Innholdsfortegnelse for May 2019 i BBC Music Magazine

Brian Wise Writer and audio producer ‘Rail travel has always been one of my passions. Writing about the First Transcontinental Railroad gave me a new understanding of America’s industrial age, a time that shaped culture as much as the economy.’ Oliver Soden Writer and broadcaster ‘For the past three years I have been writing the first biography of Tippett. Cramming 93 years of life and 32 hours of music into a wieldy narrative was not easy, but it seemed both a privilege and a necessity.’ Steph Power Writer and composer ‘My first encounter with Stockhausen was at 14. I was an aspiring guitarist-composer and drummer in a jazz orchestra and a fellow band-member played me Gesang der Jünglinge. My world changed forever.’…

100 …drummers drumming. Scotland’s East Neuk Festival is calling for percussionists of all ages to join its Big Project, to be led by the Colin Currie Quartet (above) on 29 June. 30 …cellos floating in a swimming pool. But none were harmed in Water on the Bridge, a Chicago art installation by Katinka Kleijn and Lia Kohl. 2 …become one. Snape Maltings and the Britten-Pears Foundation are to merge as the Benjamin Britten Foundation. 400 …seats in the University of Liverpool’s new concert auditorium. The state-of-the-art facility, which will be built at the cost of £17.5m, will have a stage large enough for a 70-piece orchestra.…

A British pianist has made it into the Guinness World Records for playing a piano in concert at the highest ever altitude. Evelina De Lain’s Chopin recital took place at 4,946m on the Singela Pass in the Himalayas late last year, and has now been formally recognised as the loftiest of all time. A fine achievement, and one which adds De Lain to a list of notable musicians to have performed in extreme places… Leif Ove Andsnes also has a head for heights. In 2007, while making a documentary for Norwegian TV, the pianist played Grieg’s Ballade on a concert grand perched on the edge of a mountain in the Handanger Range. Andsnes and his instrument were flown to the spot by helicopter, providing some spectacular, if vertigo-inducing, shots. Less…

Oliver Condy Editor The Qatar Philharmonic Orchestra, an ensemble made up of some of the finest players from around the world, celebrates its first decade this year. I was fortunate enough to spend a few days in Qatar’s capital Doha back in March and to attend its performance of Berlioz and Haydn at the Katara Opera House. There’s no doubt that this is an ensemble with a bright future. Jeremy Pound Deputy editor The date on which this we are sending this issue to press – 29 March – seems to have been in the news quite a bit of late! It has also been marked in my diary for a very different reason: a concert of Vivaldi’s Gloria , performed by one of my favourite local choirs.…

Handel Acis and Galatea Lucy Crowe, Rowan Pierce, Allan Clayton, Benjamin Hulett, Jeremy Budd, Neal Davies; Early Opera Company/Curnyn Chaconne CHSA 0404 As conductor, you assembled an exceptional cast for this recording… That’s the thing about recording: you can bring together the people that you really want. They’re all people that I’d worked with before and knew. You can’t get better than Lucy Crowe and Allan Clayton as the two protagonists, I’ve known Ben Hulett for a long time – he sang on the Alceste recording which won an award a few years ago – and I was working with Neal Davies at ENO at the same time. They’re all experts in their field and absolute wordsmiths. The English libretto really does stand out; was that important to you? Absolutely.…

Britten Billy Budd Jacques Imbrailo, Toby Spence, Brindley Sherratt et al; Chorus and Orchestra of Teatro Real de Madrid/Ivor Bolton; dir. Deborah Warner Bel Air Classiques BAC154 JURY AWARD Vividly filmed, this 2017 production of Britten’s seaborne opera ‘brought me close to tears’, revealed our reviewer Daniel Jaffé. Fellow viewers may well find themselves similarly storm-tossed. ‘Billy Budd packs a punch like no other opera,’ says conductor Ivor Bolton. ‘Deborah Warner’s claustrophobic production brings home the horror of these ships, where people lived horrible lives in contained spaces. The set design was full of atmosphere and detail, without being literal.’ But Warner’s mastery of the stage goes beyond the visual and, says Bolton, even the most seemingly straightforward characters leave room for doubt. ‘She’s very good at playing the ambiguity…

