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Berg: Violin Concerto & 3 Pieces for Orchestra / Ehnes, Davis, BBC Symphony

Chandos

SACD

$21.99 Oct 07, 2022

Alban Berg's output proved tremendously influential in the development of music in the twentieth century. His natural ability to write lyrical melodic lines probably remained the most outstanding quality of his style. His Op. 1 Piano Sonata was the fulfilment of a task set by his teacher and peer Schoenberg to write non-vocal music. The Passacaglia, written between the sonata and World War I, was only completed in short-score, and may have been intended to form part of a larger work. Both pieces are recorded here in skillful orchestrations by Sir Andrew Davis.

The Three Orchestral Pieces were composed alongside his first great masterpiece, Wozzeck, and could be seen as a tribute to his musical hero, Mahler. The Violin Concerto, from 1935, was commissioned by the American violinist Louis Krasner, but was inspired by the premature death (from polio) of Manon Gropius, the daughter of Alma Mahler and the architect and Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius, hence the subtitle ‘to the memory of an angel’. It proved to be one of the composer’s final works as Berg died later that year as the result of an abscess from an insect sting.

REVIEW:

The first track on this disc brings us Andrew Davis’s orchestration of Berg’s Piano Sonata. Berg wrote this accomplished piece when he was studying composition with Arnold Schoenberg. Originally meant to have had a slow movement and a finale, it ended up stand-alone. It is conceived in standard sonata-allegro form. The liner notes mention the structurally conventional fact of the repeated exposition. Harmonically, the work is very chromatic. It presents unstable key centres, whole-tone scales, with sometimes dense, often polyphonic, music. In its original incarnation, it demands a highly technical pianism. Andrew Davis explains that “its emotional and dramatic range is enormous”, and that this new orchestration needed to relate to “the sonorities of the era” – those of Mahler, Schoenberg, Zemlinsky and Schrecker. The result is a wonderful tapestry of sound. The mood varies from gentle to fervent, with a satisfyingly gentle conclusion. The organic nature of the sonata form seems to unfold continually, leading us on a magical, if sometimes disconcerting, journey. For my review, I listened several times to this hauntingly lovely re-creation of Berg’s early masterwork: it has suddenly become one of my favourite Berg pieces.

Berg wrote the Three Pieces for orchestra during the opening stages of the First World War. They present a frightening musical image of the unfolding horrors. It has been pointed out that they have Schoenberg’s Five Pieces for orchestra as an inspiration. Yet, they sound nothing like the elder man’s work. In fact, Mahler is the stylistic arbiter. One commentator has suggested that it is Mahler’s Eleventh Symphony, in the same way that Brahms One is Beethoven’s 10^th (or is it 11^th?).

The movingly beautiful Violin Concerto was the last major work that Berg composed, and one of his greatest. It was dedicated “to the memory of an angel”, the daughter of Gustav Mahler’s widow Alma and the architect Walter Gropius. Sadly, Manon died of polio at only eighteen. The work is a perfect balance of lyricism and drama. James Ehnes’s performance is magical. He tends towards optimism, which seems to bolster Berg’s contention that serial music could also be romantic. I was taken by his interpretation of this concerto and the integration of the various stylistic innovations such as the Bach chorale, the waltz-like theme and the Carinthian folk tune. The balance between the structural serialism and the more tonal moments is well managed here. There is a tenderness of tone that sings of affection but sometimes echoes despair, a tempestuous protest against life’s tragedy, and a sad, requiem-like epilogue.

Gavin Plumley’s booklet notes in English, German and French give a detailed introduction to all four works. “A note by the conductor” is a valuable extra: an essay-length appreciation of Berg’s music and an explanation of his approach to the two orchestrations. There are several photographs of the composer, the recording session, the violin soloist and the orchestra and conductor.

This is a remarkable disc. I enjoyed the two transcribed works, which genuinely add to our appreciation and understanding of Alban Berg’s earlier achievement. The performance of the two works of genius – the Three Pieces for orchestra and the Violin Concerto – are revelatory in their sympathy and understanding. It is an album that all enthusiasts of the composer must own.

-- MusicWeb International (John France)

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Berg: Violin Concerto & 3 Pieces for Orchestra / Ehnes, Davis, BBC Symphony
Chandos Oct 2022
SACD
$21.99

Classical Oboe / Lajos Lencses, Budapest Strings, Et Al

Haenssler Classic

$5.99 Oct 16, 2006

CLASSICAL OBOE • Lajos Lencsés (ob); Budapest Str; 1 Franz Liszt CO; 2 Auer Qrt; 3 Miwako Nagatomi (vn); 4 Vidor Nagy (va); 4 Dieter Brachmann (vc) 4 • HÄNSSLER 99.277 (66:57)

MOZART Adagio and Allegro, K 594. 1 DITTERSDORF Symphony in F: Adagio non molto. 2 Andantino in G. 2 HAYDN Divertimentos: No. 1 in D; 3 No. 2 in A. 3 VANHAL Quartet in C, op. 7/6 4

It’s been nearly a half century since I had the privilege of witnessing Igor Stravinsky conduct Les noces with Samuel Barber, Aaron Copland, Lukas Foss, and Roger Sessions playing the four pianos. It was a rare assemblage of celebrated composers as performers, but not an unprecedented one. Josef Haydn is known to have invited Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf (second violin), Johann Baptist Vanhal (cello), and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (on his favorite stringed instrument, the viola) to play string quartets with him. Foss and Sessions may have been the Dittersdorf and Vanhal of their time (and vice versa), but I doubt that either Barber or Copland—in their wildest dreams—would have equated themselves with Haydn and Mozart.

This historical footnote is the hook on which Lajos Lencsés, one of our most prolific and imaginative oboe virtuosos, has hung this compilation of mostly recycled odds and ends. Alert readers will notice the array of assisting artists on the disc. Only the Mozart was newly recorded, but the mixture of sources does not intrude. Little, if any, of the program is quite as advertised. The Adagio and Allegro is a transcription of a piece for mechanical organ. Haydn’s divertimentos, composed for his princely employer, were originally scored for baryton trio. The Dittersdorf pieces are slow movements from two of his Six Symphonies after Ovid’s Metamorphoses . I can’t say for sure, but I suspect that the Vanhal contribution was originally a string quartet. No matter. Appropriating music written for another instrument, quite acceptable in Classical Vienna, is hardly unheard of today, and it creates possibilities for programming that would not otherwise exist. Lencsés makes the most of those possibilities. Fanciers of the oboe with a hankering for something a little out of the ordinary (but not too much so) should enjoy this disc.

FANFARE: George Chien

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Classical Oboe / Lajos Lencses, Budapest Strings, Et Al
Haenssler Classic Oct 2006
CD
$5.99

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

Bartók: Concerto for Orchestra; Music for Strings, Percussion & Celesta / Mälkki, Helsinki Philharmonic

BIS

SACD

$10.99 ~~$21.99~~ Save 50% Oct 01, 2021

On two highly praised albums, Susanna Mälkki and her players in the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra have released recordings of Béla Bartók’s three scores for the stage – The Miraculous Mandarin, The Wooden Prince and Bluebeard’s Castle, all written before 1918. The team now takes on two of his late orchestral masterpieces. Composed in 1936 for the Basel Chamber Orchestra, Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta is one of the purest examples of Bartók’s mature style, with its synthesis of folk music, classicism and modernism. One immediately striking feature is the unusual instrumentation: two string orchestras seated on opposite sides of the stage, with percussion and keyboard instruments in the middle and towards the back. In 1940, during the Second World War, Bartók emigrated to the U.S.A., where he initially found it difficult to compose. In 1943 he received a prestigious commission from the Boston Symphony Orchestra, however, and in less than eight weeks he composed the Concerto for Orchestra. In it he worked with contrasts between different sections of the orchestra, and the soloistic treatment of these groupings was his reason for calling the work a concerto rather than a symphony.

