircut 100's 'Pelican West', and the sumptuous 'Show Me', the opening track from 'The Lexicon Of Love' from ABC. Huge 1983 albums are up next from Culture Club, with 'Black Money' from 'Colour By Numbers', and 'This City Never Sleeps' the closing track on 'Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This)' from Eurythmics. Another epic closer from Alison Moyet with 'Where Hides Sleep' from her solo debut 'Alf' is followed by 'Frankie's First Affair' from another 1984 debut, 'Diamond Life' from Sade. Roxy Music's 1982 'Avalon' included 'The Space Between', whilst Japan with 'Talking Drum' from 'Tin Drum' leads a stellar run of iconic albums from Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet, Heaven 17, Ultravox and The Human League with 'The Things That Dreams Are Made Of' from 1981's hit-packed 'Dare'. The first disc closes with Donna Summer from her Quincy Jones produced 1982 eponymous album, Tina Turner with the opening track from her landmark 1984 release 'Private Dancer' and Bruce Springsteen from his 1980 double classic 'The River', while the final track 'Mystery Achievement' was the final track on the Pretenders debut 'Pretenders' released just two weeks into 1980 - and sounding as fresh today as it did over 45 years ago. Wham! Are back opening CD2 with 'Heartbeat' from 1984's 'Make It Big' - an album that housed multiple #1 singles. Soft Cell are featured next with 'Secret Life' from their remarkable debut 'Non- Stop Erotic Cabaret', and a track that would be a #1 10 years later as a cover version, 'Young At Heart', is featured from Bananarama's 1983 debut 'Deep Sea Skiving'. A run of superb synth pop including Nik Kershaw, Howard Jones and Bronski Beat follows, before a couple of r&b influenced tracks from Shalamar, from their hit-filled 'Friends' album and Imagination from 'In The Heat Of The Night'. New-wave pop from Toyah, Kim Wilde and Culture Club come ahead of a couple of great covers: - 'Are You There With Another Girl?' from Mari Wilson, and Carmel's take on 'Tracks of My Tears' from 1984's 'The Drum Is Everything'. Next up a masterful jazz-influenced collaboration between The Style Council & Tracey Thorn, ahead of the title track from Paul Simon's 'Hearts And Bones', and a beautiful ballad 'Turn Out The Light' from Joan Armatrading's 1980 'Me Myself I' - all leading to the closing song, the title track from Paul Young's 1983 #1 'No Parlez'. CD3 opens with a stellar line up of the era's most sophisticated pop. Leading off with the timeless 'The Chauffeur' from Duran Duran's enormous second album 'Rio', before 'Taking Islands In Africa' a stand-out from Japan's 'Gentlemen Take Polaroids'. Tears For Fears made their album debut in 1983 and the title track from 'The Hurting' is featured along with a great pop moment, 'Black Night White Light' from Frankie Goes To Hollywood's 1984 debut 'Welcome To The Pleasuredome'. Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark are up next alongside Laurie Anderson from 'Big Science', The Cure from 'Seventeen Seconds' and Joy Division from 'Closer'. U.S. Alt-pop tracks from R.E.M. and The Psychedelic Furs come ahead of synth led gems from Blancmange, China Crisis and The Associates. 1981's biggest selling album in the UK was 'Kings Of The Wild Frontier' from Adam & The Ants and 'Ants Invasion' taken from it is featured next along with The Teardrop Explodes from 'Kilimanjaro', Echo & The Bunnymen with 'Crystal Days' from 'Ocean Rain', The Jam from 'Sound Affects', and Aztec Camera with 'We Could Send Letters' from their 1983 debut album 'High Land, Hard Rain', whilst the discs' sign-off is from Nick Heyward with the gorgeous 'The Day It Rained Forever' from his fantastic solo debut 'North Of A Miracle'. The final disc kicks off with a run of classic synth led epics: New Order open with 'Age Of Consent' from their second album 'Power, Corruption And Lies', and 'Hard Times', from the 1982 remix album from The Human League using the name The League Unlimited Orchestra. Visage released their second album 'The Anvil' in 1982 and the title track is up next along with three more title tracks: Simple Minds with 'New Gold Dream (81/82/83/84)' from their brilliant 1982 release, Talk Talk with 'The Party's Over' from the same year, and The Fixx with 'Reach The Beach' - from their 1983 second release which gave them a Top 10 U.S. album. In 1984, David Sylvian released his first solo album 'Brilliant Trees', and from it the outstanding and atmospheric 'Nostalgia' shares a jazz-infused sophistication with 'Almost Blue', up next from Elvis Costello & The Attractions. The Cure released their fifth album 'The Top' in 1984, and it's opening track 'Shake Dog Shake' features ahead of 'Angels On The Balcony' from Blondie, featuring their signature sound and taken from 1980's 'Autoamerican' - and from the same year - Dexys Midnight Runners from 'Searching For The Young Soul Rebels'. In 1982 The Clash released 'Combat Rock', and 'Overpowered By Funk' is included. Next up are The Police with their fusion of post punk and 'reggae rock', from their 1980 #1 album 'Zenyatta Mondatta' with 'When The World Is Running Down, You Make The Best Of What's Still Around', followed by Grace Jones' breathtaking version of 'Nightclubbing'. The opening track 'Tyler' from UB40's acclaimed 1980 debut 'Signing Off' comes ahead of the closing tracks, both of which featured on albums released on the influential 2-Tone label; The Selecter with the title track from 1980's 'Too Much Pressure', and The Specials with their cover of 'Enjoy Yourself (It's Later Than You Think)', the opening track on their 1980 album 'More Specials'. 72 fantastic tracks - A sampler of the iconic albums that represent an incredible period of creativity and originality: NOW That's What I Call An Era : The Albums 1980 1984.

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NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL AN ERA: ALBUMS 1980-1984
UNIVERSAL UK Jun 2025
CD
$24.99

Francaix: The Music for Solo Piano, Duo & Duet

Nimbus

$32.99 Apr 01, 2012

FRANÇAIX Scherzo. 5 Portraits de jeunes filles. Eloge de la danse. Piano Sonata. 5 Encores. Danse des 3 Arlequins. 8 Variations. Nocturne. 3 Equisses sur les touches blanches. La Promenade d’un Musicologue Eclectique. De la Musique avant tout chose. Pour Jacqueline. Si Versailles m’etait conté. Scuola di Ballo. 1 8 Danses exotiques. 1 15 Portraits d’enfants d’Auguste Renoir. 2 Napoléon 2 • Martin Jones, 1 Richard McMahon, 2 Adrian Farmer (pn) • NIMBUS NI 5880/2 (3 CDs: 19:05)

Had Jean Françaix been born a decade or so earlier, we would be referring to Les Sept rather than Les Six. As it was, the French-polished and long-lived composer (1912–97) followed in the footsteps of his slightly older confrères, particularly Poulenc, in typifying the French style of his era: witty, light-hearted, and insouciant. Françaix’s music derives from the bouncy rhythms and diatonic melodies of French folk music, but mixes in the vulgarity of the boulevard, the harmonic asperity of Stravinsky, and an occasional hint of 1920s jazz, all done with assured craftsmanship. While many of his concertos have been recorded—the best-known are the sprightly Piano Concertino (1932) and the Clarinet Concerto—Françaix’s output for solo piano has not. The only previous recordings I discovered are by Annette Middlebeek on a hard-to-find Koch disc from 2001, and another from 2008 by Nicole Narboni on the obscure label CDBY, which I have never heard of. (The latter recital is intriguingly promoted as “Narboni on Food, Felines, Fathers, and Jean Françaix.”) I did not manage to do any comparative listening—my order of the Koch disc failed to materialize by deadline— but in any case this new Nimbus set trumps both in terms of completeness alone.