1948 Works by Prokofiev, Myaskovsky, Shaporin and Lyadov Laura van der Heijden (cello), Petr Limonov (piano) Champs Hill Records CHRCD136 JURY AWARD ‘I wasn’t expecting it at all,’ says Laura van der Heijden, when she learns her debut recording – our March 2018 Recording of the Month – has won Newcomer of the Year. ‘I was already pleased with how the CD was received, but to get this extra amazing news was exciting.’ The 22-year-old cellist, who won the BBC Young Musician competition in 2012 and is now gearing up for her music degree finals at St John’s College, Cambridge, lavished care on her recital album with pianist Petr Limonov. ‘I wanted my first CD to mean a lot to me and to be a snapshot of who I was…

Night Music This large one-movement work for cello and piano is intense and rhythmic, influenced by dreams, nightmares, moonlight and darkness. Jumping from one musical idea to the next, it conjures up the image of a ‘night chase’. The Immortal Simpson’s 2015 oratorio, based on John Gray’s book The Immortalisation Commission , experiments with a wide variety of effects, including screams and whispers, in its exploration of paranormal activity and Victorian obsession with the occult. Cello Concerto Completed in 2018, Simpson’s concerto explores the cello’s tone and lyrical nature rather than its virtuosic potential. The cellist drives the first movement forward before a more serene second movement and a finale full of rhythm and energy. Israfel Israfel for full orchestra is inspired by Edgar Allen Poe’s poem about a singing…

Cecilia Bartoli (pictured above) is a devotee of train travel, in part because of her well-publicised fear of flying which has limited her appearances in North America. In the 1990s the Italian mezzo-soprano travelled from New York to Los Angeles in a private car attached to an Amtrak train, evoking the opera singers of an earlier age. Antonín Dvo ÿ ák was a very keen trainspotter. Not only did he enjoy criss-crossing Europe by rail but he spent his free time chatting to workers at Franz-Josef Station in Prague. He memorised international train schedules and once claimed that the opening theme to his Symphony No. 7 came to him at the Prague station, as a train carrying his countrymen arrived from Pest. Jean-Efflam Bavouzet builds model train sets as a…

The elusive art of conducting can be assessed in all kinds of different ways. One of them is the indefinable gift of making a difference to the surrounding music-making while not appearing to get in the way. A contradiction in terms, maybe – but unmistakable whenever you come across it, and relating to a blend of innate talent, the knack of silent communication with fellow performers (reaching through them to the listener), and an instinct for knowing what you want and how to get it. Over the past few decades, it’s difficult to think of any conductor who was better at that than André Previn. The ‘Previn years’ in these islands centred round his time as principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra from 1968 to 1979. Besides his enthralling…

1928 LIFE: Karlheinz Stockhausen is born in Burg Mödrath, near Cologne. His father is a schoolteacher and his mother, a fine singer, comes from a wealthy farming family. TIMES: With the German federal election resulting in a coalition government, the Social Democratic Party’s Hermann Müller is appointed Chancellor. The Nazi Party secures only 12 seats. 1953 LIFE: Having recently attended the Darmstadt summer school for new music, he goes to Paris to study with Messiaen. There, he meets fellow modernist Pierre Boulez, among others. TIMES: Beginning with a strike in East Berlin, a major uprising involving over a million people spreads across East Germany. It is brutally suppressed by occupying Soviet forces. 1993 LIFE: He completes his Helicopter Quartet, in which four members of a string quartet perform from four…

Martin Fröst (clarinet) Janine Jansen and Boris Brovtsyn (violins), Maxim Rysanov (viola), Torleif Thedéen (cello) BIS BIS 2063 Just when you think you know a piece of music, along comes a performance that opens new channels – and it makes you wonder if you’ve ever heard it quite rightly before. Take that ‘fading smile’ opening. Is that the end of the matter? Has melancholy won even before the clarinet has entered for the first time, or is this a work of many moods, each to be valued on its own terms? The latter impression is the one conveyed by this exceptionally rich reading from 2014. It can be something very small: the rapid clarinet ripples in the third movement for instance, like the glint of a fish turning in a…

