Classical CDs
graham.rickson
Eyvind Alnæs: Piano Concerto & Symphony Håvard Gimse (piano), Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra/Eivind Aadland (Lawo Classics)Eyvind Alnæs’s C Minor Symphony, written in 1897 after his return to Norway from studying in Leipzig, hints at great things, a contemporary Norwegian critic writing that “one must hope that the composer may live under such conditions that he may reap the rewards of his talent, rather than having to bury it into everyday toil and trouble.” You suspect that this handsomely crafted large-scale work appeared just a decade or so late, unable to compete with the sonic thrills Read more ...
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Bach: Solo Sonatas and Partitas Jeroen de Groot (JDG Records)Dutch violinist Jeroen de Groot recalls watching footage of Glenn Gould playing Bach's Goldberg Variations as a teenager, amazed by the brazen idiosyncrasies of Gould's pianism (“That night Gould showed me the way to Bach, and to myself”). Though Gouldian wilfulness isn't a destabilising influence on de Groot’s interpretations of Bach’s solo violin output. There's a very smart, shrewd musical intelligence at work here, de Groot's playing reflecting his lessons with the great Hungarian violinist Sándor Végh and showing a shrewd Read more ...
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Telemann Fantasias for solo violin Aisha Orazbayeva (violin) (Prah Recordings)Telemann, too readily dismissed as a plodding hack, gets a radical makeover here; the tracklisting makes it seem as if Aisha Orazbayeva is giving us six of the composer’s solo violin fantasias. Almost; the music’s all there in essence, though sometimes “in versions marked by the distortion and fragmentation of the material through the use of contemporary violin techniques.” The acoustic of a rural Suffolk church also plays a key role, the album’s opening track being a three-minute slice of soothing background Read more ...
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Prokofiev: Piano Sonatas 2, 6 and 8 Alexander Melnikov (Harmonia Mundi)These three sonatas provide a neat overview of Prokofiev’s compositional career, 1912’s No 2 blending heady romanticism with smiling, percussive modernism. I’d not realised how much of the last movement sounds like Rachmaninov’s late Paganini Rhapsody. Alexander Melnikov’s lightness of touch is dazzling, and the same movement demonstrates exactly why he’s so impressive, the swift, furious opening followed by melting lyricism barely 90 seconds later. Melnikov handles both extremes with equal aplomb, and you’re left Read more ...
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Beethoven: Piano Sonatas Op.110 and Op.111, with music by András Szöllösy and Gyula Csapó Gábor Csalog (piano) (BMC)Two Beethoven sonatas coupled with shorter pieces by a pair of contemporary Hungarian composers makes for an engaging mixture. Gabór Csalog’s disc feels very much like a single live performance, though the individual items were taped at separate recitals. Beethoven’s momumental late sonatas draw on many influences, from naïve folksong to baroque counterpoint. András Szöllösy’s Paesaggio con morti also fuses multiple elements, a sober chorale theme restated between music of Read more ...
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Ghedini: Orchestral Music Orchestra della Toscana/Daniele Rustione (Sony)Yet more music you’ve never heard by a composer who really should be better known. Giorgio Federico Ghedini (1892-1965) wrote an opera based on Melville’s Billy Budd several years before Britten, and revered Bartók, Hindemith and Stravinsky. He admired Schoenberg, though believed that, “through personal experience… it is possible to find and develop a series of 12 sounds that are purely tonal sounds, or with a sense of tonal affirmation.” Ghedini was fascinated by the music of the Italian Renaissance, transcribing Read more ...
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Brahms: Symphonies 3 and 4 NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester/Thomas Hengelbrock (Sony)Brahms’s name is tucked away in disappointingly smallish print on this disc’s imposing cover. In case you’ve missed it, there’s a glitzy new concert hall in the composer’s home city of Hamburg, and this release gives us the first official recording made there. It inevitably sets one thinking about the pros and cons of new halls, and the benefits they bring versus the squillions they cost to build. Does London need a new one? No, it doesn’t – the same money would be surely be better spent on music education in Read more ...
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Debussy: Images, Jeux, La plus que lente San Francisco Symphony/Michael Tilson Thomas (SFS Media)Debussy’s tennis-themed Jeux would surely have made a bigger splash had its 1913 premiere not been overshadowed by a certain Stravinsky premiere. This is a real grower of a piece, a tennis-themed ballet given music of supernatural delicacy and subtlety. Jeux is an otherworldly score, one of its mysteries being that it can sound like a new piece on each hearing. I’ve never heard the piece so well performed as it is here, Debussy’s shades and half-lights painted with incredible skill by Michael Read more ...
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Miloslav Kabeláč: Complete Symphonies Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra/Marko Ivanović (Supraphon)Finding an imposing cycle of eight symphonies by a 20th century composer you’ve never heard of is an event. There’s precious little of Miloslav Kabeláč’s music presently available on disc, making this release a must-hear. His was a singularly unlucky life: born in 1908, he rose to prominence as a composer in the late 1930s, gaining a senior post at Prague Radio. Having a Jewish wife, Kabeláč resigned from the role soon after the German occupation, his music officially deemed unperformable as a Read more ...
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Strauss: Suites from Elektra and Der Rosenkavalier Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra/Manfred Honeck (Reference Recordings)Manfred Honeck’s extended slice of Richard Strauss's Elektra was made in collaboration with the Czech composer Tomáš Ille, Honeck’s inspiration being performances he’d played in with Claudio Abbado with Vienna State Opera in the 1980s. The results are thoroughly absorbing, the joins seamless. We’re used to thinking of Elektra as one of Strauss’s most extreme works, but here it resembles an extravagantly lush symphonic poem. We get a very convincing taste of the full opera, Read more ...
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Gavin Higgins: Dark Arteries and other works Tredegar Town Band/Ian Porthouse (Tredegar Town Band)The heavy industries associated with British brass bands may be close to extinction, so it’s reassuring to encounter evidence that so many of them are in rude musical health. Ignore brass bands at your peril; recent years have seen schemes such as El Sistema and Stirling’s Big Noise rightly lauded, but the likes of composer Gavin Higgins point out that brass bands have been performing a similar role for centuries in the UK. Raised in the Forest of Dean, he jokes that he “practically came Read more ...
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Aubade – Music by Fauré and Poulenc Västerås Sinfonietta/Howard Shelley (piano and conductor) (dB Productions)January blues? Those afflicted should self-medicate with this collection instead of nipping down to the nearest off-licence. Nothing cheers me up quite like an invigorating blast of Poulenc’s music. Which isn’t to imply that he’s all breezy insouciance. Skilled Poulencians know how to handle the darker corners. Howard Shelley understands exactly how this music should go, and he’s helped by joyous, alert playing from Sweden’s Västerås Sinfonietta. Poulenc’s sweet-natured Sinfonietta, a Read more ...