Innholdsfortegnelse for January 2019 i BBC Music Magazine

Kate Bolton-Porciatti Writer and critic ‘Vivaldi melds the transient and the eternal in The Four Seasons : in microcosm, with fleeting violin solos punctuated by ritornelli ; in macrocosm, with an evergreen musical journey through the year’s cycle.’ Page 28 David De Roure Professor, University of Oxford ‘Ada Lovelace was a gifted mathematician and computer programmer, but the more I studied her, the more I discovered how very important music and creativity were to her too.’ Page 42 Roger Thomas Writer and critic ‘Nina Simone’s career tends to be reduced to bullet points: jazz-performer-by-default, civil rights activist, classically trained, temperamental. The reality was more subtle and complex, and her catalyst was Bach.’ Page 48…

Woodland wonders In Into the woods (Dec issue) Malcolm Hayes writes that ‘[music about] forests did not always need to suggest metaphysics’. This applies even in the Romantic 19th century, when symphonies were composed simply about forests themselves. Many say Bruckner’s ‘Romantic’ Fourth Symphony (1874-88) is a painting of the German Romantic forest and before this, in 1870, Raff premiered his Symphony No. 3, ‘Im Walde’ (In the Forest), in which he describes a 24-hour woodland stay. Even in countries not known for their extended woodland, compositions about forests were written. In Zweers’s Third Symphony, ‘To my Fatherland’ (1890) the first movement is titled ‘In Dutch forests and woodlands’. No metaphysics involved. Nor, in the 20th century, is there anything metaphysical about Shostakovich’s cantata The Song of the Forests, in…

1,930,000 …pounds for Mstislav Rostropovich’s cello. The Guadagnini sold for nearly double its estimate at Sotheby’s. 4 …female composers – Anna Appleby, Cecilia Livingston, Ninfea Cruttwell-Reade and Ailie Robertson – to be supported by a Glyndebourne scheme. 55 …concerts a year. This, pianist Mitsuko Uchida has revealed in an interview in The Guardian , is the maximum she will allow herself . 19 …years of Osmo Vänskä at the Minnesota Orchestra. The Finnish conductor has announced that in 2022 he will be moving to pastures new.…

Hot on the heels of accepting the post of music director of the Orchestre national de Lyon, Nikolaj Znaider has written an open letter to explain another decision that he has recently taken: namely, reverting to his original surname, Szeps-Znaider. Though using just ‘Znaider’ once seemed a sensible move, the violinist and conductor says that he now wants his name to reflect both sides of his family. He is, of course, by no means the first classical musician to have changed their names… Many performers over the years have adopted a memorable name to make themselves more marketable. These include the sopranos Helen Porter Mitchell, who used an abbreviation of the Australian city of her birth to become Nellie Melba, and Belle Silverman, whose adopted name of Beverly Sills brought…

Toronto’s innovative opera theatre, Against the Grain, has launched its own label in order to capture what it cites as its ‘fresh and daring’ performances. The first release will be a live recording, made in December, of Osvaldo Golijov’s song cycle Ayre. Performed by soprano Miriam Khalil, the work takes in many influences, including Sephardic lullabies and Byzantine chant. Soprano Mary Bevan joins forces with organist Joseph Nolan in January to record a disc of German Lieder at All Saints Church, East Finchley. The album, called Divinity, Mythology and Love, will explore the work of iconic Lieder composers Schubert, Haydn and Wolf and Signum Classics will release it later in the year. Soloists Jack Liebeck (violin) and John Parricelli (mandolin) joined members of the National Symphony Orchestra (UK) at Abbey…

It’s that time of year when pundits crank their befuddled old brains into reverse and pick out the ‘highs and lows’ of the previous 12 months. But that requires research, hard work and, worst of all, the capacity to recall dates and names. Eminently unsuited on all counts, I propose something a bit different: a concise musing on two themes that emerged during 2018 and will, I predict, change musical life significantly in years to come. The first is, to put it bluntly, intolerance. Intolerance is not always wrong, especially if it targets sexual misconduct or the abuse of power. And 2018 saw that net tighten around the careers of three eminent conductors. Whatever the rights or wrongs of their individual cases, all lost their jobs on the back of…

This piece is the closest a violinist gets to being an actor. You have to embody all the characters you’re playing and scenes you’re setting, which is very demanding. In Summer, particularly, I find it crucial to think intensely of a hot, smelly Venice. None of the movements in Summer feel separate – they all meld into one another in this lethargic way. The first movement has a kind of limp to it, with the missing first beat of the bar, and this moves into a second movement full of heat and mosquitos. It all ends in this eruption with the storm, which is the most physically exhausting movement to play – you have to hold onto the steering wheel and not let go. It’s hard to move straight onto…

The British composer’s late turn to opera has seen him find his true voice, and in the process reinvigorate the form for the 21st century. BBC Radio 3’s Kate Molleson meets him George Benjamin began writing his first opera at the age of 12. ‘Setting the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin,’ he winces. ‘And it was naive and terrible and thankfully came to an end halfway down page 34. Terrible! Unspeakably terrible!’ Who can corroborate? The world never heard those precocious pages, but the operas Benjamin went on to write – Into the Little Hill , Written on Skin and Lessons in Love and Violence – have changed the sound, scope, brutality and sensuality of 21st-century opera. All three were premiered in the last decade but were somehow…