Summer is tantalisingly close, but we’ve plenty of warmth and colour this month to keep you going. You can’t get much more colourful than Offenbach, who celebrates a big birthday next month. His music appears in two section choices: a stunning selection of songs and arias and a recording of his Cello Concerto – an instrument he knew only too well. Another fiery virtuoso-turned-composer is Eugène Ysaÿe, the inspiration behind this month’s Recording of the Month by Alina Ibragimova and Cédric Tiberghien. There’s lots more to discover, including a new theorbo concerto and works by Welsh composer Grace Williams. Finally, don’t miss a double helping of Handel, whose Judas Maccabaeus oratorio and recorder sonatas get the thumbs up. Michael Beek Reviews Editor This month’s critics John Allison, Nicholas Anderson, Terry…

Brahms • Parry Brahms (arr. Schoenberg): Piano Quartet in G minor; Parry: Elegy for Brahms Gävle Symphony Orchestra/ Jaime Martín Ondine ODE 1314-2 53:13 mins Schoenberg’s 1937 orchestration of Brahms’s G minor Piano Quartet continues to divide opinion. For some, it’s a magnificent and imaginative realisation of a work that in its original form already sounds like orchestral music. Others, however, are less sympathetic, claiming that the textures are too thickly drawn, especially in the louder moments of the score, and that Schoenberg’s decision to add E flat clarinet and xylophone to the orchestral fabric distorts Brahms’s intentions, since such instruments were never used by the composer. Perhaps sceptics will change their minds after listening to this beautifully-recorded version. In utilising the relatively modest-sized forces of the Gävle Symphony Orchestra,…

Edmund Finnis (b1984) Finnis has established himself as one of the UK’s most versatile composers. Born in Oxford, he studied with Julian Anderson at the Guildhall and has enjoyed creative collaborations with the Britten Sinfonia, London Sinfonietta and London Contemporary Orchestra (for which he was composer-in-association). His works, from solo to orchestral via chamber and immersive electronics, have been performed all over and premiered by some of today’s top flight musicians – including Víkingur Ólafsson, ORA Singers, Benjamin Beilman, Mark Simpson and Clare Hammond.…

Gulda • Offenbach Offenbach: Cello Concerto (Concerto Militaire); Gulda: Concerto for Cello, Wind Orchestra and Band Edgar Moreau (cello); Les Forces Majeures/Raphaël Merlin Moreau is a cellist of exceptional gifts with a vibrant directness Erato 9029552612 73:36 mins Only just 25 this year, Paris-born Edgar Moreau is evidently a cellist of exceptional gifts with a vibrant directness of delivery, absolute security of tone and intonation in all registers and a concentrated intentness in his playing that rivets the attention. Whether he also commands exceptional depths of expression is hard to judge from the works on this recording, since they demand none. Before he became the so-called ‘Mozart of the Champs-Elysées’, Jacques Offenbach (1819-1880) was a virtuoso cellist himself, and his sprawling 42-minute Grand Concerto is a show-off piece: more a…

Offenbach Colorature Songs and arias from Boule de neige, Vert-Vert, Orphée aux enfers, Un mari à la porte, Fantasio, Les Bavards, Mesdames de la halle, Le Roi Carotte, Les Contes d'Hoffmann, Robinson Crusoë and Le voyage dans la lune Jodie Devos (soprano), Adèle Charvet (mezzo-soprano); Munich Radio Orchestra/ Laurent Campellone Alpha Classics ALPHA 437 60:59 mins Jodie Devos is a gravity-defying coloratura soprano This is a marriage made in a musical heaven with the young Dutch soprano Jodie Devos reminding us just how gifted Jacques Offenbach was as a composer. And how inventive too. Yes, he has perfect musical manners; it’s true that he wears a gift for melody on his sleeve and his sense of rhythm is that of the boulevardier. But his orchestras are certainly made to sing…

Brahms Songs and Duets Brilliant Classics 95916 (2008) 196:29 mins (3 discs) Wide ranging selection and serviceable performances. Hartmut Volle’s voice is portentous and sometimes unfocused, but the folksong duets with Stéphanie Irányi are good. Recording quality is uneven and no translations are provided. ★★★ Clérambault Pyrame et Tisbé etc Harmonia Mundi HAF 8901329 (1990) 68:08 mins The restrained artifice of these mythological tales is not in the modern taste, but the stylish poise of the performers is persuasive, and Noémi Rime’s voice is a glittering gem. ★★★★ Purcell Elizabethan Lute Songs; Birthday Odes Erato 9029554315 (1972/75) 104:61 mins (2 discs) Pleasant 1970s accounts, though James Bowman’s countertenor voice has been overshadowed by recent, more flexible, rivals, and the perky but sedate speeds of the Birthday Odes now seem cautious.…

