Innholdsfortegnelse for February 2018 i BBC Music Magazine

Brian Kay Broadcaster and writer ‘As a founder member of the King’s Singers back in the 1960s, it was a huge pleasure to talk to the current generation about their continuing success, still delighting global audiences 50 years on.’ Page 24 Terry Blain Writer and critic ‘A Christmas spent listening to Tallis’s Lamentations could have been depressing. Instead it was a reminder of deeper, spiritual values at a time of year that can seem brainlessly frivolous and materialistic.’ Page 70 Amanda Holloway Music journalist ‘In a particularly busy period, Alison Balsom happily made time to talk to me about music that ignited her passion for the trumpet, and how she wants to kindle that excitement in new audiences.’ Page 118…

Beethoven’s Hammer-lite Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata (Building a Library, January), has an interesting side story to it. The sonata was published in London in December 1819, within three months of its publication in Vienna, but saw the light of day in a rather truncated form in England. Here, the Grand Sonata for the Pianoforte consisted of the first three movements only, with the fast movements surrounding the Adagio. It didn’t bear an opus number, nor a dedication. The finale was published at the same time as Introduction and Fugue for the Pianoforte, without any reference to the other publication whatsoever. Did Beethoven protest? No. It was the composer himself who thought the work might be too difficult for the English public. He authorised the publisher to cut the work – in…

Lawrence Gilman, a music critic from the New York Tribune, was clearly unimpressed. ‘How trite, feeble and conventional the tunes are,’ read his pointed review that appeared on the morning of 13 February; ‘how sentimental and vapid the harmonic treatment, under its disguise of fussy and futile counterpoint. Weep over the lifelessness of the melody and harmony, so derivative, so stale, so inexpressive.’ The work, he concluded, suffered from ‘melodic and harmonic anemia of the most pernicious kind.’ Ouch. But while Gilman may not have overly enjoyed hearing the 25-year-old composer and pianist George Gershwin give the premiere of Rhapsody in Blue with Paul Whiteman’s Palais Royal Orchestra, the audience most certainly did. ‘There was tumultuous applause for Mr Gershwin’s composition,’ reported the altogether more evenhanded Olin Downes in the…

Music’s power to console and transport is nowhere so starkly or movingly revealed as when it’s used in our rituals of public and private mourning. Whether it’s choices of music for funerals (the most popular song in the UK is currently Frank Sinatra’s My Way), works composed to commemorate the dead, or grand masses and requiems that transmute the raw material of loss and pain into cathartic expressions of hope and melancholy, music has been used across cultures and time to take us through the veil that separates existence from non-existence. Why do we have this existential longing for music at these moments? Perhaps it’s because music itself seems to belong to another plane of reality as well as our own: it is an apparition in the air, it begins…

Oliver Condy Editor I’m rather thrilled by a new recording of Kodály’s orchestral masterpiece, Dances of Galánta, by the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra under its conductor JoAnn Falletta. Inspired by folk songs from his native Hungary, the Dances have plenty of swagger alongside more intimate, seductive moments. The mournful clarinet solo near the start is so beautifully played by Patti DiLutis, the orchestra’s principal clarinettist. Jeremy Pound Deputy editor After a trip to the cinema to see Paddington 2, I decided to dig out my DVD of another Peruvian triumphing in London: tenor Juan Diego Flórez (right) in the Royal Opera House’s 2007 production of Donizetti’s La fille du régiment. Flórez grabbed the headlines at the time for his rendition of the ‘Aria of the High Cs’, but he…

Georgian musical culture possesses one of the world’s oldest traditions of polyphonic music. The use of polyphony in Georgian folk music is thought to predate the introduction of Christianity in the country in early fourth century AD. The music is made up of at least 15 regional styles (dialects), split between eastern and western groups. Georgian sacred music is primarily made up of settings of hymns for the Orthodox Church. During the Soviet era, Georgia’s chant tradition was suppressed due to the closure of many churches and monasteries. When the country declared independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 it made significant efforts to rediscover its musical heritage. Singing is an integral part of social life in Georgia, and a cappella singing has long been a key feature of Georgian…

Llyr Williams Pianist When I play Beethoven’s Sonata No. 31, Op. 110, I have part of the score hidden inside the piano. The first fugue in the last movement is particularly hard to remember. Whereas the fugue in, say, the Hammerklavier Sonata is more athletic and muscular and goes into the muscular memory fairly easily, in Op. 110, the writing is more melifluous. If you take a wrong turn it’s almost impossible to know where you are. It might also be psychological, as shortly before I was once due to play it, Mitsuko Uchida told me how she had gone all to pot in the fugue in a concert – I then found myself doing likewise. Jennifer Johnston Mezzo-soprano All Wagner roles can be difficult to learn, partly because the…