A computer that composes music? Even in our era of advanced technology, the possibility that a machine might be able to create original works of art is one that’s stretching the world’s brightest scientists, artists and programmers. Yet it’s arguably an idea as old as computing itself. Ever since the first incarnation of the computer, back in the 19th century, its power beyond the realm of numbers has been recognised. The person who first identified its potential was Ada Lovelace, a pioneer of computer programming, and today an important role model for women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Lovelace’s programming credentials are unique and remarkable but the extent of her accomplishment is even more exciting and significant. While she studied maths and understood computation with perceptions well ahead of…

Much of Nina Simone’s recorded legacy is derived from live performances and is unfortunately awash with releases of questionable provenance and endlessly reshuffled compilations of varying quality. However, in terms of both legitimacy and programming The Very Best of Nina Simone (Sony) is a good starting point, scooping up most of her best-known work and demonstrating the variety of songwriters that inspired her, ranging from George and Ira Gershwin to Randy Newman. This compilation includes her extraordinary take on ‘Ain’t Got No/I Got Life’ from the musical Hair , often omitted from others, which sees her transforming the hippie anthem into a glorious celebration of identity and self-esteem. Should you prefer to trace her recording career in more detail, several bargain box-sets of original album reissues are available on labels…

A superstar fugitive who became an honorary Scot, Giusto Ferdinando Tenducci (above) was born poor in Siena in the 1730s, castrated as a child and became world-famous for his fabulous soprano voice. But a sex scandal made him infamous. In 1766 he married his 15-year-old student in Ireland, and because he was a castrato the marriage was technically illegal. He escaped imprisonment by fleeing to Edinburgh. A flamboyant, high-spending, law-dodging Italian eunuch in the sombre streets of Enlightenment Scotland? Turns out Tenducci was a hit. He sang regularly at the Edinburgh Musical Society, whose members were mostly freemasons. Catholic superstar fugitive seduces the masons: just another Edinburgh anomaly.…

1839 LIFE: Modest Musorgsky is born into a wealthy land-owning family in the Pskov region of Russia. He begins music lessons from the age of six. TIMES: Five thousand Russian troops set out to conquer the Khanate of Khiva (in modern-day Uzbekistan). Hindered by an exceptionally harsh winter, the expedition proves a disaster. 1857 LIFE: Now an officer in the Russian Imperial Guard, he meets the composer Dargomyzhsky, through whom he meets composers Cui and Balakirev and the critic Vladimir Stasov. TIMES: The Russian composer Mikhail Glinka dies, aged 52, in Berlin. After a few months, his body is disinterred and transported to St Petersburg for re-burial. 1874 LIFE: Inspired by the drawings, watercolours and stage designs of Viktor Hartmann, a friend who died the previous year, he composes his…

Takács Quartet Hyperion CDA67585 Few quartets have enjoyed such a long and distinguished recording history as Death and the Maiden . Indeed, one of the earliest recorded versions, given by the Busch Quartet in the late 1930s (Warner Classics), still very much holds its own, particularly for the wonderfully moving way in which the players unfold the sequence of variations in the second movement, and for the sustained energy and tension of the Finale which is capped by a daring almost unhinged accelerando near the end. Later performances from 1970s and ’80s by the Amadeus (DG), the Alban Berg (Warner Classics) and Quartetto Italiano (Universal) also command enormous respect for the warmth and fluidity of their performances although they don’t take as many risks as the Busch Quartet. The Takács…

Out with the old and in with the new? Perhaps not, but as we begin 2019 it’s as good an opportunity as any to make a resolution to mix your listening up a bit. I’m certainly guilty of returning to favourite albums and composers over trying something different. This month we’ve operas by Saint-Saëns, Korngold and Arthur Rubinstein that are worthy of attention, plus a fantastic disc of orchestral works by British composer Kenneth Hesketh. If an unfamiliar take on a classic is a safer start, then how about our Recording of the Month – a reduced Monteverdi Vespers that still packs a punch. Then there’s the debut album from Leeds winner Eric Lu, and the first solo disc from violinist Elicia Silverstein. Both ought to be on your playlists……

Mahler Symphony No. 5 Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra/ Daniel Harding Harmonia Mundi HMM 902366 73:23 mins Not everyone will take to Daniel Harding’s mostly leisurely, studied approach to Mahler’s Fifth – I don’t, entirely – but what spectacular playing throughout! Who knew the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, of which he is principal conductor, could be quite as electrifying as this? Horns and trumpets are paramount, as they have to be in this symphony, and though the funeral march proper of the first movement doesn’t flow naturally as it should, the welters in between are stunning, the ultimate climax overwhelming, a demonstration-quality moment like the one at the culmination of the last fugal meltdown in the finale. The strings are world-class, too, nuanced and capable of powerful accents; the Adagietto starts…

Born in Bombay (today Mumbai), Zubin Mehta enjoyed an early musical education from his violinist father, Mehli Mehta, founder of the Bombay Symphony Orchestra. Starting young proved fruitful for the aspiring conductor, who went on to study formally in Vienna; in 1962 he would become the youngest-ever music director of a US orchestra, taking on the role at the LA Philharmonic, aged 26. In 1961 he had already begun working with the Montreal Symphony, and so presided over two North American orchestras at the same time. As well as a remarkable tenure with the New York Philharmonic from 1978-91 (he was its longest-serving music director), Mehta has enjoyed several decades associated with the Israel Philharmonic.…

Korngold Das Wunder der Heliane Annemarie Kremer, Ian Storey, Katerina Hebelková; Freiburg Theatre Choir; Freiburg Philharmonic Orchestra/Fabrice Bollon Naxos 8.660410-12 161:37 mins (3 discs) This is Korngold’s most ambitious opera and pulling it off successfully is quite a tall order. Premiered in 1927, the same year as Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, it feels closer to that dystopian drama than to The Adventures of Robin Hood, the film score for which Korngold later won an Oscar. It’s a hefty, mystical tale: ‘Blessed are those that love…they who love shall not die,’ declares the chorus. Not that you’d know, since Naxos hasn’t included a libretto, a frightful omission for such an obscure work. Long, loud and densely scored, this opera cannot be easy for its singers. Heliane, the queen who loves the condemned…