Beethoven Sonatas for Cello & Piano Erato 9029553487 (1959) 112:26 mins The sound is restricted for modern ears, but János Starker and his regular pianist György Sebök play as one, and bring flow, depth and tonal variety to these masterpieces. ★★★★ Borodin String Quartets Nos 1 & 2 Alto ALC 1298 (1964) 65:51 mins With complete homogeneity of ensemble, the Borodin Quartet bring out the innate Russian flavour of the music, and the famous Nocturne is all the more convincing in its unsentimental approach. ★★★★ David Oistrakh Encores for Violin Works by Debussy, Suk, Tchaikovsky et al Alto ALC 1357 (1954-72) 75:10 mins Taken from a variety of sources, some of the older tracks sound less well, but can’t disguise David Oistrakh’s mastery of the long melodic line, impeccable intonation…

JS Bach Cantatas Amici Voices Hyperion CDA68275 There are many lovely things about this album including some delightful instrumental playing, but some of the solo work and chorus vocal balance could be tighter. (OC) ★★★ JS Bach Violin Sonatas and Partitas Jaakko Kuusisto (violin) BIS-2197 Jaako Kuusisto – violinist, conductor, composer and older brother of Pekka – has recorded plenty of Finnish music, but here he heads for the string player’s heartland: solo Bach. It’s a rewarding listen. (RF) ★★★★ Bax Piano Works Natalia Williams-Wandoch (piano) Usk Recordings USK 1236CD Why have I not heard of this brilliant young pianist? Her premiere recordings of some of Bax’s vibrant solo piano works are full of energy and considered virtuosity. Nympholet is utterly enchanting. (OC) ★★★★ Bittner Symphony No. 1 etc Siberian…

THIS MONTH: BLUETOOTH TURNTABLES BEST ALL-ROUND SOUND Cambridge Audio Alva TT £1,500 Cambridge Audio’s first turntable in over ten years is a treat for anyone who demands a lot from their hi-fi but doesn’t have the inclination to tinker tirelessly with tone arms and tracking. The direct drive design has a weighty polyoxymethylene platter, single-piece tonearm and high-output moving coil cartridge that’s pre-installed, making it mercifully simple to set up. It also comes with a powerful integrated phono stage and is the first to offer hi-res 24bit/48kHz aptX HD Bluetooth streaming, so you can wirelessly listen using compatible speakers or headphones in the best quality. Hi-tech extras count for nothing if it doesn’t impress, but within the opening bars of violinist Itzhak Perlman and pianist Martha Argerich’s 2016 recording of…

There are some recordings that take time to enter the bloodstream, their hold on you increasing with every listen. But there are some that grab from the opening bar, their music and our ears meeting across a proverbial crowded room. Our Recording of the Year is one such ‘love at first listen’, its opening track, the relatively unfamiliar Prelude and Fughetta in G, BWV 902 gaining instant-hit status under the fingers of pianist Víkingur Ólafsson. Ólafsson’s secret to the album’s success is to adopt a style of playing that stands at the midpoint between objective performance and free interpretation, an approach that gives the impression of standing aside and letting the humanity of the music shine through, uninterrupted. Everyone, he tells me, has their own Bach – and that’s a…

Laura Farré Rozada Pianist Born: Barcelona, Spain Career highlight: In 2018, I was selected for the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group’s NEXT Scheme and released my debut album, which has brought many exciting opportunities. Musical hero: Glenn Gould for his originality and creativity and for pushing the boundaries of performance; Maria Callas, an extraordinary artist with such a strong character; and Hayk Melikyan for his promotion of contemporary music. Dream concert: It would be premiering Dutilleux’s Piano Concerto, but unfortunately he never wrote one! It would have been amazing to meet him and try to convince him to write more piano music. Marta Gardolinska Conductor Born: Warsaw, Poland Career highlight: Learning Rachmaninov’s Second Symphony in 48 hours and jumping in to conduct it with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. Equally,…

