Innholdsfortegnelse for August 2018 i BBC Music Magazine

Paul Riley Music journalist ‘It’s always nerve-wracking meeting a performer you’ve long admired from afar. No fear of disillusionment with mezzo Sarah Connolly. Whether on or off stage, her sovereign artistry and can-do resolve inspire!’ Page 24 Geoff Brown Writer and critic ‘I love multi-talented artists, so Lord Berners – composer, novelist, painter, eccentric – was made to match. A spry sense of humour, too. If only there were more like him; but Berners was one of a kind.’ Page 44 Claire Jackson Music journalist ‘Mark-Anthony Turnage’s colourful music fascinates for its cultural richness and original voice. thrilled at the chance to explore his achievements and career byways for Composer of the Month.’ Page 56…

The trouble with computers… As a composer, I read No humans required (June) with interest, but I remain unconvinced that a computer programme will produce a great musical work any time soon. Most masterpieces are such because their composers ingeniously break compositional rules. For instance, how would a computer come up with the unexpected and breathtakingly novel transition into the recapitulation that Beethoven employed in his Eroica Symphony, wherein the main tune is foreshadowed in the tonic key but accompanied by harmonies of the dominant seventh? Even if a programmer were clever enough to get a computer to compose such moments, he would essentially become the composer of the work. As it also took humans to judge that only 10-20 per cent of the music written by Aiva is ‘good’,…

3 …more years, at least, of Mirga Grazinyte-Tyla (above) at the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. The Lithuanian maestro, who has proved a hit in the Midlands, has agreed to stay with the CBSO until 2021. 16 …years after joining them, Sir Simon Rattle finally bids farewell to the Berlin Philharmonic with a concert featuring just one work: Mahler’s Sixth. 6 …goals to one. Yes, Panama lost, but at least their national anthem was played at a World Cup for the first time. 3,000,000 …pounds is the predicted asking price for a 12-seater box currently for sale at the Royal Albert Hall that affords ‘enviable views’. Total bargain, then.…

‘A greener rush of waves surely never rushed into a stranger cavern – its many pillars making it look like the inside of an immense organ, black and resounding, absolutely without purpose, and quite alone, the wide grey sea within and without.’ Karl Klingemann’s description of Fingal’s Cave in a letter home on 10 August 1829 evokes a suitably otherworldy sense of romance, unlike the diary entry of his companion Felix Mendelssohn, which simply states: ‘horrible seasickness, Staffa’. The brevity of his entry might suggest a lack of interest, but despite causing the seasickness, Scotland’s Hebrides islands made a lasting impression on the German composer, inspiring a piece that he would revise and refine for the next few years. In a letter from Tobermory on the island of Mull on…

When Eric Abramovitz was offered a scholarship to study with clarinet professor Yehuda Gilad at LA’s Colburn School, it should have been the greatest moment of his life. His girlfriend, however, had other ideas. Intercepting the college’s email of acceptance to Abramovitz, Jennifer Jooyeon Lee responded on his behalf with thanks, but no thanks, and followed up with a fake email of rejection to her beloved. Only after the couple had split did Abramovitz discover Lee’s deception, winning $375,000 in damages for the disruption to his career. But he’s not the first musician to find unexpected barriers in his way… Many bosses get the hump when a star employee announces an intention to up sticks, but few take their grudge as far as the Duke of Saxe-Weimar, who in 1717…

This month: ALINA IBRAGIMOVA Violinist MY FINEST MOMENT Ravel Violin Sonatas Nos 1 & 2; Tzigane; Berceuse sur le nom de Gabriel Fauré; Lekeu Violin Sonata in G major  Alina Ibragimova (violin), Cédric Tiberghien (piano) Hyperion CDA67820 (2011) When you get the first edit of a recording, put it in your CD player and listen to it for the first time, it always sounds different to what you are expecting, no matter what those expectations are – the feeling you have when you are playing and then what comes across through the microphone are always going to be different. The one recording, though, that I think I enjoyed the most when I first heard it back was the Ravel and Lekeu CD I made with pianist Cédric Tiberghien. It really…

Oliver Condy Editor In June I led a group of Bach fans to towns and cities where the composer worked, giving recitals on the organs in his churches as we went. It was a rewarding and thrilling week, although not without its challenges… Playing the A minor Prelude and Fugue BWV 543 at Arnstadt’s awkward console proved somewhat scary! Jeremy Pound Deputy editor When you find yourself listening for pleasure to the demonstration CDs provided with the piano grade exam scores, you know the ABRSM has chosen a good selection of pieces. Inspired, I am now trying to get my fingers round Cheryl Frances-Hoad’s characterful Commuterland, while Pound Jnr is taking on Brahms’s Wiegenlied. Rebecca Franks Managing editor If Liszt had written harpsichord music, it might have…

1994 After studies at the Royal College of Music and an early career with the BBC Singers and Glyndebourne Chorus, Sarah Connolly makes her opera debut as Annina in Richard Strauss’s Der Rosenkavalier at Welsh National Opera. 1998 She appears in the title role of Handel’s Serse at English National Opera. ‘In one sense I felt out of my depth and terrified,’ she later remembers in the Guardian. ‘The first night was real rabbit-in-headlights stuff.’ Her performance, however, proves a breakthrough moment. 2005 Her Glyndebourne performance in the title role of Handel’s Giulio Cesare opposite soprano Danielle de Niese as Cleopatra proves the highlight of the season. In the same year, she makes her debut at the New York Met. 2009 Dressed as Admiral Nelson, she appears in front of…

“ I honestly don’t think it had occured to anyone that a solo theorbo concerto would be possible” It’s a curious quirk of the modern age that the most important musical instrument of the Renaissance is having, well, a renaissance. On YouTube, a video of a lute prelude and allemande by the 17th-century French composer Robert de Visée has clocked up almost a million views. On Spotify, almost 15,000 people subscribe to the playlist ‘Lute Music for Alchemists’ – featuring such blockbuster composers as, ahem, Alessandro Piccinini, Alonso Mudarra and Cuthbert Hely. Meanwhile, on the same platform, British lutenist Matthew Wadsworth has well over 16,000 listeners loyally streaming his tracks each month. These may be small numbers compared to superstars of the violin and piano, let alone the pop world,…