Berlioz Grande Messe des Morts Bror Magnus Tødenes (tenor); Bergen Philharmonic Chorus & Orchestra/Edward Gardner Chandos CHSA 5219 (hybrid CD/SACD) 80:54 mins One of my happiest musical memories of the last few years is of a performance of Berlioz’s Requiem under Edward Gardner at the Three Choirs Festival in Gloucester. He has the measure of this work – of its pacing, its contrasts and, not least, of its idiosyncrasies. Among my favourite moments here is the momentous hush before the first ‘mors stupebit’, with lower strings barely audible, stupefied by the extraordinary idea of death itself in awe; and the moment is all the more terrifying after the full blaze of brass and drums to which the engineers do full justice, as they do to the overall impression of space…

A prolific American composer, John Harbison earned plaudits as young as 16. He studied at both Harvard and Princeton, and counted Walter Piston among his tutors. Following his 1987 Pulitzer Prize, his standing as one of the leading composers of the US was confirmed by commissions from Metropolitan Opera and the Vatican, his many chamber, symphonic, choral and solo works being recorded and regularly performed. He is principal guest conductor of Boston’s ensemble Emmanuel Music, and a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).…

JS Bach • A Debicz JS Bach: Inventions Nos 1-15, Sinfonias Nos 1-15; A Debicz: Toccatas 1-4 Aleksander Debicz (piano) Warner Classics 9029560146 60:33 mins A YouTube film shows Aleksander Debicz walking around Warsaw ahead of recording his album Cinematic Piano. Influenced by film music as well as hip-hop, Debicz’s own toccatas recorded here are very conservative in idiom, yet their rhythmic verve is hard to resist. If only one could say the same about his playing of Bach’s Inventions, but a general lack of a sense of line and shading results in some lacklustre accounts, not helped by an almost complete absence of even the most basic ornamentation. True, Debicz plays Bach’s own ornamented alternative version of the E flat Two-Part Invention, but elsewhere the music all too often…

Born in New York, Edward MacDowell was accepted on an international scholarship to the Paris Conservatoire. From there he studied in Frankfurt, where he met and performed for Schumann and Liszt. Eventually relocating to Boston, he found work as a pianist and teacher before becoming Columbia University’s first music professor in 1896. Depression, ill health and eventually dementia took its toll, but he left notable piano works, not to mention an artistic fellowship programme that benefitted composers such as Copland, Beach, Barber and Bernstein.…

January round-up  Let’s hear it for the Rhodes electric piano, which is all over this month’s selection. Derived from a keyboard used in providing music therapy for injured American servicemen (the origins of jazz instrumentation are rarely obvious), the Rhodes has had both electromechanical and digital incarnations and has moved in and out of jazz fashion since its early advocacy by Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea. Piano prodigy Connie Han uses the instrument on a couple of tracks on her debut Crime Zone, a slice of slick, up-tempo LA modernism that’s perhaps a tad overstretched in terms of material but is still very listenable. All her instincts are in the right place; her technique is absolutely flawless, her cool rhythm section and empathetic horns are firmly on the case, the…

17. Victoria Hall Where: Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent Opened: 1888 Seats: 1,467 Amid the celebrations for Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee in 1887, the Stoke Town Hall Committee commissioned ‘a room capable of holding a larger number of people than any existing building in the district’. The following year the Victoria Hall was officially opened with a two-day festival of speeches and recitals on the spectacular organ. Originally, the room seated 2,800 people, but when wooden benches were replaced with seating, the number was reduced to the 1,467 seats of today. Thanks to the timber-framed elliptical ceiling, the hall has superb acoustics, often described as one of the best in the country for a venue of its size. In 1999 the hall was involved in a major Cultural Quarter renovation project which saw…

Apollo's Fire: The Cleveland Baroque Orchestra Named for the classical god of music and the sun, Apollo’s Fire was founded by its Artistic Director, Jeannette Sorrell, to revive the Baroque ideal that music should evoke the various Affekts or passions in the listeners. Apollo’s Fire tours internationally and has released 27 CD recordings, including Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos and Bach’s St. John Passion. info@apollosfire.org www.apollosfire.org Baroque at the Edge London’s coolest early music festival invites adventurous musicians from all backgrounds to take the music of the Baroque and see where it leads them. Artists include pianist Gabriela Montero, viol/electronics wizard Liam Byrne, singer Nora Fischer, chamber group Ceruleo, and folk duo Dipper Malkin. No rules, no programme notes. All you need to know is how to listen. LSO St Luke’s. 4-6…

So, musically, how was 2018 for you? This issue, Richard Morrison (p27) takes a look at his own standout moments and performance highlights from the past 12 months. On p38, however, we’ve invited a clutch of renowned artists to share their hopes – and fears – for the year ahead, from personal ambitions to general concerns for the music world. It makes for fascinating reading. My 2018 highlight was back in June when I had the opportunity to give recitals on the organs of Arnstadt’s Neue Kirche and Mühlhausen’s Divi Blasii – Thuringian churches where the young JS Bach cut his teeth. Both modern instruments are close in build and sound to the organs Bach would have played (the Arnstadt organ still contains around 20 per cent of its original…