Although Françaix was an expert orchestrator, probably more skilled than Poulenc, whose Story of Babar the Elephant he arranged for orchestra, the younger composer first made his mark as a pianist. He continued to play throughout his life, not only his own works but also music by other composers, often teaming with the cellist Maurice Gendron. Many of his compositions involve piano, and I notice a three-disc set of chamber music with the composer at the piano is scheduled to be released late in 2012 (this being the year of Françaix’s centenary, of course).

Meanwhile, we have the indefatigable Martin Jones to bring us up to speed on the keyboard works. The set opens with the early, mostly staccato Scherzo, a favorite of the composer that he played often, and it shows him at his most deft in its clarity and harmonic sleight of hand. The Scherzo sets the tone for the rest of the program and is tossed off with perfect élan here by Jones. Françaix preferred miniatures, and many of the larger works are in fact suites made up of several short movements. Some, such as the oddly titled Promenade d’un Musicologue Eclectique , are composed of tributes to other composers such as Chopin, Ravel, and Adam. Françaix always sounds like himself, but Ravel was clearly a major influence along with Chabrier and, to some extent, Satie. We might expect a work titled Piano Sonata to be more serious in tone but that expectation is quickly dashed; the first movement scampers off like a French poodle. (The same thing happens in the composer’s one symphony.) The sonata’s second movement (Elégie) features an Impressionistic bell-like accompaniment. Timing is one of the composer’s finest assets: Nothing outstays its welcome, and just as one might be tiring of high spirits a pensive moment of lyricism comes along, like the lovely “La Tendre” in the Five Portraits of Young Girls suite. The gentle Nocturne’s arpeggiated left hand registers like updated Fauré, and it is this piece, the composer’s final composition for solo piano (1994), that brings the first disc to a close.

In the duo and two-piano works Jones is joined by Richard McMahon or Adrian Farmer. The Eight Exotic Dances of 1957 draw on popular Latin and jazz forms. The final movement is titled Rock’n’roll but it is far more jazz than rock, a musical genre too earthy for the fastidious Françaix, I suspect. Napoléon and Si Versailles m’etait conté are two-piano arrangements of music from films, while Scuola di ballo is a ballet score from 1933, which, 30 years later, the composer reworked for himself and his daughter Claude to play. The resulting score is more elaborate than a mere reduction, as you will hear if you compare it to the orchestral version recorded by Thierry Fischer and the Ulster Orchestra (Hyperion). It draws on music by Boccherini in much the same way as Stravinsky reinterpreted Pergolesi in Pulcinella , and forms a joyous finale to the program.

Devotees of piano music and avowed completists owe a lot to Martin Jones, truly one of the finest of British pianists. For Nimbus he has recorded a good deal of Spanish music (including multiple discs of Mompou), a Czerny series, Szymanowski, and several others. He is a sparkling technician, but beyond that he always manages to sound utterly sympathetic in the music he chooses to record. His partners in this enterprise are equally at home; McMahon, for one, has a formidable reputation in duet work. Nimbus’s recording strikes me as perfect; as usual, there is air around the sound but it is never muddy, always crisp, and suits the piano to a T. While it may be asking too much to listen to the three discs straight through (though I did so without any ill effect, several times), this is undoubtedly a delightful set to dip into and certainly a significant addition to the catalog.

FANFARE: Phillip Scott

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Francaix: The Music for Solo Piano, Duo & Duet
Nimbus Apr 2012
CD
$32.99

Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Shakespeare Overtures Vol 1 / Penny, West Australian Symphony

Naxos

$19.99 Sep 28, 2010

Also available: Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Shakespeare Overtures, Vol. 2 / Penny, West Australian Symphony

CASTELNUOVO-TEDESCO Julius Caesar, op. 78. The Taming of the Shrew, op. 61. Antony and Cleopatra, op. 134. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, op. 108. The Tragedy of Coriolanus, op. 135. Twelfth Night, op. 73 • Andrew Penny, cond; West Australian SO • NAXOS 8.572500 (65:07)

Who knew that Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco wrote overtures to 11 of Shakespeare’s plays? Not I and apparently not many others either, as every one of the works on this disc is claimed to be a world premiere recording. Naxos labels it Volume 1, so a companion CD containing the remaining five overtures— The Merchant of Venice, Much Ado about Nothing, As You Like It, The Winter’s Tale , and King John —is expected.

If you know Castelnuovo-Tedesco (1895–1968) by anything other than his famous D-Major Guitar Concerto, possibly his Violin Concerto titled “The Prophets,” and perhaps a few of his Jewish-themed choral works included in the Milken Archive of American Jewish Music project distributed on Naxos, you’re doing better than I am. Here is a composer with a catalog of more than 200 works—and that’s just the ones with opus numbers—who has simply never achieved recognition commensurate with the volume and quality of his output.

His “sin,” no more and no less than that of his close Italian contemporaries—Casella, Pizzetti, Malipiero, and Respighi—was to be born at a time and place where composing music in a late-Romantic and Impressionist style was regarded as regressive and reactionary by the modernists elsewhere on the Continent. Of this group, only Respighi seems to have enjoyed more or less permanent staying power. But Castelnuovo-Tedesco (hereinafter referred to as C-T for short) struggled against a second bias. Under Mussolini, Italy’s Jews may not have suffered the same fate as did their German, Austrian, and Polish co-religionists under Hitler, but fascist Italy was still not the friendliest place for a Jewish composer.

So in 1938, C-T left for the U.S., where he soon found work, as did so many other composers who fled Europe in those years, in the film industry. MGM Studios embraced him with open arms, and over the next several years he contributed to the scores of more than 200 films, all the while continuing to compose concert music. He became one of the most sought-after composition teachers in Los Angeles, taking on as students André Previn, Henry Mancini, and John Williams.

The first impression to strike one about these Shakespeare overtures is their made-for-the-movies character. This is not intended to be uncomplimentary; rather, it’s an observation of the vividly colored orchestration and the sweeping cinematic panoramas the music seems to encompass. Of the 11 overtures, six of them were written after C-T had arrived in the U.S. and taken up with the Hollywood crowd. Three of these— A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1940), Antony and Cleopatra (1947), and The Tragedy of Coriolanus (1947)—are on this volume. The earliest numbers—i.e., the five written while C-T was still in Italy—were The Taming of the Shrew (1930), followed by Twelfth Night (1933), The Merchant of Venice (1933), Julius Caesar (1934), and The Winter’s Tale (1935).

All of the overtures were conceived as stand-alone concert works, not as curtain-raisers to operas or incidental music to staged productions of the plays, and not as film music to accompany the rolling of the opening credits. As such, C-T’s overtures avoid storytelling; they do not attempt in a few minutes’ time to telescope the action of the plots. Instead, they take their cue from one or more specific events in the plays and develop a strictly musical narrative around them. This downplays programmatic associations and lends each overture a sense of structural integrity as a complete entity unto itself, worked out entirely in formal musical terms.

Over time, the overtures grew, not necessarily in length—though the 1947 Antony and Cleopatra expanded to nearly 18 minutes—but in ambition of orchestration. Where the 1930 Taming of the Shrew employs strings, double woodwinds, four horns, two trumpets, timpani, harp, piano, and percussion—hardly a modest-sized orchestra—the later overtures triple the winds and add English horn, contrabassoon, tuba, a second harp, tubular bells, glockenspiel, castanets, and a battery of various drums. Moreover, augmented string sections now find their parts frequently divided, and section leaders are highlighted in many striking solo passages. “The more grandiloquent moments,” observe Andrew Penny and Graham Wade in their booklet note, “anticipate the epic sweep of Miklós Rózsa’s film scores for Ben Hur or Quo Vadis of the 1950s.”