Hindemith Horn Concerto Dennis Brain (horn); Philharmonia/ Paul Hindemith Regis RRC1407 This rarely performed work is something of a mystery as it seems to exploit the nimbleness and lyricism of the horn, capturing the soul of the instrument. A unique feature is the inclusion of a poem by Hindemith in the last movement, which the soloist is directed to play in a recitative style, wordlessly reciting the poem. The recorded sound captures the purity of Dennis Brain’s tone and the effortless ease of his playing. Ruth Gipps Horn Concerto David Pyatt (horn); LPO/Nicholas Braithwaite Lyrita SRCD316 Perhaps Ruth Gipps suffered from being ‘unfashionable’ at the time, but happily this is being redressed now. Gipps has her own individual voice, exploiting the full range of the instrument to add to the…

Should a teaching institution wise up its students for the world as it is – inequities, imperfections and all? Or should it encourage them to reject the shortcomings of the industry they hope to enter? To me, those are the questions prompted by the extraordinary incident that ended with the Royal Academy of Music paying £186,181 in compensation for the wrongful dismissal of one of its teachers, Francesca Carpos-Young. In the RAM’s eyes, Carpos-Young’s offence (for which she was dismissed) was to have circulated a document to 800 students suggesting ways in which they could cultivate a ‘good reputation’ in the profession. In her rather clumsily phrased notes, she reflected on the nicknames in use among musicians, including ‘pond life’ (string players in general) and ‘gypos’ (violinists). It was this…

Debussy The Late Works Magali Mosnier (flute), Isabelle Faust (violin), Antoine Tamestit (viola), Jean-Guihen Queyras (cello), Xavier de Maistre (harp), Alexander Melnikov, Tanguy de Williencourt, Javier Perianes (piano) Harmonia Mundi HMM 902303 The last year has been awash with Debussy recordings of various shapes and sizes, released to mark his centenary year. The French label Harmonia Mundi joined in the fun, with nine discs celebrating the French composer’s genius. This one – focusing on Debussy’s later works and combining three chamber sonatas with his final pieces for solo piano – was arguably the pick of the bunch. ‘We used period instruments from exactly the time the works were written’ Violist Antoine Tamestit, one of a remarkable team of A-list instrumentalists to appear on the disc – violinist Isabelle Faust, pianist…

SPECIAL AWARD ‘I’m off to Canada on Wednesday, and tomorrow’s going to be hectic,’ Tasmin Little tells BBC Music Magazine, ‘so I thought today would be the best time to have a chat.’ This neatly sums up the busy life of the brilliant British violinist. Since the late 1980s, Little has scarcely taken a break from a schedule of concerts at home and abroad, recordings and radio, masterclasses, TV documentaries, outreach work ranging from schools to prisons… and, of course, magazine interviews. Few musicians have done as much as she has to bring classical music to a wide audience, unearth and champion neglected repertoire, commission new works and act as an important spokesman for the artform, influencing the great and the good. Hence, she becomes the recipient of the first…

Rachmaninov Symphony No. 2 LSO/André Previn Warner Classics 0852892 Previn put the original, uncut version of this then-neglected symphony firmly back on the map. André Previn conducts Vaughan Williams Soloists, LSO/André Previn RCA 88875126952 (download) The interpretations here cast refreshing new light on this great cycle. Previn Violin Concerto ‘Anne-Sophie’ Anne-Sophie Mutter (violin), Boston Symphony Orchestra/André Previn DG E4745002 A major statement from the composer-conductor’s later years, performed with warmth and firepower by its dedicatee. Walton Symphony No. 1 LSO/André Previn Sony G010004009424W (download only) Previn’s first recording of this symphony remains remarkable for its crackling rhythmic energy and drive. Gershwin Rhapsody In Blue; Piano Concerto André Previn (piano), LSO Warner Classics 2435668912 A definitive display of Previn’s keyboard skills, deftly catching the music’s lyrical inventiveness and improvisatory streak.…

In 1988, the composer Brian Ferneyhough remarked on the pioneering innovation since youth of a goliath – not just of the postwar European avant garde, but of all western music: ‘I doubt that there has been a single composer of the intervening generation who, even if for a short time, did not see the world of music differently thanks to the work of Stockhausen.’ Few composers have shone so brightly, and with such intensity of vision, as this child of a Germany shattered following years of extremism and war. And few have ignited such controversy – or passion for and against their music. Karlheinz Stockhausen was born in 1928 in Burg Mödrath, near Cologne, to fervently Catholic parents. Encouraged with piano lessons to develop his evident musical gifts, his early…