James Newby Baritone Born: Leicester, UK Career highlight: Performing in the world premiere of Brett Dean’s Hamlet, and getting to spend two months in the same rehearsal room as the likes of Vladimir Jurowski, John Tomlinson, Sarah Connolly and Allan Clayton. I’m not sure there’s any better education for a young singer. Musical hero: The way baritones Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Benjamin Luxon colour phrases and bring such honesty to their singing is such a huge inspiration and something I try hard to emulate. Dream concert: Performing in Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast at the BBC Proms. Nicolas Namoradze Pianist Born: Tbilisi, Georgia Career highlight: Playing Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 2 with conductor Karina Canellakis and the Calgary Philharmonic, because it was a performance in which we all shared a vision,…

Vivaldi Di due rai languir costante Cecilia Bartoli (mezzo-soprano); Il Giardino Armonico/Giovanni Antonini Decca 478 3388 They don’t actually know which opera this aria was composed for, so there’s a kind of mystery around it. like this I one particularly because there are two flageolets – these old wind instruments – and the way it is written for them, and the voice, is absolutely magical. I’m a big fan of Cecilia Bartoli and this was actually the first time I heard her. I think she’s an absolutely amazing artist and I like the way she approaches her recordings. She always searches for unknown pieces. Jean de Cambefort, Cavalli et al Le Concert Royal de la Nuit Ensemble Correspondances/ Sébastien Daucé Harmonia Mundi HMC952223/24 I love this disc and the project.…

The festive feeling of the harvest is right there from the start. Somehow, though, this concerto catches me off-guard technically. Perhaps it’s because I grew up in Australia and we don’t really have seasons – only hot and less hot. I learned Spring and Summer first and came to Autumn later. But the first movement especially is really difficult. It’s more awkwardly written than the others and there’s a lot more jumping around to do. The Adagio molto is extremely peaceful. Everyone has eaten their share after the bountiful harvest – food coma time! It’s quite an uncomfortable movement to play. You’re trying not to wake the sleeping people, so you don’t want a sudden bump in the line or phrasing. In the third movement, there’s the challenge for the…

Concerts so dark the audience can barely read the programme, so cold they can’t hear the music for their chattering teeth and so high up they get vertigo: just three of the many deprivations promoters have subjected the paying public to in the name of classical music with a difference. Blame the premiere of Handel’s Music for the Royal Fireworks, with its canons and pyrotechnics. Never mind that a concertgoer’s dress was set alight, that one soldier lost a hand and another was blinded. The fact was, the promoter persuaded thousands of Londoners to turn up. Over 250 years later, they’re still using all the tricks of the trade to encourage listeners to come. At the same time, new approaches intended to attract fresh audiences to classical music have evolved.…

Debussy and Ravel were enthralled by Musorgsky’s audacious use of harmony One can often tell a great deal about a composer by who their fans are among their peers. For Musorgsky – whose main period of creativity was, it should be remembered, during the 1860s and ’70s – they included virtually every leading French composer of the late-19th and early-20th century. When Saint-Saëns brought a score of Musorgsky’s opera Boris Godunov from Russia back to Paris, Debussy and Ravel among others were enthralled by the music’s innovative and audacious use of harmony, and its new expressive horizons. Under Musorgsky’s influence, Debussy composed his evocative and atmospheric orchestral Nocturnes – indeed its opening theme is practically stolen from Musorgsky’s song ‘Thou didst not know me’ (from the cycle Sunless). Ravel famously…

The work  ‘Just imagine a man whose health will never be re-established, and who from sheer despondency makes matters worse rather than better,’ wrote Schubert to his friend Leopold Kupelwieser in March 1824; ‘just imagine a man whose brightest hopes have come to nothing, to whom happiness of proffered love and friendship offers nothing but anguish, for whom enthusiasm for what is beautiful threatens to vanish altogether, and then ask yourself if such a condition does not represent a miserable and unhappy man?’ The music is dark and sombre, the few shifts into a brighter major key offering little relief This confessional letter reveals the composer’s desperate state of mind as he grappled with the harsh realisation that there was no hope of him recovering from syphilis. He had spent…

Pavel Haas Quartet An arresting and powerful opening statement sets the scene for a thoroughly engrossing 2013 recording which achieves a similar level of urgency to that of the Takács. The Pavel Haas Quartet are particularly insightful in the way they conjure up the ghostly chill in the closing passage of the first movement, and there is a magical poignancy to the first violin’s melodic decoration of the Death and the Maide n theme in the first variation of the second movement. At the opposite end of the dynamic spectrum, there’s much to admire in the strongly punctuated, almost Brucknerian, rhythms of the Scherzo and the visceral power and wildness of the Finale. (Supraphon SU4110-2) Jerusalem Quartet A resonant recording helps to bolster the full-blooded nature of this 2008 interpretation.…

Monteverdi Vespro della Beata Vergine (1610) Ludus Modalis/Bruno Boterf Ramée RAM1702 90.37 mins (2 discs) Bruno Boterf brings us a Vespers of unique beauty, in a version Claudio Monteverdi had printed but which until now has never been recorded. Published in 1610, the Vespers won the composer the coveted directorship of St Mark’s, Venice. It’s easy to see why: in scope, scoring, invention and technical command, the work dwarfs any earlier music of its kind. But in his one edition Monteverdi actually gave the means to create two productions, one sumptuous and another smaller-scale. Until Boterf, all directors took up the former, with its 15-instrument ritornelli ‘Sonata sopra Santa Maria’ and its seven-voice Magnificat. The smaller Vespers that Boterf performs has no ritornelli, no ‘Santa Maria’ sonata, and a six-voice…