Casanova spent his happiest days in Parma, and every foodie knows that the city of Parma ham and Parmesan is a good place to enjoy yourself. But its musical pleasures are appetising, too. Toscanini was born here; Paganini was buried in the city; and Verdi – born 20 miles away at Busseto – is a local hero. It says something about Parma’s priorities that a town smaller than Northampton should have two opera houses. The Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini, meanwhile, plays in the Auditorium Paganini, a new hall converted from a sugar factory in 2001 by Renzo Piano, the architect of London’s Shard – its new rehearsal facilities are in the same wooded park. As the orchestra for the entire Emilia-Romagna region, it’s never short of work: it doubles as the…

Colorado has been a launchpad for classical crossover musicians, including banjo-players Jake Schepps and Jayme Stone and fiddler Enion Pelta-Tiller. Schepps worked to find common ground between Bartók and forms of American acoustic music on his disc An Evening in the Village, which then inspired him to commission four US composers – Marc Mellits, Matt McBane, Gyan Riley and Matt Flinner – to write for his quintet. Banjo-player Jayme Stone has also championed contemporary composers, recording Andrew Downing’s This County is My Home, while classically trained violinist Enion Pelta-Tiller performs in the string band Taarka, merging Western and Eastern traditions.…

Taverner Choir With one singer to a part, and a dry acoustic, this 1986 recording is the most intimate available version of the Lamentations . Although there are beautiful moments, the atmosphere is generally ascetic and inward-looking, a soul-searching rather than crowd-pleasing interpretation. As such it has unique insights to offer: the five singers differ markedly in timbre, and you can follow their contributions with absorbing clarity. It is part of a two-disc Tallis anthology that is itself hugely recommendable. ( Erato 562 2302 ) Clerks of the Choir of New College, Oxford In his 38 years as the director of New College Choir, Oxford, Edward Higginbottom made many excellent recordings and this, from 1995, is one of the finest. With two voices to a part, the choir produces an…

Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6 MusicAeterna/ Teodor Currentzis Sony 88985404352 45.38 mins Few performances of Tchaikovsky’s angst-ridden symphonic masterpiece have encapsulated the overwhelming passion of its musical argument to the same degree as this brilliantly recorded account. Teodor Currentzis has a clear and unified vision of the music’s trajectory, his interpretation grabbing you by the scruff of the neck and compelling you to follow its relentlessly tortured path from first bar to last. Much is revealed in the claustrophobic way Currentzis projects the brief slow introduction. The few silences are hesitant and halting, but packed with expectancy, whereas the first sforzando marking in the fifth bar has a terrifying almost painful physical impact. The ensuing Allegro non troppo emerges tentatively from the gloom, and seems initially to be understated. But this…

Musically gifted, Cantelli (see p78) appeared as organist at the local church aged ten, and made his debut as a pianist aged 14. After studying at the Milan Conservatory, he conducted Novara’s Teatro Coccia in 1941. He had to leave this post in 1943 to join the Italian army. When he refused to support the Fascists he was sent to a Nazi-run labour camp. He escaped to Milan but was recaptured; he was only saved from execution by the liberation of Italy in 1944. A perfectionist, he often conducted from memory.…

The son of a German father and an Italian mother, Wolf-Ferrari was born in Venice. Originally named Wolf, he added his mother’s maiden name to his surname in his late teens. He initially showed a talent for art, and studied for a year at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome. After studying counterpoint under Rheinberger at the Akademie der Tonkunst in Munich (1892-95), he returned to Venice where he established himself as an opera composer. Il segreto di Susanna, premiered in Munich 1909, is his most famous work.…

This is an impressive first recording from the Sollazzo Ensemble Parle Qui Veut: Moralizing Songs of the Middle Ages Works by Ciconia, Giovanni da Firenze, Andrea da Firenze, Paolo da Firenze, Franceso Landini, Niccolò da Perugia, Solage & Teramo Sollazzo Ensemble Linn CKD 529 45:53 mins This is the first recording from the prize-winning Sollazzo Ensemble and in this ingeniously assembled collection they delight us with a songs of defiance and gentle rebuke directed against the gossips and naysayers of 14th and 15th century society. The result is a magical sound-carpet of music drawn from repertories not given convincing attention since the efforts of the Medieval Ensemble of London, David Munrow, and Gothic Voices some decades ago. The fluid ‘conversational’ style of these accomplished musicians (they perform some of these…

In Steven Isserlis’s hands, the trench cello sounds remarkably fine The Cello in Wartime Cello Sonatas by Fauré, Debussy and Bridge; plus works by Webern, Saint-Saëns, Parry, Novello and trad. Steven Isserlis (cello), Connie Shih (piano) BIS BIS-2312 (hybrid CD/SACD) 65:38 mins If IKEA were to make a cello, this would be it. Built by WH Hill around 1900, the quaint trench cello played here packs up into what could be an ammunition box – doubling as its body – with a slot-in neck and screw-in end-pin. Owned originally by keen amateur Harold Triggs of the Royal Sussex Regiment, it accompanied him to the trenches in World War I. So how does it sound? In Steven Isserlis’s hands, remarkably fine – though he only uses it for a handful of…