REVIEW:

There hasn’t been a coupling of these two iconic works this successful in, well, decades. Usually the pieces get divided between different performers, or if it’s the same forces throughout, one work comes off better than the other. Not here. Start with the Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta. No one (except possibly Reiner) attempts to play it at Bartók’s indicated timings–around six+ minutes per movement. Everyone is slower, and often rightly so, but sometimes rather too much slower. Mälkki sounds just about perfect: in the range of seven minutes per movement, with an eerily flowing opening fugue, a ferocious second movement Allegro, a terrifying Adagio (listen to those timpani glissandos at the bottom of the texture), and a finale that features an imaginative and characterful flexibility of tempo, highlighting its dance-like character. The Helsinki strings play with extraordinary discipline, even if some of the “special effects” such as col legno bowing could resister more strongly. Never mind. It’s a great performance.

So is that of the Concerto for Orchestra. Perhaps the best thing I can say about it is that it sounds like a genuine collaborative effort between conductor and orchestra. Mälkki keeps the music flowing, reveling in the fine ensemble that the Helsinki Philharmonic has become: the brass fugato in the first movement, the “games of pairs” in the second, or the eerie woodwind solos in the brooding Elegia–nothing here is less than world-class. In the finale, Mälkki finds an idea balance between hard-driving forward movement and precision of articulation. She also keep something especially exciting in reserve for the coda, which dashes away thrillingly. BIS has captured the entire production in powerfully present, tactile sound that really lets you hear down through the ensemble, from top to bottom. This really is an exceptional release. If you love this music, be sure to hear it.

– ClassicsToday.com (10/10; David Hurwitz)

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Bartók: Concerto for Orchestra; Music for Strings, Percussion & Celesta / Mälkki, Helsinki Philharmonic
BIS Oct 2021
SACD
~~$21.99~~ $10.99

Schumann: Symphonies No 2 & 4 / Zacharias, Orchestre De Chambre De Lausanne

MDG

SACD

$24.99 May 01, 2012

SCHUMANN Symphonies: No. 2; No. 4 • Christian Zacharias, cond; Lausanne CO • MDG MGD 940 1745-6 (SACD: 64:51)

This is the first time I have ever heard these symphonies played gracefully by a chamber orchestra. What makes them so beautiful is that Christian Zacharias does not employ his orchestra’s limitation of size as an excuse for delivering spiky phrasing and rude noises. (Roger Norrington! Beware of Dog!) What I encounter instead in these performances is the delicacy of Schumann’s piano suites and the fine ear of a pianist who knows this music must dance. In fairness, the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra is not that small—perhaps 50-strong here—but usually the temptation would be to overcompensate with smaller-dog tensile energy.

Happily we find instead kinder, gentler versions of big-orchestra Schumann. This approach works best in the inner movements of both symphonies, but also especially well in the danceable opening allegro of the Fourth. Taken a bit faster than usual, the Adagio of the Second Symphony could actually propel a couple gracefully around the room. In the outer movements we get similar tea-dance spirit, but at the slight expense of something larger and more exciting. This is such smooth, euphonious cozy Schumann; it is almost Dvo?ák.

Schumann, of course, was obsessed by the sound of disembodied trumpets during the composition of his Second Symphony. And there is more metaphysical fear and Wagnerian mystery to be captured in its introduction than heard here. Christoph Eschenbach evoked this hauntingly in his Bamberg cycle for Virgin in the early ’90s. And Ernest Ansermet, just up the road in Geneva, didn’t do badly with it, either. Small forces have difficulty with the stasis of mood and mystery. In particular, tremoli with a large complement of strings can evoke the infinite nature of things. But in reduced numbers, they demystify and can pester like flies at a picnic.

So I shall not argue that Zacharias has exhausted the possibilities found in these symphonies, just that the beauty of his approach will surprise you, in delicious but unobtrusive surround sound. If there is perhaps more grit, force, and sheer amorous passion to be found in the Second Symphony, well, Clara Schumann would certainly have thought so. As a small symbol in her diaries reveals, she and Schumann had sex virtually every day for 10 years! I always suspected girls loved Schumann!

FANFARE: Steven Kruger

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Schumann: Symphonies No 2 & 4 / Zacharias, Orchestre De Chambre De Lausanne
MDG May 2012
SACD
$24.99

Antonio Draghi & Leonardo García Alarcón: El Prometeo

Alpha

$29.99 Mar 27, 2020

The original score of El Prometeo (Prometheus) is held in the Leopoldine Library in Vienna. It dates from 1669 and was written by Antonio Draghi, a composer who was also a singer, notably in the operas of Cavalli. For the first time in history, an Italian set a text in Spanish. The last act of El Prometeo has disappeared. But since the libretto of this act has survived, Leonardo García Alarcón decided to rewrite all the music for it. 'I immersed myself in Draghi's music in order to understand his style, his favorite intervals, the type of melody he composed and the type of basso continuo he was fond of, so as to try to produce a score that is worthy of him. So I hope that this third act will measure up to his music, his intentions and his creativity!' says the Argentinian conductor. Directing a brilliant cast (Fabio Trümpy, Mariana Flores, Giuseppina Bridelli, Scott Conner, Borja Quisa, Zachary Wilder, Ana Quintans), Leonardo García Alarcón brings this Baroque opera to life in Spanish, an opportunity to show his love for his mother tongue, 'a supremely musical language'!

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Antonio Draghi & Leonardo García Alarcón: El Prometeo
Alpha Mar 2020
CD
$29.99

All'opera - Roberto Alagna: Complete Opera Recordings on Warner Classics

WARNER CLASSICS

$120.49 Nov 01, 2024

A singer of passion, elegance and dynamism, excelling equally in Italian and French opera, Roberto Alagna has numbered among the world's leading tenors for more than 30 years. His idiomatic phrasing and diction have consistently attracted praise. His recorded catalogue is substantial. In the judgement of the authoritative Grove Book of Opera Singers his recordings document "the plangent lyricism of Alagna's tone and the appealing ardor and inner fire of his style". Referring to his interpretation of the title role of Verdi's Don Carlos, in the recording conducted by Antonio Pappano, the New York Times wrote, "His intensely lyrical yet refined singing was a genuine revelation"

This 33CD box contains complete operas - by Bizet, Donizetti, Gounod, Massenet, Offenbach, Puccini, and Verdi - recorded between 1992 and 2017 and originally released by EMI Classics, Virgin Classics, Warner Classics, and Erato. The box notably documents Alagna's productive artistic partnerships with soprano Angela Gheorghiu (his wife from 1996 to 2013) and conductor Antonio Pappano.