Hesketh Knotted Tongues; Of Time and Disillusionment; In Ictu Oculi BBC National Orchestra of Wales/ Christoph-Mathias Mueller An exhilarating and beautiful synergy of form and expression Paladino Music PMR 0092 54:42 mins Kenneth Hesketh is a composer at the height of his considerable powers. Born in Liverpool in 1968, his music is saturated with an Anglo-French modernism informed by figures from Dutilleux to Knussen, and interests from classical architecture to medieval iconography. These three recent orchestral works showcase to brilliant effect his deepening fascination with scientific and other philosophies of existence. Entropy and mutation, Memento Mori, and Cartesian theories of humans as unreliable machines – such humanist preoccupations give rise to a purely musical, abstract approach to sound and structure. The result is an exhilarating and beautiful, sometimes disturbing, synergy…

Beethoven Piano Concertos Nos 4 & 5 Nicholas Angelich (piano); Insula Orchestra/Laurence Equilbey Warner Classics 9029563417 74:16 mins Given the competition, you need good reason to issue yet another recording of Beethoven’s last two piano concertos – and this group has one. This is a period-instrument performance, but with a difference: the piano, a fastidiously restored 1892 Pleyel, not the usual underpowered fortepiano, was chosen for its ability to project across a modern concert hall, while possessing a sonority evoking what might have been the character of its original performance. Its sound melds satisfyingly with a small orchestra playing on gut strings and with period wind instruments. The opening chords of the Fourth Concerto usher in what feels almost like chamber music, so intimate is the sound; Nicholas Angelich’s articulation…

Saint-Saëns Ascanio Jean-François Lapointe, Eve-Maud Hubeaux, Karina Gauvin, Clémence Tilquin; Choeur et Orchestre de la Haute Ecole de Musique de Genève; Choeur du Grand Théâtre de Genève/Guillaume Tourniaire B Records LBM 013 190:00 mins (3 discs) Saint-Saëns gives his principal singers every opportunity to shine This is a magnificent curiosity – a late five-act French Grand Opera heard as its composer intended for the very first time in this recording. Saint-Saëns wrote his version of Benvenuto Cellini in less than 12 months and the ballet was completed in 1889 the following year. Ascanio was tailored for the Paris Opéra, but overwhelmed by the death of his mother the composer left before rehearsals were completed and the work was cut down to the management’s preferred size. It would be good to…

Parry Twelve Sets of English Lyrics, Vol. 3 Sarah Fox (soprano), Roderick Williams (baritone), Andrew West (piano) Somm Recordings SOMMCD 272 58:46 mins Parry deftly suggests the encroaching chill of eventide Parry is widely loved for several choral pieces and the mass song Jerusalem. Something of their noble quality – innate to the man himself – can be heard in these songs, although ‘My heart is like a singing bird’ with which this album opens does little to dispel the impression of Parry as a worthy but rather conventional late-Victorian gentleman. The ones that follow, however, are of increasing interest. With track five we reach a genuine masterpiece: ‘The sound of hidden music’, sung with winsome ingenuousness by soprano Sarah Fox, was apparently Parry’s very last song, and could easily…

WS Bennett Chamber Trio; String Quartet in G; Sextet in F sharp minor Jeremy Young (piano), Leon Bosch (double bass); Villiers Quartet Naxos 8.571379 77:30 mins Best known for his piano concertos, William Sterndale Bennett also wrote a notable body of chamber music. This new release, if a little uneven in places, still shines a welcome light on three little-heard works. Most substantial is the Sextet in F sharp minor, a colourful and tightly-structured work for string quintet (including double bass) plus piano. Written in Bennett’s final year of study at the Royal Academy of Music, the Sextet is closely modelled on Mendelssohn, with whom he warmly corresponded for several years. The Villiers Quartet are a touch low on energy at the work’s opening, and intonation is not always secure;…

The Dreams & Fables I Fashion Biber: Mystery Sonatas – The Crucifixion; Passacaglia; Sciarrino: 6 Capricci; Pandolfi: 6 Sonatas for Violin and Continuo; Berio: Sequenza VIII for Violin; JS Bach: Partita No. 2 in D minor – Chaconne Elicia Silverstein (violin), Mauro Valli (cello), Michele Pasotti (theorbo) Rubicon RCD1031 56:27 mins The performances are technically secure with faultless intonation Taking the first line of a Metastasio sonnet for the title of her debut album, Elicia Silverstein has woven an aural pattern in which she links the 17th-century stylus phantasticus with the Italian avanguardia of the second half of the 20th century. In so doing, Silverstein demonstrates a connective element in the two periods which could so easily have been pretentious but which, aided by her own lucidly explanatory essay, is…

Brahms Symphony No. 3, etc Swedish Chamber Orchestra/Thomas Dausgaard et al BIS-2319 (hybrid CD/SACD) mins If some of the rubato and tempos in the Third Symphony don’t always feel natural, the sound and phrasing is always stylish. There’s beauty in Anna Larsson’s Alto Rhapsody, although she sounds off-colour in the songs. (RF) ★★★ Handel Nine Suites Scipione Sangiovanni (piano) Piano Classics PCL10143 Handel’s masterful suites shine in this well-articulated, controlled performance. I could have done with a little more crispness, and a greater distance between piano and mic. (OC) ★★★ John Ireland Orchestral Works Royal Scottish National Orchestra/ Martin Yates Dutton CDLX 7353 Ireland’s gorgeous Downland Suite is coupled here with his lesser-known incidental music to Julius Caesar and his soundtrack for the film The Overlanders. Stirring performances (OC) ★★★★…