The work  In 1890, the 57-year-old Brahms announced his retirement: the freshly completed Second String Quintet Op. 111 was, he said, to be his last work. It would have made a marvellously warm and affirmative conclusion to a composing career that had begun the dark and turbulent depths of Romantic Sturm und Drang. But then, in March the following year, Brahms made a return visit to Meiningen to hear its famous orchestra. This time he was struck by the playing of the principal clarinettist, Richard Mühlfeld. It wasn’t just the polish and assurance of Mühlfeld’s playing that impressed him: there was something uniquely vocal about it, something Brahms found beguilingly and movingly ‘feminine’ – so much so that before long he had nicknamed his new friend ‘Fräulein Klarinette’. It also…

Thea King (clarinet) This is a darker, more introverted take than many, but it has its own riches. The landscape is less varied than in the Martin Fröst version: forest shadows and haunted perspectives predominate, but it’s all beautifully judged. One is made particularly aware of long lines, and of their exquisite polyphonic interweaving, yet there are plenty of telling ‘vocal’ touches too. Thea King and the Gabrieli Quartet’s manner may be more restrained, the expression subtler, but the passion is there, and it leaves a lasting impression. (Hyperion CDA 66107) Nash Ensemble In this 2006 recording, we hear a very different approach from that of Fröst and his team. This is the Romantic autumnal mood at its most luxurious: ‘mists and mellow fruitfulness’, with a resigned awareness of…

L Boulanger • Ysaÿe• Franck • Vierne L Boulanger: Nocturne; Franck: Violin Sonata in A major; Vierne: Violin Sonata in G minor; Ysaÿe: Poème élégiaque Alina Ibragimova (violin), Cédric Tiberghien (piano) Hyperion CDA68204 78:29 mins This is simply superb in every way. Franck’s Sonata in A usually dominates any violin recital, especially when the performance is as wonderful as this, yet here it is but one component in an exquisitely balanced programme. The great Belgian violinist Ysaÿe is the common denominator between three of the works, doubtless drawing on Alina Ibragimova’s strong pedigree in his music having already recorded his challenging solo sonatas. Ysaÿe’s contemplative Poème élégiaque acts as the perfect prelude, while both Vierne’s and Franck’s sonatas were written for him, the latter as a wedding present. Vierne’s four-movement…

Mozart Symphonies Nos 40 & 41 NDR Radiophilharmonie/Andrew Manze To make these two symphonies sound so fresh is no mean feat Pentatone PTC 5186 757 (hybrid CD/SACD) 74:47 mins It’s become quite fashionable to do Mozart’s last two symphonies with all the repeats, making them into imposing edifices lasting nearly 40 minutes apiece. Certainly, in the case of the Jupiter Symphony the finale’s second-half repeat can be justified since its inclusion throws greater weight onto the coda when it eventually arrives, with its famous contrapuntal combination of all five themes. Played in this way the finale becomes the crowning glory not only of this work, but of symphonic thought altogether up to its time. Andrew Manze’s interpretations justify the repeats elsewhere, too. In his hands, the opening bars of the…

These glamorous sets from the Berlin Philharmonic’s own label are so beautifully made that they push my ‘want one’ button before I’ve managed to get a disc into the player. But do we need a new set of conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler’s Berlin Radio recordings 1939-1945? (Berliner Philharmoniker BPHR 180181; 22 CDs or SACDs) Vintage mono, a far-from polished orchestral sound; and we’ve heard them all before, haven’t we? Not quite it turns out; there are some surprises in store. Historically, this is still a vital collection: the wartime Berlin Philharmonic concentrating on Austro-German repertoire when music from enemy countries was banned. This is music-making of searing immediacy recorded as Germany was slowly losing the war, the Berliners constantly under the threat of allied bombing, not knowing whether they might be…

JS Bach Concertos Nos 1-6 Alto ALC 1605 (1986-7) 101:17 mins (2 discs) The English Chamber Orchestra’s lively and charming Brandenburgs (1986/7) see flautist supremo William Bennett at the top of his game (No. 4, with Paul Edmund-Davies and in lieu of recorders). ★★★★ Haydn Piano Concerto in D; 4 Piano Sonatas Doremi DHR-8069 (1970) 67:17 mins Vasso Devetzi brings a liquid touch to Haydn's sonatas (notably the slow movements of Nos 23 and 46). In the concerto, the Moscow Chamber Orchestra are sympathetic collaborators. Some sound fuzz. ★★★ Perfume of Italy Concertos and Sonatas for Mandolin Christophorus CHR 77434 (2011) 61.26 mins Artemandoline transports us to 17th-century Naples, where the mandolin enjoyed peak popularity. Vivaldi and Scarlatti sit alongside little-known Grand Siècle gems in an evocative programme. ★★★★ A…