ORA is helping the next generation with the launch this year of its Composer Competition. Its Youth category is aimed at under-19 year-olds from all backgrounds and will offer intensive mentoring to ten outstanding talents. The Open category, meanwhile, will call for ‘reflective works’ from composers of all ages, with the winner chosen at next year’s competition final concert by a jury chaired by ORA president Stephen Fry (above). Each work chosen for the final in both categories will be recorded live. ‘We want the competition to reach composers of all ages,’ says Digby. ‘After all, Mendelssohn wrote his Octet when he was 16 and Richard Strauss was 84 when he wrote his Four Last Songs.’…

“ Lord Berners dyed pigeons in different colours to prettify the grounds of his estate in Faringdon, Oxfordshire” In 2018 we’re far from the heyday of the 19th-century Romantic age, when the image formed of the great artist as a tormented genius, but when it comes to classical composers old notions can still linger at the back of our minds. Shouldn’t a real composer live in a garret, be dirt poor, with a bothersome family and some fatal infirmity, and forever be kicking against society, battling to get the music out to an uninterested, uncomprehending world? You could label this characterisation an example of the Beethoven syndrome, with maybe some of Schubert thrown in. Yet if this is the lurking caricature of an artist, what do we do with the…

‘The best Judges allowed it to be the most finished piece of Musick,’ glowed The Dublin Journal in 1742. ‘Words are wanting to express the exquisite Delight it afforded to the admiring crouded Audience.’ That ‘most finished piece of Musick’ was Handel’s Messiah, whose first-night audience thrilled to its rousing Hallelujahs in the same way as they do today. But not all great works have enjoyed the same fortune. Drunk conductors, knock-kneed dancers, greedy diners – all these and more have turned premieres into a nightmares. Bizet’s Carmen offended polite society. Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius was too difficult. Bernstein’s Candide wasn’t funny enough. It seems composers just can’t win. Or can they? Sometimes it just takes time and patience – every one of the 15 works here was a flop…

‘There will be no further operas by me that you will ever have to sit through again’ ‘They all know far more than I do about writing music. I’m an amateur. I’ve been found out.’ Such was Mark-Anthony Turnage’s wry response as critics gaggled together on Twitter to condemn his opera Coraline after its recent premiere at the Royal Opera House , with one or two reviewers appearing unusually keen to express their disapproval by the means of social media. ‘Don’t worry,’ added Turnage in a later Tweet. ‘There will be no further operas by me that you will ever have to sit through again. I’m done with the genre. Going to leave it to my more talented contemporaries and younger colleagues.’ This strong response is typical Turnage, a composer…

The work Robert Schumann met the poet Heinrich Heine when he was 17, visiting Munich in the spring of 1828. Heine, 12 years Schumann’s senior and fast building a peerless reputation, made a profound impression on the young musician and law student – he recalled that Heine ‘laughs about the trivialities of life and is scornful about the pettiness of little people’. Later, Schumann set as many as 40 of Heine’s poems to music. Many of these date from 1840, a year that Schumann devoted to creating such an outpouring of songs that it is often termed his ‘Liederjahr’ (see left). This was, in personal terms, a difficult time. He and the 20-year-old Clara Wieck, fighting Clara’s father for the right to marry, were perpetually caught up in libel, legal…

Fritz Wunderlich (tenor) First, the irresistible Fritz Wunderlich. The German tenor’s tone, recorded in 1965, is sure and shining. He inhabits every phrase and every word, imbuing ‘Ich will meine Seele tauchen’ with real Sehnsucht , and no hint of sentimentality. Tempos are brisk and effective; ‘Die Rose, die Lilie’ is fast, but not gabbled, and ‘Am Rhein’ is not a caricature. ‘Ich grolle nicht’ is a tightly-wound spring, finding release in the top notes. Pianist Hubert Giesen starts well with lovely tone, but becomes ploddy in later numbers. (Deutsche Grammophon 449 7472) Gerald Finley (baritone) Gerald Finley, in seamless and soaring partnership with the pianist Julius Drake, brings us a poet who not only leaps to life, but nearly tips into madness. Finley’s voice has a special, luminous beauty,…

Beethoven Unbound Beethoven: Complete piano sonatas Llyr Williams (piano) Signum Records SIGCD527 835:57 mins (12 discs) Having caught several of the Wigmore recitals out of which this box of live recordings was compiled, I had some idea what to expect, but when listened in sequence the whole thing has epic sweep. Although the last three sonatas make a perfect final disc, Llyr Williams has not structured this collection chronologically: instead, he’s chosen to turn it into a series of recital programmes, each of which follows a satisfying arc. Thus, for example, he avoids placing the two little Op. 49 sonatas, which resemble each other cosily, back-to-back: instead they book-end the Diabelli Variations, with the Rondo of Op. 49 No. 1 coming as a ‘rococo-style upbeat’ to Diabelli’s waltz, and the…

The apotheosis is both radiant sunset and deepening darkness Elgar Symphony No. 2; Serenade for Strings BBC Symphony Orchestra/ Edward Gardner Chandos CHSA 5197 (hybrid CD/SACD) 66:42 mins Elgar wrote that he had ‘written out my soul’ in the Second Symphony, and there is probably no richer and more complicated self-portrait in all his output. And there’s the problem for the interpreter: to make as much as possible speak for itself – including the riddles and contradictions – while keeping a sense of the Symphony as one great, unified outpouring. Edward Gardner does this stunningly well: if anything, better even than in his fine account of the First Symphony. From the wonderful lyrical springboard opening right through to the final slow fade there’s a singing line that rises, falls and…

Gershwin • Ravel Gershwin: Piano Concerto in F Ravel: Piano Concerto in G; Piano Concerto for the left hand Denis Kozhukhin (piano); Orchestre de la Suisse Romande/Kazuki Yamada Pentatone PTC 5186 620 (hybrid CD/ SACD) 74:55 mins There’s terrific piano playing here, especially in the Gershwin, which comes over in all its wild, technicolour glory. OK, so it sprawls, but who cares? When Schoenberg says of you ‘there can be no doubt that he was a great composer,’ you can let the brickbats bounce off with a merry laugh. Denis Kozhukhin also has the mighty measure of Ravel’s Left Hand Concerto, delivered with no sign of strain and in general with a good grasp of its peculiar architecture. My only query is over his idea of linking the first two…

