All Reviews articles – Page 218
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ArticleBridge: String Sextet in E flat major. Korngold: String Sextet in D major op.10
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: ConcertanteComposer: Bridge, Korngold Composed in 1912, Bridge’s three-movement E flat major Sextet shows an effortless grasp of Straussian chromatic harmony, with typically expert writing for the viola, and a formal control that makes light of the structural ...
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Article
Bach: Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin BWV1001–6, Partita for Solo Flute BWV1013 (arr. viola)
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Scott Slapin (viola)Composer: Bach American violist Scott Slapin’s second recording of Bach’s solo sonatas and partitas features big-boned Bach playing. He uses a modern ‘cut-away’ viola by Hiroshi Lizuka, which is given a warmly vivid personality in this resonant recording. ...
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ArticleJ.S. Bach's Suites for solo cello BWV1007–12
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: David Kenedy (cello)Composer: Bach Having been inspired to take up the cello through listening to Casals’s recordings of the Bach suites, it’s perhaps inevitable that David Kenedy, a pupil of Aldo Parisot and Boris Pergamenschikow, should have approached ...
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ArticleDvorák: String Quartet in A flat major op.105, Piano Quintet in A major op.81
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Psophos Quartet, Dana Ciocarlie (piano) Composer: DvorákThe Psophos continues on its inconsistent path with this CD, which contains one good performance and one that has sorely tried my patience. The adorable A flat Quartet opens with a ...
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ArticleShostakovich: String Quartets nos.6, 8 & 11
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Jerusalem Quartet Composer: ShostakovichThis disc makes me regret that I have not heard the Jerusalem’s first disc of Shostakovich quartets, with nos.1, 4 and 9. If we are to have yet another cycle of all 15, it should ...
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ArticleBernstein: Serenade. Weill: Violin Concerto op.12
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Régis Pasquier (violin) Picardy Orchestra, Edmon Colomer (conductor)Composer: Bernstein, WeillScored for solo violin, string orchestra, harp and percussion, Bernstein’s five-movement Serenade is typically loaded with extra-musical meaning – in this case five Greek philosopher–poets as featured in Plato’s Symposium, who ...
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ArticleMendelssohn: String Quartets in A minor op.13 & in F minor op.80, Four Pieces op.81
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Elias QuartetComposer: Mendelssohn The Elias Quartet gives fully committed accounts of Mendelssohn’s two most impassioned and adventurous quartets, combining commendable musical intelligence with youthful élan, tenderness and fantasy. Following the poise of the A minor Quartet’s thoughtful, song-based ...
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ArticleGórecki: String Quartet no.3 ‘… songs are sung’
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Kronos Quartet Composer: GóreckiWhere do you go after writing a best-selling Symphony of Sorrowful Songs? Write a quartet of sorrowful songs, it appears. The subtitle is from a poem by the Russian Velimir Khlebnikov: ‘When people die/songs are ...
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ArticleMozetich: Affairs of the Heart. Langer: Platch. Schnittke: Concerto for Three. Bennett: Sometimes it Rains
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Roman Mints (violin) Maxim Rysanov (viola) Kristine Blaumane (cello) West Kazakhstan Philharmonic Orchestra, Mikel Toms (conductor)Composer: Mozetich, Langer, Schnittke, Bennett Affairs of the Heart is a 23-minute violin concerto by the Slovenian-born Canadian composer Marjan Mozetich, much inspired by ...
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ArticleInfluencias. Ravel: String Quartet. ToldrÁ : Vistes al mar. Turina: Oración del torero
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Casals QuartetComposer: Ravel, ToldrÁ , TurinaIt was as a violinist and founder of the Spanish Renacimiento Quartet that the composer Eduard Toldrà was best known. The title was symbolic, for Toldrà (1895–1962) was identified with the Renaixença (‘Renaissance’): a Modernist movement spurring ...
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ArticleThe Oregon String Quartet and all that Jazz. Works by Glinsky, Lee, Steinhardt, Baker & Gearhart
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Oregon Quartet, Diane Monroe (jazz violin)Composer: Glinsky, Lee, Steinhardt, Baker & Gearhart The Oregon Quartet’s mission here was to unearth recent jazz- and rock-oriented chamber music for the contemporary audience. The selection of pieces varies in scope as well ...
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ArticleAngele Dubeau - Solo. Works by Piazzolla, Ridout, Locatelli, Enescu, Glick, Brubeck & Campagnoli
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Angele Dubeau (violin) Blair Williams (narrator) Pierre Lebeau (narrator)Composer: Piazzolla, Ridout, Locatelli, Enescu, Glick, Brubeck & Campagnoli After 30 years of giving concerts, violinist Angele Dubeau, something of a household name in her native Canada, has compiled this eclectic programme ...
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ArticleViola VoilÁ . Works by Schubert, Drigo, Vieuxtemps, Cage, Stravinsky, Apituley, Fauré & Piazzolla
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Esther Apituley (viola) Rië Tanaka (piano) Eric Calmes (electric bass) Hans Dagelet (trumpet) Amsterdam Viola QuartetComposer: Schubert, Drigo, Vieuxtemps, Cage, Stravinsky, Apituley, Fauré & Piazzolla This is the second CD by the enterprising Esther Apituley, following Violent Viola (released in 2005). Now ...
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ArticleEttore Causa. Works by Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Granados, Chopin, Saint-Saëns, Scriabin, Prokofiev, Debussy, Rachmaninoff, Schumann, Fauré, Mendelssohn & Ysaÿe
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Ettore Causa (viola) Ulrich Staerk (piano)Composer: Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Granados, Chopin, Saint-Saëns, Scriabin, Prokofiev, Debussy, Rachmaninoff, Schumann, Fauré, Mendelssohn & Ysaÿe The viola world may not be awash with compositions, but I feel cheated when the debut disc from an ...
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ArticleSchoenberg: Verklärte Nacht. Strauss: Metamorphosen, Sextet from Capriccio
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Concertante Chamber PlayersComposer: Schoenberg, StraussThis is an attractive disc from one of the most enterprising chamber groups to emerge from America over the past decade. The performances, if slightly mixed, feel fresh, committed and versatile, and the programme, bringing together three 20th-century ...
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ArticleRomance. Works by Glazunov, Saint-Saëns, Dvorák, Tchaikovsky, Lalo & Casals
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Han-Na Chang (cello) Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia Orchestra, Antonio Pappano (conductor)Composer: Glazunov, Saint-Saëns, Dvorák, Tchaikovsky, Lalo & Casals After two weighty releases of mainstream repertoire by Shostakovich and Prokofiev, Korean–American star Han-Na Chang, now in ...
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ArticleBloch: Baal Shem Suite, Suite hébraïque, Suites nos.1 & 2 for solo violin. Ben-Haim: Violin Sonata in G minor, Berceuse sfradite, Improvisation and Dance
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Hagai Shaham (violin) Arnon Erez (piano)Composer: Bloch, Ben-Haim Bloch’s music invariably builds out of extreme contrasts: one minute quietly meditative, the next devotedly impassioned. He is not a composer particularly given to light touches or major-key frivolity ...
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Article
Enescu: Complete works for violin and piano vol.1: Violin Sonata in A minor ‘Torso’, Violin Sonata no. 2 in F minor, Impressions d’enfance op.28
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Remus Azoitei (violin) Eduard Stan (piano) Composer: EnescuEnescu’s three sonatas are high-water marks of turn-of-the-20th-century violin literature, not least because Enescu, friend to Ysaÿe and teacher of Menuhin, was one of the finest virtuosos of his day, acclaimed in Vienna and ...
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ArticleHandel: Recorder Sonatas op.1 nos.2, 4, 7, 9 & 11, Sonata in B flat major HWV377 (transcr. Gibley)
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Tatty Theo (cello) Carolyn Gibley (harpsichord) Composer: HandelTaking as her precedent the arrangements made by Baroque composers to maximise income from their compositions, Carolyn Gibley has transcribed six of Handel’s sonatas for recorder and continuo to form cello ...
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ArticleKarlowicz: Violin Concerto in A major op.8. Szymanowski: Violin Concerto no.1
The Strad Issue: January 2007Musicians: Piotr Plawner (violin) Zielona Góra Philharmonic Orchestra, Czeslaw Grabowski (conductor)Composer: Karlowicz, SzymanowskiWhile many musicians were making the pilgrimage to Paris in the early 1900s, Szymanowski studied the folk music of his native Polish Tatra mountains, enthusing that ‘each man must go to ...
