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Mozart: Lodron Night Music - Divertimenti / Mardirossian, CCPO Pardubice

Brilliant Classics

$9.99 ~~$12.99~~ Save 25% Jul 19, 2024

Mozart wrote the Divertimento K247 in June 1776 for the name-day of Countess Maria Antonia Lodron, a family friend whose two daughters were pupils of the composer. He went on to write the Concerto for Three Pianos with the countess and her daughters as the intended soloists. Meanwhile K247 displays the 19-year-old composer's lyrical gifts but also his structural sophistication and his unerring feel for instrumental sonorities. K287 followed in 1777 as a direct sequel, composed for the same occasion and the same forces, and cast in comparably expansive terms across six movements. The intervening year seems to bring a refinement of both craft and humour, for K287 is one of the miracles of Mozart's lighter music, touched with high contrasts, memorable themes and sturdy developments. The second movement is a genial Andante and Variations which instantly transcends it's 'occasional' context. The heart of the work is the Adagio, placed fourth, where the solo violin outlines a melody cast from the same mould as the slow movement of the G major Violin Concerto K216 from two years earlier. But then Mozart comes up with a genuinely funny musical joke at the start of the finale, where the strings paint a recitative without words, like a virtual soprano on an empty stage. Testifying to their adaptability, these divertimenti have attracted performances and recordings by forces ranging from the one-per-part Vienna Octet to Karajan's Berlin Philharmonic. This new recording presents an attractive middle way, infused with vigour and charm by the Czech Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra of Pardubice under the baton of the Armenian conductor Vahan Mardirossian. Mardirossian and his Czech colleagues have made several successful albums together, including the serenades by Dvorák on Brilliant Classics (97030). Their recording of these perennially appealing early-Mozart works is accompanied by a new essay from Mark Viner.

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Mozart: Lodron Night Music - Divertimenti / Mardirossian, CCPO Pardubice
Brilliant Classics Jul 2024
CD
~~$12.99~~ $9.99

Joaquin Nin: Piano Music / Martin Jones

Nimbus

$20.99 Jan 01, 2010

NIN Danza Ibérica. Mensaje a Claudio Debussy. Cadena de valses. Canto de cuña para los huérfanos de España. “1830” Variations sobre un tema frivolo. 3 Danzas espa?olas • Martin Jones (pn) • NIMBUS 5851 (67:15)

Good to see a whole disc of the piano music of Joaquín Nin (1879–1949), issued as part of the Nimbus 5000 series. The pianist Martin Jones is well known as an intensely musical player, and so it is here. His articulation throughout is a model of clarity, his pedal work the result of much thought. This is immediately evident from the first piece here, Danza Ibérica (subtitled “In Seville on a May Night”), a bright, busy work that ends in decidedly exuberant fashion. The sultry central section is beautifully realized by Jones; elsewhere, active rhythms dance infectiously.

The Mensaje a Claudio Debussy (Message to Claude Debussy) of 1929 is a hugely successful tribute (Nin describes it as a boceto sinfónico , a symphonic sketch). Of course, Debussy was fascinated by Spanish music so the homage is remarkably apt. Jones is magnificent, as much in the cloudy, Impressionist mists as in the remarkable cadenza that the piece contains. Thematically, allusion is all. No direct quotes, but many shapes that point to familiar gestures from Debussy’s scores.

The Cadena de Valses (Chain of Waltzes) is subtitled “Evocación romántica.” Schubert lurks in the background (Schubert’s centenary was just around the corner at the date of composition, 1927). This, surely, is a masterpiece. There is a plethora of references, from Soler and Weber through Schubert and Granados. But it appears as all of a magnificently effective piece. Jones seems to have an authentic Spanish swing at his disposal as well as an ability to project large-scale form.

Moving forward a decade, the Canto de cuña para los huérfanos de España (Lullaby for the Orphans of Spain) of 1938 is a lament for children orphaned because of the civil war. This is a magnificently touching elegy, dark and harmonically complex. Jones ensures the end is almost unbearably touching. Perhaps the disc should have ended with this piece, as no matter how long the gap between pieces, it is too short.

Luckily, the variations that follow begin innocently and don’t make for too much of a shock. Dating from 1934, and from Paris, it is a superbly constructed piece that deserves more outings on the concert platform. Jones rises to the challenges perfectly (listen to the octaves of the first variation, or the deep flowing lyricism of the Schumannesque second). Jones also plays with a beautifully wistful touch when required.

Three dances composed in September and October 1938 complete the disc. The first is another “Danza Ibérica,” somewhat more stripped down than the example that opened the recital. It is followed by a “Danza Andaluza” (Nín claimed it to be based on an Andalusian song), on paper a study in repeated notes but in reality a tender statement of the utmost beauty. Finally, a “Danza Murciana,” alternating 6/8 and 3/4 meters (as well as major and minor modes).