Hindemith Cello Concerto Prokofiev Sinfonia Concertante Rautavaara Cello Concerto No. 1 SWR Music SWR19418CD (1971/75) 74:46 mins Fine radio recordings from Stuttgart and Baden-Baden, encapsulating János Starker’s tantalising cool intensity and passionate restraint. ★★★★ Hindemith Violin Concerto Szymanowski Violin Concerto No. 1, Violin Sonata Alto ALC 1355 (1956-62) 73:48 mins  David Oistrakh mines the expressive core of these elusive scores with scintillating flair, partnered dazzlingly by Kurt Sanderling, Paul Hindemith and pianist Vladimir Yampolsky. ★★★★★ Prokofiev • Rachmaninov • Kabalevsky Piano Concerto No. 3 Praga Digitals PRD 250 395 (1949-55) 82:23 mins Expertly transferred, Emil Gilels’s incandescent live accounts of the Rachmaninov and Prokofiev with Kondrashin transcend their sonic limitations, although the Kabalevsky is rather short on charm. ★★★ Alfred Campoli The Bel Canto Violin Vol. 5 Eloquence 482 5143…

Boito Mefistofele (highlights) Eloquence 482 4757 (1959) 73:55 mins A highlights edition of Boito’s extraordinary opera benefits from Cesare Siepi’s grand-scale demon, though Giuseppe Di Stefano and Renata Tebaldi are both uneven, conductor Tullio Serafin disappointing and the sound limited. ★★★ Teresa Berganza Eighteenth-Century Portraits Eloquence 482 5836 (1961-86) 137:16 mins (2 CDs) A singer of outstanding interpretative gifts, Teresa Berganza sings her trademark Mozart alongside other 18th-century masters – an ideal introduction to one facet of her immaculate artistry. ★★★★★ Teresa Berganza Brava Berganza! Eloquence 482 6397 (1959-62) 131:20 mins (2 CDs) Rossini figures largely in this second Berganza compilation alongside songs from the regions of Spain as well as some zarzuela items, to which the mezzo brings her unique and inimitable artistry. ★★★★★ Fritz Wunderlich Mozart Contemporaries SWR…

Despite composing dozens of operas and numerous vocal works, the Italian composer’s enduring legacy is perhaps as a teacher. Indeed, he taught both singers and composers, most notably Haydn and the castratos Farinelli and Caffarelli. Haydn in fact lived with Porpora in Vienna for a time, serving as his accompanist. It’s safe to say that such students attracted more fame and wealth than he ever did. An invitation to London in 1729 to set-up an opera company to rival Handel’s ended in its bankruptcy. Even his funeral in 1768 was paid for by a subscription concert. Poor Porpora.…

Beethoven Sextet in E flat, Op. 71; Duo No. 1 in C, WoO27/1; Octet in E flat, Op. 103; Rondino in E flat, WoO25; Marsch und Trio für Militärmusik, WoO29 Scottish Chamber Orchestra Wind Soloists Linn CKD 572 55:13 mins There’s still a received notion that Beethoven just couldn’t do light music - in which case how does one explain the enduring popularity of the Op. 20 Septet? Granted, none of the pieces recorded here is on the same level as that delightful, witty divertissement, but when played with the kind of spirited, intelligent musicianship the Scottish Chamber winds bring, the Sextet and Octet in particular spring to life. One wouldn’t normally expect late-18th-century aristocratic entertainment music to survive the test of time, but this really does speak across the…

Melnikov draws an exceptional range of colours from his Erard Debussy Préludes – Book II; La mer (arr. piano duet)* Alexander Melnikov, Olga Pashchenko (piano)* Harmonia Mundi HMM 902302 63:32 mins Prepare to be spellbound. Debussy’s Préludes have prompted some extraordinary pianism, yet this new version of Book 2 from Alexander Melnikov stands out from the crowded pack in this anniversary year. Confounding the norm of recording both books, presenting just the second provides a different perspective. Even more distinctive is pairing them with Debussy’s own piano duet version of La mer. Joined by Olga Paschenko, Melnikov makes a strong case for this being more than a curiosity or pale imitation despite Debussy’s uncompromising approach to transcribing his refined orchestration. There is plenty of awe-inspiring majesty and sparkle, and they…

Besides its array of star performers, last year’s bumper crop of jazz anniversaries included a landmark recording session. In March 1957 the young Sonny Rollins, already proclaimed a ‘saxophone colossus’, enhanced his stature with an album at once unprecedented, superb and a touch eccentric. Inspired by his first trip to the West Coast, Way Out West featured the tenorist in a trio setting, accompanied only by bass and drums instead of the standard quartet with piano. The format raised some eyebrows but for Rollins it represented an advance in the harmonic freedom and space he’d been seeking, and which the album’s musical results triumphantly affirmed. Supported by the elite duo of bassist Ray Brown and drummer Shelly Manne, Sonny carved a creative swathe through a typically wide-ranging programme, including a…

LONDON Tête à Tête: The Opera Festival King’s Cross & Kings Place, 26 July – 18 August Tel: +44 (0)20 7121 1100 Web: www.tete-a-tete.org.uk As Welsh-Iranian torch songs meet electronica, composer Errollyn Wallen dips into her Songbook and Toscatastrophe takes an irreverent pickaxe to Puccini. Hold on tight! The world’s zaniest festival of new opera returns. Beethoven Piano Society of Europe St James’s Piccadilly, 1-22 August Web: www.bpse.org To mark the 20th anniversary of Tippett’s death, four young prizewinning pianists – Yuki Negishi, Julian Trevelyn, Lee Jae Phang and Thomas Ang – perform the composer’s complete sonatas alongside works by Beethoven. The Brandenburg Project Royal Albert Hall, 5 August Tel: +44 (0)20 7070 4441 Web: www.bbc.co.uk/proms Over two BBC Proms, conductor Thomas Dausgaard and the Swedish Chamber Orchestra present all…

