New Release Round-up,
New Release Round-Up - 28th July 2023
Martin Owen plays Strauss, Schumann & Weber
Martin Owen (horn), BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, John Wilson
Currently principal horn of the BBC Symphony Orchestra, Owen is joined by Christopher Parkes (Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Sinfonia of London), Alec Frank-Gemmill (Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra), and Sarah Willis (Berliner Philharmoniker) for Schumann's Konzertstück, which opens the album in ebullient style; it's followed by Strauss's two horn concertos from 1882 & 1942, and Weber’s Concertino (originally intended for natural horn).
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Mahler: Rückert-Lieder, Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, Kindertotenlieder
Sarah Connolly (mezzo), Joseph Middleton (piano)
This is the first instalment of a series of Mahler's complete piano-accompanied songs, curated and performed by Middleton (who has been hailed by BachTrack as 'as classy a Lieder pianist as can be found anywhere in the world'). This programme of three great song-cycles sees him partnering Sarah Connolly, an artist with whom he's performed Mahler for many years and whom he describes as a profound influence on his approach to the composer - look out for our in-depth interview with him about the project next week...
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC, Hi-Res+ FLAC
The Polish pianist's account of Book I of The Well-Tempered Clavier (released in 2019) was a Recording of the Month in Gramophone, with reviewer Jed Distler describing her interpretations as 'some of the greatest and most fulfilling Bach pianism on record' thanks to her 'pianistic resourcefulness, keen polyphonic acumen [and] impeccable taste'; like its predecessor, this volume is recorded on a Shigeru Kawai grand. A prize-winner at the International Chopin Competition in 1980, Pobłocka is the first Polish pianist to record the complete Well-Tempered Clavier.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC
Taking its title from a new work by Nico Muhly (composed for Sampson & Wadsworth in 2019, and setting part of Hildegard von Bingen's O viridissima virga), this recital also includes folk songs and broadside ballads, plus music by Dowland, Campion, Purcell and Britten; in a neat piece of symmetry, Bingen's own setting of O viridissima virga closes the programme.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Contemporary American Composers
Elizabeth DeShong (mezzo), Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Riccardo Muti
Recorded towards the end of Muti's tenure as Music Director, this all-American triptych comprises Hymn for Everyone by Jessie Montgomery (who became the orchestra's Composer-in-Residence in 2021), Chicago Symphony viola-player Max Raimi's Three Lisel Mueller Settings, and Philip Glass's Symphony No. 11. In last month's issue of Gramophone, Pwyll ap Siôn declared that 'this album stands as testimony to the Italian master’s innate musical understanding and ability to bring out the best in almost everything he conducts'.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
Štilec's series of music by his compatriot Wranitzky (which began in the spring of 2021) has been praised in Fanfare for his 'inherent knack for the style' and the 'splendid' playing of the Pardubice orchestra. This sixth instalment features world premiere recordings of incidental music for three plays which Wranitzky composed in the mid-1790s: Die Spanier in Peru, oder Rollas Tod, Jolantha, Königin von Jerusalem, and Achmet und Zenide.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC
Conciertos Románticos
Jorge Federico Osorio (piano), Orquesta Sinfónica de Minería, Carlos Miguel Prieto
Described by the Los Angeles Times as 'one of the most elegant and accomplished pianists on the planet', Mexican-born Jorge Federico Osorio performs concertos by two of his compatriots: Ricardo Castro and Manuel María Ponce. The programme is completed by solo piano pieces by each composer: Castro's Berceuse, Canto de Amor and Plainte, and Ponce's Arrulladora, Gavotta, Romanza de Amor and Intermezzo.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Admired by Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff, the music of Vasily Kalinnikov (1866-1901) is relatively little-known outside his native Russia, although his Symphony No. 1 was conducted by Toscanini in the 1940s and broadcast by US radio. It's presented here alongside his Serenade for Strings, two orchestral Intermezzi, and his final completed work: the Heine-inspired symphonic poem Le Cedre et le Palmier, composed a couple of years before his early death from tuberculosis.
Available Format: SACD
Following his Chandos debut album Elogio de La Guitarra (which prompted Gramophone to praise his 'formidable technique' and 'tongue-in-cheek flamboyance'), the Polish guitarist continues to explore Spanish repertoire in a programme which includes Tárrega's Capricho árabe, Mompou's Suite Compostelana and Albéniz's Malagueña. The two closing works, however, are rooted in the musical traditions of Turkey: Carlo Domeniconi's variations on the Anatolian folksong 'Uzun İnce Bir Yoldayım’, and his four-movement suite Koyunbaba.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Subtitled 'Gardens, Fables, Prisons, Dreams', this collection of eight chamber works (all of which receive their world premiere recordings) includes Thwaites’s arrangement of Delius’s In a Summer Garden for two pianos, a musical retelling of Oscar Wilde’s fable The Selfish Giant, a moving tribute to the dissident Russian poet Irina Ratushinskaya, and For Vijay - drawn from a score which Thwaites composed for Indian choreographer Vijaylakshmi Subramaniam.
Available Formats: CD, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Mussorgsky: Boris Godunov (DVD)
Bryn Terfel (Boris), Kostas Smoriginas (Andrey Shchelkalov), John Graham-Hall (Shuisky), Ain Anger (Pimen), David Butt Philip (Gregory), John Tomlinson (Varlaam), Rebecca de Pont Davies (Hostess); Royal Opera House Covent Garden, Antonio Pappano, Richard Jones
This Covent Garden production from 2016 used the original 1869 version of Mussorgsky's score, and featured Terfel's debut as the eponymous tsar: Classical Source declared that the Welsh bass-baritone 'devours every scene he is in', whilst The Guardian noted that 'Terfel makes his character unusually sympathetic – and pathetic too'. The Evening Standard, meanwhile, observed that 'Jones’s psychologically probing production, laced with flashes of grim humour, superbly evokes the wild-eyed manic quality of this Boris'.
Available Format: DVD Video
This first instalment of SOMM's new Mahler Pioneers series features the British premiere of Das klagende Lied (recorded live at the Royal Festival Hall on 13th May 1956 and featuring Joan Sutherland, Norma Procter & Peter Pears), a 1960 performance of Symphony No. 4 (conducted by Walter Goehr, with Teresa Stich-Randall), and the Adagio from Symphony No. 10 (with Hermann Scherchen conducting the BBC Symphony Orchestra). Also includes the first release of interviews with Alfred Friese and Leopold Stokowski, recorded in 1962 and 1970.
Available Formats: 2 CDs, MP3, FLAC, Hi-Res FLAC
Katherine Cooper - Head of Editorial