Calum MacDonald’s booklet notes are exemplary. Competition is high in this music: Thomas Tirino on Koch was welcomed by Peter Rabinowitz in Fanfare 25:3; Nicholas Unwin on Centaur was no less enthusiastically rated by Lawrence Johnson in Fanfare 22:1. Yet Jones makes such a strong case, and is so well recorded with just the right amount of presence (at Wyastone, Monmouth, in 2007) that, while listening, it is difficult to imagine alternatives. And there can be no higher praise than that.

FANFARE: Colin Clarke

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Joaquín Nin is, perhaps, best rememberd as the father of composer Joaquin Nin–Culmell (Culmell was his mother’s maiden name) and writer Anaïs Nin, for his music, in Britain at least, is seldom, if ever, performed and he is but a name, if that, to music-lovers. It’s hard to see why he is so neglected for these works are highly colourful and full of pleasing, and entertaining, things. Like the music of Astor Piazzolla these pieces speak the musical language of the composer’s homeland, in this case Cuba, dominated by things Spanish, and, although slight, are well worth investigating.

After a rather breathless start, the first piece is a kind of more modern (harmonically and rhythmically) version of a piece from Albeniz’s Ibéria, Mensaje a Claudio Debussy. It comes as welcome relief. In general, it’s a slow, quiet, dance - at times it sounds like Constant Lambert - and it builds to an impressive climax but falls away again towards the end. This is a fine piece.

Cadena de valses is a set of waltzes, in the manner of Ravel’s Valses nobles et valses sentimentales, but without the variety of that masterwork. Nin’s work is pleasing but one would have welcomed some rest from time to time; it’s all a bit tiring. The gentle restraint of Canto de cuna para los huerfanos de España (Lullaby for the Orphans of Spain), a requiem for the children who had been left without parents after the Spanish Civil War, is a touching memorial which says more, in its simple way, than many a bigger and bolder work.

1830: variaciones sobre un tema frivolo, whilst firmly keeping one eye on the past, isn’t ignorant of the future, but as the frivolous theme is developed we hear many different voices including one which is terribly reminiscent of Michael Carr’s title music for television’s The Edgar Wallace Mystery Theatre! The similarity is so clear that one wonders if Carr knew the Nin work, for there’s no reason that he shouldn’t. The piece alternates virtuoso movements with slower, more relaxed ones. There’s a real virtuoso rush at the end which is quite delightful.

The final three pieces are dances of one kind or another. This is a very pleasant collection of, basically, light piano pieces, but there is a problem; the range of the music is very limited and as Jones plays them in the same way – what else can he do? – a sense of boredom sets in. The best thing to do is sample a couple of tracks at a time, for listening to the whole CD in one sitting will give you an unfavourable impression of the music, as it did me. Whilst Nin, on the strength of this music, is no lost master it’s very enjoyable stuff, and an interesting insight into what happened in Spanish piano music after Albeniz and Falla. The recording and notes are excellent.

-- Bob Briggs, MusicWeb International

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Joaquin Nin: Piano Music / Martin Jones
Nimbus Jan 2010
CD
$20.99

Lutyens: Piano Works, Vol. 3 / Martin Jones

Resonus Classics

$18.99 Jan 26, 2024

In this, the final volume of his landmark survey of the piano works of Elisabeth Lutyens, pianist Martin Jones presents further world premiere recordings from this undeservedly neglected composer. Featuring works from across the span of Lutyen’s career, the earliest works to be included on this album are the short pieces Overture, Berceuse, Barcarolle and Dance Souvenance from 1944. The unpublished Holiday Diary from 1949, Helix from 1967, and Three Books of Bagatelles from 1979 complete the set.

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Lutyens: Piano Works, Vol. 3 / Martin Jones
Resonus Classics Jan 2024
CD
$18.99

MARTINU: Songs for mezzo-soprano and piano

Naxos

$19.99 Oct 18, 2005

Although Martinu is known for a number of significant choral works, including his oratorio the Epic of Gilgamesh, relatively little attention is given to his vocal music. Songs with piano, many of them still unpublished or only made available in print.

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MARTINU: Songs for mezzo-soprano and piano
Naxos Oct 2005
CD
$19.99

Rossini: L'occasione Fa Il Ladro / Fogliani, Martirosyan, Antonelou, Ruggeri, Utzeri

Naxos

$29.99 Aug 28, 2012

Composed by the young Gioachino Rossini in eleven days to comply with a contractual commitment, L’occasione fa il ladro (Opportunity Makes A Thief) is a comedy of multiple confusions. Count Alberto, travelling to be wed to a fiancée he has yet to meet, leaves an inn with the wrong suitcase. Don Parmenione audaciously adopts the Count’s identity, determined to take the bride for himself. This single-act burletta is a swift and deftly plotted moral drama, Rossini’s exuberant inspiration poured into interactions both tender and hilariously bewildering.