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All'opera - Roberto Alagna: Complete Opera Recordings on Warner Classics
WARNER CLASSICS Nov 2024
CD
$120.49

FRENCH CHAMBER MUSIC FOR HARP & ENSEMBL
ALTO May 2013
CD
$11.01

Benjamin Godard: Complete Piano Trios

MDG

$23.99 Mar 01, 2010

GODARD Piano Trios: in g, op. 32; in F, op. 72. Jocelyn: Berceuse • Parnassus Tr • MDG GOLD 3031615 (59:47)

Listening to these two piano trios by Benjamin Godard (1849–95), one would never guess that he trained as a violinist under Henri Vieuxtemps at the Paris Conservatory. I say this because both works are launched by a storm of piano passagework so turbulent as to leave Mendelssohn hanging on for dear life at the dock. From this one might understandably surmise that Godard was one of the great keyboard virtuosos of the 19th century, though such was not the case. This is music that is strangely beautiful and beautifully strange, which makes it difficult to describe, so perhaps some background will help.

The Jewish Godard was born in Paris at a time when opera was all the rage and when piano and violin giants—Alkan, Chopin, Liszt, Paganini, Vieuxtemps, Wieniawski, etc.—filled Parisian salons and concert halls to overflowing. Godard, like his slightly earlier French Jewish compatriots Meyerbeer and Halévy, sought fame and fortune in the opera house, writing at least eight operas, only one of which, Jocelyn , seems to have had any staying power. Unlike Meyerbeer and Halévy, however, Godard did not place all or most of his eggs in one basket. He was highly prolific in a number of genres, composing a surprisingly large number of works considering his relatively short life of 46 years. Among his output are concertos for violin and piano—a Naxos recording of the violin concertos with Chloë Hanslip was reviewed by Ian Lace in Fanfare 31:6—ballets, overtures, three symphonies, three string quartets, sonatas for violin and cello, the two piano trios on this disc, plus numerous songs and solo piano pieces. Yet out of more than 150 works, Godard is today remembered mainly for the Berceuse from his opera Jocelyn , added as an encore at the end of the current CD. It might also be mentioned that Godard was openly hostile to Wagner and outspokenly critical of the German composer’s anti-Semitism.

It’s too easy, perhaps intellectually lazy even, to cite Mendelssohn and Schumann as the only influences in Godard’s music and to just leave it at that, for there’s much more going on here. Take, for example, the rolling, roiling turbulence that opens the 1884 Piano Trio No. 2 in F Major. Franck’s A-Major Violin Sonata was still two years in the offing, but it’s uncanny how closely Godard’s writing presages the beginning of the second movement in Franck’s sonata. There is also a degree and a type of chromaticism in this score that would not have occurred to Mendelssohn or Schumann and that is more common to the French school; I’m thinking particularly of Fauré, who, after all, was born five years before Godard.

Like most works of its genre and period, a second theme, quieter and more lyrical in nature, is introduced. But here is where I believe Godard is at his weakest. The desire and the impulse are there, the gesture sincere, but the ability to craft a memorable melody eludes him, and what emerges in its place is a kind of soft-shoe, salon-style music that bides its time until the next storm surge washes away the cucumber and cress sandwiches. Listen, for example, beginning at 4:20 in the first movement, and then to the violin’s entrance 10 seconds later.

The Piano Trio No.1 in G Minor dates from 1880 and was, at one time, quite popular. Again, the piece opens in a state of tumult, with restless, agitated passagework in the piano. Here, the Mendelssohn influence is a bit more pronounced. Listen, for example, beginning at 1:54 in the first movement, to the second theme that unfolds like a Mendelssohnian song without words. The Leipzig composer is also conjured up in Godard’s Tempo di Menuetto, which is actually a moderately paced scherzo. But these good-natured elves sound more like oafs, hiccupping and clumsily tripping over each other as if they’ve had a bit too much to drink.

I might question the Parnassus Trio’s violinist, Yamel Yu, and cellist, Michael Gross, for overdoing it a bit on the portamentos in the Andante quasi Adagio and elsewhere. The potted plant is leafy enough; fertilizer is not needed. As note author Martin Bernklau observes, “The way Godard’s lyrical talent sometimes borders on sentimentality in the slow movements probably engendered a favorable response in the salons.”

The concluding Allegro vivace provides further evidence of French influences in Godard’s music that tend to dilute the prima facie Mendelssohn/Schumann argument, for here we have a clear example of the cyclic techniques favored by Berlioz, Franck, Saint-Saëns, and Liszt. The trio’s last movement begins with the same material that began the first movement. Godard then transforms it harmonically and rhythmically in true cyclic fashion.

As salon pieces go, the Berceuse from Jocelyn , in Bernklau’s words, “is certainly not kitsch despite its popularity. It is a little gem whose tender melodic beauty has survived more than a century.”

Most record labels are proud to trumpet first-ever recordings. That MDG doesn’t do so in this case suggests to me that previous recordings of Godard’s piano trios may have once existed. Currently, however, I find no other listings. As hinted at above, I wasn’t particularly thrilled by the Parnassus Trio’s somewhat raffish readings; I could imagine this music being played more tastefully and with greater refinement by a French ensemble that better understood the musical aesthetic of Godard’s time and place. But we’re not likely to get another recording of these works anytime soon, and technically, the Parnassus Trio is an exceptionally fine ensemble whose many excellent performances on MDG—trios by Lalo, Philipp Scharwenka, and Rheinberger—I’ve been enjoying for a number of years. Recording, as always with this label, is outstanding. In the absence of perhaps more idiomatic readings, this is definitely recommended, especially to those who enjoy exploring the nooks and crannies of 19th-century chamber music.

FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

Although Benjamin Godard's prolific output is represented today primarily by the Berceuse from his opera Jocelyn, his two piano trios are anything but salon fluff. Each four-movement work fully taps the medium's textural potential, with plenty of melodic interest, well-sustained development, and witty touches, such as the deft alterations from triple to duple time in the G minor Trio Minuetto and the hushed exchanges between the piano's broken chords and the pizzicato strings in the F major Trio's Allegro vivace finale (letter L in my copy of the Durand score).

The Trio Parnassus pretty much matches the high standards it set in its excellent Schumann recordings for MDG. The musicians are especially responsive to the Adagio movements' long, unfolding narratives, and generally take Godard's explicit dynamic directives on faith. Ideally I'd prefer faster, more effervescent and sharply characterized finales than what the Trio Parnassus delivers, but the ensemble still makes a strong case for reviving these works. In the absence of an earlier, out-of-print edition on Koch Schwann featuring the Trio Ma Non Troppo, the Trio Parnassus has no current catalog competition here. Recommended.

--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

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Benjamin Godard: Complete Piano Trios
MDG Mar 2010
CD
$23.99

Mozart, Strauss & Geisselbrecht

Gramola Records

$15.99 ~~$20.99~~ Save 25% Nov 11, 2014

Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto and Richard Strauss’ Metamorphoses represent late, great works by two composers whose geniuses were once more expressed in unprecedented intensity. + The WWII era Metamorphoses for 23 strings is characterized by profound grief, but ultimately expressing hope for the future. + Commemorating the outbreak of WWI, young Austrian composer Flora Marlene Geisselbrecht (b. 1994) joins in on the appeal for peace with Die Waffen nieder! ("Lay Down Your Arms!"), giving credit to Bertha von Suttner by incorporating citations of the first female Nobel peace-prize winner.

