Dance!: Igor Stravinsky; Richard Birchall; Caroline Shaw; Cheryl Frances-Hoad; Maurice Ravel

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This curious programme springs some pleasant surprises. The best is saved till last: David Knotts’s remarkably inventive arrangement of three episodes from Ravel’s ballet Daphnis et Chloé...Bringing... — BBC Music Magazine, Christmas Issue 2022, 4 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 21st Oct 2022
Catalogue No: SOMMCD0658
Label: Somm
Length: 65 minutes

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Stravinsky: Pulcinella Suite

Work length23:10

$8.00

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$14.00

Arr. R. Birchall for Piano Trio
Annie Yim (piano), Michał Ćwiżewicz (violin), Richard Birchall (cello)
Minerva Piano Trio

I. Sinfonia

Track length2:11

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II. Serenata

Track length3:17

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III. Scherzino

Track length2:17

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$1.75

IV. Tarantella

Track length3:24

$1.00

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$1.75

V. Toccata

Track length2:19

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VI. Gavotta

Track length1:15

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VII. Vivo

Track length3:54

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VIII. Minuetto

Track length4:33

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Birchall, Richard: Contours

Work length8:49

$4.00

$5.20

$7.00

Annie Yim (piano), Michał Ćwiżewicz (violin), Richard Birchall (cello)
Minerva Piano Trio

I. Moderate

Track length2:36

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II. Fast

Track length1:50

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III. Nocturne - Adagio

Track length1:51

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IV. Fast Waltz

Track length2:32

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Shaw, C: Gustave le Gray

Work length9:54

$2.00

$2.60

$3.50

Arr. A. Yim for Piano Trio
Annie Yim (piano), Michał Ćwiżewicz (violin), Richard Birchall (cello)
Minerva Piano Trio

Frances-Hoad: My Fleeting Angel, for piano trio

Work length9:00

$3.00

$3.90

$5.25

Annie Yim (piano), Michał Ćwiżewicz (violin), Richard Birchall (cello)
Minerva Piano Trio

I. Larghetto

Track length2:04

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$1.75

II. Allegro spiritoso e scherzando

Track length4:11

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III. Allegretto eleganza

Track length2:45

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Knotts: Scenes from 'Daphnis et Chloé'

Work length15:04

$3.00

$3.90

$5.25

Annie Yim (piano), Michał Ćwiżewicz (violin), Richard Birchall (cello)
Minerva Piano Trio

I. Nocturne

Track length5:19

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$1.30

$1.75

II. Pantomime

Track length5:33

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

III. Danse guerrière

Track length4:12

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

About
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About

SOMM Recordings is thrilled to announce Dance!, the debut recording by the Minerva Piano Trio, featuring seminal pieces by Stravinsky and Ravel alongside new work by two British composers, Cheryl Frances-Hoad and Richard Birchall, and Pulitzer Prize-winning American, Caroline Shaw.

Formed in 2013 and acclaimed for their “immaculate technique… high degree of maturity, concentration, commitment and energy” by Classical Source, the Minerva Piano Trio – pianist Annie Yim, violinist Michał Ćwiżewicz, and cellist Richard Birchall – has earned glowing plaudits from audiences and critics alike, Arcana FM marking them as “an ensemble which is clearly going places”, Classical Source declaring “how lucky modern-day composers are to have such expert and sympathetic advocates”, The Times praising them for “the most beautiful sounds”.

Dance! features two ballet pieces by Stravinsky and Ravel, the former’s Pulcinella Suite arranged by the Minerva’s Richard Birchall, the latter’s Daphnis et Chloé heard in David Knott’s arrangement of three scenes that, says the Trio’s Annie Yim, illustrate “the discovery of love: innocence, awakening, touch, and passion”. Both arrangements are receiving first recordings.

Also making their debuts on disc are Birchall’s own Contours, described by Caroline Potter in her informative booklet notes as exploring “the notion and elastic meaning of its title in different ways”, and, in Annie Yim’s arrangement, Caroline Shaw’s Gustave Le Gray. Rooted in a Chopin Mazurka, it eloquently mimics its artist namesake’s facility for poetically layered voices and images.

Completing the recital is Cheryl Frances-Hoad’s My Fallen Angel. Inspired by a short story about the dour, deadening domesticity of married life by the poet Sylvia Plath, Potter likens both composer and piece to Olivier Messiaen, hailing the work’s “logic and appealing sound world of its own” and Frances-Hoad as “a sound-colour synaesthete who associates specific colours with sounds”.

Reviews

Christmas Issue 2022

This curious programme springs some pleasant surprises. The best is saved till last: David Knotts’s remarkably inventive arrangement of three episodes from Ravel’s ballet Daphnis et Chloé...Bringing out instrumental combinations and sonorities familiar from Ravel’s Piano Trio, Knotts translates the ‘Nocturne’ quite brilliantly: music which can seem becalmed in the ballet itself here sounds intriguing and compelling.

November 2022

These are clear, crafted performances in high quality sound captured by Adaq Khan at London’s Menuhin Hall. Recommended.

British Music Society Journal

The Minerva Trio really are a superb group of young musicians, who in this disc perform flawlessly. Not just flawless technique but flawless musicality, each movement of each work is beautifully shaped. The recording, likewise, is of demonstration quality.

Dance!

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