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Rossini: L'occasione Fa Il Ladro / Fogliani, Martirosyan, Antonelou, Ruggeri, Utzeri
Naxos Aug 2012
CD
$29.99

Martinu: Complete Piano Works Vol 5 / Giorgio Koukl

Naxos

$19.99 Feb 24, 2009

Giorgio Koukl' survey of Martinu' complete piano music has been praised as "a delight" and "estimable and important". Since the release of Volume 4, which was originally intended to be the final disc of this series, several manuscripts of previously unreleased material.

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Martinu: Complete Piano Works Vol 5 / Giorgio Koukl
Naxos Feb 2009
CD
$19.99

Franz Reizenstein: Piano Music / Martin Jones
Lyrita Oct 2014
CD
$37.99

Grainger: The Complete Piano Music / Martin Jones

Nimbus

$37.99 Oct 01, 1996

An essential box set of Graingeresque delight.

2011 marks the fiftieth anniversary of Percy Grainger’s death and the event has witnessed the reissue of a number of important recordings. This isn’t one such, because it’s remained in the Nimbus catalogue throughout, but I did want to draw brief attention to this super-abundant, characterful, and wholly marvellous five CD set of the complete piano music, played by the indefatigable, stylistically apt Martin Jones. He’s one of the undersung masters of a variety of repertoire – as good in Iberian music as he is in British, I’d suggest.

Here his encyclopaedic survey acts as a modern day cornerstone. You should hear his recordings, if you are excited by Grainger, and compare and contrast them with the composer’s own recordings which fortunately – all the 78s at any rate – have recently been reissued in a five CD set by APR [7501]. The experience is both exciting and diverting. But Grainger only recorded (and re-recorded) a fraction of his own pieces, whereas Jones has collared the lot. And how!

The first disc starts with some classic Grainger; the brio, clarity and speed of Jones’s take on Handel in the Strand is a tonic whilst To a Nordic Princess rises to a passionate pitch of assertion. In a Nutshell is a suite the charms of which seldom pall, and in this performance Jones crafts an unusually expressive Pastoral, slow and spare then incrementally building up in sonority, power and speed. The playful and vibrant badinage of The Immovable Do is especially well realised – one of the very best moments in this opening disc - though the reflective and beautiful Colonial Song runs it, very differently, close. Those who have never come across the roistering cakewalk of In Dahomey are in for a treat.

The second disc is given over to arrangements. To a degree it’s of less pressing interest to the Grainger novice, but it’s essential ground for those who want to understand his enthusiasms and the musical means by which he conveyed them. The opening of the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto makes some fearsome demands on the intrepid solo pianist whereas the Brahms Cradle song that cannily follows it is delightfully spun – lissom legato, not lion-hearted virtuosity. His arrangement of Nimrod is probably quite well known but that of Rachmaninoff – the finale of the Second Concerto – probably less so. I must admit that the Dowland transcription, of Now, O now, I needs must part, is absolutely irresistible in Jones’s performance. He really does have the touch for refinement in these works. Of the other works, it’s interesting to contrast Grainger’s own 1929 78 of the Rosenkavalier with Jones’s. Then there’s the convoluted tribute to Stephen Foster, the well-known Bach Blithe Bells and the same composer’s Fugue in A minor – it reminds one of Bach’s importance to Grainger, as performer and composer.

The third disc offers 28 examples of Graingeresque delight. Some are very concise folk-songs and traditional songs, others better known examples of his art. Let me just suggest a few which I think especially illuminating or unusual. If you’ve not come across The Merry King, try to do so, and you won’t regret it; it’s hauntingly beautiful. A Jutish Melody was recorded by Grainger in one of his very rarest 78s – a double-sided 1929 Columbia. He takes it a touch faster than Jones. Spoon River is played with vibrancy but Jones is ever alert as to treble colouration. There are also the simple and complex versions of One more day my John.

The fourth disc is a curious collection but that only makes it the more valuable for completists. We have Stanford’s Four Irish Dances, the deeply sensitive Fauré songs – what a shame Grainger didn’t record them – and the opening movement transcription of the Schumann Piano Concerto, which, like the Rachmaninoff, is probably best known by close readers of Grainger’s work in this field – a virtuosic single-voiced domestication, as it were, of the concerto literature. Another such is the better remembered Grieg Concerto first movement, also in this disc. His homage to Delius comes via the Air and Dance – but there are plenty of things to occupy the eager ears in this disc. Uppermost amongst them we find Angelus ad Virginem, a lovely carol, and then some of Grainger’s early works. These include the Schumannesque Klavierstücke in E, and the other early pieces which are variously awkward and Brahmsian or, in the case of the one in B flat, incomplete. There’s also the one in D, which Grainger dedicated to his father. The Bigelow March, an insouciant piece, was actually written by Ella Grainger, Percy’s wife.