While certain parallels may exist, it should be emphasized that C-T’s overtures are serious symphonic works. They are not the stuff of movie soundtracks or, in arrangements, of summer-evening pops concerts. They are, however, not truly of their time—a statement that could apply to Respighi as well—in that they are big, bold, brightly painted musical billboards in a post-Romantic/Impressionist style that feature many of the same exoticisms and techniques one hears in scores like Respighi’s Roman Trilogy.

I take Naxos at its word that these are world premiere recordings; therefore, it is taken as an article of faith that other versions for comparison purposes do not exist. No matter, for the performances here by Andrew Penny and his West Australian Symphony Orchestra sound aces to me, and the recording has plenty of headroom for maximum impact in the music’s most massively scored passages. I can’t imagine why anyone would not be taken with these highly attractive scores. Definitely recommended.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

Thank God Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco's overture to A Midsummer Night's Dream doesn't sound anything like Mendelssohn: it's just a luscious bit of late-Romantic impressionism, and it's as lovely as it is concise. The big piece here is Antony and Cleopatra, nearly 18 exotic minutes of it, sounding rather like, well, the 1963 film score to Antony and Cleopatra (which was by Alex North, actually). The fact is that Castelnuovo-Tedesco had quite a successful career in Hollywood after swapping the fascism of his native Italy for the escapism of sunny California. The Taming of the Shrew is charming and witty, Coriolanus suitably somber, and Twelfth Night, rather like the play itself, mysterious and curiously elusive. All of the music is well played by the West Australian Symphony Orchestra under Andrew Penny--there are a few moments of iffy ensemble, but nothing to worry about, and the sonics are suitably vivid. Very enjoyable indeed.

– David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

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Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Shakespeare Overtures Vol 1 / Penny, West Australian Symphony
Naxos Sep 2010
CD
$19.99

Brigadoon & Kiss Me Kate - Original Television Soundtracks / Robert Goulet

Sony Masterworks

$17.99 Mar 04, 2014

Long before Carrie Underwood in The Sound of Music, network television was regularly airing versions of Broadway musicals in the 1950's and '60s. Following his blazing introduction in Camelot, Robert Goulet had become one of the hottest actors of the time. Capitalizing on his fame, the ABC network showcased Goulet in live broadcasts of Brigadoon in 1966 and Kiss Me, Kate in 1968. Lerner and Loewe's Brigadoon features Goulet with Peter Falk and Sally Ann Howes, and Cole Porter's Kiss Me, Kate stars his then-wife, Carol Lawrence, as well as Jessica Walter and Michael Callan.

Tracks:

KISS ME, KATE
1. Overture 2:42 - Orchestra
2. Another Op’nin’, Another Show 2:12 - Ensemble
3. Why Can’t You Behave 1:53 - Jessica Walter
4. Wunderbar 2:32 - Robert Goulet and Carol Lawrence
5. So In Love 3:00 - Carol Lawrence
6.We Open in Venice 2:08 - Robert Goulet, Carol Lawrence, Jessica Walter, Michael Callan and Chorus
7. I Hate Men 2:18 - Carol Lawrence
8. I’ve Come to Wive It Wealthily in Padua 2:14 - Robert Goulet
9. Tom, Dick or Harry 2:29 - Jessica Walter, Michael Callan, Tony Hendra and Nick Ullett
10. Were Thine That Special Face 2:34 - Robert Goulet
11. Too Darn Hot 2:27 - Michael Callan and Chorus
12. So Kiss Me, Kate 0:47 - Robert Goulet, Carol Lawrence and Chorus
13. Where Is the Life That Late I Led 4:17 - Robert Goulet
14. Always True to You in My Fashion 2:44 - Jessica Walter
15. So In Love (Reprise) 3:10 - Robert Goulet
16. Brush Up Your Shakespeare 2:46 - Jules Munshin and Marty Ingels
17. I Am Ashamed That Women Are So Simple 1:37 - Carol Lawrence
18. Finale 0:46 - Ensemble

BRIGADOON
19. Overture 4:05 - Orchestra
20.Brigadoon 1:44 - Chorus
21. Almost Like Being In Love 2:50 - Robert Goulet and Sally Ann Howes
22. McConnachy Square 1:58 - Marlyn Mason and Chorus
23. From This Day On 2:28 - Robert Goulet and Sally Ann Howes
24. Come to Me, Bend to Me 3:26 - Tommy Carlisle
25. The Heather on the Hill 4:24 - Robert Goulet and Sally Ann Howes
26. Waiting for My Dearie 1:46 - Sally Ann Howes
27. I’ll Go Home with Bonnie Jean 3:07 - Tommy Carlisle and Chorus
28. There But for You Go I 2:47 - Robert Goulet
29. Brigadoon (Reprise) 1:12 - Chorus

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Brigadoon & Kiss Me Kate - Original Television Soundtracks / Robert Goulet
Sony Masterworks Mar 2014
CD
$17.99

Martucci: Piano Concerto No 1, Etc / Coggi, La Vecchia

Naxos

$19.99 May 26, 2009

MARTUCCI Piano Concerto No. 1. 1 La canzone dei ricordi 2 • Francesco La Vecchia, cond; Gesualdo Coggi (pn); 1 Silvia Pasini (mez); 2 Rome SO • NAXOS 8.570931 (67:53 Text, no Translation )

Giuseppe Martucci (1856–1909) was a forerunner to the so-called “generazione dell’ottanta” of composers (see Malipiero review elsewhere) that sought to initiate a new golden age of instrumental music in Italy to vie against the overwhelming dominance of opera. Most of those who would follow in his footsteps—and the list is long, including the likes of Casella, Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Menotti, Pizzetti, Respighi, Rota, Wolf-Ferrari, and Zandonai—hedged their bets by playing both sides of the fence; but Martucci was unique for his time and place in that he wrote no operas whatsoever. Ironically though, in his role as a conductor, introducing Wagner’s operas to Italy may have done more to poison the well of Italian opera than any of his works as a composer did to stanch the opera rage. If you can’t lead the cattle away from the watering hole, do the next best thing: contaminate the water and kill them.

During his lifetime, Martucci was best known as a conductor, pianist, and teacher, Respighi being one of his more prominent students. His compositional output is not overly large, totaling fewer than 100 published opus numbers. Among them, however, are two symphonies, two piano concertos, two piano trios, a piano quintet, one sonata each for violin, cello, and organ, and a considerable volume of pieces for solo piano.

The current release—Volume 3 in Naxos’s complete survey of Martucci’s orchestral music—contains works that are not new to the recorded catalog. The Piano Concerto No. 1 in D Minor and La canzone dei ricordi were both coupled together, as here, in another Martucci survey a decade or so ago on the ASV label. The artists there were pianist Francesco Caramiello in the Concerto, soprano Rachel Yakar in the vocal work, and Francesco D’Avalos leading the Philharmonia Orchestra. That entire collection is now available in a super-budget four-disc set on Brilliant Classics. At about the same time that ASV was busy with their Martucci project, along came Sony with their release of the composer’s Piano Concerto No. 2 in B? Minor played by pianist Carlo Bruni, paired once again with La canzone dei ricordi , sung by Mirella Freni. The conductor and orchestra on that recording were Riccardo Muti and La Scala Philharmonic.