Sviatoslav Richter Works by Franck, Grieg and Ravel SWR Classic SWR19409CD (1994) 77:34 mins Captured at the Schwetzingen Festival in 1994, this remastered recital recording doesn’t show reluctant recordee Sviatoslav Richter (1915-1997) at his best, with the notable exception of the effervescent Miroirs. ★★ Beethoven Piano Sonatas Nos 7, 21 & 32 Orfeo C939171B (1970) 80:15 mins Another remastered concert recording, this time from 27-year-old Daniel Barenboim at the Salzburg Festival in 1970 – fully a world-class pianist, as this special performance reveals. ★★★★ Bach/Busoni Chaconne Beethoven Piano Sonata No. 3 Orfeo C943171B 39:21 mins (1965) Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli’s Bach/Busoni Chaconne is dispatched with angular dispassion on this second Salzburg Festival concert recording. The similarly cool attention to detail in the Beethoven is tempered by a playful scherzo. ★★★ The…

LONDON Theatre of Voices Kings Place, 9 Feb Tel: +44 (0)20 7520 1490 Web: www.kingsplace.co.uk Stockhausen’s vocal sextet Stimmung notches up its half century, and to mark the anniversary the Theatre of Voices revisits director Paul Hillier’s 2006 version. The ensemble’s subsequent recording instantly earned the composer’s approval. Nash Ensemble Wigmore Hall, 10 Feb Tel: +44 (0)20 7935 2141 Web: www.wigmore-hall.org.uk After a pre-concert featuring Duruflé’s only surviving chamber work, the latest instalment in the Nash Ensemble’s ‘French Connection’ series is built around Boulez’s arrangement of Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis (sung by soprano Sophie Bevan). Fauré, Ravel and Stravinsky complete the programme. Philharmonia Southbank Centre, 15 Feb Tel: +44 (0)20 3879 9555 Web: www.southbankcentre.co.uk The Philharmonia’s principal guest conductor Jakub Hrusa takes charge as the orchestra continues its journey into…

For those not used to it, learning music by heart is a daunting and long process involving hours of hard slog (see our feature on p42). But is it worth it? The choir I sing in here in Bristol was recently asked to perform Howells’s Take Him, Earth, for Cherishing by memory – the subsequent hours (days) spent listening, repeating and cursing drove almost all of us to drink. And yet that slog did, indeed, pay off, Howells’s music gaining an immediacy and new-found energy. For musicians that face their audiences, playing without music is surely a must – how many times, for instance, have you sat near the front of a concert hall, only to have the soloist’s entire body obscured by a music stand? That said, no one…

Tippett revived Tippett’s abandoned Symphony in B flat is to be heard for the first time in over 80 years when the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and conductor Martyn Brabbins perform it at Glasgow’s City Halls on 1 February. Though the work enjoyed a few outings soon after it was composed in 1933, it was never published and Tippett lost interest in it. The BBC SSO’s performance will be broadcast on Radio 3. See Composer of the Month, p64. Truly honoured Awards to classical musicians were in short supply in the 2018 New Year’s Honours list. Our hearty congratulations, however, to Jonathan Freeman-Attwood, principal of the Royal Academy of Music, who is awarded a CBE; Sarah Alexander, chief executive of National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain, who has received an…

Who says Carmen has to die? Not director Leo Muscato (left), who in his recent Florence production of Bizet’s opera reworked the plot to have the heroine instead shooting her would-be killer Don José. His reasoning for this unlikely twist? To make a statement against increasing violence against women. Traditionalists may sniff, but it is not the first time an opera plot has found itself significantly altered… Censors, religious or political, have proved a regular thorn in the side of composers. One to suffer horribly badly was Verdi, several of whose operas came under scrutiny, not least The Sicilian Vespers. Though it successfully premiered in Paris in 1855, so tense was the political situation at home that, when it came to creating a version in Italian, Verdi decided his tale…

Anita Rachvelishvili jumped to fame when, for her international debut, Daniel Barenboim chose her to open the La Scala season in the title role of Bizet’s Carmen, cast opposite tenor Jonas Kaufmann. ‘It was a huge risk for me,’ says the Georgian mezzo. It paid off. Her performance was acclaimed and she has been signed to Sony Classical. And, yes, her debut disc will include two arias from Carmen. One of Handel’s star sopranos was Giulia Frasi, who is at the heart of a new CD from Ruby Hughes. The Chandos Records disc explores pieces by Handel and other composers that Frasi inspired. ‘I was struck by the empathetic temperament and lyrical ease of the vocal writing embodied in so much of the music written for her,’ says Hughes.…