Tribute to Bernstein Marin Alsop returns to the BBC Proms with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra to celebrate the centenary of her mentor, the legendary conductor-composer Leonard Bernstein. She’s joined by pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet for Bernstein’s Symphony No. 2, ‘The Age of Anxiety’. Also on the programme is the equally politically-charged Slava! (A Political Overture) by Bernstein, and Shostakovich’s mighty Fifth Symphony. BBC Four; 31 August Prom from the past Bernstein conducted twice at the BBC Proms, and this special Prom turns the clock back to the first of those concerts, in 1987. Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto and Mahler’s Fifth Symphony were on the programme, performed by the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. For this homage to Bernstein 31 years on, Annalien Van Wauwe is the soloist, joining the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and…

Will London ever get its grand new concert hall? Things have gone a little quiet of late, presumably while someone scurries around for some cash to fund the odd architectural drawing or feasibility report. Meanwhile, attention has been happily drawn to other classical music bricks-and-mortar stories in, shock horror, places outside of the M25. While London has been getting itself in a spin about a concert hall that won’t even be in the centre of town, things have been going great guns in our second city, where the brand new Royal Birmingham Conservatoire’s concert hall has just attracted a £1 million donation; and in BBC Music Magazine’s home of Bristol, St George’s Hall (the best chamber acoustic in the UK, don’t you know?) is on the cusp of opening its…

The BBC Symphony Orchestra is set to move home. In a recent announcement, the BBC’s director general Lord Hall revealed plans for brand new music studios that will provide a purpose-built base for the London-based ensemble, along with the BBC Symphony Chorus and the BBC Singers. The new ‘music legacy’ site, which will be built by the London Legacy Development Corporation in the Stratford Waterfront development in East London, will include state-of-the-art music recording and rehearsal studios and, as well as its resident BBC ensembles, will also be used regularly by the BBC Concert Orchestra. The move to the new building from the current studios in Maida Vale is currently planned for 2022/23. ‘As well as being state-of-the-art and purpose built – unlike Maida Vale, which was originally a skating…

Zoie Reams Mezzo-soprano Born: Chicago, US Career highlight: Playing the part of Clarice in La pietra del paragone at Wolf Trap Opera last year. Singing a lead Rossini role truly frightened me at the time but, looking back, it was an especially rewarding experience. Musical hero: The American soprano Leontyne Price for her artistry and what she gave to the opera world. Being an African-American and moving in the world of opera in the way she did is something I aspire to. Dream concert: It would be a mix of opera, musical theatre, jazz, spiritual and dance – with a full orchestra! All of these styles tumbled into one for me when I was younger. Joon Yoon Pianist Born: Seoul, South Korea Career highlight: My debut at the…

The Passion of Musick Dorothee Oberlinger (recorder), Johanna Seitz (harp), Markus Märkl (harpsichord) et al Deutsche Harmonia Mundi 88875064762 I like this recording very much, largely because of the repertoire. Dorothee Oberlinger plays a lot of English music here, mainly from the 17th century, and uses many styles of ornamentation, improvisation and instrumentation. There is one work I particularly love, and that is Nicola Matteis’s Diverse bizzarrie sopra la vecchia sarabanda o pur ciaccona. It’s wonderfully composed, with many strange colours, and a hint of folk song. You need to interpret this music with a lot of fantasy and good taste, as is done here. Rosetti Symphony in G minor Concerto Köln Apex 2564625512 For me, Antonio Rosetti was interesting because he had dark passionate ideas in an era when,…

Iveta Apkalna Organist Symphonic music is very special to me as an organist, because there is so much to learn from the different layers and the drama and colours of the performance. The orchestral sound helps me choose registrations and stops on the organ. Conductor Robin Ticciati’s recording of Debussy’s La mer and Fauré’s Pelléas et Mélisande is constantly on my CD player. I saw Robin in his inauguration concert with the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester, and it was the first time I saw him conducting live. He has an authentic, magical approach to being on stage and makes you forget where you are, and I have only experienced a similar reaction to Claudio Abbado. I don’t always listen to classical music at home, however. I love classical music, but it’s so…

It’s ironic that Elgar metamorphosed his friends into such an affectionate and uplifting piece as the Enigma Variations, because in recent decades his most ardent supporters have not always presented themselves as a picture of harmony. The decision by Elgar’s family to allow Anthony Payne to complete Elgar’s sketches for a Third Symphony, against the composer’s express wishes, caused one blazing row, though Payne’s reconstruction proved to be so convincing that it was gradually accepted even by its fiercest opponents. Now the trustees of the Elgar Foundation - chaired by the lawyer-turned-politician-turned-opera-critic David Mellor and responsible for the composer’s birthplace in Lower Broadheath, just outside Worcester - are in hot water. They have decided to remove the archive of Elgar material from the birthplace, and instead deposit it in the…

Hubert Parry (1848-1918) Hailing from Highnam, near Gloucester, Parry reached rare emotional depths in his 12 sets of English Lyrics, composed from 1881 onwards. Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) Born in Down Ampney, Vaughan Williams’s many contributions to the song catalogue include Songs of Travel (1904) and On Wenlock Edge (1909), setting Robert Louis Stevenson and AE Housman respectively. Gustav Holst (1874-1934) The Cheltenham-born composer’s many songs include settings of English writers plus, most famously, texts from the ancient Rig Veda, translated from the Sanskrit by himself. Herbert Howells (1892-1983) Though best known for his choral works, the Forest of Dean’s most famous musical son also wrote a significant number of songs, including the haunting cycle A Garland for de la Mare. Ivor Gurney (1890-1937) The former Gloucester Cathedral chorister –…

Francesco Canova da Milano (1497-1543) was the first famous lutenist-composer. The Italian channelled his renowned improvisatory skills into writing ricercars and fantasias, which influenced generations to follow. But for a first taste of the rich world of the lute, head to the bountiful Elizabethan golden era, when the instrument was in its heyday. John Johnson (1545-94), one of three royal lutenists, turned dances of the time – pavans, galliards, almains and so forth – into art forms. He paved the way for the greatest of English composer-lutenists, John Dowland (1563-1626). Exquisite melancholy was Dowland’s calling card, nowhere more so than in his lute song Flow my tears. He penned many other lute songs, as well as solo lute works and viol consorts with lute. The design and tuning of the…