The good news is that I have the Freni/Muti CD, so I’m able to compare the Sony recording with the new Naxos. The bad news is that of the D’Avalos survey on ASV, I have only the two symphonies, but not the disc with the Piano Concerto; thus, I’m unable to compare Caramiello to Coggi. So let me begin with La canzone dei ricordi (“The Songs of Memories”), which seems to be one of Martucci’s more enduring works. As originally completed in 1887, the piece was conceived for mezzo-soprano and piano. It wasn’t until 11 years later (1898) that Martucci orchestrated it. The piece is a setting of seven poems by Rocco Pagliera. Unless one is fluent in Italian, Naxos’s printing of the texts in Italian only is highly frustrating. The Sony with Freni provides translations in English, French, and German.

The poems, as can be deduced from the work’s title, are about dreams recollected, mostly of longed-for, but alas, only imagined loves. More interesting are Martucci’s formal design and musical content. Each song ends in a different key from which it started. The song that follows it begins in the key in which the previous song ended. Thus, by the end, we have returned to the key and the poem with which the cycle began. Stylistically, Martucci’s indebtedness to Wagner is unmistakable, but it’s a Wagner tinted—some might say tainted—by some of Puccini’s more pastel orchestral touches that one hears in La bohème . Martucci undoubtedly knew the opera, which premiered in 1896, two years before his orchestration of La canzone dei ricordi.

Freni was 60 when she recorded the Martucci with Muti in 1995. Age had added a degree of weight to a soprano voice that in its youth was lighter and more lyric in character. I’m not suggesting she would have made a good Brunhilde, but her projection in these songs comes across as sounding more Wagnerian than does Silvia Pasini’s delivery on the new Naxos. Nor by any means is it just a matter of voice. Freni dispatches the cycle in just over 28 minutes, compared to Pasini’s drawn-out 33:50. The result is that Freni’s reading has tremendous dramatic thrust, frequently sounding like an agitated Brunhilde railing in high dudgeon against Wotan, while Pasini sounds more like Mimi in her “Mi chiamano Mimì” aria from La bohème.

If my description has led you to believe that I prefer Freni to Pasini in this song cycle, you’d be wrong. Martucci may have been a Wagner champion, but he was not Wagner; and Pagliera’s poems, to which Martucci set his music, are not about mythic warriors, heroes, and the downfall of the gods. They’re about dreams remembered in that half-conscious state of waking. Pasini, I believe, comes closer to capturing the more impressionistic character of the poetry and the music; and Francesco La Vecchia has under him in the Orchestra Sinfonica di Roma a better ensemble than Muti did at the time in his La Scala Philharmonic.

Since I have no other recordings of the Piano Concerto against which to compare Gesualdo Coggi’s performance, I can be brief. If you love big, Romantic piano concertos, Martucci’s D-Minor Concerto is right up there with some of the best of them. Echoes of Schumann, Grieg, and Brahms’s First Concerto (his Second hadn’t been completed yet when Martucci wrote his score in 1878) reverberate throughout the score, and maybe even a hint every now and then of Tchaikovsky (assuming Martucci had heard it in its original 1875 version prior to starting work on his own Concerto). Gorgeous music, gorgeous playing, gorgeous recording; this one is not to be missed.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

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Martucci: Piano Concerto No 1, Etc / Coggi, La Vecchia
Naxos May 2009
CD
$19.99

Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky: Romeo & Juliet / Gatti, RPO

RCA

$17.99 May 30, 2012

Registering a wide emotional range, Gatti makes very familiar material seem fresh and compelling without being willfully "different."

This pair of Romeo and Juliets from Daniele Gatti and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra is the conductor's fourth CD for BMG Conifer. Others include a Bartók disc, Respighi 's "Roman Trilogy," and a very effective Mahler Symphony No .5. With the Prokofiev, the trend in recent years has been for conductors to fashion their own series of selections from the compete work and to eschew the three suites the composer produced that may be musically satisfying but that ignore entirely the narrative flow of the ballet. A spectacularly successful example is a 1996 RCA disc from Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony which, at 78 minutes, presents a bit more than half of the ballet—perhaps all you really need outside the context of a staged performance. Gatti takes a middle ground. He plays most of the movements from the "official" Suites Nos. 1 and 2 (op. 64b and op. 64c) but reorders them to make more dramatic sense. Gatti states in the notes, "I have chosen to present the individual pieces as a series of colorful contrasts, as Prokofiev did, whilst retaining a semblance of the original story line."

The conductor succeeds considerably. Gatti registers a wide emotional range, rendering aptly both the most tender music and the crudest moments. He captures both the Neoclassical spirit of the work, as in his graceful, spontaneous-sounding "Juliet, the young girl," and the overtly Romantic gestures. The "Balcony Scene" has moments of exquisite delicacy, rising to a fervent tenderness; the closing "Romeo at Juliet's Tomb" is powerful, with an acutely agonized sense of grief. Those who love this music will have (at least) one of the several versions of the complete score—Maazel's, on a bargain-priced London "Double Decker" set, fills the bill nicely—and I find Tilson Thomas's balletic, well-played program indispensable. There's also still a place for the traditional, composer-approved suites: Muti's early 1980s readings of the first two, for instance.

In Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet, Gatti makes very familiar material seem fresh and compelling without being willfully "different." The opening minutes are permeated with a sense of longing, and when the Big Theme comes, while Gatti doesn't wallow, his performance is certainly quite stirring. From Intersound's budget-priced "Royal Philharmonic Orchestra" series, we know this venerable ensemble plays well for any good conductor; they play exceptionally well for their young Music Director. The recording is billed as having "EDR"—"Extended Dynamic Range"—and, indeed, you'd better adjust the volume level with care. The opening chord of "Montagues and Capulets" starts at a modest level, but Crescendos to a cataclysmic roar that had me diving for the gain control the first time out. The sound, generally, is nonfatiguing, with imaging and depth that are very good, if not quite state-of-the-art. The conductor's respiratory exertions are episodically audible.

There are close to 100 listings for the Tchaikovsky in Schwann Opus and dozens of Prokofiev's R & J, in various forms. Do you really want another version of these perennial favorites? You may want Gatti's.

-- Andrew Quint, FANFARE [7/1999]

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Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky: Romeo & Juliet / Gatti, RPO
RCA May 2012
CD
$17.99

Nyman: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat / Trevino, Williamson, Nashville Opera

Naxos

$9.99 ~~$19.99~~ Save 50% Sep 09, 2016

REVIEWS:

It is difficult to pin down just what makes this opera so appealing; let’s just say that it is an opera, like Nixon, in which everything works. This performance is a fine one; in particular, the two men speak and sing so clearly that an English speaker needs no libretto.

– Fanfare

This performance is a fine one; in particular, the two men speak and sing so clearly that an English speaker needs no libretto. “Neurology’s favourite term is deficit. The word denotes impairment, or incapacity of neurological function. Loss of language, memory, vision, dexterity, identity and a myriad of other lacks and losses of specific function.” One could not find many opera libretti that begin with words that would seem more at home in The Lancet; but, then again, Michael Nyman’s The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat is no ordinary opera. It is based on an essay of the same name published in 1985 by the distinguished neurologist Dr Oliver Sacks (1933?2015), who, alongside Christopher Rawlence and Michael Morris, was also responsible for Nyman’s libretto. Largely dependent as it is on notes made by Sacks about an actual case, the opera has no real plot as such. It simply depicts two meetings between a neurologist (called Dr S.), a patient, and his wife. The first meeting takes place in the neurologist’s surgery, the second, longer one in the patient’s home. During these encounters it gradually becomes clear that the patient, a distinguished singer and teacher called Dr P., is suffering from a condition called visual agnosia, which in essence prevents him from recognizing or understanding what he sees. Both his hearing and, bizarrely, his actual eyesight are fine, his voice and musicality are undimmed, and he can play a mean game of imaginary chess; but his “mental blindness” results, for example, in him asking directions of a parking meter, trying to shake hands with a music stand and, heartbreakingly, thinking his wife is actually his hat. At one point in the opera the neurologist asserts that there is “no trace of dementia” in Dr P.’s behaviour; but Oliver Sacks subsequently stated that the symptoms suffered by the real-life patient on whose case the work is based were related to the early onset of Alzheimer’s disease – an insight which, for many listeners, will lend this twenty-year-old opera an eerily contemporary feel.