That strange clucking, shuffling noise you can hear isn’t a new piece of avant-garde electronica. It’s the sound of chickens coming home to roost. For decades – centuries, probably – sexual harassment and outright abuse has been an unpleasant feature of musical life. Think of the historic cases of music teachers abusing pupils that recently came to light in Manchester. Think of the numerous directors of church and youth choirs convicted of child-sex offences. Think of the ‘casting couch’ stories constantly circulating in the opera world, involving young singers of both sexes who feel pressurised into responding to inappropriate suggestions or pressures from senior figures with the power to hire or fire them. And think of the swirl of salacious anecdotes surrounding famous 20th-century conductors – Leonard Bernstein regularly taking…

Original Debut Recording (1971) The first ever King’s Singers album consists mainly of popular songs, a number of which are heard in deft arrangements by Gordon Langford, whose Trio accompanies the group here. Originally released under the title ‘By Appointment’, the disc is rounded off by Ron Goodwin’s sublimely daft ‘What Kind of Things (Do the King’s Singers Sing)?’ party piece. Chandos CHAN6562 Madrigal History Tour (1984) A wide-ranging tour of Renaissance madrigals that followed the King’s Singers’ groundbreaking TV series of the same name. Accompanied by The Consort of Musicke and lutenist Anthony Rooley, the tour takes us on a musical journey of Italy, England, France, Spain and Germany, including composers such as Byrd, Lassus, Willaert and Flecha. Warner Classics 585 7142 The Beatles Connection (1986) The composer György…

OVER THE PAST FEW MONTHS, our awards jury has been listening anew to each of the recordings awarded five stars by our critics throughout last year. After many hours of lively discussions, they whittled over 200 recordings down to a shortlist for you to vote on. Here, over the next three pages, are all 21 nominations, all superb recordings that will give you a lifetime of enjoyable and fulfilling listening. Now it’s time to read about them before you head to our voting website at classical-music.com/awards, where you can listen to the clips and choose your favourites. Get clicking! THE AWARDS JURY: NICHOLAS ANDERSON, ERICA JEAL, DAVID NICE, KATE WAKELING, OLIVER CONDY, REBECCA FRANKS, ANDREW MCGREGOR Orchestral nominations Mahler Symphony No. 3 Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra/ Bernard Haitink BR Klassik…

‘The prime need in the Western World is to break the ice of rationalism and release the imaginative life once more.’ Michael Tippett’s statement, made in wartime Britain in 1940, was at a distant remove from the spirit of the age. It could be argued that it still is today. At once deeply rooted in English tradition and a spectacular nonconformist to it, Tippett by his early thirties had composed a fair amount of music. He withdrew these early statements after a choice handful of works – the First String Quartet, First Piano Sonata and the Concerto for Double String Orchestra – had announced the arrival of his true voice. More traditionally tonal or modal than modernist, with an appealing lyrical element, Tippett’s ‘breakthrough’ idiom to that extent connected with…

Tchaikovsky described this symphony as his best and most sincere work. Do you agree? I’m absolutely convinced it is the most sincere. It’s not music that should be played regularly. It’s music to consider and talk about. It’s not a symphony to play in concert halls, with the musicians waiting to go home. It’s suicidal music. It’s a protest. It’s a piece to play when bad forces take over your city, when your home town becomes a prison. That’s its purpose. That’s why I play this symphony rarely. For this recording, we gathered friends in Berlin, with a glass of wine and candles, and we played the symphony for 35 people. It was a kind of ceremony in darkness. Why is the piece so emotionally and physically powerful? It’s a…

Beethoven Symphonies Nos 6, 7 & 8 Pentatone PTC5186 250 (hybrid CD/SACD) (1973-75) 111.13 mins (2 discs) Warm, lyrical accounts from three orchestras and Rafael Kubelik. Quadraphonic sound sank these recordings originally; they are now in SACD. ★★★ Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 3 Brahms Haydn Variations; Symphony No. 3 Orfeo C916172A (1962-63) 112:40 mins (2 discs) Wonderfully characteristic late Hans Knappertsbusch performances: broad, flexible, the fruits of a lifetime’s devotion to the Viennese classics. The Beethoven concerto with Géza Anda is especially fine. ★★★★★ Beethoven Symphonies Nos 3 & 8 Alto ALC 1353 (1988) 78:28 mins Wyn Morris’s reputation is of being impossibly temperamental. Yet on the strength of these two performances of demanding works, the Welsh conductor was capable of inspiring great orchestras to great heights. This recording with…

Cecilia Bartoli and Sol Gabetta are valiant duelling partners Dolce Duello Arias by Caldara, Albinoni, Gabrielli, Vivaldi, Handel and Porpora; plus Boccherini: Cello Concerto In D, Op. 34 Cecilia Bartoli (mezzo-soprano), Sol Gabetta (cello); Cappella Gabetta/Andrés Gabetta (violin) Decca 483 2473 76:48 mins Despite its sugary title and frothy cover, this disc features music-making of the highest order and a rigorously researched programme of Baroque arias with obbligato cello – a sweet duel (or ‘dolce duello’) between the human voice and the then young instrument, oft praised for its vocal qualities. Longterm friends and colleagues, mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli and cellist Sol Gabetta make for valiant duelling partners who converse, parry and riposte in spirited combat. Bartoli is velvet-toned, vivacious and voluptuous as ever. Her diction is sharp as a sabre;…