Roderick Williams Ave verum corpus Re-imagined Williams’s texturally fascinating response to Byrd’s anthem won the choral category at the 2016 British Composer Awards. Ken Burton Many are the Wonders Burton’s skill here is in uniting the gospel and Anglican choral traditions – to magical effect. John Rutter Suzi’s Carol Rutter takes his text from a 15th-century manuscript for this simple carol. The title reflects his respect for Digby’s choral work. Roxanna Panufnik (above) Kyrie after Byrd Panufnik preserves the structure and voicing of Byrd’s Five-Part Mass but employs gently shifting, ethereal harmonies. Eriks Ešenvalds Infelix ego after Byrd Ešenvalds’s setting of Girolamo Savonarola’s words is inspired by Byrd’s, and is equally anguished. Richard Allain Videte miraculum Alain’s imitative motet has instant appeal, its repetitions recalling Pärt, its harmonies Eric Whitacre.…

Among his various friends and associates, Lord Berners could number several of the leading artistic and academic figures of his day. There were, for instance, the scribbling Sitwell siblings, Edith, Osbert and Sacheverell; the politically variegated Mitford sisters, one of whom, Diana, commissioned him to write a ‘Fascist March’; eccentric fashionista Elsa Schiaparelli; acidulous novelist Evelyn Waugh; classicist and wit Maurice Bowra; experimental wordsmith Gertrude Stein (above, with Berners), and the inevitable Salvador Dali. All of these, plus many besides, added their own defintive hue to the composer’s already colourful existence.…

The wind is bitingly cold, and there’s the steel glint of snow in the air. The ground is icy, and the water is whipped up into waves. Standing on the edge of the docklands, looking out over the Göta älv brings to mind the briny tang of Britten’s Peter Grimes or even the stormy seas of Wagner’s Flying Dutchman. An apt location, perhaps, for one of Gothenburg’s most recognisable buildings, the opera house. Its striking design echoes its setting: the entrance like the prow of a boat, the curve of the glass foyer perhaps like the hull of a cruise liner. The design, said the architect Jan Izikowitz, ‘[is] possessed by an airiness that sends your mind soaring across the meandering landscape like wings of seagulls.’ Located on the country’s…

Character development Turnage has cited operas by Britten, Tippett and Shostakovich as key influencers. He uses Tippett’s technique of assigning an instrument to a character to give works definition. Into the darkness Accusations of bleakness surround Turnage’s work. He has said that he is often quite surprised at how intense some of it becomes, and several tweaks have been made to works in search of frothier melodies. Non-traditional solo instruments A one-time flautist and saxophonist, Turnage writes brilliantly for woodwind – as in Your Rockaby, a concerto for soprano sax, reportedly his favourite instrument – and also for brass, as he shows in Set To. Cross-cultural pollination Turnage is not afraid to mix genres or tackle difficult subject matter, such as drug addiction, which forms the backdrop to Blood on…

Before 1840, Robert Schumann had composed largely for the piano, producing works such as Carnaval , Davidsbündlertänze and Kinderszenen . But then, in the year of his 30th birthday, he turned to songwriting. The masterpieces to flow from his pen during his ‘Year of song’ included two Liederkreis cycles that set Heine and Eichendorff, Dichterliebe and Frauen-Liebe und Leben . Though he didn’t abandon song after that, orchestral and chamber music started to occupy him, and the first of his four symphonies was completed in 1841.…

This set is recorded live; is there more pressure for perfection? Well, we recorded all the rehearsals as well, so it’s not a hundred per cent live. You get the best of both worlds by doing it that way. Sometimes it’s hard to motivate yourself in the studio; it’s hard to get the energy level going, which you would in a concert. There are things in Beethoven Unbound that, if I was doing it in the studio, I probably could do better, but we just had to forego some of that to get the excitement of live performance. What are the benefits for the listener of the curated programme, as opposed to a chronological presentation? Certain pieces reflect on each other, and you’ve also got a huge contrast between various…

Receiving music lessons in Enniskerry, Ireland, from both her father and governess, Boyle composed from an early age. She went on to study in Dublin with Charles Kitson and, while caring for her parents and the family estate, entered composition competitions. Her relative isolation meant she had few opportunities to promote her talent, though the Carnegie UK Trust published her most successful work, The Magic Harp, in 1920. Boyle also studied under Vaughan Williams, in London from 1928, though she retreated to Ireland when war broke out.…

Bizet Les Pêcheurs de Perles (original 1863 version) Julie Fuchs, Cyrille Dubois, Florian Sempey, Luc Bertin-Hugault; Les Cris de Paris; Orchestre National de Lille/Alexandre Bloch Pentatone PTC 5186 685 (hybrid CD/ SACD) 109:42 mins (2 discs) The critic of Le Figaro was particularly cutting after the first night of Les Pêcheurs de Perles in 1863: ‘There were neither fishermen in the libretto, nor pearls in the music,’ he wrote. Berlioz, however, was kinder, particularly about Bizet’s music, and he was right. As Alexandre Bloch and the Orchestre National de Lille remind us, this is a magnificent score that blends the exotic, the dramatic and the lyrical. This is also the first ever recording of the premiere version of the opera, edited and reconstructed by Hugh Macdonald for the publishers Bärenreiter…

JS Bach ‘Liebster Jesu, mein Verlangen’, BWV 32; ‘Ich geh und suche mit Verlangsen’, BWV 49; ‘Selig ist derMann’, BMW 57 Sophie Karthäuser (soprano), Michael Volle (bass); Members of RIAS Kammerchor; Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin/Raphael Alpermann Harmonia Mundi HMM 902368 64:38 mins In the summer of 1725 Bach launched himself into a third cantata cycle for the Leipzig liturgical year, and it’s from this ‘Jahrgang’ that Raphael Alpermann sources three cantatas all linked by a common conceit. Each postulates a dialogue in which a soprano representing the soul interrogates a bass taking the role of Jesus. In pursuing so intimate a conception, Bach throws the musical weight behind artfully conceived arias and duets, the chorus relegated to a simple concluding choral in two instances, and banishment in the third.…