THIS MONTH: CD SYSTEMS MID-RANGE CHOICE Roberts Radio Stream 67 £599 This is an all-in-one CD system that’s the ideal size for your home office. It’s quite an investment compared to a Roberts radio, but the wooden cabinet, large easy-read display and streaming options make it good value, especially as Spotify Connect, Deezer, Amazon Prime Music and TIDAL all come built in, not forgetting Wi-Fi connectivity, Bluetooth and DAB/DAB+/FM. Performance is sprightly and enjoyable, and while it doesn’t match the exquisite-sounding Ruark R4 MK3 (£559) it does offer considerably more connectivity. robertsradio.com BUDGET PRICE CHOICE Denon D-T1 £269 Here’s proof that you don’t have to spend big to enjoy great sound and a multitude of features. Denon’s traditionally styled micro hi-fi might look a little ’90s compared to the latest…

Alan Davey , the controller of BBC Radio 3, picks out three great moments to listen out for in January New Year’s Day Concert We return to Vienna’s Musikverein for the 79th edition of the annual New Year’s Day Concert. As ever, waltzes and polkas by the Strauss family will be played with gusto by the Vienna Philharmonic, this year performing under the baton of Christian Thielemann. New Year’s Day Concert: 1 Jan, 10.15am Bach’s Christmas Oratorio The BBC Singers are joined by the Academy of Ancient Music in Bach’s Christmas Oratorio at St Luke’s Church, Chelsea this month. The mastery of Bach’s retelling of the nativity story is the perfect way to reflect on Christmas in the new year. Radio 3 in Concert: 9 & 11 Jan, 7.30pm Behind…

Carole Boyd is known to millions of BBC Radio 4 listeners as The Archers’ Lynda Snell, Ambridge’s arch-cajoler, do-gooder and Christmas panto director. This Christmas, Snell is staging her own adaptation of Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales which you can hear in full on 29 Dec and 5 Jan on Radio 4, and afterwards on BBC Sounds. Away from The Archers, Boyd has recorded more than 300 audiobooks from George Eliot’s Middlemarch to Ian McEwan’s Atonement, has played every female character in CBeebies’ Postman Pat and performs concerts of words and music with the Bibby Piano Duo. There was a lot of music in the house when I was young – my mother played the piano in a sort of thumpy way because she never had many lessons. And I remember…

Tasty cheese Richard Morrison, in deriding amateur choirs’ performances of pop numbers (Christmas issue), misses the point. We have all seen ‘the whining schoolboy… creeping like a snail unwillingly’ to his instrumental lesson where an ageing and inflexible tutor insists upon him practising yet again a classical piece with which he is thoroughly bored, until he gives up playing altogether, and the difference engendered when another tutor encourages the same schoolboy to play some John Williams film themes which he and his family know well. The analogy with the amateur choir is apposite: the objective in each case is to encourage participation, performance and enjoyment by the player/singer. If that involves a choir accepting an occasional piece of ‘musical cheese’ in its repertoire, so be it. If the performers find…

Pick of the Flicks Felix Mildenberger has won the 15th Donatella Flick Conducting Competition. At the final at the Barbican in London, the 28-year-old German impressed the judges with his command of works by Wagner, Prokofiev and Kodály, winning himself £15,000 and the year-long post of assistant conductor at the London Symphony Orchestra. His fellow finalists were Harry Ogg, of the UK and Alexander Colding Smith from Denmark. Philharmonia farewell Maybe one day Mildenberger will take the helm of the Philharmonia Orchestra? The London-based ensemble is currently on the look-out for a new maestro after its current principal conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen announced that the 2020/21 season will be his last in post. The Finn will be heading across the pond where, in another recently announced move, he is to take…

This month: Arabella Steinbacher violinist MY FINEST MOMENT Britten • Hindemith Violin Concertos Arabella Steinbacher (violin); Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra/Vladimir Jurowski Pentatone PTC 5186625 (2017) I wanted to record the Hindemith concerto because it’s not played that often. Then I found out that Britten and Hindemith composed their violin concertos in the same year and they had very similar stories. They both left Europe to spend time in America, and you can hear a lot of loneliness in the music. The composers are so different from each other, but they bring it out in their way; so it’s really interesting to play both concertos, and record them, at the same time. It was a challenge, not only musically but also physically, because we had to record both concertos in a…

Mediocrity is a valuable attribute, says Tom Service . It lies at the heart of popular music throughout the ages, and helps us identify the truly great works of art. It’s one of the most memorable moments in Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus, when Antonio Salieri defines himself ‘the patron saint of mediocrity’. We know he’s right: Salieri has just enough talent to know how untalented he is next to the towering yet infantile genius of Wolfie Mozart. The irony is that in his lifetime Salieri was more successful than Mozart, in terms of how often his operas were performed and in the position he held at the Austrian court. Not that you’d know it from orchestras’ and opera houses’ programming around the world today. Salieri has been roundly defeated by Wolfie.…

Oliver Condy Editor Part of the perks of being the editor of this magazine are the industry’s festive bashes. And at the BBC Sounds do earlier in December down in the crypt of London’s Glaziers Hall, the select gathering was treated to a splendid performance by saxophonist Jess Gillam of the final movement of Milhaud’s Scaramouche. A terrific way to kick off a party. Gillam ended her mini-set with a gorgeous rendition of The Christmas Song. Jeremy Pound Deputy editor Rather pleasingly, driving my son to a Saturday morning football match in Gloucestershire took us past the birthplaces of Holst, Parry and then Howells. A perfect excuse, then, to dig out Tenebrae’s exceptional Songs of Farewell album from 2011, which happens to feature works by all three composers.…