Borghild Bryhn Langaard Works by Wagner, Grieg, Kjerulf, Bull, Verdi , Puccini et al Nordic Sound NOSCD1987 (1908-1916) 67.63 mins Surprisingly vivid sound in these ancient recordings by the Norwegian soprano Borghild Bryhn Langaard, who studied with Grieg’s wife Nina The Wagner extracts are especially impressive. ★★★★ Marteau Lieder Solo Musica SM 263 (1956) 53.11 mins Henri Marteau (1874-1934) is remembered in song performances by mezzo Vesselina Kasarova that suffer from poor intonation, plus stronger archival recordings by Fischer-Dieskau. ★★★ Brahms Lieder Orfeo C941171B (1965) 61.06 mins The velvety richness of Grace Bumbry’s mezzo is captured near the start of her international career in this Brahms programme with pianist Beaumont Glass at the Salzburg Festival. ★★★★ Haydn • Mozart Scenes & Arias Decca Eloquence 482 5049 (1956-60) 63.01 mins The…

Her Handel Variations draws us in with heartwarming immediacy Brahms Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Handel; 4 Ballades, Op. 10 Nelly Akopian-Tamarina (piano) Pentatone PTC 5186 677 (rec. 1995-96) 63:38 mins Born in 1944, the Russian pianist Nelly Akopian-Tamarina won the gold medal in the Zwickau Robert Schumann competition at 19; she was one of the last students of Alexander Goldenweiser, and the first of Dmitri Bashkirov. As a soloist of the Moscow State Philharmonic she was one of the bright hopes of Soviet pianism, but her sister married a Jew and emigrated to the West. As a result, Akopian-Tamarina’s career was blocked by the censors, preventing her from recording or performing for more than a decade; she turned to painting instead. Moving to the West, she carved…

Born Soghomon Soghomonian in Küthaya in Turkey and orphaned by the age of 12, Komitas was taken to the Gevorgian Seminary in Vagharshapat to be a chorister. In 1894 he was made a vardapet (archimandrite), and took the name Komitas after a seventh-century Armenian hymn writer. He went first to Tiflis to study music theory, then to study in Berlin (1896-99). An expert on Armenian folk music, he collected over 3,000 pieces, some of which he reworked in his own compositions. Komitas moved to Constantinople in 1910, but lost his sanity during the notorious Armenian genocide that took place in 1915.…

February round-up It’s one of those months when the assorted styles of music that coexist under the jazz umbrella seem more diverse than ever, a fact that’s always worthy of celebration. As it happens, the idea of celebration also figures directly in Roscoe Mitchell’s Bells for the South Side, a two-disc set of 12 gnarly trio compositions presented at Chicago’s Museum of Contemporary Art in honour of the AACM (the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians) and Mitchell’s 71st birthday. The formal constraints imposed by the ensemble size and instrumental make-up throw the works themselves into sharp relief, with the unique mix of intuition and intellect that typifies the hardcore Chicago avant-garde being compellingly deployed here by a pool of musicians that includes Hugh Ragin and William Winant. Good…

The Pro Arte Quartet: A Century of Musical Adventure John W Barker University of Rochester Press ISBN 978-1-58-46-906-7 366pp (hb) £25 rrp In this detailed account of the Pro Arte Quartet’s 100-year existence, the generous appendices are almost worth the cover price alone. There’s a complete discography (both commercial and unofficial), exhaustive listings of commissions, dedications, premieres, and the 150 submissions made in response to a mid-1980s invitation for new chamber music pieces (including works by Babbitt, Cage, Cowell and Crumb). Not to mention synopses of fictional works inspired by the quartet (notably viola player Bernard Milofsky’s The Fiddlers Four), and clarification regarding the question of whether Benny Goodman performed Mozart’s Clarinet Quintet with them in the mid-1930s (he didn’t) and went on to record it (he walked…

5. The Queen’s Hall Where: Edinburgh Opened: 1979 Seats: 900 Edinburgh’s Queen’s Hall is one of the city’s finest concert venues, located on the Southside, about a 15-minute walk from Princes Street. The former church, built in 1823 as Hope Park Chapel, was designed by architect Robert Brown who is also responsible for other Grade A-listed Georgian buildings in the city. The church’s closure in the 1970s coincided with the search for new premises by two recently formed ensembles, the Scottish Baroque Ensemble (founded 1969) and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra (founded 1974). After a fundraising campaign that included a concert by flautist James Galway, The Queen’s Hall opened its doors in 1979. Queen Elizabeth II attended the opening ceremony. Due to the hall’s excellent natural acoustics, John Drummond, the director…