Knowledge of this clinical background might lead the prospective listener to expect an unrelievedly grim work. But that is not really the case. Not only are there moments of black, indeed Kafka-esque humour, but there is much also about compassion and love. The neurologist, for example, could hardly be more different from, say, the cruel, inhuman sawbones of Berg’s Wozzeck. At the very beginning he expresses dissatisfaction with neurology’s tendency to focus on “everything that patients aren’t, and nothing that they are”, wishing instead to “restore the human subject at the centre”; and he retains a genuine interest in and compassion for Dr P., assuring him, for example, at the end that “I cannot tell you what is wrong… But I know what is right.”

Then there is Mrs P., the singer’s wife. She emerges as a thoroughly sympathetic character, who is forced to undergo an emotional journey into which the listener is drawn and with which he or she can fully identify. Initially Mrs P. seems in denial (or perhaps is simply being over-protective), when she tells the neurologist that her husband is “as fit as a fiddle” and just “makes silly mistakes, more like practical jokes”. Later on, though, we become more clearly aware of her very real love and admiration for her husband: she continually praises him and his singing, expresses vicariously hurt pride when the neurologist suggests that changes in his painting style are due to his illness rather than any process of artistic maturation, and cannot hide her all too understandable fears for his future.

Finally, this opera is to some extent also a hymn of praise to the power of music. Music is, quite literally, all that keeps Dr P. going: his musical gifts are still very much intact; he sings to himself all the time; and, as the neurologist says at the end, in essence he uses music to organize his life, so that the only relevant prescription can be: “More music”. Not, of course, that this can lead to an entirely happy ending. The opera’s last words, spoken by the neurologist in retrospect, are: “To this inner soundtrack he moved, he acted, Fluently. Cogently. But, when the music stopped… so did he”. So music can’t be or do everything; but while there’s music, there’s hope.

As to Nyman’s music ? well, predictably enough, it consists in the main of recitative-like vocal lines supported by a repetitively chugging chamber group consisting of two violins, a viola, two cellos, a harp and a piano. But there is much more to it than that. There are certainly some operatic subject-matters to which a basically minimalist style would not be suited; but here it works well. Nyman’s steady rhythms and additive processes here create a sense of inexorable nervous tension, which has the effect of reflecting very vividly the gradual but relentless loss of Dr P.’s powers of cognition. By way of contrast, this nervous tension is frequently interrupted by slower, more lightly scored passages, which tend to accompany reflections on proceedings by the neurologist, but can also involve less predictable elements, such as a full performance of Schumann’s ‘Ich grolle nicht’ from Dichterliebe, which Dr P. delivers to his wife’s piano accompaniment. A particularly good example of Nyman’s ability to vary his musical material within a consistent style comes in a five-minute passage towards the end of the scene in the neurologist’s surgery: the tempo accelerates as Dr P. describes the “darting details” (a sunflower, a snowflake, a map of Dresden, a dinosaur) that flash fleetingly into his mind; this gives way first to an almost arioso passage where he imagines a river and an idyllic guest house, and then to a more heavily scored, faster one that climaxes in his bizarre yet humanly tragic misidentification of his hat. Cumulatively, the music gives expression to a mixture of ongoing tension and emotional ups and downs which will strike many listeners as sensitively reflecting the experience of observing and accompanying a person afflicted with a degenerative illness.

The new Naxos performance of Nyman’s work is based on a production given by Nashville Opera in November 2013. Indeed, one of its functions is clearly to provide a souvenir of that occasion: there is a brief note by the director, John Hoomes, and a veritable smorgasbord of credits naming everyone even remotely associated with the production, from the pianist’s page turner through the make-up artist to every conceivable luminary of the Nashville Opera Association. That said, there is nothing to suggest that the CD itself was recorded ‘live’: the sound is of excellent ‘studio’ quality, and there are no audience or stage noises.

The three young singers generally acquit themselves well. Curiously, given that one sings the Duke of Mantua and the other Sparafucile, the (pleasingly) baritonal tenor, Ryan MacPherson and the bass, Matthew Treviño initially sound rather like each other – a situation which isn’t helped by the seeming misattribution of some of their lines in the online libretto. But that impression doesn’t really last, and both clearly have the measure of their roles, combining expressiveness with excellent diction. The rather brittle, fluttery soprano of Rebecca Sjowäll will not please all ears, but she gives a vivid performance as the unfortunate wife, rising well to her occasional ‘big moments’ ? such as her anguish when, following a period of relative lucidity, Dr P. fails to recognize a photograph of his mother, and her anger when the neurologist speaks seemingly unkindly of her husband’s painting. Dean Williamson and his musicians give a thoroughly sound and sensitive account of the score, though one which seems to me rather to underplay its humour.

Overall, it would be idle to pretend that this new recording supersedes that on CBS Masterworks (MK 44669) featuring such seasoned campaigners as Emile Belcourt and Frederick Westcott, and conducted by the composer. I have seen no evidence, however, to suggest that this 1987 issue remains generally available, or that there have been any other recordings since. In that context especially, the Nashville recording can be warmly welcomed and recommended. One could do with slightly older singers, and the performance as a whole perhaps lacks something in characterful individuality; on the other hand, there is nothing seriously wrong with it, the sound is good, and – above all – it restores to the catalogue a highly unusual work of real craftsmanship and considerable depth.

– MusicWeb International (Nigel Harris)

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Nyman: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat / Trevino, Williamson, Nashville Opera
Naxos Sep 2016
CD
~~$19.99~~ $9.99

Whitbourn: Annelies / Zukerman, Jordan

Naxos

$19.99 Jan 22, 2013

It’s remarkable that The Diary of Anne Frank has not been the subject for a major choral work until this thoughtful and often moving setting of selected texts (the original version premiered in London in 2005, conducted by Leonard Slatkin) by English composer James Whitbourn and librettist Melanie Challenger. Material from the ultra-famous diary has been used for an oft-performed opera/mono-drama (by Grigori Frid), a song cycle, numerous individual songs, and of course as the basis for a famous play and movie, but never for a vocal work of this form (a kind of choral-song cycle/cantata/tone poem) or scope (14 musical sections lasting a total of 70 minutes).

A convincing argument could be made that Anne Frank’s diary doesn’t need musical treatment; it works just fine on its own. Its prose (translated from Dutch to English) does not readily fall into musical phrases; neither do those phrases, beautiful as they often are, suggest handy poetic rhythms. Rather, the power of Anne Frank’s writing lies in the fact of its unadorned simplicity and heartfelt expression, which needs no embellishment or commentary. That said, Whitbourn, who is a first-rate composer for voices, has seen fit (been inspired) to attempt to enliven and enrich some of those revered words with music, and Annelies (Anne Frank’s full, original name was Annelies Marie Frank) is the result.

Whitbourn states that Annelies is “a commemorative work” both for Anne and for “those voiceless millions who shared her fate.” The intent of the librettist was to focus on Anne’s keen observations of people, of events in her immediate environment and of the world beyond, and of her own situation and longed-for destiny. The order of presentation of the text selections is not chronological (the first one is from April, 1944, only a few months before the inhabitants of the Annexe were found by the Nazis and taken away); rather the selections are organized to capture the essence of Anne’s thoughts, feelings, and character independent of time, which at some point ceased to have the same relevance for her as for those not confined as she was, separated from the normal measurements of life and progress.