Whether or not Vivaldi himself wrote them, I’m fascinated by the sonnets that precede each of The Four Seasons . Spring is this announcement that the new season is upon us, as the birds and all kinds of nature join in this huge celebration. For me, performing it is all about correlating all the images that you have in your mind with the technical challenges that Vivaldi gives you. There’s so much going on – from the sleeping goatherd with the dog barking to the bagpipes and dancing nymphs – and it’s all a bit of a raucous romp. The danger is that you come crashing too fast out of the starting gate. It’s all about pacing yourself and trying to keep a level head. Spring is the Season that…

The first movement of Winter has fast virtuosic writing and downward scales that don’t always fit the fingers you’ve got to play them with. It’s intended to be exciting and challenging as well. You’ve got that fantastic bit where the teeth are chattering; it’s very high up and we’re playing demi-semi-quavers – it’s not complicated as such, but it does require a lot of coordination because you’ve got to change your double-stopping in a nanosecond. The last movement is a bit of a finger-twister too. One of the biggest challenges in this movement is ensemble with the lead violinist and the orchestra – you’ve got some of the fastest writing that there is in the entire piece, and you’ve been playing for 45 minutes already. It’s quite a challenge to…

‘You have the same name as Bach – my first love!’ Thus was journalist Tim Sebastian disarmed by the legendary pianist, singer and occasional songwriter Nina Simone at the beginning of her interview for the BBC television show Hardtalk in 1999. Though tagged as a jazz performer, a label she regarded as both disparaging and inaccurate, the classical repertoire had been her original source of musical inspiration; she would remark that to play it was to be ‘as close to God as I know’. Her earliest experience of performing it, however, had been less positive. “ At just ten years old, she was steeped in the music of Mozart, Beethoven, Czerny and JS Bach” Born Eunice Kathleen Waymon in Tryon, North Carolina in 1933, her childhood piano lessons were with…

City rivalries can produce some sublime slanging matches, especially where Glasgow is involved. ‘Aw fur coat and nae knickers’ is just one of the poetic slurs levelled at Edinburgh by its garrulous neighbour – the assertion being that, underneath the grand architecture and the auld wealth, under the proud contours and the stately institutions attached to capital status, Edinburgh is no more sophisticated than anywhere else. Not where it counts. Glasgow has a point and doesn’t. Edinburgh is a city of layers, literally. Streets built upon staircases built upon streets. Postcard elegance and pee-stained medieval closes. Home of Jekyll and of Hyde, home of the biggest arts festival in the world and the dreichest February nights. It’s a UNESCO World Heritage Centre with a current city council that gives the…

Audacious harmonies Musorgsky composed at the piano, and often discovered striking and unorthodox harmonies through extemporising. In this way, he hit upon the remarkable bell harmonies which open the coronation scene of his opera Boris Godunov . Language of the heart Musorgsky’s expressiveness derives to a degree from Schumann’s harmonic language. Yet one of his greatest achievements was the way his music reflects the fractured, multidimensional nature of the individual human soul or identity – whether the mighty yet tormented Tsar Boris (below, played by Theodor Scheidl in 1936) or a humble peasant woman. Compare and contrast Particularly when Musorgsky’s music is without the thread of a vocal line, an idea is often not so much answered as complemented or contrasted with another idea. ‘Dawn on the Moscow River’ which…

Schubert was in fairly good spirits at the start of 1824, which he welcomed in by breaking a window at a New Year’s party – an omen, perhaps, for 12 months that would leave his spirit similarly shattered. The previous year had him diagnosed with syphilis, whose effects now began to take their toll, while his state of mind was probably not helped by a passion for his pupil Caroline Esterházy that evidently went unrequited. Aside from the Death and the Maiden quartet, other major works from this year include his F major Octet and the ‘Rosamunde’ String Quartet.…

Why is a recording of this version such a rarity? I think the Vespers are so magnificent, big and impressive that people are afraid of doing a small version. When you read the score, you can see Monteverdi wrote that some of the bass parts and ritornelli may be omitted. There are also two versions of the ‘Magnificat’ – one with instruments and another with only organ. My decision was to do something like that, without disrespecting Monteverdi’s directions. There was another recording before this by Rinaldo Alessandrini – though not of the whole piece. What effect does reducing the ensemble have? It’s no less powerful; the energy is always there and the sound – 12 voices – is really impressive, I think. The 12 singers correspond to the number…

Beethoven Symphonies Nos 5 & 7 Alto ALC 1375 (1962) 64:35 mins Magnificent, no-nonsense Beethoven from the first and best of Herbert von Karajan’s three recorded sets with the Berlin Philharmonic, with a masterful Fifth Symphony, at once thrilling and unrushed. ★★★★★ Beethoven Creatures of Prometheus Brahms Haydn Variations Haydn Symphony No. 100 (Military) Eloquence 482 5505 (1949-52) 136:43 mins (2 discs) In this Van Beinum compilation, decent-ish early Decca sound conveys classy LPO playing in Beethoven’s Prometheus, plus the Concertgebouw’s quality in Brahms’s Haydn Variations. ★★★★ Vaughan Williams Symphony No. 6; Dona nobis pacem Vanguard Classics SVC-7 (1966) 72:30 mins Maurice Abravanel and the Utah Symphony offer solid quality in VW’s Sixth, just missing the intensity of the best versions. Dona nobis pacem has two fine soloists but pallid…