Wagner’s Parsifal New York’s Met Opera has a long association with Wagner’s Parsifal as it was, in 1903, the first opera house to stage it outside Europe, flaunting the composer’s wishes that it should only be performed at Bayreuth. In this new Met Opera production, broadcast on Radio 3, the quest for the Holy Grail is led by tenor Klaus Florian Vogt. Opera on 3; 17 Feb, 4pm Bath Bach Festival Since 2012 Bath’s Bachfest has attracted some of the greatest Baroque names to the city’s historic venues. This year is no exception with soprano Lucy Crowe lined-up for the monumental Mass in B minor at Bath Abbey. For this In Concert Harry Bicket conducts the English Concert and Erebus Ensemble. Radio 3 in Concert; 26 Feb, 7.30pm Animal life…

Alison Balsom first came to prominence as a finalist of BBC Young Musician in 1998. A former student of Håkan Hardenberger and a BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist, she has performed at the Last Night of the Proms and has released a string of best-selling discs on EMI, performing on both natural and modern trumpets. Appointed an OBE in 2016, Balsom is visiting professor of trumpet at the Guildhall and has recently been appointed artistic director of the Cheltenham Music Festival. When I took up the trumpet at seven, my teacher had us playing Bach chorales in a brass quartet. I didn’t know it was Bach, I just knew it was incredibly beautiful. At the same time I started playing the cornet in my local brass band – we…

Military woes As a former head of woodwind studies at two royal conservatoires, it was with dismay that I read the news concerning the potential diminishing of military bands in the UK (Comment, January). We cannot, of course, defend nor justify their existence just on tradition and an employment opportunity for young musicians. Both these maybe true, but the musical standard achieved in all of the bands is also extremely high, the services they provide are many, and all set a real example for musicians worldwide. What the bands display in terms of discipline, culture and morale-boosting support for other parts of our military services is widely recognised. Many of them go abroad as medical auxiliaries to provide a vital cog in our activities overseas, and at home play at…

Ella van Poucke cellist Born: Amsterdam, the Netherlands Career highlight: It’s difficult to say. I have enjoyed so many projects in different ways, one of them being my debut with the HR-Sinfonieorchester Frankfurt and maestro Christoph Eschenbach conducting. Musical hero: One of them is pianist András Schiff. I’ve been lucky to work and play with him and hear him in concert on many occasions. His knowledge and presence when teaching and performing have inspired me a lot. The way he plays Bach is exceptional. Dream concert: Playing Beethoven’s String Quartet Op. 131 with a quartet formed of amazing players in one of Europe’s great halls. Ben Goldscheider horn player Born: London, UK Career highlight: Being part of BBC Young Musician was remarkable; to get to the final and…

3rd: Woodrow Wilson, the 28th President of the United States, dies at the age of 67 of a stroke and heart-related problems at his house in Washington, DC. His two terms in office, from 1913-21, saw him lead the US through the First World War and take a major role at the 1919 Versailles Peace Conference. 12th: In the Valley of the Kings, the British Egyptologist Howard Carter and his team lift the granite lid on the sarcophagus of Tutankhamun to reveal the gold mummy case lying within. The discovery marks a high point of recent explorations that begun in 1922 and is eagerly awaited, but Carter strictly regulates press coverage. 14th: Founded in 1911, the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company, which specialises in selling or leasing industrial machinery and office appliances, decides…

Weill Quodlibet Die Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie/ Antony Beaumont Chandos CHSA5046 I am fond of a piece by the young Kurt Weill, Quodlibet. He wrote it while studying with Ferruccio Busoni, himself an important figure. In 1922, Weill wrote music for a children’s pantomime on the subject of the ‘magic night’ (Die Zaubernacht) and recomposed it into an orchestral fantasy piece – the Quodlibet. You can hear traits of future Weill in the marching music and its sarcasm, as well as Busoni’s idea of ‘Young Classicism’ and Mahler’s influence. R Strauss Enoch Arden Claude Rains (actor), Glenn Gould (piano) Sony G010003287466F Strauss’s Enoch Arden for piano and speaker, is very 19th century and melodramatic. In his day it was one of his most popular works, but now it’s not known. The first…

Karina Canellakis Conductor I recently conducted Rachmaninov’s The Bells, and so have been listening to Kirill Kondrashin’s recording. I was particularly impressed by the chorus – I love hearing a Russian chorus singing the Russian text – and also by the tightness and density in the sound. I understand that Kondrashin had a very disciplined rehearsal technique and was very tough about detail, and you can hear that in his recordings. It’s very inspirational. I grew up with a recording of Elisabeth Schwarzkopf singing Richard Strauss’s Four Last Songs. She’s incredible, and has such a unique voice! The piece itself has a very heavy subject matter, in that it sets poems that are effectively about resigning oneself to death, and there’s something about the suppleness in Schwarzkopf’s voice that moves…