Mahler Des Knaben Wunderhorn Warner 9029573984 (1968) 50:03 mins Electrifying, inspired performances. Schwarzkopf and Fischer-Dieskau show complete mastery of vocal and orchestral colour in this crystal-clear, still-revelatory recording with Szell and the LSO. ★★★★★ Poulenc Gloria, Christmas Motets Saint-Saëns Messe a quatre voix Eloquence 482 8798 (1973-82) 81:36 mins A sparkling, precise rendition of Poulenc’s mysterious, often playful Gloria by the Choeur de la Radio Suisse Romande, make a welcome foil for Saint-Saëns’s lengthy and occasionally ponderous mass. ★★★★ Verdi Requiem Alto ALC 1602 (2009) 82:04 mins (2 discs) Slightly woolly and hefty sound at times (especially the chorus), but the soloists are appropriately operatic. Plenty of drama and grandeur from Colin Davis and the LSO. ★★★★ Christa Ludwig Brahms: Alt-Rhapsodie; Mahler: Des Knaben Wunderhorn, etc. Warner Classics 9029573885 (1962-68)…

The A major Trio’s slow movements have sensuous charm Telemann Essercizii Musici: Trio and Solo Sonatas Florilegium Channel Classics CCS 40118 119:35 mins (2 discs) Essercizii musici is perhaps the most impressive of Telemann’s chamber music collections. Until quite recently it was thought to date from c1739 but it is now known to have been printed in 1727 or 1728. The collection comprises solo sonatas with continuo, two suites for solo harpsichord, and 12 trio sonatas. The instruments are varied but specific to each work and include recorder, flute, oboe, violin, viola da gamba and harpsichord. In what I presume to be the first of two instalments, Florilegium presents 11 of the 24 pieces: seven of them are trios while the remaining four are continuo sonatas. Florilegium has already shown…

The London-born composer’s early educational years were guided by both Benjamin Britten and Elisabeth Lutyens. Later Saxton studied with Luciano Berio amongst others while studying at Cambridge and Oxford. A Gaudeamus International Composing Prize-winner at 21, Saxton has gone on to write for a plethora of UK orchestras, plus top-drawer soloists including Steven Isserlis, Leon Fleisher, Roderick Williams and Mstislav Rostropovich. His 2010 opera The Wandering Jew (NMC Records, NMCD170) was premiered on BBC Radio 3.…

August round-up To mix a metaphor, the double-edged sword of the festival milk round is now upon us again, with the world’s jazz talent clustering around these events rather than coming soon to a venue near you. It’s a good time to console oneself with some new CDs and, following Tim Garland’s example, perhaps also to consider the resurgence of jazz composition alongside the improvising tradition, essentially a product of the past few decades and possibly linked to the relatively recent adoption of jazz by music colleges. Whatever the case, it’s always good to have a new CD from Canadian pianist and composer Renee Rosnes, particularly as she’s underexposed on the European live circuit. Beloved of the Sky is a fine selection of varied originals for quintet that showcase her…

11. Royal Concert Hall Where: Nottingham Opened: 1982 Seats: 2,499 Positioned on the site of the old Empire Palace of Varieties, the Royal Concert Hall is part of a complex that includes the Nottingham Theatre Royal. Completed in 1982, the striking building was designed by Renton Howard Wood Levin Partnership, the architects responsible for the Sheffield Crucible Theatre. Thanks to its acoustical canopy, which can be raised, lowered and tilted backwards to suit each occasion, the hall caters for divers acts. The first performance was by Sir Elton John, no less, while more recent visitors have included orchestras such as the Hallé and St Petersburg Philharmonic, rock bands, and solo artists ranging from singer Gary Barlow to German violinist Arabella Steinbacher. As part of its 2018-19 Nottingham Classics international concert…

Edinburgh Festival Radio 3 is at the renowned Edinburgh Festival again this summer, bringing you the best of the 71st season. Highlights include Nicola Benedetti in Vivaldi and Telemann violin concertos (7 Aug) and Ronald Brautigam’s recital of Mendelssohn and Chopin on fortepiano (13 Aug). 6-24 August, 11am-1pm Eurovision Young Musicians The brilliant biennial competition returns as part of the Edinburgh Festival. Eighteen talented young musicians from member countries of the European Broadcasting Union will compete for a place in the grand final. This year’s judges include conductor Marin Alsop and composer James MacMillan. 18-19, 24 August, various times The Brandenburg Project The Swedish Chamber Orchestra has commissioned six leading composers to write partner works for each of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos. With the line-up including pieces by Mark-Anthony Turnage, Olga…

The British pianist jumped to the attention of UK audiences in 2004, when he won the keyboard final of BBC Young Musician aged just eleven. Eight years later, he played at the First Night of the Proms and signed to Decca Classics, for whom he has recorded three solo recitals and one concerto disc. In 2015, Grosvenor won a BBC Music Magazine Award and this year makes two BBC Proms appearances: on 16 August with the National Youth Jazz Orchestra and on 24 August, playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 21 with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and conductor Sakari Oramo. My mother is a piano teacher, so I started learning with her at the age of five. I learned to read music fairly quickly I think, as there’s a video of…

Early starts I heartily agree with the campaign of Nicholas Daniel about music education in schools (The Full Score and Richard Morrison, July). When my daughters entered infant school in the late 1960s, they and every other new entrant were handed a recorder practically as they came through the door. If they showed any ability whatsoever they were then encouraged to take up a more demanding instrument and given free lessons. My two did show such ability and we later arranged private tuition for them – they both became competent amateur violinists and music has played a great part in both their lives. John Rogers, Leeds Caesar and sea dog Your article on Danielle de Niese’s appearance at the Glyndebourne production of Handel’s Giulio Cesare in 2005 (BBC Music Magazine…

Elgar leaves home Elgar’s written archives are to be moved from The Firs, his birthplace in Worcestershire, to the British Library in London. The decision to move the documents, which was made by the Elgar Foundation to ensure their long-term future, has been met with disappointment by councillors in the composer’s home county. See Richard Morrison, p23 Max benefit Maxim Emelyanychev has been named as the new principal conductor of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. The 29-year-old Russian, who is also principal conductor of Il Pomo d’Oro orchestra in Switzerland, will begin his new role in September 2019. He came to the SCO’s attention when he took over a concert at late notice in March, wowing the Edinburgh audience in works by Schubert and Dvorák. Nicely named The state-of-the-art concert hall…

We reveal who’s recording what, and where… Deutsche Grammophon, which celebrates its 120th birthday this year, continues to add some big artists to its roster. Just announced is the exclusive signing of conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin who, in addition to major posts in Philadelphia and Montréal, not to mention the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, is soon to begin as music director of New York’s Metropolitan Opera. His new contract with the ‘Yellow Label’ will see recordings with all of the ensembles, including a new cycle of Rachmaninov symphonies and piano concertos with the Philadelphia Orchestra and pianist Daniil Trifonov. China’s oldest orchestra, the Shanghai Symphony, and conductor Long Yu have also signed with DG ahead of the ensemble’s own 140th anniversary. A first release, of Chinese and Russian repertoire, is due…