Mozart Piano Concertos Nos 15 and 16; Quintet for Piano and Winds Jean-Efflam Bavouzet (piano); Manchester Camerata/ Gábor Takács-Nagy Chandos CHAN 20035 71:03 mins Soloist, conductor and orchestra conjure a magical soundworld 1784 proved to be a vintage year for Mozart, prompting a steady stream of masterpieces, three of which are featured in this enthralling release. First, we have the exuberant Concerto in D major, K451. The opening tutti of the first movement sets the scene for the rest of the performance, the Manchester Camerata under Gábor Takács-Nagy delivering blisteringly energetic articulation in the powerful full orchestral passages, as well as ensuring that there is a vibrant sense of dialogue between strings and wind in the gentler second idea. These contrasts in mood, coupled with the ability to engage in…

Borodin Prince Igor Eloquence 482 6935 (1955) 205:33 mins (3 discs) Belgrade Opera presents Borodin’s sole opera without cuts and some sense of style; but Dusan Popovic ’s Igor is surrounded by undistinguished performances, and more recent recordings supersede this. ★★ Rossini Il Barbiere di Siviglia Sony 19075811272 (1982) 155:18 mins (3 discs) A suave account of Rossini’s classic comedy, with Riccardo Chailly and his La Scala forces clearly enjoying the piece and a top-quality cast fulfilling the requirements of all the principal roles. ★★★★ Rossini La Cenerentola Sony 18075811282 (1983) 147:46 mins (2 discs) With an almost contralto quality to her mezzo, Lucia Valentini Terrani brings dignity as well as accomplishment to Rossini’s Cinderella, supported by a choice cast and conductor plus period-instrument forces. ★★★★ Tchaikovsky Eugene Onegin Eloquence…

Chansons Françaises Berlioz, Ravel, et al Eloquence 481 7502 (2012) 70:32 mins Polished, if somewhat prosaic, performance by Wolfgang Holzmair and Maria Belooussova of an extremely attractive selection of mainly well-known French songs. ★★★ France Works by Poulenc, Jolivet, et al SWR SWR19065CD (2005-09) 70:09 mins Mesmerising performances of a range of French choral works from the familiar (Poulenc) to the undeservedly unfamiliar (Jolivet, Aperghis). Director Marcus Creed brings out every detail. ★★★★★ Schubert Schwanengesang Harmonia Mundi HMM 932139-40 (2012) 110:40 mins (2 discs) With Christoph Eschenbach’s imaginatively conceived accompaniments, Matthew Goerne’s burnished legato evoke a darkly Romantic world, despite some very slow tempos and fugitive consonants. ★★★★ Fritz Wunderlich Lieder by Beethoven, Brahms, et al SWR Music SWR19064CD (1965) 158:05 mins (3 discs) We can all learn from tenor…

Beethoven String Quartet No. 6 in B flat, Op.18; String Quartet No. 8 in E minor, Op. 59 No. 2 (Rasumovsky No. 2); String Quartet No. 16 in F, Op. 135 Elias String Quartet These live performances burst with spontaneity Wigmore Hall Live WHLive0093/2 102:04 mins (2 discs) There’s no danger here of familiarity breeding contempt. Recorded in 2015, this sixth and final volume of the Elias String Quartet’s admirable Beethoven cycle comfortably matches the exulted qualities of earlier releases. As before, the two-disc set features one of the Op. 18 quartets, a mid-period work and one of the late masterpieces to create an exquisitely balanced programme in itself. Inevitably, perhaps, the set concludes with Beethoven’s last statement in the genre, Op. 135, as well as the concluding quartet of Op.…

Martha Argerich has a complicated relationship with recording, but found a perfect solution to her issues with microphones in her 15-year project at the Lugano Festival, surrounding herself on stage with family, friends and protégées, and allowing her record labels to eavesdrop. The  Lugano Recordings (Warner 9029594897; 22 CDs) has an enviable back catalogue to plunder, and excludes any that don’t include Argerich herself. Mozart first, an Argerich favourite: the D minor Concerto K466, then Grieg’s two piano version of the Sonata K545 with Piotr Anderszewski – a treasurable partnership, as is Mozart K381 with Maria João Pires. The Beethoven collaborations bring more frequent Lugano partners: Renaud and Gautier Capuçon, and cellist Mischa Maisky, whose sometimes extreme Romanticism is intelligently tempered by Argerich in Beethoven’s Triple Concerto. Chopin’s E minor…

LONDON Baroque at the Edge LSO St Luke’s, 4-6 January Tel: +44 (0)20 7638 8891 Web: www.baroqueattheedge.co.uk This open-minded festival of Baroque music returns for a second edition, mixing gamba and electronics, a concert-drama that re-imagines Purcell’s last hours and a violin recital from Elicia Silverstein bringing together Bach and Berio. Up first is pianist Gabriela Montero. Soundstate Southbank Centre, 16-20 January Tel: +44 (0)20 3879 9555 Web: www.southbankcentre.co.uk Rebecca Saunders, Claire Chase and Du Yun are featured as composers and performers in a celebration of the new that brings together Ensemble Modern, London Sinfonietta and the Southbank Centre’s resident orchestras. James Dillon’s Tanz/ haus: triptych 2017 receives its London premiere; and the Aurora Orchestra’s ‘Songs from the Road’ sees Mahler, Muhly and Du Yun walk with a steady pace.…

Classical Fix As well as listening to Radio 3 programmes live, you can now listen back to many of them in podcast form, as well as other exclusive BBC podcasts via the BBC Sounds app and website, which were launched at the end of November. Classical Fix is now in its second series of podcasts, with Clemency Burton-Hill curating playlists for guests who are wanting to learn more about classical music. These include author, journalist and podcaster Elizabeth Day, who is introduced to the music of composers such as John Tavener, Clara Schumann, Vivaldi and David Lang. Burton-Hill always chooses music from a wide range of styles and composers, appealing both to classical music newcomers and to more seasoned listeners. Other episodes this series feature guests including songwriter and folk…