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Mozart, Strauss & Geisselbrecht
Gramola Records Nov 2014
CD
~~$20.99~~ $15.99

Mendelssohn: Early Works / Biondi, Europa Galante

Naïve

$9.49 ~~$18.99~~ Save 50% Sep 23, 2022

In this new album of music by the young Mendelssohn, Fabio Biondi and Europa Galante explore the influence of Classicism on the Italian repertoire, while researching some of the composer’s lesser known works. Mendelssohn is rarely spoken of as a child prodigy, and yet he showed extraordinary talent from a very young age. This program of works composed when he was between eleven and eighteen, selected by Fabio Biondi and his ensemble Europa Galante is proof. “Here you can perceive,” writes the Italian violinist and conductor, “this knowledge of the past uniquely combined with an already profoundly Romantic sensitivity: Mendelssohn shows both the teachings of Bach and the Baroque school, and the flamboyant spirit of the young Romantics.”. Taking inspiration from his predecessors in the German tradition, Mendelssohn polished his counterpoint, and practiced the fugue – as Mozart had done before him on discovering Bach – and the concerto. We discover a young composer well versed in Baroque and Classical forms, which he embellished with his own sparkling charm.

This album is also an opportunity to discover some of Mendelssohn’s lesser-known works, including the noteworthy Salve Regina sung by the soprano Monica Piccinini, several solitary fugues, a Largo and Allegro for piano and strings and a Concerto for violin and string orchestra in D minor. “This is a profound work,” says Biondi, who also plays the violin solo here, “with a rich orchestral part, which does not merely accompany the soloist, but is also fully engaged in all its sections, and a particularly interesting violin part. It conveys a constant good humor, in a huge kaleidoscope of formulations, while always retaining its formal construction.”

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Mendelssohn: Early Works / Biondi, Europa Galante
Naïve Sep 2022
CD
~~$18.99~~ $9.49

Zani: Sonate a Violino e Basso / Rognoni, Ensemble L'Aura Soave

MV Cremona

$19.99 Oct 06, 2017

The ‘Sonate 12 a Violino e Basso intitolate "Pensieri armonici" Opus. 5’ clearly belongs to Andrea Zani's second post-Vivaldian style. Without a dedication, these sonatas are still stylistically tied to the baroque style, but there are hints of the gallant style in them, above all because of the frequent use of appoggiaturas and in the cantabile themes and their development. Each of them having three movements, in the initial and final Allegros the violin, the indisputable protagonist, giving vent, shows off with captivating virtuosity, supported by a precise and well constructed bass. The Adagios are superb, placed as a contrast between the two extreme quick movements where the cantabile nature of the writing for the violin is full of "melos" making these pages quite enjoyable. The quality of the composition of these sonatas makes one consider the unjust oblivion into which the musical work of Zani has fallen. It was previously so respected and is now practically unknown. Violinist Andrea Rognoni and the ensemble L’Aura Soave breathe new life into this forgotten work.

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Zani: Sonate a Violino e Basso / Rognoni, Ensemble L'Aura Soave
MV Cremona Oct 2017
CD
$19.99

Boccherini: String Quartets Op 32 No 3-6 /Quartetto Borciani

Naxos

$19.99 Feb 01, 2002

This delightful disc presents absolutely first-rate performances of chamber music that deserves to be much better known. There are two reasons that Boccherini's music hasn't worn as well as Haydn's or Mozart's. First, his prevailing mode of gentle graciousness precludes the kind of emotional depth and drama that the two Viennese masters routinely write into their instrumental music. Second (and related to the first point), Boccherini writes marvelously varied expositions--witness the C major (Op. 32 No. 4) quartet's opening Allegro bizzarro--but uneventful developments. In short, his music isn't as well sustained or as purposeful as Haydn's or Mozart's, but it's also not as lengthy or ambitious, so within its given parameters there's some wonderful writing, and the Quartetto Borciani plays these quartets for all they're worth. In particular, they characterize the opening movements with as much gusto as the music can take. Even the initial Allegro comodo of the tepidly genial G minor quartet (Op. 32 No. 5) moves purposefully forward, while the same work's final Capriccio ad libitum captures the players (and the composer) in full fantastic flight. By contrast, slow movements are marvelously sustained and possess a genuinely Italianate singing tone--as in the heavenly and impressively large-scale Adagio from the D major quartet (Op. 32 No. 3). In sum, you won't easily hear a more persuasive case being made for this music, and Naxos' sonics are top-drawer. Come and explore! --David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

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Boccherini: String Quartets Op 32 No 3-6 /Quartetto Borciani
Naxos Feb 2002
CD
$19.99

CONCERTO & CONCERTINOS
MDG Mar 2001
CD
$24.99

Jones: Brass Quintet "Quinquifed"

Lyrita

Sheet Music

$39.99 May 03, 2024

Among his many compositions, Kenneth V. Jones wrote a concerto for string orchestra (1956), a concerto for oboe and strings (1963), The Pollock, an orchestral prelude (1963), O Light Invisible, a cantata for soprano, mixed chorus and orchestra (1963), a sonata for solo violin (1967), Dialysis, for violin and harpsichord (1973), Quaquaverse, for saxophone quartet (1979), Paean for organ (1983), three Sinfonias for orchestra, as well as piano works, song cycles, film, play and television scores and church music, including hymns and anthems. Quinquifid for Brass Quintet (1980) was written for Equale Brass, who premiered the piece in the Purcell Room on 6 December 1980. Quinquifid was first broadcast by the BBC on Radio 3 on 30 December 1981. The structure of this work is built on a notion of five sections, each linked without a break by cadenzas for each of the solo instruments. The opening movement begins with an Andante introduction flecked by flutter-tongued trumpet and moves into a more urgent Allegro section that exploits the lyrical qualities of the tuba to expressive effect. Gradually the music intensifies, building to a powerful climax, before falling away abruptly, paving the way for the next section, a brief duet for the two trumpets, marked 'Shadow Play' in the score. Light and lively, the finale offers flowing interplay between the instruments and brings the score to a confident conclusion.

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Jones: Brass Quintet "Quinquifed"
Lyrita May 2024
Sheet Music
$39.99

Bacewicz: Orchestral Works, Vol. 1 / Oramo, BBC Symphony

Chandos

SACD

$21.99 Nov 17, 2023

The three works on this album were all composed between 1943 and 1953. Despite the extreme experiences and difficulties she faced during this undoubtedly most tragic time in Poland’s history, Grazyna Bacewicz managed to compose outstanding works which constitute splendid testimony to the vibrant creative potency for which she was renowned. Until 1939 her career as a virtuoso violinist and an emerging composer evolved naturally. Trained by the best Polish pedagogues at the Warsaw Conservatory, she went on to acquire an international education thanks to an Ignacy Paderewski Scholarship, which allowed her to pursue her studies in Paris: composition with Nadia Boulanger, violin with André Touret (1932 – 33) and Carl Flesch (1934 – 35). In spite of her soloistic successes she decided to join the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra as its leader, in order that an improved knowledge and understanding of an orchestra should inform her composition. Poland then suffered terribly at the hands of Hitler and Stalin, before coming under the control of the Soviet Union. This album was recorded and released in collaboration with the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, a state cultural institution promoting Polish culture around the world and actively participating in international cultural exchange.

REVIEWS:

The Polish-born Bacewicz had trained as a violinist, but also studied composition in Paris with Nadia Boulanger...the elegant neoclassicism that Bacewicz imbibed in her lessons with Boulanger is evident in both these symphonies, though not so obviously in the extrovert Overture from 1943 also included on the disc. It’s possible to construe her style as a bridge in Polish music between Karol Szymanowski, or at least his later neoclassical works, and the Bartók-influenced modernism of Witold Lutosławski...those influences, as well as perhaps a debt to Shostakovich, too, are welded into a distinctive style that never seems derivative. Her handling of the large-scale four-movement forms is wonderfully assured, while the moments of high dissonance suggest that even in the early 1950s she was not prepared to conform to the precepts of Soviet populism as meekly as the authorities might have liked.