Pick a note, any note: what colour is it? A paradoxical question, you might think, but it’s a strange fact that the language we use to describe music is saturated with images of colour and light. We talk about lower, quieter sounds as ‘darker’ or ‘duller’: think of the opening of Stravinsky’s The Firebird, those tenebrous basses churning away with their magical but gloomy harmonies: a symphony of dark-reds and blacks, maybe? But its ending is a blaze of brightness and radiance (I think of yellows, blues, and purples) so that the whole piece turns from black to white, from darkness to light. But even to talk about relative brightness or darkness of orchestral sounds is to enter the world of metaphor. Because sounds possess no colouristic reality at all:…

Paul Lofthouse, Leeds I was privileged to see Maxim Vengerov (above), one of the world’s great violinists, perform at Leeds Town Hall in June. While his Bruch No. 1 and Saint-Saëns Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso were extremely well played, it was in the second half of the concert that he really showed his colours. He took the podium to conduct Tchaikovsky’s masterly Sixth Symphony and it was beautifully performed: exciting, lyrical, tenderly felt, deeply moving and explosive. It put me in mind of the great tradition of Russian conductors of this work such as Gergiev, Kondrashin, Svetlanov and Mravinsky.…

Felicity Lott soprano If I’m choosing a song that I’ve sung often and that moves me, it would be Britten’s arrangement of Waly Waly – I’ve been performing it for years. The text is lovely and simple, and the accompaniment is really simple too. The harmony changes so remarkably in the last verse – ‘Love is handsome and love is fine, and love is a jewel while it is new. But when it is old…’ – and then changes again on ‘cold’ where there’s this fantastic bleak chord. It’s such fun to try and capture the same kind of colour in the voice on the words, ‘And fades away like morning dew’. Thomas Allen baritone Michael Head wrote a number songs with terrific charm, including The Estuary, which I’ve known…

In the early 1980s the Irish literary critic Denis Donoghue challenged cultural theorists to stop explaining away the mystery of art. His Reith Lectures for the BBC teased out the threads of an academic trend that today surrounds every condition of life with explanations neatly tailored to fit different, often contradictory systems of knowledge. Yet the experience of contemporary sacred choral music and the appetite of audiences for it suggest that art’s mystery remains in high demand. Just ask Suzi Digby. The founder and conductor of ORA is in the business of meeting that demand, commissioning and performing 100 new works for unaccompanied choir within a decade and recording as many of them as possible. ORA’s a cappella commissions are intended to stand as a bridge between the golden era…

‘I hadn’t passed any exams – I had just appeared from nowhere’ ‘Ekele’ means ‘greetings’ in Igbo, one of Nigeria’s ethnic languages, and as such it makes a very apt title for a new recording by the pianist Rebeca Omordia. Consisting of piano pieces by contemporary or recent Nigerian composers, none of the music on the disc has been recorded before – Ekele welcomes us, as it were, to a previously undiscovered musical world. Funding the project herself, Omordia trawled through a huge amount of material, and the results are both engaging and revealing; the first 250 copies sold out quickly, necessitating a second run. ‘My aim,’ Omordia tells me, ‘is to make these composers known to the Western world. There is much more piano music where this came from,…

Wilhelm Stenhammar was one of the most important Romantic era figures in Swedish music, and he played a vital part in turning the Gothenburg music scene into one to rival the country’s capital. He was in fact born in Stockholm, but from 1906-22 Stenhammar was the artistic director and chief conductor of the Gothenburg Orchestral Society, today the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra. It was the first full-time professional orchestra in Sweden. Stenhammar invited Nielsen to conduct there, and involved leading living composers including Sibelius. A major composer himself, he wrote incidental music for several productions at the city’s Lorensberg Theatre.…

1960 LIFE: Mark-Anthony Turnage is born in Corringham, Essex. His father, who works for an oil company, plays the piano and sings, and his mother plays the cornet in a brass band. TIMES: The Beaulieu Jazz Festival descends into chaos when fights break out between trad and modern jazz fans. The event is later dubbed ‘The Battle of Beaulieu’. 1983 LIFE: At the Tanglewood Summer School, he is mentored by Hans Werner Henze, who urges him to turn his attentions to opera. TIMES: As the Conservatives win the General Election with a majority of 144 seats, Margaret Thatcher is re-elected as Prime Minister. 1974 LIFE: By now a keen composer, he is accepted into the junior section of the Royal College of Music. There, he is tutored by Oliver Knussen,…

This is a magisterial, mesmerising performance, with a touch of genius Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (baritone) Gerald Moore (piano) Orfeo C294921B (1956) Not all of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau’s studio recordings of Schumann’s Dichterliebe are everything they might be; some vocal weaknesses creep in in the later ones, respectively with pianists Christoph Eschenbach and Alfred Brendel, though the recording with Jorg Demus is more satisfying. Seek out in preference the concert performance from the 1956 Salzburg Festival with the Lieder pianist-par-excellence Gerald Moore. The German baritone was 31 at the time and at the very top of his game, amply matched by Moore’s beautifully pitched playing. The result is a magisterial, mesmerising performance with a touch of genius about it. Recorded sound quality is not great, but I can forgive it. Fischer-Dieskau’s singing is…

For me there is nothing more exciting than making a musical discovery, and I like to think that these pages serve as a portal to new sounds and adventures in listening. Of course, one person’s discovery might be another’s old favourite; but as the review of our Recording of the Month proves, even the familiar can be rediscovered and make you fall in love all over again. At least two of this month’s choices are recordings of music written centuries ago, that are evidently still as vital and thrilling as ever. But are the old ones really the best? There are comparatively new works reviewed in the following pages, by the likes of Robert Saxton and Alexey Shor, that might change your mind if you think so… but it depends…

