Dvorak: Cello Concertos

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this performance is remarkably fine and the interaction between soloist and orchestra generates one of the most exciting ensemble performances of recent years. Steven Isserlis is inside the piece... — BBC Music Magazine, November 2013, 5 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 30th Sep 2013
Catalogue No: CDA67917
Label: Hyperion
Length: 79 minutes

Presto Recording of the Week

30th September 2013
Gramophone Magazine

October 2013

Editor's Choice
BBC Music Magazine

November 2013

Orchestral Choice

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Dvořák: Cello Concerto in B minor, Op. 104

Work length39:24

$3.30

$4.50

$6.15

Steven Isserlis (cello)
Mahler Chamber Orchestra
Daniel Harding

I. Allegro

Track length14:52

$1.10

$1.50

$2.05

II. Adagio ma non troppo

Track length11:29

$1.10

$1.50

$2.05

III. Allegro moderato

Track length13:03

$1.10

$1.50

$2.05

Dvořák: Four Songs, Op. 82: No. 1, ‘Leave Me Alone’

Work length4:22

$1.10

$1.50

$2.05

Mahler Chamber Orchestra
Daniel Harding

Dvořák: Cello Concerto in B minor 'original ending', Op 104

Work length1:31

$1.10

$1.50

$2.05

Steven Isserlis (cello)
Mahler Chamber Orchestra
Daniel Harding

Dvořák: Cello Concerto in A major

Work length33:51

$3.30

$4.50

$6.15

Steven Isserlis (cello)
Mahler Chamber Orchestra
Daniel Harding

I. Andante – Allegro non troppo

Track length16:30

$1.10

$1.50

$2.05

II. Andante cantabile

Track length6:55

$1.10

$1.50

$2.05

III. Allegro risoluto

Track length10:26

$1.10

$1.50

$2.05

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Recording of the Week, Steven Isserlis plays Dvořák's Cello Concerto

30th September 2013

The British cellist joins Daniel Harding and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra for the evergreen B minor concerto and its lesser-known predecessor from 1865, revised and orchestrated by German composer Günter Raphael.

Hyperion is delighted to present the world’s best-loved cello concerto performed by one of the world’s best-loved cellists: national treasure Steven Isserlis. Isserlis has waited 40 years to record this pinnacle of the repertoire, and here with his regular collaborators, the Mahler Chamber Orchestra and Daniel Harding, this long gestation has proved to be overwhelmingly fruitful. Isserlis writes of the concerto that ‘the power of its emotional journey, expressed with Dvorák’s characteristically folk-like simplicity and directness, offers an irresistible mix of the epic and the touchingly confessional’. The combination of emotional power and simplicity is also a feature of Isserlis’s playing, and part of what makes him such a consummate performer of this work.

This album puts Dvorák’s B minor cello concerto in context, including not only the original ending, but an orchestral version of the song Lasst mich allein which is quoted in the concerto’s second and third movements.

Isserlis has also recorded a version of Dvorák’s first cello concerto, a little-known work from the composer’s early period which he never orchestrated. This version (in what is almost definitely its premiere recording) is by German composer Günter Raphael, whose works were performed by Furtwängler among others, and is extensively rewritten from the composer’s original. To turn to Isserlis’s own words again: ‘Of course, it is not a masterpiece on the level of the later B minor concerto; but is it fair to lock up an older child just because their younger sibling is a genius? I love the A major concerto for the beauty of its melodies, for the freshness of its inspiration, for its typically rustic spirit—and for the sense of sheer joy that bubbles through the entire work.’

Reviews

November 2013

this performance is remarkably fine and the interaction between soloist and orchestra generates one of the most exciting ensemble performances of recent years. Steven Isserlis is inside the piece from the start...this is a performance to treasure for its beauty and commitment.

October 2013

Isserlis is on spellbindingly eloquent form in an entrancingly poetic and urgently communicative reading that really does sound like it's being captured on the wing...Harding and the Mahler CO are with him every step of the way; theirs is a real, breathing collaboration...Don't miss this special release.

30th September 2013

The overriding impressions I gained in listening to the concerto, right from the outset, were of a confident and majestic treatment of the music, from both orchestra and soloist...This may be a disc built around performances by Steven Isserlis, but I must confess that for me the most delightful track is the orchestrated version of Dvořák’s own Lied, “Lasst mich allein”.

29th September 2013

his performance recalls the reckless abandon of the youthful Jacqueline du Pré in the work’s most extrovert passages, albeit tempered with the wisdom of experience and musical maturity...abetted by magically fresh music-making from Harding’s MCO.

29th September 2013

The death of [Dvorak's] sister-in-law prompted the rewriting of the last movement of the later concerto, played, as is the whole, with a passion that is thrillingly balletic.

The Arts Desk 9th November 2013

How wonderful to hear a familiar work sounding so fresh and potent. Steven Isserlis's Dvořák anthology is revelatory, in so many ways. There's the sumptious orchestral playing from Daniel Harding's Mahler Chamber Orchestra...Isserlis is terrific – blending security with spontaneity, his quiet playing so eloquent.

Dvorak: Cello Concertos

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Recording of the Week, Steven Isserlis plays Dvořák's Cello Concerto

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