Certainly the drive and conviction behind these performances suggest that Oramo believes passionately in the music’s worth, and the BBCSO revels in its expert orchestration. It all promises well for subsequent instalments.

-- The Guardian

[The] third symphony’s anxiety-ridden introduction (marked Drammatico) surely reflects the mood of its times, as does the relentless drive and restlessness of the Molto allegro energico that follows, in clear sonata form. The stalking bass line that begins the following Andante brings in an incessant coloristic development where melodic figures struggle to have a fully lyrical moment, only to be interrupted by a thwacking bass drum. The basis of both scherzos is mercurial shifts of mood and color, ceaselessly restless, though sometimes playful. And how acutely the BBC players inhabit those many moods – one senses the orchestra’s conviction and enthusiasm for this music in playing that is energetic, fulsome, and highly refined.

-- The Classic Review

As recordings of Grażyna Bacewicz’s music have surfaced over the past 10 years or so, it has become obvious how unfairly neglected she was previously...Through first the suffering of the war years in Poland, then the cultural diktats of life under a Soviet Union-aligned government, Bacewicz managed to continue composing and retain her own voice. The two symphonies share a powerful, headlong drive. Given its premiere in 1952, the Symphony No 3 is the more tightly argued of the two, compressing its ideas with an internal logic that generates a fierce electric charge, with pounding energy rarely far away. The Symphony No 4, following a year later, takes up where its predecessor left off, though the scope of its musical ideas ranges somewhat more widely and the tension is less insistent. The breezy Overture, written in occupied Warsaw in 1943, is not obviously wartime music, unless its joyous energy hides some coded meaning, as in Shostakovich’s symphonies. This is music very much of its time, rolling together the intense concentration of Shostakovich with a dash of Bartók’s exploratory sound-worlds and William Walton’s show-off orchestration into a very cogent whole. The performances by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sakari Oramo, do not stint the vigorous spark of Bacewicz’s imagination.

-- The Financial Times

Oramo and the BBCSO offer an exhilarating account of this extrovert music[, the Overture].

The music [of the Symphony no. 3] is taut and full of interest; Oramo leads a powerful, athletic performance. The slow movement, an Andante, is most attractive and expressive; it features a good deal of very appealing writing for the woodwinds. The vivacious Scherzo requires – and receives – very precise articulation from the orchestra. The music is fast, lively, and often witty. In this movement, Bacewicz displays a jazzy brilliance in her writing; so much so that I was put a little in mind of Walton. The finale opens with a quiet, ominous introduction in which the low brass and tam-tam make important contributions. The main body of the movement (Allegro con passione) is often dramatic and, as I hear it, has an element of darkness. The movement is eventful and often powerful. Graźyna Bacewicz’s Third Symphony is a most interesting composition, which I’m keen to explore further. Oramo and the BBCSO do it very convincingly.

...Sakari Oramo and the BBC Symphony Orchestra have presented the works with such skill and commitment. I hope they’ll record more of this composer’s orchestral music for Chandos. When my colleagues and I sampled this SACD...we were impressed by the big, immediate sound. Further listening on my own equipment has reinforced that view. The sound has a good dynamic range and plenty of presence. Chandos has presented both the music and the performances in an ideally vivid fashion. The booklet includes an extended essay by Katarzyna Naliwajek.

-- MusicWeb International

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Bacewicz: Orchestral Works, Vol. 1 / Oramo, BBC Symphony
Chandos Nov 2023
SACD
$21.99

Beethoven: Piano Concerto No 5, Triple Concerto / Fleisher

Sony Masterworks

$17.99 Oct 27, 2009

I didn't at all take to Fleisher's account of Beethoven No. 3, but I must say that this is a most impressive and exciting account of the Emperor, aided and abetted by a wonderful accompaniment from Szell and his orchestra—and, I mustn't forget, by a most intelligently balanced recording.

Fleisher plays the first movement with splendid brio and the dash with which he gives out the opening flourishes is equalled by the orchestra's attack and energy when it starts the tutti. In one passage of brilliant semiquavers he tends to hurry very slightly, both times it comes, but in general his rhythm is excellent. There are, too, passages of most lovely liquid playing, a kind of brush of quiet sound, beautiful not only as sound but admirable in that they let woodwind solos come through without any forcing by the players. Fleisher is obviously always aware of what's going on in the orchestra and knows when he should be taking part in chamber music, rather than always holding the front of the stage. He does indulge in a wide range of speeds but not, I suppose, more than is usually done. The slow movement is played simply by both soloist and orchestra, as it should be— yet it's a difficult thing to play something so apparently simply but make it as moving as it is here.

At the very end of the movement (bar 80) you may be surprised to hear the strings play a long crotchet, arco, instead of the pizzicato to which we are all so used (which starts only at the last quaver of the bar). I asked Denis Matthews (always a mine of Beethoven information) about this and he told me he had played the concerto with Szell and was quite astonished at rehearsal when the expected 'plonk' from the strings didn't happen. Szell told him that Beethoven's autograph has the `pizz' written over the rests in the middle of the bar: and I now see that the preface in the Eulenburg miniature score states the same thing (despite which, the word is printed at the start of the bar!). This is not a trivial point, for it occurs, of course, at just about the most magical moment of the whole concerto and I do think that the long, grave, B flat from the strings is far more apt than the rather disturbing 'plonk' which emphasizes Beethoven's change from B to B flat in the wrong way.

The finale goes splendidly all through and I only don't like Fleisher's mannered playing of part of the main theme each time. I refer to the bars marked espressivo, which would appear to suggest something other than his jerky delivery of the right hand phrases. But this is a small point and there is no doubt that this is the sort of performance that will make you enjoy the music afresh, for the playing all through the concerto is both zestful and perceptive; Szell's contribution is an added source of pleasure—and the admirable engineering complements the players' artistry.

-- Gramophone [1/1966, reviewing the original LP release of the Emperor Concerto]

------------------------------

The apologies invariably made for Beethoven's Triple Concerto seem to have an effect on performances. I have rarely, if ever, known one which did not in some respect carry an apology with it, and I have rarely, if ever, known one which treated the work in the strong bravura way which makes for success in the Emperor or violin concertos. But here is just such a performance, and it makes one glory in what Beethoven did achieve in the work.

The scale of the work as conceived by Stern, Rose and Istomin is quite different from that of the rival performances on record, however enjoyable. The precision and stylishness of Schneiderhan, Fournier and Anda on DGG make for an eighteenthcentury manner in the outer movements, particularly the first. Some may well continue to prefer it, and technically the balance with the orchestra is better than on the new CBS disc, but the newly roused echoes of other Beethoven concertos place the Stern/ Rose/Istomin performance in the right period. It is after all a produce of the Fidelio years, the years which also produced the Fourth Piano Concerto, the Violin Concerto and the Symphonies Nos. 4 to 6. It is possible to regard the formalism of the outer movements, their conscientious balance of thematic statements by each of the three soloists in turn, as a return to eighteenth-century practice, but the sheer size speaks rather of a really grand manner. And if the thematic material is more bald and less striking than that in other Beethoven concertos (at least in the first movement) there was a practical need with three soloists to keep ideas short.