Beethoven Symphonies Nos 5 & 7 New York Philharmonic/ Jaap Van Zweden Decca Gold 481 6856 69:56 mins These are amazing performances, recorded live, with thoroughly deserved cheers, in the Lincoln Center in 2015 and 2014 respectively. I imagine that the New York Philharmonic is thrilled to have so invigorating and colourful a figure as Jaap van Zweden as their chief conductor. On the basis of everything I have heard under him, he is one of those rare musicians who not only give powerful accounts of little known works, but also re-animate the standard repertoire without indulging in attention-drawing ‘insights’. From the opening bars of Beethoven’s Fifth, which it is possible for a seasoned listener to feel he has heard often enough, there is intense conviction. Not only in the…

Bruckner Symphony No. 7 SWR Music SWR19417CD (1958) 59:16 mins Paul Hindemith’s rapid and largely prosaic account doesn’t compare with most of the innumerable recordings of this great work; to be avoided unless you are in a hurry and just want to hear the notes. ★★ Bruckner Symphony No. 7 SWR Music SWR19410CD (1999) 71:14 mins A great performance by Kurt Sanderling, wonderfully flexible from the opening notes, with superb balance and warmth of string tone, only lacking the second movement’s climactic cymbal clash. ★★★★★ Mahler Symphony No. 6 SWR Music SWR19416CD (1981) 68:24 mins A rushed performance of Mahler’s most relentless orchestral work, making the first movement sound like bad Shostakovich, and best in the scherzo, which Kirill Kondrashin rightly places second. ★★★ Suk Asrael Symphony Krejci Serenata SWR…

Born in Kiev, Shor trained as a mathematician in Moscow, emigrating to Israel in 1991 then eventually settling in New York. Entirely self-taught as a musician, he originally composed as a pastime, being principally inspired by melody. He became friends with viola player David Aaron Carpenter who saw some of Shor’s music and took an interest in performing it. Shor is now composer in residence for the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra, and his music has been performed around the world by such soloists as Maxim Vengerov, Freddy Kempf, Sabine Meyer and Dimitry Sitkovetsky.…

Under Adams’s baton this is a compelling account on every level John Adams Doctor Atomic Gerald Finley, Julia Bullock, Brindley Sherratt; BBC Singers; BBC Symphony Orchestra/John Adams Nonesuch 7559793107 157:00 mins (2 discs) Familiarity makes the heart grow fonder of John Adams’s third opera, and also more fearful of its almost unbearable tension in the musical countdown to the ‘two billion dollar experiment’ testing the atomic bomb in Los Alamos. Gerald Finley ‘owns’ the operatic characterisation of J Robert Oppenheimer, the immensely cultured inventor whose Faustian pact changed the world after the war was over, and may yet destroy it. He sang the role in Peter Sellars’s inaugural production, at English National Opera and – best of all, I think – in the 2017 Barbican concert performance which followed Maida…

Meunier finds a deeply human dimension to Buxtehude’s work Buxtehude Abendmusiken: Cantatas BuxWV 10, 34, 41, 60 & 62; Sonatas BuxWV 255 & 261 Vox Luminis; Ensemble Masques/Lionel Meunier Alpha Classics ALPHA 287 85:17 mins Vox Luminis’s BBC Music Magazine Award-winning disc commemorating the quincentenary of the Lutheran Reformation contained one eyebrow-raising lacuna: there was nothing by Buxtehude. Perhaps the mystery is explained by this alluring postscript devoted exclusively to the music of an organist JS Bach arguably admired above all others. He esteemed him as a composer too, and must have devoured the Advent Abendmusiken concerts that made the Marienkirche the toast of musical Lübeck. Lionel Meunier’s crack consort teams up with the equally estimable Ensemble Masques to explore some of the music that might have been performed during…

JS Bach Chorale Preludes, BWV 724, 741, 957, 1091, 1092, 1094, 1097, 1099, 1105, 1111-1119; Fantasias, BWV 563, 570, 571, 1121; Fugues, BWV 700, 946, 947, 949, 950, 951a, etc. Plus works by Johann Christoph Bach, JM Bach, Frescobaldi, Froberger, Grigny, Kuhnau, Marchand & Pachelbel Benjamin Alard (organ, harpsichord) Harmonia Mundi HMM 902450-52 247:55 mins (3 discs) Benjamin Alard has set himself the task of recording the complete keyboard works of JS Bach in a numerologically significant 14 chapters – 14 being the cypher Bach derived from the letters of his name. Since the project pursues a chronological path, this first instalment necessarily includes a deal of juvenilia, but there’s no denying a judicious organisation at work. Each of these three discs creates a musical snapshot at a landmark juncture.…

JS Bach Cello Suites Nos 1-6 Sophie Webber (cello) Gimpy Records Gimpy1801  Though perhaps lacking in authoritative zing, the US-based, English-born cellist delivers what is by turns a passion-fuelled and meditative performance of Bach’s best. (MB) ★★★ Bruckner Piano Works Ana-Marija Markovina (piano) Hänssler Classic HC17054  Why do we not hear Bruckner’s piano music more often? These galumphing, leaden-booted works should tell you why. If there is any charm lurking within, Markovina doesn’t share it. (JP) ★★ Gloria Coates Piano Quintet, etc Roderick Chadwick (piano); Kreutzer Quartet, et al Naxos 8.559848  Both of these Emily-Dickinson-inspired pieces are bracing and intriguing, with quarter-tone tuning in one and a distinctive brass-percussion palette in the other. Committed performances. (RF) ★★★★ Michael Gordon Clouded Yellow, etc Kronos Quartet Cantaloupe CA21140  An uncompromising album marking…

THIS MONTH: PORTABLE HI›RESOLUTION MUSIC PLAYERS BUDGET PRICE CHOICE EA Audio Fiio X1 II, £99 For £99, the X1 II has a huge amount going for it. At 10cm long and weighing 106g, it’s portable, has a colour screen and an iPod-style touch-wheel. Two-way Bluetooth means you can receive a signal as well as stream from it, there’s room for a 256GB Micro SD card and it can handle files up to 192kHz/32bit WAV and 192kHz/24bit FLAC. All that would count for nothing if the sound didn’t deliver – while it doesn’t come close to the Astel & Kern (right) and lacks a little in the bottom end, its performance sounds anything but cheap. ea-audio.co.uk MID-RANGE CHOICE SONY NW-ZX300, £600 Sony has crammed plenty into the NW-ZX300’s stylish aluminium case…