Setting English prose, especially of the un-self-conscious variety, to music is not easy—it usually comes off sounding unnatural, contrived, forced. Melodies go off in weird directions, misled by irregular rhythms and jagged inflections. Britten and Menotti got it absolutely right; Whitbourn, while very often successful, doesn’t always join them. When you have to set words such as, “I started packing my important belongings. The first thing was my diary…”, or, “We arrived at the Prinsengracht, led through the long passage and up the wooden staircase to the Annexe…”, you need to think of the realization as speech, not as some remote, detached musical expression. But here, passages like this seem contrived to “fit” rather than to illuminate the thought or idea of the speaker.

One problem for me was the choice of soprano for the solo passages. Arianna Zukerman unquestionably has a beautiful voice, but her big sound and operatic style, especially in this chamber version of the work, and her somewhat detached delivery of the texts seemed at odds with the sincere, uninhibited voice of the teenage Anne. In fact, for me the best parts of the work were those featuring the chorus.

There also are some misleading contextual issues that at least on the surface seem unnecessary. One is the point in the score titled “Passing of time”, a quote from a diary entry in January, 1944. Here, the text simply says “The years went by. There’s a saying: ‘Time heals all wounds,’ that’s how it was for me.” From this we have no way of knowing that in her diary, what Anne was actually referring to was her experience of love for a boy, before the war, but in this context we’re led to believe that it was some vague reference to her endless days spent in the confined, oppressive world hiding in the Annexe. Later in the work, in lines quoted from February, 1944, we hear of Anne’s desire to “fulfill my longing at last…” But the important lines telling us what this longing is are omitted. We’re led to believe that it refers to something about spring, but actually she is talking about how she is “longing—really longing—for everything: conversation, freedom, friends, being alone.” She even longs—”to cry!”

Apart from these pointed reservations, I have to say that Whitbourn does a wonderful job finding musical contexts and expressive techniques to realize them. He uses his chamber instruments (violin, cello, piano, clarinet) well, sometimes calling them to create the sounds of traditional Jewish music, at others to paint a mood, whether of gloom or levity, contemplation or exuberance or apprehension. And his writing for unaccompanied voices, which constitutes a large part of the score, is superb; there are so many moments of happy inspiration throughout that you easily glide past the less shining sections.

Some of the more affecting sections come near the end of the work: the beautiful hymn-like tune on “Ich danke dir für all das Gute…” (Anne included this German text, which she said at the conclusion of her prayers each night, in the diary on March 7, 1944); the eerily captivating choral/instrumental evocation of the scene of the Annexe residents’ discovery, capture, and rude departure for Westerbork and the concentration camps (“The capture and the concentration camp”); the following a cappella chorale based on verses from the Psalms and from Lamentations.

I actually wished that the work had ended there—by now it had effectively made its point, shining its light on several of this remarkable teenage girl’s all-too-briefly lived moments of insight, despair, longing, eloquence, and most of all, of hope, doomed yet more desirable, more sustaining than the alternative. At this point, it just seemed fitting to leave us to ponder the true, harsh end, enhanced by the open, bitter chords of this chorale and the final words (“The young and the old lie on the ground; the maids and young men are fallen”, from Lamentations). However, it’s also easy to understand Whitbourn and Challenger’s decision to instead leave us with the words and image of the more positive, optimistic Anne, whose spirit rose above and outlived all the evil that surrounded her: “As long as you can look fearlessly at the sky, you’ll know you’re pure within.” These words understandably may inspire us and make us feel better (nothing wrong with that), but, as Anne’s observations should vividly remind us, we still cannot escape from who we are as humans, what we’ve done, and why these things that happened to Anne and millions of others, in one form or another, keep happening.

-- David Vernier, ClassicsToday.com

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Whitbourn: Annelies / Zukerman, Jordan
Naxos Jan 2013
CD
$19.99

Hindemith, Ligeti, Nielsen: Wind Quintets / Vienna Quintet

Nimbus

$20.99 Feb 01, 2004

Let me say it right off the bat: I absolutely loved this CD, and I’m betting that you will, too. I have been enthralled with Hindemith’s Kammermusik ever since I acquired the complete set of works collected under that title in Riccardo Chailly’s 1992 two-disc Decca release. Seven works in all make up the series. Six are essentially chamber concertos, each featuring a different solo instrument: piano in the op. 36/1, cello in the op. 36/2, violin in the op. 36/3, viola in the op. 36/4, viola d’amore in the op. 46/1, and organ in the op. 46/2. The seventh, op. 24/1, is for 12 solo instruments. That leaves the op. 24/2 for five wind instruments heard here, to which Hindemith gave the title Kleine Kammermusik. Technically speaking, it falls outside the set of seven the composer designated Kammermusik, but in style it shares much in common with its siblings. Written in 1922, it is a delightful thing, peppy, perky, and playful, with just enough of those Hindemithian sour notes thrown in to give the piece a lemony zest. The Six Bagatelles by György Ligeti (b. 1923) is a fairly early piece written between 1951 and 1953, while the composer was still living in Hungary. The work is based on six movements from Ligeti’s Musica ricercata, and is clearly indebted to neo-Classical models, particularly Bartók and Stravinsky. Do not expect anything like the later spatial and spectral tone-cluster music that made Ligeti famous in the West.

I am of two minds when it comes to Carl Nielsen (1865–1931). Hearing his name so often in hyphenation with Sibelius (like Debussy and Ravel), I could not imagine how or why anyone would pair these two composers who sounded to me so utterly different in style and musical speech. Moreover, I was (and still am) a Sibelian to the core, and I was mystified that Nielsen, who seemed quite the inferior of the two, could be held up as an equal. Well, that was a long time ago, and before I really applied myself to learning Nielsen’s music. I still believe that Sibelius was the greater of the two composers, but they are so different from one another that comparisons are not very instructive. I have long since come to appreciate Nielsen for the individual and special voice that was his.

His Wind Quintet, op. 43, from 1922, is testament to that unique voice. At nearly 25 minutes, it is a substantive and masterful work. The concluding Theme and Variations movement, especially, is not only a brilliant display of wind-writing technique, but really beautiful and moving music.

What can I say about the Quintett Wien? These five musicians are more than masters of their craft; they come together as a perfectly blended ensemble that breathes as a single living organism. Truly magnificent. Nimbus captures them in an acoustic that is open and radiant, but not reverberant. I know that I will be playing this CD many times over.

Jerry Dubins, FANFARE

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Hindemith, Ligeti, Nielsen: Wind Quintets / Vienna Quintet
Nimbus Feb 2004
CD
$20.99

Falling In Love With Paul Desmond

RCA

$17.99 Mar 15, 2013

Falling in Love With Paul Desmond is part of RCA's mid-line Falling in Love With series, which focuses on romantic highlights from classic big-band, swing, and jazz artists. There aren't any risky choices on Desmond's volume, but that's fine, since each of the title's 11 cuts -- including "When Joanna Loved Me," "Body and Soul," "My Funny Valentine," "Embarcadero," and "Then I'll Be Tired of You" -- sustains a mellow, romantic mood. This record may not really be necessary, but for anyone looking for lovely, romantic music from Desmond, it's not a bad choice at all.

-- Stephen Thomas Erlewine, AllMusic.com

Personnel includes: Paul Desmond (alto saxophone); Albert Richman (French horn); Gene Bianco, Gloria Agostini (harp); Jim Hall (guitar); Eugene Wright, Gene Cherico, Milt Hinton (bass); Robert Thomas (drums, percussion); Connie Kay (drums).

Recorded at Webster Hall and RCA Studio A in New York, New York between 1962 and 1964. Includes liner notes by Joshua Sherman.