In achieving a sense of size Stern, Rose and Istomin reveal their own stature in the relaxation of the playing. Lesser players would either screw up the tension or become ponderous, but these three over and over again convey the joy of their playing: the relaxed lilt of the second subject, Rose's natural warmth in the slow movement enunciation, the whole of the final Rondo Polacca. Not only has the main Polacca theme tremendous verve, the middle episode, when the `yatta-tah-ta-tah-ta' rhythm emerges on horn and lower woodwind, has a unique tang of East European music. Stern obviously takes the idea of a Polacca literally and exaggerates the first beat in each dactyllic phrase, giving a real bounce to the music, and he is matched by his colleagues.

Then the semiquaver allegro reprise of the main theme towards the end is taken very fast and very clear, the result extraordinarily exciting. You have only to compare the DGG performance, very fast too and excellent in its way, to realize why Stern's, Rose's and Istomin's playing is not merely vital but great. Equally exciting are the furious florid dialogues between violin and 'cello in the passage-work of first and last movements. All three soloists are masterly in varying the tension, in shaping towards climaxes, and Ormandy draws from the Philadelphia Orchestra yet another of his really full-blooded accompaniments. In relation to the soloists the orchestra may seem a little backward, but the salient tuttis burst out with great effect, to match the scale of the soloists' playing. The nearness of the soloists does of course make it hard for them to sound as though they are playing really softly, and initial sotto voce entries in the finale are too loud.

In my detailed comparisons I have occasionally found points in which rivals score over Stern, Rose and Istomin, and the other CBS version has Serkin in marvellous form actually dominating the performance from the least prominent solo part, the non-virtuoso piano role originally devised for the Archduke Rudolf. But no minor shortcomings can alter the positive merits of what could well come to be regarded as a classic record.

-- Gramophone [10/1965, reviewing the original LP release of the Triple Concerto]

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Beethoven: Piano Concerto No 5, Triple Concerto / Fleisher
Sony Masterworks Oct 2009
CD
$17.99

Holmboe: Chamber Music (II) / Ensemble MidtVest

Dacapo Classical

$13.99 Jan 29, 2013

HOLMBOE Eco. Aspects. Sonata for Cello Solo. Quartetto Medico. Sextet • Ens MidtVest • DACAPO 8.226074 (70:28)

The music of Vagn Holmboe (1909-1996), in addition to these chamber works (of which this is Vol. 2), extends to more than 370 pieces including 13 symphonies. His music is generally described as neoclassical but operating within the parameters of an organic form of development. Holmboe described this as a process of gradual but evident change in the music “interrelated with many things that slowly seep in through a life lived with nature.” Thus his music tends to be quite serious, despite occasional moments of jocularity, but never off-putting. His earlier style was based on the music of his mentor, Carl Nielsen, then developed through years spent in the Balkans studying the folk music there.

These five works come from the latter stages of his career, the earliest of them being the Quartetto Medico of 1956. This piece was written for friends of his who were amateur musicians and professional doctors, which explains its lack of difficulty as well as the humorous titles of the movements (such as Andante medicamento, Allegro quasi febrile and the two “Intermedicos”). The wind quintet Aspects dates from 1957, but the other works are all later: the Solo Cello Sonata from 1968-69, the Sextet from 1973, and Eco from 1991.

The liner notes claim that there is a “Zen-like balance between intellect and nature” in his music, and I would concur. Oddly enough, however, I found that his slow movements were much more emotionally affecting to me than his fast ones. Either the Ensemble MidtVest doesn’t play these with enough good-humored brio, or it just isn’t in there to be brought out, but in either case I find his Allegro s to be peppy but lacking the boisterous good humor of Nielsen’s.

Of course, in the case of the solo cello sonata—played with tremendous feeling and elegance by Jonathan Slaatto—this is serious music indeed, thus the fast passages in the first movement are more in the nature of exposition and spinning out of the theme rather than an attempt at humor. Indeed, I found this to be the most interesting, and certainly the deepest, work on this disc, alternating its moods quickly but always logically. The primary key of the sonata is G Minor, but true to his proclivity for using Balkan folk music, Holmboe works primarily in modes and not in Western keys. Either Slaatto has a somewhat light and airy tone or the microphone placement makes it sound thus, but in either case I felt that the overly reverberant soundspace did not flatter the instrument in this work. That being said, there is little or nothing one can quibble of in either the work’s construction (I wonder if Holmboe was ever more mercurial in his change of moods than he is here) or its emotional impact.

Despite the overall lightness of tone (and texture) in the Quartetto Medico, this music is not really very jocular either. Rather, it floats like a cloud within the universe of Holmboe’s mind, to some extent like Debussy’s early chamber music. This is particularly true of the second “Intermedico,” marked Poco largamente , which is played by the solo pianist in a dreamy style and manner, while the finale ( Allegro con frangula ) starts with piano but is soon joined by the winds. The tempo is more of an Allegretto , not terribly fast, though the music soon doubles in speed as it swirls to a conclusion.

Holmboe’s Sextet begins with the solo cello, which is a bit deceiving, as well as in a slowish tempo that soon picks up. Again, the music is slightly jocular but not really humorous, yet as in the case of all his music it makes a good impression. The Andante cantabile second movement seems to suspend time and place as the music simply hangs above one’s ears while listening, while the final Allegro molto coalesces musical moods into a typically quirky finale.

If this disc is your introduction to Holmboe’s musical world, as it was for me, I think you’ll be intrigued and charmed by it. If you haven’t gotten around to Holmboe’s chamber works but like his other music, this one is a must.

FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

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Holmboe: Chamber Music (II) / Ensemble MidtVest
Dacapo Classical Jan 2013
CD
$13.99

Out Of The Question

SteepleChase

$22.99 May 15, 2024

Already on her 2015 leader debut album (Lonely City SCCD 33118) Allegra Levy age 24 at the time was the complete artist equipped with prowess as singer-song writer of unique quality. On this fifth release Allegra compiles another intriguing concept album asking and answering all kinds of questions about life backed by all-female powerhouse quartet. “Throughout, Levy’s distinctive warm cool vide – equal part Junie London and Chris Conner – and flawless articulation shine brilliantly through.” Christopher Loudon of JazzTimes commented on Levy’s other concept album Looking At The Moon (SCCD 31852) selected as Editor’s Pick by JazzTimes. Allegra Levy is a recipient of several prominent awards as performer and composer.

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Out Of The Question
SteepleChase May 2024
CD
$22.99

Haydn: Keyboard Trios, Vol. 6 / Aquinas Piano Trio

Naxos

$9.99 ~~$19.99~~ Save 50% May 13, 2022

Haydn’s 30 Piano Trios were written at a time when the harpsichord was being replaced by the pianoforte and when a parallel change saw the emergence of sonata-allegro form. His earliest trios, such as the Trio in F major, Hob. XV: 40, were also known as Divertimentos or Partitas, whilst the Trio in G major, Hob. XV: 15, was part of a group that offers the performer the alternative scoring of flute over the more usual violin. They reflect the airy and nimble qualities that grace all of Haydn’s works in the genre.