“Music can help people understand what makes humanity so valuable, so special” When Lisa Batiashvili was a young girl in 1980s Georgia, she would eagerly await her father’s return from his travels. As a member of the ‘official’ state string quartet, violinist Tamas Batiashvili was one of the few Georgian musicians – few Georgian anythings – who were allowed, by the authorities, to leave the country. When he came home, he would bring not just the occasional Western chocolate bar or bag of sweets, but treasures altogether more delicious: LPs and cassettes bearing a certain golden label. ‘Deutsche Grammophon recordings with Karajan, Anne-Sophie Mutter, the Berlin Philharmonic,’ Batiashvili recalls when we meet, three decades later, at a brasserie in central London, ‘all these things that seemed so distant but which…

‘Some musicians, such as András Schiff, are born with a gift for memorising’ On 2 April 2007, David Farrow memorised a random sequence of 3,068 playing cards and recalled it perfectly to clinch the Guinness world record, which he still holds. ‘Give me just four hours and I’ll give you a mind like a mental magnet!’ he tells visitors to his website today. If only Farrow had been around to coach me 20 years earlier in April 1987 when, as a young piano teacher, I performed Chopin’s G minor Ballade from memory to an audience of 300 parents at a school concert. The piece had featured in my music college graduation recital five years earlier. I’d played it a few times in public since, so as I settled myself at…

“You’ve got the study the score to the point where you can sort things out if something goes wrong” My red wine is fizzy. The conductor of tonight’s concert, Alpesh Chauhan, has invited a group of us for dinner at his favourite pizzeria in the Italian city of Piacenza, and no, I’m not imagining bubbles in my wine glass. Chauhan spots my double-take. ‘It’s Lambrusco; it’s supposed to be like that. They only produce it around here – after a concert, you’ve got to have it, really’. The waiter circles, then presents a basket full of little pillows of hot dough. Everyone looks expectantly to Chauhan – after music, the cuisine of the Parma region is currently his favourite topic. But that’s not entirely why the whole table waits for…

Madrigal rhythm: As a student, Tippett decided that classical music in England was too much in thrall to the remnants of Romanticism. He found a way forward in the rhythmic invention of vocal part-writing in Tudor and Elizabethan madrigals. Landscapes: Tippett would surely have shunned the idea that his music connected with English ‘pastoralism’, but he loved the countryside, and aspects of its idealised musical tradition, including modes and drones, feature in his works. Melody and harmony: Discussion of Tippett’s music generally focuses on its rhythmic counterpoint derived partly from the madrigal tradition, partly from Beethoven. But in the works up to the mid-1950s, there is an underrated gift for melody and an expressive harmonic sense. Wider musical worlds: Tippett looked to draw on idioms from foreign cultures, particularly American…

‘Tallis is dead, and Music dies’, mourned composer William Byrd in his elegy Ye Sacred Muses of 1585, summing up in one line the immense impact of his friend, colleague and fellow Catholic. Born in the first decade of the 16th century, Tallis cannily navigated the reigns of both Catholic and Protestant monarchs, not just managing to survive but even enjoying regal favour. Though much of his music from the time of Elizabeth expresses the pain of a Catholic living in staunchly Protestant England, his own career was actively aided by the queen, who gave him and Byrd an exclusive licence to publish music. Building a Library is broadcast on Radio 3 at 9.30am each Saturday as part of Record Review . A highlights podcast is available at bbc.co.uk/radio3…

What makes a great recording? It’s a question I have been pondering recently, not least after talking to the conductor Teodor Currentzis (see right), who holds passionate views about how, when and why particular pieces of music should be recorded. It’s also a subject I have been pondering at greater length with this year’s BBC Music Magazine Awards jury. Our bunch of brilliant and indefatigable critics has been sifting through all the recordings given five stars in the magazine last year, choosing the very best for the 2018 shortlists. You can read all about these wonderful nominations on p38 – we think it’s a fascinating selection. Then head to our voting website www.classical-music.com/awards where you can hear clips from all the nominated recordings, and, crucially, cast your votes. This month’s…

Every nuance is crafted, yet there is a sense of danger Stravinsky Berg: Fragments from Wozzeck; Ligeti: Mysteries of the Macabre; Stravinsky: The Rite of Spring; Webern: Six Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 6 (DVD & Blu-ray) Barbara Hannigan (soprano); London Symphony Orchestra/Simon Rattle LSO Live LSO 3028 85 mins (DVD + Blu-ray) The Rite of Spring does not dominate here, not because the performance is lame. Rather, it is part of something truly exceptional, joined here by masterpieces from Webern, Berg and Ligeti in performances of outstanding beauty, passion and power. This film captures a concert at the Barbican from January 2015, when the public courtship between the London Symphony Orchestra and Sir Simon Rattle was still ongoing and their artistic marriage not yet certain. Their mutual suitability is confirmed…