Digitally remastered by James Nichols (BMG Studios, New York, New York).

This is part of RCA Victor's Falling In Love With series.

Personnel: Paul Desmond (alto saxophone); Jim Hall (guitar); Gene Bianco, Gloria Agostini (harp); Al Richman (French horn); Robert Thomas (snare drum, percussion); Connie Kay (snare drum).

Liner Note Author: Joshua Sherman.

Recording information: RCA Studio A, New York, NY (1962-1964); Webster Hall, New York, NY (1962-1964).

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Falling In Love With Paul Desmond
RCA Mar 2013
CD
$17.99

D'Albert: Symphony in F / Markl, MDR SO

Naxos

$9.99 ~~$19.99~~ Save 50% Feb 26, 2013

D’ALBERT Tiefland: Symphonic Prologue. Symphony in F, Op. 4 • Jun Märkl, cond; MDR Leipzig RSO • NAXOS 8.572805 (62:40)

A recording of Eugen d’Albert’s early Symphony in F Major appeared on CPO three years ago and was reviewed by James A. Altena in 33:6. That version was conducted by Herman Bäumer leading the Osnabrücker Symphony Orchestra. D’Albert’s life story is reasonably well known, so it needn’t be recapped at length. In short, he was born in Glasgow, studied in London, and at 17 won a scholarship to study in Austria. There he was so taken with Austro-German music and culture that he repudiated his English training as worthless and from that day forward considered himself a right and proper German. He studied with Liszt, met Brahms, and built a career as one of the foremost piano virtuosos of his day. Between 1904 and 1905, d’Albert toured the U.S., and in 1907 succeeded Joseph Joachim as director of Berlin’s Hochschulefür Musik. D’Albert counted among his circle of associates and friends, Richard Strauss, who dedicated his Burleske to him, Hans Pfitzner, Engelbert Humperdinck, and Ignatz Waghalter (see the interview with Irmina Trynkos in 36:3). D’Albert’s personal life was a bit of a mess. Like Henry VIII, he married and divorced six times, though as far as we know, all of d’Albert’s wives kept their heads. When connubial contentment eluded him, he comforted himself in the arms of a mistress. His love of Germany and all things German must have soured when the First World War broke out, for in 1914, he moved to Zurich and became a Swiss citizen. He died, however, in Riga, Latvia, where he’d traveled to secure a divorce from his sixth wife.

Little by little d’Albert’s interest in composing began to overtake his career as a pianist. His output is not insignificant. It includes 21 operas, of which the seventh, Tiefland , first staged in 1903, was a major success, playing in houses around the world. It still holds the boards today, though mainly in Austria and Germany. Other works include a Cello Concerto, two piano concertos (available on Volume 9 of Hyperion’s “Romantic Piano Concerto” series), a couple of string quartets, an overture to Grillparzer’s Esther , a Piano Sonata, a handful of solo piano pieces, and lots and lots of songs.

Note: d’Albert composed the overture to Gilbert and Sullivan’s Patience in 1881, just prior to his departure for Austria. Except for the cello concerto, the two piano concertos, the symphony on this disc, and his opera, Tiefland , plus several recordings of excerpts therefrom, not a lot else by d’Albert has found its way onto disc.

Another note: if you’re searching ArkivMusic for d’Albert, you’ll find him listed under the letter “A,” as Albert, Eugène d’—odd, since the site lists D’Indy as D’Indy, Vincent. Maybe it has something to do with the lowercase “d” vs. the uppercase “D.” Amazon and the Fanfare Archive put d’Albert under “D,” but the Archive purges the apostrophe, giving his name as dAlbert. How many ways can you spell “dog?” How about “dawg?”

I concur in the opinion of others that d’Albert’s compositional strength lies mainly in his mastery of the craft; his thematic ideas lend themselves well to development and he knows his way around the orchestra. I find it a bit more difficult, however, to concur with colleague Altena that Brahms and Schumann are ever-present in d’Albert’s 1886 symphony. If you’ve not heard the piece before, my guess is you would find its soundscape rather generic, as if fashioned from some factory-made, synthetic, wash-and-wear fabric. The garment fits the style of the day, but the pants are somehow baggy and nondescript. Granted, d’Albert was only 22 when he composed his one and only symphony, but attractive as it is in the moment, it’s not the sort of work whose melodies or other features linger.

If the opening strains of the Symphonic Prologue to Tiefland recall the opening of the Scène aux champs movement from Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique , it’s with good reason. D’Albert is painting a similar pastoral scene in which two shepherds are heard calling to each other on their pipes. Following that, the music seems to meander along a path on which it first meets, greets, and passes Wagner, only to encounter Debussy around the next bend walking his poodles, Pelléas et Mélisande . I confess to never having heard d’Albert’s opera, Tiefland , but if the rest of it is anything like the Prologue, I can understand the work’s success; it’s actually quite alluring, more so I would say than the symphony. But then the symphony is one of the composer’s earliest orchestral efforts—only the Piano Concerto No. 1 of 1884 predates it—whereas Tiefland came after d’Albert’s self-styled conversion to German-hood, and is a mature work by a composer already seasoned in writing for the stage by six previous operas.

I’m unfortunately not familiar with the CPO recording Altena reviewed, but this current release by Jun Märkl and the MDR Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra strikes me as eminently satisfactory. Playing and recording are both topnotch, and if you’re not acquainted with d’Albert’s music, this disc, at Naxos’s budget price, is an excellent way to gain some familiarity with it—enough, at least, to know whether you might care to explore further. On those grounds, recommended.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

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D'Albert: Symphony in F / Markl, MDR SO
Naxos Feb 2013
CD
~~$19.99~~ $9.99

Klughardt: Lenore - Symphonic Poem, Op. 27; Gernsheim: At A Drama / Mayrhofer, Anhaltische Philharmonic

Sterling Records

$20.99 Aug 01, 2013

KLUGHARDT Symphony No. 2, “Lenore” 1. GERNSHEIM Zu einem Drama 2 • 1 Manfred Mayrhofer, 2 Klaus Arp, cond; 1 Anhaltische PO; 2 SWR Kaiserlautern SO • STERLING 10962 (51:07)

This disc is a bit of an oddity with respect to the contents. While released only in 2012 and coming to me this year, the recordings on it were made respectively on October 14, 2002 (a live concert performance of the Klughardt) and July 6, 1995 (a studio recording of the Gernsheim). No explanation is provided as to why the issuance of either item was so long delayed. At any rate, these are world premiere recordings of two works by two significant but hitherto neglected German composers of the Romantic era, whose music has only in the last decade or so become somewhat better known. As I have approvingly reviewed previously issued discs of other works by both composers in these pages, I happily return to both of them again.

In 34:5 and 36:4 I favorably reviewed CDs of chamber music by August Klughardt (1847–1902): two different recordings of his Piano Quintet, coupled respectively to ones of his String Quartet and Piano Quintet. While noting that he became an avowed disciple of the Liszt/Wagner “New German School” after meeting Liszt (an event variously dated to either 1871 or 1873 in different sources; 1871 appears to be correct), the major influences on his chamber music were Mendelssohn, Schumann, and Brahms, with some Liszt thrown in at points for good measure. By contrast, in this Symphony, Klughardt’s allegiance to Liszt and Wagner—albeit the earlier Wagner of Rienzi and the scenes of pageantry in Tannhäuser and Lohengrin —is complete and self-evident.