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Haydn: Keyboard Trios, Vol. 6 / Aquinas Piano Trio
Naxos May 2022
CD
~~$19.99~~ $9.99

Italian Oboe Concertos - Platti, Salieri, Rosetti, Besozzi

Naxos

$19.99 Jan 01, 2002

Whether or not the oboe's your thing, this recording promises baroque/classical-period concerto fans a solid hour of pleasant listening. The exceptional quality of the opening G minor work by 18th-century composer Giovanni Platti rewards multiple hearings for its splendid, agile melodies, flowing rhythmic style, and, most of all, it's exquisitely lovely slow-movement solo lines. Oboist Anthony Camden, a soloist of vast experience and well-deserved acclaim, lavishes care and artful expression on this and all the other works on the program, enhancing even the less-illustrious works--the relatively routine if still agreeable Salieri and Rosetti pieces--with his facile technique and eloquent articulation. His tone is at once warm and tangy, very easy on the ear, and, as a singer with a text, he effectively alters its quality as the music suggests. Equal in interest to the Platti is the concerto by Carlo Besozzi (1738-c. 1798), a piece that offers the soloist some wonderful virtuoso challenges, highlighted by an exciting cadenza in the opening Allegro and fancy passagework in the concluding Allegretto. Camden is partnered by an excellent and responsive City of London Sinfonia, sympathetically directed by Nicholas Ward. The sound is appropriately full-bodied with a touch of brightness that serves the music and solo instrument well. --David Vernier, ClassicsToday.com

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Italian Oboe Concertos - Platti, Salieri, Rosetti, Besozzi
Naxos Jan 2002
CD
$19.99

Romantic Viola Sonatas / Togawa, Grigoryan

Naxos

$13.99 ~~$19.99~~ Save 30% Jan 12, 2018

These three works together constitute an attractive and generous programme. All three are little known although all have been recorded, if not necessarily on particularly high profile releases. There is not an abundance of chamber works involving solo viola and this disc certainly adds to our understanding of how a repertoire for the instrument emerged during the early years of what we now regard as the Romantic era. It also introduces a young recitalist who plays with an assured technique and no little passion. She is the German-born and trained violist Hiyoli Togawa who also has Japanese and Australian roots. Her well-matched accompanist is the Armenian Lilit Grigoryan. There is an interesting and rather confessional interview with Ms Togawa on the Naxos website in which she explains the appeal of these pieces and her philosophy in terms of their performance. To cut to the chase she characterises the works pithily as follows: “Onslow’s sonata reflects …..cheerfulness as well. …..Onslow’s sonata has nothing of Kalliwoda’s dreaminess nor does it have the deep seriousness of Mendelssohn’s sonata.”

Onslow’s Sonata is in fact his own transcription for viola of the first of his three Cello Sonatas Op 16. I have previously expressed enthusiasm for Onslow on this site, and this interesting sonata proves as imaginatively conceived and executed as his String Quintets which are currently being recorded by the Elan Quintet and released systematically by Naxos. While this sonata is not especially earth-shattering it is unusually democratic as the instrumental protagonists are clearly treated as equal collaborators. The opening Allegro is pleasing enough, amiable if rather conventional. The work’s true heart and highlight is the gorgeous Andante. It is odd how individual movements in Onslow’s large and unfamiliar output sometimes make one stop in one’s tracks. Such is the case with this limpid and tender Andante where violist and pianist demonstrate a deeply intuitive sympathy. Onslow’s stylistic influences tended to be Beethoven and Schubert but this early work hasn’t fully absorbed the spirit of these Romantic giants and I find there is something rather Gallic about it. Focusing on Grigoryan’s restrained accompaniment it’s possible to perceive something of French music’s future; it has a weirdly wistful and melancholic Faurean hue. The final Allegretto is contrastingly light as air and full of a youthful joie de vivre. It’s enjoyable, delightfully played and cleanly recorded.

There follows a rare outing for Mendelssohn’s Viola Sonata. I can hear some readers reacting with surprise – “Mendelssohn wrote a Viola Sonata??” Not only A viola sonata. In terms of the viola as we know it, ie not the viola d’amore, my research has thus far failed to turn up an earlier example of this form. (I’m sure somebody reading this will be far better informed….) It dates from 1824 when Mendelssohn was in teenage prodigy mode, although it has no opus number and wasn’t in fact published until 1966. It’s a dark inspiration and it nails its colours to the mast from the first bar of the opening Adagio-Allegro. Its gloomy countenance is tackled with great restraint by Hiyoli Tagowa as if to emphasise the contrast with the more conventional Allegro section which follows although this is not without its own moments of introspection (an 1820s example of teenage angst?). The melodic lines are unusually chromatic. The way the music simply fades at the conclusion of this movement is most novel, and beautifully managed by both players. Indeed the entire work is full of original touches and consequently its relative neglect is puzzling to me. It is scarcely believable that this sonata, with its unusual but utterly convincing structure and especially the brooding darkness of its melodic content could possibly have been produced by a boy of 15. The following Menuetto-Allegro molto will be familiar to anyone on nodding terms with Mendelssohn’s First Symphony (also in C minor) which followed soon after the sonata in March 1824 as it was reworked as the symphony’s third movement. The ensemble between the two players is again outstanding, the instruments have been very closely recorded but this doesn’t detract from the overall sound, which is truthful but never excessively so. The finale is more typically Mendelssohnian and employs his beloved variation form, though the final Allegro forms a kind of independent coda to the whole work, and sort of acts as a counterweight for the first movement fade-out. Another truly individual touch is the piano solo which dominates the final variation. This is lovingly played by Lilit Grigoryan who truly makes the most of her moment. It also underlines the fact that just as in the Onslow work, piano and viola are equals here. While this sonata is not necessarily a masterpiece of Octet proportions the viola repertoire is hardly overflowing and Mendelssohn’s early contribution to the form should surely be better known. It seems the most significant rival to this new recording is the one by Paul Coletti and Leslie Howard on a Hyperion disc from 1998 (CDA 66946), but this is a superlative account from Togawa and Grigoryan, the highlight of the disc for me.

It concludes with the equally unfamiliar set of Six Nocturnes Op 186 by the prolific Johann Kalliwoda, born in Prague in 1801. The notes tell us that these little pieces were among the works that kept his name alive at the start of the twentieth century, not least because they could be used for intimate family chamber performances. Nor do they appear to fulfil the stereotype of the ‘nocturne’ in the sense that the set alternates between slow and fast pieces. The fact that they were written a generation later than the Onslow and Mendelssohn works is reflected in a style that occasionally brings Schumann to mind, most notably in the last of the group which opens with a notably dark and chromatic flourish. Togawa most certainly does not hold back here, and the close microphones capture her 1749 Testore viola in really vivid sound which actually suits these brief and closely argued pieces admirably.

This is a terrific disc. My concern is that issues with generic titles like ‘Romantic Viola Sonatas’ often get overlooked by the record-buying public. I hope this review provides readers with the necessary encouragement to acquire it. It showcases another deeply impressive young violist (I was fortunate to be asked to review Ellen Nisbeth’s superb BIS disc of English repertoire late last year) doing her bit for the instrument. She also has the benefit of a sympathetic and generous accompanist and a warm, if close recording. While the Mendelssohn work is a standout, its companions here are far from makeweights.

– MusicWeb International (Richard Hanlon)

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Romantic Viola Sonatas / Togawa, Grigoryan
Naxos Jan 2018
CD
~~$19.99~~ $13.99

FANDANGO

HERB ALPERT PRESENTS

$13.99 Sep 09, 2016

FANDANGO - Released 20 years after the Latin-inspired "The Lonely Bull", this album marks a return to a Hispanic sound. Alpert had wanted to do something to commemorate the 20th anniversary of his first hit, so he traveled to Mexico and made a recording intended solely for the Latin-American market. However, his interest was kindled by the diversity and quality of the local musicians, and he decided to record an entire album there. Additionally, research revealed that his hit "Rise" had not made an impact on his Tijuana Brass fanbase, and he wanted an album that bridged the gap between his more contemporary sound and his previous mariachi-influenced style. Remastered from the original analog tape mixes and presented with their original, iconic artwork!