The final disc has bigger works, ending with The Warriors. It also includes those pieces written for four hands on one piano, four on two pianos, six on one piano and six on two pianos. Children's March: "Over the Hills and Far Away" is a sonorous and ebullient example of Martin Jones and Richard McMahon playing on two pianos. But all these pieces are richly exciting and attractive. In the midst of all this don’t overlook the calm solo Grainger fashioned from William Byrd – The Carman’s Whistle or indeed Gershwin’s Embraceable You. The resilience of the performers and the clarity of the six-handed, two-piano, arrangement of The Warriors elevates it to a must-hear experience.

I hope this has given some indication of why this is so essential a box for admirers of the composer. I appreciate that Nimbus’s sound in these 1989-91 recordings is not to everyone’s tastes, but it will certainly do, and the booklet notes are classy. What a splendid undertaking this was.

-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International

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Grainger: The Complete Piano Music / Martin Jones
Nimbus Oct 1996
CD
$37.99

Saariaho: Maan Varjot etc. / Latry, Martinez-Izquierdo, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France

Ocora Radio-France

$20.99 Feb 16, 2024

Kaija Saariaho (1952-2023), featured in 2017 at Radio France's Festival Presences of contemporary music, was a central figure in a generation of internationally renowned Finnish composers and performers.

Kaija Saariaho developed computer-assisted composition techniques and mastered working with tape and live electronics, but she also encountered French composers of so-called spectral music, whose techniques are based on computer analysis of the sound spectrum of individual notes on different instruments.
In the profusion of works that Saariaho has produced in recent years, two features have marked her entire career. One is the close collaboration with other artists –writers, directors, musicians, etc.– in the creation of new works. The other is the concern to make her music, not the treatment of an abstract process, but an urgent sharing of ideas, images and emotions from the composer to the listener.

This collection is the recording echo of the Festival Presences (created in 1991) and its commissioning and creation activities, supported by Radio France's musical ensembles.

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Saariaho: Maan Varjot etc. / Latry, Martinez-Izquierdo, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France
Ocora Radio-France Feb 2024
CD
$20.99

Stravinsky: Music For Piano / Martin Jones
Nimbus Jul 2002
CD
$32.99

Dvorak & Martinu: Piano Concertos / Kahanek, Hrusa, Bamberg Symphony

Supraphon

$42.99 Oct 04, 2019

An extraordinary constellation of artists is one the major attributes of the new recording – a Czech conductor and a Czech soloist, and a German orchestra, who have a Czech sound in their DNA. All three of them enjoy great renown in both the European and global contexts. Symbolical is the selection of the album’s repertoire – the same world war that deprived the players of the German Philharmonic in Prague of their home and that in 1946 gave rise to the Bamberger Symphoniker in Germany, made Bohuslav Martinu leave his country and Europe itself. The composer wrote his Piano Concerto No. 4, “Incantation”, in New York in the twilight of his life, when it was evident that he would never return to his homeland. The connection between Ivo Kahánek and Martinu is profound indeed, with the pianist having played the Incantation at concert halls all over the world. The performance of the Incantation in Bamberg, captured on the present album, was lauded by the critics as revelatory. The studio recording of Antonín Dvorák’s Piano Concerto (based on Sviatoslav Richter’s account) ranks among the most remarkable returns to the composer’s original version of the work, forbearing the “effective and virtuoso improvements” carried out by its later arrangers. It showcases the tender and melodious music of Dvorák, who always strove to emphasise cordial expression, giving it preference to instrumental impression.

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Dvorak & Martinu: Piano Concertos / Kahanek, Hrusa, Bamberg Symphony
Supraphon Oct 2019
CD
$42.99

Turina: Piano Works / Martin Jones

Nimbus

$32.99 Jul 03, 2020

Turina’s principal works are conceived for large forces and on a broad canvas, but he turned to the piano for the creation of suites of evocative miniatures throughout his life. Martin Jones has been one of Britain’s most highly regarded solo pianists since first coming to international attention in 1968 when he received the Dame Myra Hess Award. The same year he made his London debut at the Queen Elizabeth Hall and his New York debut at Carnegie Hall, and ever since has been in demand for recitals and concerto performances on both sides of the Atlantic. He is a prolific recording artist and his many major projects include the complete solo piano works of Mendelssohn, Brahms, Debussy, Grainger, Stravinsky, Korngold, Szymanowski, Granados, Guastavino, Mompou, Ernesto Halffter, Joaquin Nin, Has Gál, Jean Françaix, Jean Roger-Ducasse, and Alan Richardson. “Martin Jones as a recording artist has been part of my listening experience for almost as long as I’ve been collecting albums. Seeing his distinguished and still active career celebrated by Nimbus Records in this way is a true delight.” (Dominy Clements, musicweb-international.com)

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REVIEW:

Martin Jones, one of Britain’s most highly-regarded pianists since first coming to international attention in 1968 when he received the Dame Myra Hess Award, offers a beautiful rendering of Spanish composer Joaquin Turina’s piano works, compiling an earlier recording from 1999 with some newer ones. These are miniatures that evoke dance rhythms of Spain. Cinco Danzas is especially well done, but there could be some small disagreements with interpretation. IV has a wonderful rhythmic feel, with evenness of playing. 'Fiesta’ has a sense of dynamic growth, with a constant ostinato-like rhythm. 'Danza Ritmica’ could have a quieter opening (it is marked pianissimo and lighter). To nitpick a little, the work could be a hair faster. Jones could aim for longer phrasing, especially in the running 16th notes that occur often. His range of sound is impressive. 'Seguriya’, marked allegro vivo, could be approached with a quicker pace. His use of the left hand articulation, slightly non legato, brings out the melodic line perfectly, and the work comes to a wonderful finish. The start of El Castillo de Almodovar is extremely beautiful, but I do wish for a more ominous and softer turn, as that movement is marked ppp. Still, besides these quibbles, this recording is a delight.

– American Record Guide (Sang Woo Kang)

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Turina: Piano Works / Martin Jones
Nimbus Jul 2020
CD
$32.99

Martinu: Complete Piano Music Vol 6 / Giorgio Koukl

Naxos

$19.99 Jun 30, 2009

These two volumes [6 & 7] of the complete solo piano music of Bohuslav Martinu announce the completion of an outstanding undertaking. The series was originally intended to run to only four discs but has since trawled further outwards. The catch means it is now, quite clearly, the most extensive and exhaustive collection of the works for solo piano ever recorded.

Volume six starts with the 1931 Esquisses H203. They’re written in pungent neo-classical form, and hints of chinoiserie, Paris-style, haunt the second of the six, as well as Ragtime. Martinu, though, always remained far more allusive stylistically than fellow Czech Schulhoff in this regard. Impressionist hues haunt the Fourth whilst I’m sure I hear a larky Volga Boatmen embedded in the Ragtime melos of No.5 – plenty of sinewy articulation here.

Jeux was also written in 1931 and is a locus classicus of Martinu cross-rhythms. I suggest you start with No.3 of the four of Book I, which is both fluent and fluid but also sports a characteristically saturnine neo-classical drive. The second book is no less fine for all that: in some ways it’s more piquant still, with a warm and malleable quality to the Andante [No.3] and a martial tune laced with Prokofiev-like moments [No.6]. We go right back to 1917 for Tri lyrické skladby (Three Lyric Pieces). These take in a Mussorgsky Pictures feel in the first of the three. The second starts like an etude, diverts to popular chinoiserie, then noodles off in the direction of the nineteenth century drawing room. Weird mélange.

There are pieces you probably have not come across even in literature devoted to the composer. The Black Bottom is one. It dates from 1927 and is a delightful minute’s worth of your time. The sleeve note writers have relied too much on Wikipedia for this one. Jelly Roll Morton’s Black Bottom Stomp came via Perry Bradford’s introduction of it in 1919 in Nashville, Tennessee, not the Black Bottom district of Detroit. Naturally you won’t be interested in this, but I am.

Vecer na pobreží (Evening at the Shore) dates from 1921 and will intrigue admirers of the composer. In three brief movements he creates an intimate impressionistic tableau, somewhat reliant on Griffes possibly, where, in the central panel, the left hand waves lap into the right hand melody line delightfully and where the storm in the finale gently eases away. This may seem atypical but it shows the ease with which he assimilated French models and distilled them potently. The disc ends with the grand bell peals of Písen beze slov, the valedictory Nocturne and the plangent Chanson triste in D minor....

So Koukl’s pilgrimage has come to its end. He has been a most worthy guide, and now takes his place at the top table of Martinu performers on record. At budget price he has no peers. As a complete cycle this set has no rivals. Individual performances from the likes of Firkušný, Leichner and others may be more arresting in isolation but the overarching reach of Koukl proves dominant and permanent.

-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International

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Martinu: Complete Piano Music Vol 6 / Giorgio Koukl
Naxos Jun 2009
CD
$19.99

Martinu: Complete Piano Music Vol 7 / Giorgio Koukl
Naxos Aug 2009
CD
$19.99

Come Una Volta / Martineau, Alessandrini, Concerto Italiano

Naïve

$18.99 Oct 12, 2018

A luminous, easily recognizable instrument, and a symbol of Italy's learned and popular musical tradition, the mandolin has been the subject of several major compositions throughout the history of music. First of all, the famous concertos by Vivaldi: two of them appear here on this intensely romantic album (‘Come une volta’) that Julien Martineau - one of today’s greatest figureheads of the instrument - has recorded for Naïve. We also finally get to hear, thanks to the world premiere recording by Julien Martineau, the legendary, virtuosic and poetic second concerto (of which the manuscript was lost) by Raffaele Calace (1863-1934), who was often described as "the Paganini of the mandolin". The instrument is in fact so close, in many ways, to the violin. The Caudioso concerto completes an album which, steeped in authenticity and musical excellence, honors and lends prestige not only to the art of mandolin, but also to Italian and musical culture as a whole.

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Come Una Volta / Martineau, Alessandrini, Concerto Italiano
Naïve Oct 2018
CD
$18.99

Piano Recital: Jones, Martin - MOSZKOWSKI, M. / FRIEDMAN, I.
Nimbus Jan 2005
CD
$20.99

Lutyens: Piano Works, Vol. 1 / Martin Jones

Resonus Classics

$18.99 Oct 15, 2021

The name Elisabeth Lutyens is synonymous with music that is overtly serial, uncompromisingly modernist, and of daring and fearless individuality. Yet there is much to explore behind the naturally combative and provocative façade of this extraordinary composer, whose music is at various times sensual, thoughtful and delicate, as well as dark, turbulent and even violent. With a program of works all composed in the last decade of her life, and containing world premiere recordings, the first volume of pianist Martin Jones’s survey of Lutyens’s piano works includes five works at times startling in their stark beauty, and bursting with both vivid imagery and lyrical fluidity.

REVIEW:

Was there ever as unrepentant a lifelong modernist - or one so dedicated to the sensuous, poetic, emotive potential of atonal music - as Elisabeth Lutyens, the composer who coined the term "cowpat school", inveighed against "folky-wolky modal melodies" and chided her students for "boring tonal references" if she unearthed an accidental major or minor triad in their compositions? Boulez, maybe, but few others.

The works here on Vol. 1 are all relatively late, the earliest being Plenum I (signifying a silent space filled up with sound, emptied out, and refilled) of 1972. Notated without barlines and with some economically used extended techniques, the piece is representative of Lutyens greater freedom of notation in later years, though strictly organized with note-rows and in her favourite palindromic form. Notated silence is increasingly important in later works, especially the spare, though amply expressive, La Natura dell’Acqua, her last work for piano. Detached phrases and gestures - many delicate and bejewelled, some aggressive and strident - combine in an abstract but expressive way that the composer likened to the late, non-figurative paintings of Turner. An even better example of this is the marvelously descriptive The Great Seas, an 18-minute tone poem hailed by Michael Finnissy (who premiered it) for its "sensuality … delicacy and fluidity" but also "violence, darkness and pain", which predominantly gives the impression of vast, calm expanses illuminated by constantly changing lighting conditions, but intermittently and graphically hints at the extreme violence of deep currents and suddenly flaring storms. The Preludes are a perfect summation of Lutyens' piano writing; bearing evocative titles (three of them from Keats), they are highly expressive and descriptive, the shade of Debussy detectable in the background. Although the composer preferred French clarity, lucidity, and elegance to what she saw as heavyweight German Expressionism, two of these pieces - "Strange Thunders …" and "The Shifting of Mighty Winds …" are notable for their muscular, aggressive energy. The earlier Impromptus are the most unabashedly, dissonantly atonal works here; succinct and compressed, they sound like passionate, extrovert derivatives of Webernian economy.

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Lutyens: Piano Works, Vol. 1 / Martin Jones
Resonus Classics Oct 2021
CD
$18.99

Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsodies / Martin Ivanov

Gramola Records

$23.99 Sep 04, 2020

"One must defend the Hungarian Rhapsodies on two fronts: First against musicians of the 'serious' brand who look down on them as showpieces, and secondly, against the piano maniacs who abuse them as showpieces." By these words, great pianist Alfred Brendel characterizes the Hungarian Rhapsodies S 244 by Franz Liszt, which have now been recorded for Gramola by the young Bulgarian pianist Martin Ivanov. The thin line between overwhelming virtuosity on one hand and poetic finesse on the other seems to be tailor-made for Ivanov, who already showed great success with his recordings of Chopin, Schumann and lately with his recording of Liszt's Sonata in B minor.

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Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsodies / Martin Ivanov
Gramola Records Sep 2020
CD
$23.99

Carl Czerny: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 2 / Martin Jones

Nimbus

$32.99 Jun 01, 2010

Quite simply exemplary and splendidly recorded as well.

The in this series was what I called ‘a valuable corrective to the partial, more generally held view of Czerny as a composer of an exhaustive number of pedagogic studies.’ This view is simply reinforced by volume 2 which is, similarly, a two disc set and which offers the same tangible musical rewards as the earlier volume.

There is nothing in the second volume quite as extensive as the massive Sixth Sonata of 1827. Nevertheless we do get four powerfully proportioned sonatas from his maturity played, as before, with powerful eloquence by Martin Jones, one of the most exploratory and energising pianists before the public. The interesting thing about Czerny’s sonatas is that the primary influence is not that of Beethoven. Rather it often sounds to have been Schubert who exerted the greater pull. The opening movement of the Eleventh Sonata, for example, sounds like a Schubert finale, though Brahms’s name is evoked by sleeve note writer Calum MacDonald. The sonata’s slow movement is a romantic soliloquy, its finale a songful, almost Schumannesque one played with warmth and clarity. This sonata dates from 1843. Nearly a quarter of a century earlier his first effort shows similar virtues. It’s a sonata that was admired by Liszt, who dedicated his Transcendental Etudes to Czerny, and is a powerful, exciting and generous spirited five-movement work. In this nourishing piece the central Adagio is hard to overlook, so richly cantabile is it, and so finely played too. Czerny is careful to balance the two faster inner movements; his Prestissimo agitato is galvanically brisk, whereas the Rondo is altogether more relaxed.

The Second Sonata is not unlike the First in that it too has five movements, one fewer than the Sixth where, one feels, Czerny did at least emulate Beethoven’s multi-movement example in his late string quartets. It is however much more concise than the earlier work. It has a most touching slow movement and an Allegro agitato that reminds one of the similar movement in the First. Another link comes from Czerny’s schema which is to end both these sonatas with a Fugue. In the First sonata the fugue is linked to earlier material, but not in the Second where the fugue stands, in effect, as a separate entity. The effect is grand, but it does lessen the sense of cumulative tension that the earlier work generated. The Sonatine is more compact still, but belies its name by virtue of its elevated and highly personal powers of reflection. And there are two small pieces. The Chanson sans paroles is spiced with delicious filigree, whilst the Character Etude Op.755 is a lissom and decidedly lovely effusion.

There is one remaining volume in this series, and one awaits it with anticipation. Jones’s playing is, quite simply, exemplary and he has been splendidly recorded as well.

-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International

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Carl Czerny: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 2 / Martin Jones
Nimbus Jun 2010
CD
$32.99

Schumann: Piano Quintet - Piano Quartet - Märchenerzählungen

Naxos

$13.99 ~~$19.99~~ Save 30% Sep 25, 2012

Between 1841 and 1843 Schumann wrote some of his greatest chamber works, among them the Piano Quartet and the Piano Quintet, both in E flat major. Written in an astonishing five-day period, the Quintet displays both the heroic and the lyric impulses in his music, boldness contrasting with songful tenderness, and march themes with lyricism. The Piano Quartet also exudes such qualities, not least in the ravishing slow movement, and the masterful breadth of Schumann's expression. The four Meñrchenerzahlungen are happy, energetic pieces. Winning high praise from the American press, pianist Xiayin Wang has toured with the St Petersburg Symphony Orchestra in St Petersburg itself, as well as in the United States. Founded in Chicago in 1946, and based at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee since 1963, the Fine Arts Quartet is one of the elite few to have recorded and toured internationally for over half a century.

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Schumann: Piano Quintet - Piano Quartet - Märchenerzählungen
Naxos Sep 2012
CD
~~$19.99~~ $13.99

Daniel Jones: Rediscovered Piano Works [4 CDs] / Martin Jones

Lyrita

$37.99 Jul 15, 2022

Martin Jones has been one of Britain’s most highly regarded solo pianists since first coming to international attention in 1968 when he received the Dame Myra Hess Award. The same year he made his London debut at the Queen Elizabeth Hall and his New York debut at Carnegie Hall, and ever since has been in demand for recitals and concerto performances in Europe, Russia, Australia, Canada, North & South America. He has made over 90 recordings with Nimbus Records exploring music that is not often played including the complete works of 18 composers. This year will see the release of 4 discs of newly discovered manuscripts of Daniel Jones. Also, together with Adrian Farmer, 3 discs of French music for 4 hands. During next year, as well as giving concerts, he will complete 3 discs of the first recordings of all the piano works of Elizabeth Lutyens for Resonus Records, and continue his American Piano Series with Volumes 6 & 7 for Prova Recordings which will include several new works especially written for him, and, for Nimbus a collection of Brazilian music by Mignone, Gnatalli & Lorenzo-Fernandez.

Check out the 1-CD compilation based on this recording!

REVIEW

Dylan Thomas described his friend Daniel Jones as playing the piano and announcing gravely “My twentieth sonata…this one is Homage to Beethoven.” For many years I and most other readers assumed a degree of satirical exaggeration in this description; those of us who knew the music of the composer were aware that he had written very little for the piano apart from his admittedly substantial collection of brief Bagatelles, certainly not a whole score of piano sonatas. But, as it now transpires, Daniel Jones’s statements were as wildly at variance with the truth as Dylan Thomas’s. Martin Jones has unearthed in the music archives as the National Library of Wales a vast output of piano music written in the period 1933 to 1949 – and it clear that what is included in this collection of four very full discs is far from the whole of the body of music involved.

[Let] us be truly thankful and grateful for the investigative work of Martin Jones and Adrian Farmer who have unearthed these gems and brought them to our attention. And especially to the indefatigable Martin Jones, whose exploits in the field of rare and unknown piano music have produced so many other revelations over the years. His performances here, as indeed we would expect, have life, engagement and agility; it is clear that the composer himself must have been no mean shakes as a pianist in his younger years, but even he cannot have expected such a demonstration of skill and prowess as we find time and again on these discs. The recorded sound too, as we would also expect from the Wyastone Leys studio, is excellent. The carefully considered layout between discs is admirable, with the larger works separated by miniatures to produce an order suitable for continuous listening without fatigue. And the presentation – a sixteen-page booklet packed with invaluable and indeed unique information – is all that one could wish for.

--MusicWeb International (Paul Corfield Godfrey)

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Daniel Jones: Rediscovered Piano Works [4 CDs] / Martin Jones
Lyrita Jul 2022
CD
$37.99

Piano Music of Radamés Gnattali / Martin Jones

Nimbus

$20.99 Oct 06, 2023

Radamés Gnattali (b. Porto Alegre, 27 January 1906; d. Rio de Janeiro, 3 February 1988). Brazilian composer, pianist and conductor. Although classically trained his working life was dominated by popular music. His influence on the arrangements and orchestrations of Brazilian popular music was powerfully felt through his weekly broadcasts on Rádio Nacional which began in 1938, and continued into the mid 1950s. His own compositions are a conscious fusion of classical and popular idioms. Even though Gnattali’s association with popular music undoubtedly prejudiced his reception as a classical composer he was never critical or dissatisfied with Brazilian music. Even towards the end of his life he could say ‘I have never been frustrated with making popular music. I do it gladly and enjoy it very much … If I had gone to Europe, I might have been a great pianist – because I had the qualities for it – but I would never be a Brazilian composer’. This programme is primarily drawn from Gnattali’s earliest works. In this period he is either writing melodies in a popular style, or using folk melodies directly, and the characteristic shape of Brazilian song is never absent for long. [Adrian Farmer]

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Piano Music of Radamés Gnattali / Martin Jones
Nimbus Oct 2023
CD
$20.99

Boismortier: Sonatas For 2 Flutes / Fabiano Martignago, Luca Ventimiglia

Brilliant Classics

$13.99 Oct 16, 2020

Composing came easily to Joseph Bodin de Boismortier (1689–1755). Having arrived in Paris in 1724, he embarked on writing what would become a vast catalogue of instrumental music focused on the flute (or recorder), which so tickled the palates of his bourgeois and aristocratic audiences and amateur performers, and of which he was himself a considerable practitioner. In particular the works for paired flutes reveal a fluency of style that speaks eloquently for Boismortier’s fluency as a composer. The six duets collected here are first and foremost music to enjoy, both in the playing and the listening. Boismortier’s duets reflect the rhetorical principle of elegant and refined conversation, a musical translation of intimate dialogue between two equals, neither of which is ever reduced to the role of mere accompaniment. The prevailing rule is imitation or agreement: when a theme is stated by one player it is taken over by the other and developed, never challenged or opposed. Even the three duets in his first published collection, Op.1, provide ample proof of Boismortier’s lively creative spirit as well as his skill in counterpoint, designed to attract professional players keen to show off their technical and expressive expertise. The movement titles within each duet may encapsulate French dance forms – Gavotte, Allemande, Courante and so on – but Boismortier was far too cultivated and cosmopolitan a musician not to absorb influences from farther afield. His contrapuntal style makes him the French equivalent of Telemann, and the busy passagework recall the violin writing of Italian Baroque masters such as Corelli and Geminiani.

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Boismortier: Sonatas For 2 Flutes / Fabiano Martignago, Luca Ventimiglia
Brilliant Classics Oct 2020
CD
$13.99

Martinů: Piano Trio No. 1 - Dvořák: Piano Trio No. 3 / AOI Trio

Haenssler Classic

$20.99 Jan 06, 2023

Two Czech composers, one piano trio from each – that is the program of this recording. Not that they are contemporaries: the first composer, Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904), was born about half a century before his compatriot Bohuslav Martinů (1890-1959). Both composers came from Bohemia, Dvorák from the little town of Nelahozeves on the west bank of the Vltava, Martinů from Policka in east Bohemia. And in the history of “classical” music, both of them are representatives of the National Czech School. This was a movement that emerged in the mid-nineteenth century to match similar developments in other European countries. This national dimension continued to grow up to the middle of the 20th century. The core commitment of the National Schools is to be seen in the way numerous European composers alluded in their works to the folk music of their land, bringing out national color in the sound of their music. Both Dvorák, an early representative of the Czech School, and Martinů, a late champion of Czech nationhood, pay tribute in their compositions to the popular music of their Czech homeland.

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Martinů: Piano Trio No. 1 - Dvořák: Piano Trio No. 3 / AOI Trio
Haenssler Classic Jan 2023
CD
$20.99

Turina: Piano Trios Nos. 1 and 2 - Martinu: Bergerettes (Phi
Centaur Records Jan 1996
CD
$18.99