JS Bach • Helmschrott JS Bach: Magnificat; Helmschrott: Lumen Siri Karoline Thornhill, Sophia Körber (soprano), Theresa Holzhauser (mezzo-soprano), Markus Schäfer, Robert Sellier (tenor), Andreas Mattersberger (bass); Simon Mayr Chorus; Concerto de Bassus/Franz Hauk Naxos 8.579049 65:57 mins Lumen, which makes up most of this disc, is described by the composer Robert Maximilian Helmschrott (b1938) as ‘an interfaith dialogue for soloists, chorus and orchestra’. Based on a complex of texts taken from the Bible, the Qur’an, the Bhagavad Gita, the Latin Mass, Brecht, Goethe and beyond, it seeks to create a commonality between religions too often perceived as conflicting. A major task, indeed, and the result is often intriguing; the style is occasionally reminiscent of Stravinsky and Messiaen, but at times shows considerable individuality in the handling of timbre. Lumen’s three…

Brahms The Piano Quartets Primrose Piano Quartet Meridian CDE 84650/1-2 123:47 mins (2 discs) These dedicated performances aim to combine historical and modern approaches. John Thwaites uses three different pianos of the period, each with a notably transformative effect on the music. The Ehrbar instrument for the C minor Quartet is wonderfully warm and resonant; the work is placed first, according to order of composition rather than numbering (Brahms first drafted it in 1855, in thrall to the Schumann family). The Streicher for the official No. 1 in G minor is mellower by far than the impression this extrovert work often produces on the modern piano; and the Blüthner for the A major Quartet provides a soundworld that is chewy, woody and clear. The performers draw out the vivid characters…

JS Bach Chorale Partitas Stephen Farr (organ) Resonus RES10234 55:46 mins For his first all-Bach disc Stephen Farr turned to the chorale preludes gathered together in Clavier-Übung III. This sequel is similarly chorales-indebted, but covers what, to many, will be less familiar territory. It comprises four sets of chorale partitas with which the young composer honed his skills in the arts of variation, motivic elaboration, embellishment and long-term planning – early prototypes for that masterpiece of his last years: the Canonic Variations on Von Himmel hoch. It’s a bold idea to programme them back-to-back, though perhaps a little self-defeating. Consumed at a sitting they can sometimes make for an austere listen, despite Farr’s best efforts to ring the changes with artful registrations that revel in the resources afforded by a…

LONDON Handel’s Semele Alexandra Palace Theatre, 2 May Tel +44 (0)871 220 0260 Web: www.monteverdi.co.uk Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s Monteverdi celebrations in 2017 must have whetted his appetite for touring opera. This spring the conductor takes Handel’s Ovid-inspired Semele around Europe, including to the newly restored Victorian theatre at Alexandra Palace (see ‘Venue of the month’, left). Louise Alder sings the title role in a concert-staging by Thomas Guthrie. Le Concert de l’Hostel-Dieu St John’s Smith Square, 11 May Tel: +44 (0)20 7222 1061 Web: www.lfbm.org.uk As part of London Festival of Baroque Music, this Lyon-based ensemble celebrates the 400th birthday of the Venetian composer, poet and singer Barbara Strozzi with a late-evening postscript to The Bach Players’ earlier dance-themed concert. Laments and songs by Strozzi are set alongside music…

MAY’S RADIO 3 LISTINGS  Schedules may be subject to alteration. For up-to-date listings see Radio Times 1 WEDNESDAY 6.30-9am Breakfast 9am-12 noon Essential Classics CHOICE 12 noon-1pm Composer of the  Week Amy Beach 1-2pm Lunchtime Concert 2-3.30pm Afternoon Concert 3.30-4.30pm Choral Evensong A recording from the archives 4.30-5pm New Generation Artists 5-7pm In Tune 7-7.30pm In Tune Mixtape 7.30-10pm Radio 3 in Concert from the Royal Festival Hall, London. