Reviews – Page 171
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ArticleEncores: as performed by Pablo Casals. Works by Popper, Debussy, Godard, Chopin, Sgambati, Lassen, Fauré, Wagner, Elgar, Boccherini, Falla, MacDowell, Granados, Kreisler, Saint-Saëns & Trad.
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2011Description: A disc of encores that makes an appealing recital in its own rightMusicians: Alban Gerhardt (cello) Cecile Licad (piano)Composer: Popper, Debussy, Godard, Chopin, Sgambati, Lassen, Fauré, Wagner, Elgar, Boccherini, Falla, MacDowell, Granados, Kreisler, Saint-Saëns & TradTo compile this disc, Alban ...
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ArticleForays. Franck: Violin Sonata in A major. Vaughan Williams: Six Studies in English Folksong. Schubert: Arpeggione Sonata in A minor
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Mixed results from double bass transcriptions of works ‘stolen’ from other string instrumentsMusicians: Craig Butterfield (double bass) Charles Fugo (piano)Composer: Franck, Vaughan Williams, SchubertBassist Craig Butterfield describes his disc as an excusable ‘act of musical thievery’. His instrument sings with eloquence in ...
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ArticleFux: Partite a 3
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Vivacious performances of cosmopolitan late 17th-century partitasMusicians: Ars Antiqua Austria/Gunar Letzbor (violin)Composer: Fux Gunar Letzbor’s ensemble is a persuasive advocate of Fux’s partitas, the movements of which range from dances to complete ouvertures and combine the expressive and the ...
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ArticleAdams: String Quartet, Son of Chamber Symphony
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2011Description: An authoritative account of John Adams latest contribution to the quartet mediumMusicians: St Lawrence Quartet, International Contemporary Ensemble/John AdamsComposer: AdamsJohn Adams has made a number of excursions into the string quartet medium, but this 2008 work is the first to ...
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ArticleKurtág: Signs, Games and Messages; Szorongòs es vigasztalòs H.J.-nek; Illés Arpadné emlékére; Mesto, lacrimoso; Misterioso – altero
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Faithfully achieved accounts of music by a master miniaturistMusicians: Maurizio Barbetti (viola)Composer: Kurtág Signs, Games and Messages is a continuing series of isolated movements written during the past half century – and continually revised – by that post-Webernian miniaturist György Kurtág (b.1926). ...
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ArticleMendelssohn: Cello Sonatas no.1 in B flat major op.45 & no.2 in D major op.58, Variations concertantes op.17, Romance sans paroles op.109
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Spirited Mendelssohn from a consummate cellistMusicians: Colin Carr (cello) Thomas Sauer (piano)Composer: MendelssohnAny disc by Colin Carr is an event, and Cello Classics is to be congratulated on getting him and Thomas Sauer into the studio, soon after the British ...
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ArticleOn Cold Mountain: Songs on Poems by Gary Snyder. Whelden: Cold Mountain Songs. Frith: For Nothing. Morris: The Bubble of a Heart. Mathieu: For All
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Baroque meets contemporary in four works for voice and stringsMusicians: Karen Clark (contralto) Galax QuartetComposer: Whelden, Frith, Morris, MathieuThis promising disc represents a collision of ideas, containing settings of verse by the US Beat poet Gary Snyder for the unusual combination of ...
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ArticleProkofiev: Violin concertos no.1 in D major op.19 & no.2 in G minor op.63, Sonata in C major for two violins op.56*
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Indianapolis prizewinner Pavel Berman brings freshness and eloquence to ProkofievMusicians: Pavel Berman, Anna Tifu* (violin) Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana/Andrey BoreykoComposer: ProkofievWhen compared with, say, Itzhak Perlman’s EMI coupling with Gennadi Rozhdestvensky or Isaac Stern’s Sony classic with Eugene Ormandy, the natural perspectives ...
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ArticleVenezia. Rosenmüller/Legrenzi/Stradella Sonatas
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: An enjoyable disc homing in on three composers working in Venice c.1677Musicians: Rare Fruits Council/Manfredo Kraemer (violin)Composer: Rosenmüller/Legrenzi/StradellaManfredo Kraemer and colleagues focus on the late 17th-century Venetian sonata with a selection of works by Stradella, Legrenzi and Rosenmüller. Their sense of style ...
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ArticleBeyond Tradition
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: A worthwhile introduction to the folk styles of eastern EuropeMusicians: Bohemian QuartetComposer: Trad Based in Rhode Island, the Bohemian Quartet ( violin, viola, cello and bass) specialises in gypsy music of central and eastern Europe. Although it takes its name ...
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ArticleBliss: Violin Sonata. Walford Davies: Violin Sonata in A major. Bowen: Violin Sonata in E minor op.112
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Welcome recordings of three rare British violin sonatasMusicians: Robert Luck (violin) Matthew Rickard (piano)Composer: Bliss, Walford Davies, BowenWhen Robert Luck examined the manuscript of Arthur Bliss’s unpublished Violin Sonata in the Cambridge University Library he found that it had three pages crossed ...
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ArticleBeethoven: String Quartets in D major op.18 no.3, A major op.18 no.5 & F major op.135
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: The Artemis Quartet brings a deft touch to the last instalment of its Beethoven quartet cycleMusicians: Artemis QuartetComposer: BeethovenThere are times when one wishes Beethoven had given his lyrical impulse freer rein, as at the start of the enchanting opening movement of ...
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ArticleBeethoven: String Quartets op.59 nos.1-3 ‘Rasumovsky’, String Quintet in C major op.29
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Raw-edged Beethoven from players brought up in the period-instrument worldMusicians: Kuijken Quartet, Marleen Thiers (viola)Composer: BeethovenThis set combines the dynastic Kuijken ensemble’s 2006 recordings of op.59 no.3 and op.29 with newly available 2009 accounts of opp.59/1 and 59/2. Historically informed performance is ...
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ArticleBrahms: Cello Sonatas no.1 in E minor op.38 & no.2 in F major op.99, ‘F-A-E’ Scherzo (arr. Bailey), Lieder arrangements
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Brahms’s two cello sonatas are accompanied by a welcome selection of transcriptionsMusicians: Zuill Bailey (cello) Awadagin Pratt (piano)Composer: BrahmsZuill Bailey’s transcription of the scherzo from the ‘F-A-E’ Sonata, with its original melodic line presented an octave lower, is an excellent addition to the cello ...
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ArticleBrahms: Violin Concerto in D major op.77. Schumann: Symphony no.4 in D minor op.120
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: A promising account of the Brahms Concerto marred by a lugubrious startMusicians: Arabella Steinbacher (violin) Vienna Symphony Orchestra/Fabio LuisiComposer: Brahms, SchumannHere is yet another Brahms Concerto adhering to a totally spurious, inauthentic tradition of dragging out the opening movement ad nauseam. By the ...
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ArticleBritten: Cello Symphony, Symphonic Suite from Gloriana, Four Sea Interludes from Peter Grimes
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: A deeply felt account of Britten’s symphony for cello and orchestraMusicians: Paul Watkins (cello) BBC Philharmonic/Edward GardnerComposer: BrittenIn using the term ‘symphony’ for the concerto he wrote for Rostropovich in 1962–3, Britten was partly trying to get away from the idea of the concertante ...
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ArticleRolla: Viola Sonatas in E flat major op.3 no.1, in D minor op.3 no.2 & in C major, Duetto in A major for violin and viola op.18 no.1, Esercizi
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Advocacy for a little-known composer needs more of a sense of his periodMusicians: Jennifer Stumm (viola) Liza Ferschtman (violin) Connie Shih (piano)Composer: RollaAlessandro Rolla (1757–1841), who appears to have given Paganini lessons in 1795, is now relatively unknown but was clearly a ...
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ArticleRoslavets: Cello Sonatas nos.1 & 2, Meditation, Dances of the White Maidens, Viola Sonata (transcr. cello)
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Impressive playing that manages to surmount a heavy-going musical voiceMusicians: Lachezar Kostov (cello) Viktor Valkov (piano)Composer: RoslavetsIn his heyday in the 1920s, Nikolai Roslavets (1880–1944) was viewed as a progressive, boundary-pushing composer. Yet by the end of the decade, his post-Scriabinesque chromaticism fell ...
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ArticleSchumann: Piano Trios in D minor op.63, in F major op.80 & in G minor op.110, Six Pieces in Canonic Form op.56 (arr. Kirchner), Fantasiestücke op.88
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Mixed results in Schumann’s works for piano trio Musicians: Christian Tetzlaff (violin) Tanja Tetzlaff (cello) Leif Ove Andsnes (piano)Composer: SchumannThe only Schumann piano trio to have given posterity pause for thought is the D minor, so it bodes ill that this star ensemble is ...
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ArticleTaneyev: String Quartets nos.2 & 4
The Strad Issue: January 2011Description: Sympathetic accounts of string quartets by an important but neglected Russian composerMusicians: Carpe Diem QuartetComposer: TaneyevSergei Taneyev was a musical phenomenon. By the age of ten he was studying piano at the Moscow Conservatoire and just three years later became Tchaikovsky’s composition pupil. He was only ...
