Today's new releases include late Schubert from British pianist Christian Blackshaw on Pentatone, eighteen cantatas by Johann Ludwig Bach from German Baroque ensemble Capella Sollertia on Ricercar, Beethoven's last three piano sonatas from Imogen Cooper on Chandos, and Bruckner's Te Deum and Mass No. 3 from Pablo Heras-Casado in Stuttgart.
Johann Ludwig Bach: The Leipzig Cantatas
Capella Sollertia, Johanna Soller
Johann Ludwig Bach was the cousin of Johann Sebastian, who programmed these eighteen cantatas in Leipzig in 1726 (when 'JL' was Kapellmeister at the court of Meiningen) and made copies to preserve them for posterity. The album was Recording of the Month in the latest edition of Gramophone, when Jonathan Freeman-Attwood described it as 'a revelation in the sheer weight of first-rate 'Bach', previously under the radar...delivered with exceptional attentiveness and care.'
Available formats: 4 CDs, Download & Streaming (up to 96 kHz, 24 bit)
A Moment in Time
Christian Blackshaw (piano)
Blackshaw makes his debut on Pentatone with two works which Schubert composed towards the end of his short life: the Four Impromptus D899 from 1827 and the Piano Sonata No. 21 in B flat (one of his last major works for the instrument). Schubert's music has long occupied a special place in the British pianist's heart and repertoire: reviewing a 2015 recital at Wigmore Hall which included the Moments Musicaux and Impromptu No. 3, the Financial Times noted that 'you’ll find no sense of ego, only sincere, deeply felt playing that conveys more in one phrase than others find in a whole piece. Most importantly, it conveys a lifetime of experience.'
Available formats: CD, Download & Streaming (up to 96 kHz, 24 bit)
Bruckner: Te Deum & Mass No. 3 in F minor
SWR Symphonieorchester, SWR Vokalensemble, WDR Rundfunkchor, Pablo Heras-Casado
Premiered at the Musikverein in Vienna in 1886, the Te Deum was described by Bruckner as 'the pride of my life'. Composed two decades earlier (although Bruckner continued making revisions until the 1890s), the Mass in F minor had a rather less auspicious start in life, with the composer funding and conducting the premiere himself after the scheduled conductor balked at its length and vocal difficulties; the work gradually gained a foothold in the repertoire, with Brahms enthusiastically applauding an 1893 performance to the delight of the composer. These performances were recorded live in Stuttgart as part the Bruckner bicentenary celebrations.
Available formats: CD, Download & Streaming (up to 48 kHz, 24 bit)
Beethoven: The Last Three Sonatas
Imogen Cooper (piano)
Now in her mid-seventies, the British pianist writes: 'It has taken many years for me to perceive the last three sonatas by Beethoven as the evolving journey I now feel them to be. A combination of wariness of Op. 109 and overawe of Op. 111 kept me solely concentrated on Op. 110...Now it would be hard for me to play any of the last three sonatas alone'. Reviewing her recording of the Diabelli Variations (another work which she came to relatively late in life), The Sunday Times declared that 'Cooper’s technical command and musical insights are up there with those of her mentor, Alfred Brendel', whilst Pianist Magazine admired her 'forensic detachment, faultless sense of idiom, and intellectual rigour'.
Available formats: CD, Download & Streaming (up to 96 kHz, 24 bit)
HK Gruber: Piano Concerto
Frank Dupree (piano), ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, HK Gruber
In addition to the Piano Concerto (dedicated to Emanuel Ax, who gave its premiere in 2017), this album also includes the concert suite from the 2014 opera Short Stories from the Vienna Woods, which was hailed as 'magnificent' by Musical America and described as 'a dance on the edge of the abyss [which] goes straight to the heart' by Süddeutsche Zeitung. The final work on the programme is Castles in the Air for solo piano, which receives its world premiere recording here and was written in 1981 to celebrate ten years of concerts at Schloss Grafenegg in Gruber's native Austria.
Available formats: CD, Download & Streaming (up to 44.1 kHz, 16 bit)
Allan Pettersson: Symphonies Nos. 3 & 8
Norrköping Symphony Orchestra, Christian Lindberg
Lindberg and the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra began their mission to record all of the Swedish composer's orchestral works back in 2010, with previous instalments garnering praise for their 'meticulous and fervent engagement with the scores' (Diapason) and 'clarity and conviction' (BBC Music Magazine); Gramophone opined that 'no one plays Pettersson like them!'. Shot through with echoes of Shostakovich, Sibelius and Mahler, No. 3 was premiered in 1956, whilst the autobiographical No. 8 was first performed in 1972.
Available format: SACD
Harbingers of Exile: Songs from the In-Between
Florian Störtz (bass-baritone), Aleksandra Myslek (piano)
The German bass-baritone Florian Störtz took first prize at the International Handel Singing Competition in 2023 and also won the International Helmut Deutsch Lied Competition earlier that year. He makes his debut on Delphian with a programme which centres on the songs of German-Jewish composer Robert Kahn (1865-1951), a friend of Brahms and teacher of Wilhelm Kempff and Arthur Rubinstein who fled his homeland for England in 1939 after the Nazis banned his music. The recital also includes songs by Robert Schumann and Korngold, as well as Hindemith's Drei Hymnen von Walt Whitman.
Available formats: CD, Download & Streaming (up to 96 kHz, 24 bit)
Arensky & Rachmaninoff: Romances
Anastasia Prokofieva (soprano), Sergey Rybin (piano)
This fascinating programme from the Russian coloratura soprano and her regular recital-partner illuminates the connection between an inspirational teacher and his star pupil: Rachmaninoff studied composition with Arensky in his teens, and shared his tutor's fascination with Russian folk melodies as well as his proclivity for virtuosic piano-writing in his songs (Rybin describes the two composers as 'unmistakably the branches of the same stylistic tree').
Available formats: CD, Download & Streaming (up to 96 kHz, 24 bit)
Mascagni: Zanetto
Yajie Zhang (Zanetto), Narine Yeghiyan (Silvia), Chor und Orchester der Berliner Operngruppe, Felix Krieger
Premiered in Pesaro in 1896 (six years after the composer's masterpiece Cavalleria rusticana), this scena lirica for two singers is set in Renaissance Florence and tells the story of a wealthy, determinedly single hotelier who falls in love at first sight with a young wandering minstrel but conceals her true identity from him by pretending to be an impoverished widow. This live recording was made at the Konzerthaus Berlin in 2022, and was praised by MusicWeb International for Krieger's 'unobtrusively sensitive' conducting and the 'equally subtle and expressive' orchestral and choral contributions.
Available formats: CD, Download & Streaming (up to 96 kHz, 24 bit)
Strauss: Ein Heldenleben & Beethoven: Symphony No. 8
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Thomas Beecham
This 33rd volume of SOMM's Beecham Collection presents two remarkable performances which took place at the Royal Festival Hall in 1956, newly remastered by Lani Spahr: Beethoven's Symphony No. 8 was recorded on 12th December, and Ein Heldenleben on 17th October. Reviewing the latter concert, one contemporary critic enthused that 'the epilogue was played with such tenderness as to bring tears to the eyes', whilst another declared that 'this is how Strauss can sound when conducted with musical sensibility deepened by experience'.
Available formats: CD, Download & Streaming (up to 44.1 kHz, 24 bit)