Jonathan Plowright shows the expressive power of virtuosity Paderewski • Stojowski Paderewski: Piano Concerto; Nocturne in B flat; Stojowski: Symphonic Rhapsody Jonathan Plowright (piano); Sinfonia luventus/Łukasz Borowicz Warner Classics 9029578756 54:45 mins With the centenary of Polish independence this year, we are likely to hear more of Jan Paderewski (1860-1941), the virtuoso pianist-composer who was a signatory to the Treaty of Versailles and served as Poland’s first prime minister. His magnificent Piano Concerto (1888) has never quite disappeared and virtuosos have recorded it; outstanding versions include those by Earl Wild, Barbara Hesse-Bukowska, Kevin Kenner and Nelson Goerner, and perhaps significantly the work appeared (played by Piers Lane) on Vol. 1 of Hyperion’s now epic Romantic Piano Concerto series. Here Jonathan Plowright cements his already proven connection to Paderewski’s music with…

Melba’s Farewell Arias by Verdi, Puccini, Gounod, Bemberg, Massenet, Lotti et al Eloquence 482 8093 (1926) 77:24 mins Amazing that Nellie Melba was 65 when she said farewell to Covent Garden with such a youthful sounding Mimì. Forget the surface noise – Melba’s technique triumphs throughout. ★★★ The People’s Tenor: Luciano Pararotti Arias by Puccini, Verdi, Donizetti et al Decca 483 2742) 139:20 mins (2 discs) If there’s anyone under 30 who hasn’t yet heard Luciano Pavarotti in his prime, here it is. Best to draw a discreet veil over CD 2 of Italian songs. ★★★ Fritz Wunderlich Operetta Arias by Lehár, Kalman, Fall, Stolz, Dostal, Tauber SWR Music SWR19038CD (1954-65) 118:53 mins (2 discs) Tenor Fritz Wunderlich brings his burnished tone and immaculate legato to operetta from the Silver…

Grace Williams was the first Welsh composer to write a symphony (in 1943), and the first female British composer to write a score for a feature film, Blue Scar (1949). Born in Barry, on the coast of South Wales, Williams studied at Cardiff University and then with Gordon Jacob and Ralph Vaughan Williams at the Royal College of Music. After living in London and Lincolnshire, Williams returned to Barry in 1945. From pieces like Sea Sketches to Ave Maris Stella, the coastal landscapes and sounds of the sea were a profound influence on her music.…

Albéniz Piano music Miguel Angel R Laiz (piano) Naxos 8.573779 There’s a beautiful lyricism to Albéniz’s piano writing and more than a hint of Chopin (including a charming portrait of Mallorca where the Polish composer spent some time). (OC) ★★★ JS Bach The Art of Fugue Accademia Bizantina/Ottavio Dantone Decca 483 2329 We will forever argue over the scoring of Bach’s final fugal utterances. Dantone directs performances on harpsichord, chamber organ and string ensemble in all combinations. Illuminating. (OC) ★★★★ Beethoven Piano Sonatas Nos 28 & 30; Bagatelles, Opp. 119 & 126 Ishay Shaer (piano) Orchid Classics ORC100076 An accomplished debut CD from Israeli pianist Ishay Shaer. Thoughtful accounts of two late sonatas sandwich two groups of lively Bagatelles. (RF) ★★★★ Beethoven Piano trios Oliver Schnyder Trio Sony Classical 88985445822 There is a good…

Henry Lowther’s Still Waters Can’t Believe, Won’t Believe Henry Lowther (trumpet & flugelhorn), Pete Hurt (tenor sax), Barry Green (piano), Dave Green (double bass), Paul Clarvis (drums) Village Life 171013VL 46:56 mins Trumpeter Henry Lowther has been a creative mainstay of British jazz for half a century and he’s as happy playing mainstream standards as he is duetting with a computer musician in free improvisation. He’s the man who reassured Miles Davis (Dave Holland introduced them) that yes, playing jazz trumpet in a rock context was perfectly possible. Now, a couple of decades since 1997’s ID , Lowther’s band Still Waters, formed to explore his compositional interests, has released a new album of gorgeous, limpid tunes that make for thoroughly seductive listening. This impeccably recorded music is by turns playful,…

THIS MONTH: PLUG-AND-PLAY TURNTABLES HIGH END CHOICE Pro-Ject Audio Juke Box E £369 (£499 with speakers) Based on the award-winning Pro-Ject Primary turntable, the Juke Box E is a brilliant combination of digital and analogue audio. As well as a built-in phono stage (for connecting an amplifier and a turntable) there’s a pre-amp and a 50W power amp, so you can simply plug in the speakers and play. There’s also an RCA input for connecting another source such as a CD player, a Bluetooth receiver for digital streaming in near-CD quality (aptX) and there’s even a digital display and remote control. Features count for nothing if a turntable sounds awful, but Pro-Ject has produced another superb entry-level deck that’s a pleasure on the ears and has a compelling performance that…