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FANDANGO
HERB ALPERT PRESENTS Sep 2016
CD
$13.99

Brahms: Symphony No 4, Hungarian Dances / Alsop, London PO

Naxos

$19.99 Sep 25, 2007

Top Brahms!

Here it is: the final release in the set of Brahms symphonies from Marin Alsop with the London Philharmonic. Previous reviews have praised just about every aspect of this new Naxos cycle, and while I admit to arriving somewhat late on the scene I have to admit that all expectations are realised.

So that you know where I’m coming from, my formative introduction to the symphonies of Brahms came with the 1983 live cycle on DG with Leonard Bernstein and the Vienna Philharmonic. The influence of those initial impressions of intensity and edgy freedom of expression are of course hard to shake, but there is always more than one way to skin a great piece of music, and later on I was as likely to be found settling down with a good book and Herbert von Karajan’s 1989 recordings with the Berlin Philharmonic. Other versions have passed my way as well – Günter Wand’s 2001 RCA cycle with the North German Radio Symphony Orchestra for instance, and those lovely old Bruno Walter recordings with the Columbia Symphony Orchestra now on Sony, which still sound surprisingly good given their vintage.

If done properly, Brahms’s symphonic writing means that you will have read the same page a multitude of times in that ‘good book’ you have in your hand while listening. The content and meaning of the words will remain as obscure as at the first attempt as your ears and attention are absorbed and enthralled by the lush musical garden that gradually unfolds through your loudspeakers, or in my case headphones. With Alsop and the LPO you might as well give up on reading at all, and give yourself over to a feast of wonderful music-making.

Marin Alsop’s tempi are measured and sustained in what seems to me an ideal way in this symphony. The first movement seems at first urbane and restrained, but the ceiling is set high, and there is plenty of room for bite and drama in the music – never hurried or unstable, but with a gloss of perfect preparation which seems to allow the listener to plunge directly and deeply into Brahms’s inspired vision. The same is true of the second Andante moderato movement, in which the winds initially shine with lush resonance. Intonation is crucial here, and the LSO’s wind and brass are spot on – playing as one. The timing and anticipation is beautifully measured in advance of the ‘big tune’ at 8:55, which is turned out here without histrionics, but as a noble and almost infinite field of sound – a bounteous source for a composer like Elgar, whose own ‘Enigma’ variations spring immediately to mind.

A lightness of touch is required of the third movement’s Allegro giocoso, and Alsop blows away any cobwebs which may have gathered in a sweep of freshness. There’s a slightly anticipatory rhythm at 4:23 caused by an edit, but this will hopefully only be noticeable to fully trained and overly picky reviewers. The final movement brings back the measured, sustained feel of the first, but with that extra turbulence, and those quicksilver touches of detail in the orchestration pointed subtly and superbly by all concerned in this recording. I was wondering if that slow central section wasn’t just a little too slow and lingering, but the re-entry of the full orchestra at around 6:00 is made all the more magical for being delayed for that extra few ounces of ‘down-time’, and the final run builds in intensity to create a fully satisfying close.

The Hungarian Dances presented here are the ‘leftovers’ from Brahms’s own orchestrations of nos. 1, 3 and 10, covered in volume 2 of this series. The dances here have been newly orchestrated by Peter Breiner in an imaginative commission from Naxos especially for this recording. Breiner’s versions respect Brahms’s orchestral resonances for the most part, but inject quite a bit of extra jazzy impact and violinistic Hungarian idiom, emphasising some of those seriously fun syncopations with extra percussion and brass. There is a danger of creating a set of little P.D.Q. Bach monsters here, but with the essence of Brahms’s ideas held largely intact I admire the way Breiner has stretched these pieces just enough to make them into genuine orchestral showpieces, without turning the smiles they bring into disrespectful guffaws.

I think the way is clear – I simply must have the rest of this set.

-- Dominy Clements, MusicWeb International

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Brahms: Symphony No 4, Hungarian Dances / Alsop, London PO
Naxos Sep 2007
CD
$19.99

Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Music for Violin & Orchestra / Tianwa Yang, de Boer, SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg

Naxos

$19.99 Feb 10, 2015

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco considered the 1924 Concerto Italiano to be his first truly symphonic venture. This tuneful, fresh and transparently scored concerto here receives its world première recording. It was admired by the great violinist Jascha Heifetz, for whom the composer wrote his Concerto No. 2 ‘I Profeti’ (The Prophets), an impassioned work ‘of biblical character and inspiration’ with an almost cinematic sweep. The recipient of the coveted Echo Klassik award for her album of Mendelssohn’s two Violin Concertos [8.572662], Tianwa Yang is widely recognized as one of the outstanding rising stars on the world classical music scene.

REVIEWS:

This recording of Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s early (1924) Concerto Italiano purports to be a world premiere, and while you can never really tell these days, this is certainly the first time that I have seen the work on disc. It’s very enjoyable, and very Italian–in a good way. The thematic material has character, even in the long opening Allegro moderato e maestoso, while the central Arioso sets the seal on the music’s Italianate lyricism. Yang plays the work very confidently; she has no technical limitations at all, and she captures the warmth of those romantic tunes with unfailing aplomb. Certainly she deserves credit for learning a big, unfamiliar piece that she’ll probably never be asked to play in concert.

The Concerto Italiano also makes ideal sense as the coupling to the slightly better known Violin Concerto No. 2 “I Profeti” (“The Prophets”). Composed in 1931, it was taken up by Heifetz, no less, who made a stunning recording that has popped up in various incarnations (coupled to the Walton Concerto on Naxos Historical). The modern reference version has been Perlman’s hard to find outing with Mehta and the Israel Philharmonic on EMI, in tandem with Ben-Haim’s Violin Concerto. The piece is interesting in that it really does sound like a (good) soundtrack to a Hollywood bible epic, although it predates both the genre and the composer’s American period by more than half a decade. If you like, say, Respighi’s exotic tone poems or Bloch’s Schelomo, then you’ll enjoy this well-wrought and colorful work similarly.

Again, Tianwa Yang plays with unflagging gusto and, in music that can turn kitschy, taste. Now is usually the time we get to say something condescending, like “She’s no Heifetz, or Perlman,” but the truth is that she doesn’t suffer at all from the comparison. She’s an excellent artist, one whose musicality and passion speak for themselves, and she can hold her own against anyone. The only caveat stems from the proficient but somewhat too polite accompaniments provided by the SWR ensemble under Pieter-Jelle de Boer, as well as the less than glittering sonics. Not bad, mind you, and probably as good as we have right to expect for such rare repertoire, but it could have been better still. If you don’t know this music, you should hear this.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

The Concerto Italiano is not the breezy, pseudo-Victorian piece that its title might suggest; indeed, it is rather a melancholic work. I profeti is a rather more lively and colorful work, its glittering, singing lines certainly bring a resonant response both from soloist Tianwa Yang and the SWR Symphony Orchestra.

-- Gramophone

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Castelnuovo-Tedesco: Music for Violin & Orchestra / Tianwa Yang, de Boer, SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg
Naxos Feb 2015
CD
$19.99