The “Lenore” Symphony has a decidedly complicated background story. Klughardt worked on the score between 1871 and 1873, immediately upon first meeting Liszt. At this time he also met Joachim Raff, who was likewise identified with the New German School to the extent that he approved of and wrote program music. Unaware that Raff also was working on a symphony (his No. 5) based on the poetic ballad Lenore by Gottfried August Bürger (1747–1794), Klughardt discussed the poem with Raff and played portions of his draft score for him. Raff apparently said nothing to Klughardt and proceeded to finish and premiere his own work first. When Klughardt later became aware of Raff’s Symphony, he wrote Raff a letter in which he apologized to him for poaching on the latter’s turf. Moreover, he then published his own work as a symphonic poem rather than a symphony, though he continued to number it as a symphony in his personal catalog. This in turn has led to confusion among writers as to whether Klughardt wrote six or seven symphonies. To complicate the numbering of Klughardt’s symphonies further, there are: a) an unpublished early Symphony in F Minor, performed in 1871 but then withdrawn by the composer; and b) another Symphony in F Minor, dating from 1876, that was numbered and published as his Symphony No. 2. Thus, depending on who has counted what, this “Lenore” Symphony has been variously referred to as an unnumbered symphonic poem, Symphony No. 1, or Symphony No. 2.

The “Lenore” Symphony is cast in four movements, although the second and third ones are joined together such that they form one continuous movement and effectively reduce the total to three. The music follows the plot of the poem quite closely (Klughardt prefaces each movement with a quotation from the ballad). The young maiden Lenore anxiously awaits the return of her sweetheart Wilhelm, who has been fighting as a soldier in the army of King Frederick II of Prussia in the Seven Years’ War. The war has ended and soldiers are returning, jubilant, from the battlefield. When Wilhelm fails to appear, the distraught Lenore utters a blasphemous attack upon God, which causes all to withdraw from her in horror. Deserted, she suddenly hears a knock at the house door; she opens it and to her joy Wilhelm is there, clad in armor. He tells her that he has come to take her to their wedding bed; they mount his steed and gallop off. As they ride, the increasingly agitated Lenore asks her lover a series of questions, to which she receives increasingly cryptic and ominous replies. At their destination they dismount; Wilhelm now reveals his true form as a skeleton, and escorts Lenore to their wedding bed—the grave. Her wish is fulfilled, albeit not as she had hoped.

The first movement ( Heftig bewegt —Violently turbulent) represents the anxious vigil of Lenore. It opens with a dramatic, declamatory theme on the lower strings—one which recurs throughout the entire work—that sounds startlingly like the motif that Modest Mussorgsky later created to signify the brutal boyar Ivan Khovansky in his Khovanshchina . A contrasting lyrical second theme appears occasionally; I presume that this signifies Lenore’s love. The succeeding Scherzo is dominated by a brashly vulgar and raucous march tune, accompanied by loud percussion, depicting the triumphal parade of the returning soldiers. This segues without pause into the third movement ( Langsam, aber durchaus leidenschaftlich —Slow, but passionate throughout), which depicts Lenore’s despair and her blasphemous outburst with music of a gentle, sweet melodiousness that belies the putative subject matter. The Finale ( Mässig —Moderately) opens with a dotted eighth-note theme representing Lenore’s and Wilhelm’s ride, and then at various points recalls material from the previous movements, ending with the opening theme of the first movement transformed into a peaceful close in the major key.

The first time I listened to this piece, without having read the booklet notes in order to avoid creating any a priori prejudices, I was thrown for a loop and heartily disliked it, thinking it was a piece of ramshackle incompetence because the movements did not follow standard symphonic structures such as sonata or rondo forms. The second time I listened to it, after reading the booklet notes and re-approaching it instead as an extended symphonic poem (or as a symphony after the manner of the Dante and Faust symphonies of Liszt), it began to grow on me, and after several more hearings I have come to like it a great deal, admiring its unconventional boldness. Klughardt reported to friends that Wagner, the work’s dedicatee, said to him: “After reading through your symphony I must confess that I regard you as a notably gifted person: it is no small achievement to bring such a score to this world.” However, the booklet notes for one of the Klughardt chamber music CDs I previously reviewed state that Wagner rejected the dedication with the dismissive comment that he “perceived the whole merely as a study very much in need of correction in terms of style.” Whether only one or both of these is true, I cannot ascertain; I can only say I enjoy it thoroughly.

I have sung the praises of Friedrich Gernsheim (1839–1916) on several occasions, including a review in this issue of a disc of his symphonies Nos. 1 and 3. Zu einem Drama , his one other major orchestral work apart from his four symphonies, was composed in 1902 and published in 1910. Here, Gernsheim’s oft-noted close similarity to Brahms is quite evident; indeed, this work is a step-brother of Brahms’s Tragic Overture, not only musically but also thematically in that their titles do not point to any more specific programmatic content. Gernsheim’s work has its own distinctive traits, however; it is far more ambitious in scope, lasting almost 18 minutes as opposed to about 12 for the Tragic Overture, and the orchestration is more brilliant in a way that shows Gernsheim was not impervious to the music of Wagner and Richard Strauss. Laid out in a modified sonata form with contrasting interludes, it is a work of great substance and integrity that grows upon me with each new hearing.

The Anhaltische Philharmonie is based in Dessau, the city where Klughardt spent the last two decades of his life; the Kaiserlautern Symphony is located in the city of that name in the southern Rhineland, very close to Worms where Gernsheim was born and raised. Both orchestras play very well for their respective conductors, who are able interpreters. The recorded sound for both items is excellent; the hall in Dessau obviously has first-rate acoustics. A bit oddly, in the “Lenore” Symphony the audience noise between movements is neither edited down to a seamless transition nor left intact; instead, a few seconds of noise is left after each movement, followed by the sudden break of a silent interval between CD tracks. The very informative program notes for the “Lenore” Symphony are written by Klughardt scholar Alan Krueck; those for Gernsheim’s Zu einem Drama by the noted British music critic Malcolm MacDonald. If you are someone who is interested in exploring lesser-known 19th-century orchestral repertoire, this disc provides a most inviting portal into that realm; heartily recommended.

FANFARE: James A. Altena

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Klughardt: Lenore - Symphonic Poem, Op. 27; Gernsheim: At A Drama / Mayrhofer, Anhaltische Philharmonic
Sterling Records Aug 2013
CD
$20.99

SINGLES COLLECTION VOL. 2 1947-60

ACROBAT

$29.58 Dec 06, 2024

Mills Brothers - The Singles Collection Vol. 2 1947-60 - It's a representative overview of the second era of their career and is a fine showcase for their highly distinctive style of vocal harmonies. - FThe Mills Brothers were a pioneering vocal quartet, who performed in a jazz-flavoured barbershop style and were forerunners of the doowop groups of later years- they broke new ground as the first African-American group to have their own network radio show in the USA. In the course of their long career they made more than 2,000 recordings and had around 60 US chart entries. So prolific were that we have chosen to present their releases on 78s and 45s in two 4-CD sets, of which this is the second (Vol. 1 is ACQCD7185). This 108-track 4-CD collection comprises selected A & B sides from their releases on the Decca and Dot labels from 1947 through to 1960, with just about every release represented by at least one side. It features 27 chart hits, including the No. 1 "Glow Worm", and the Top 10 entries "Across The Alley From The Alamo", "I Love You So Much It Hurts", "I've Got My Love To Keep Me Warm", "Someday (You'll Want Me To Want You)", "Daddy's Little Girl", "Nevertheless" and "Be My Life's Companion". It features recordings with Al Jolson, Ella Fitzgerald and Peggy Lee, and with the orchestras of Sy Oliver, Hal McIntyre and Owen Bradley. It's a representative overview of the second era of their career and is a fine showcase for their highly distinctive style of vocal harmonies.

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SINGLES COLLECTION VOL. 2 1947-60
ACROBAT Dec 2024
CD
$29.58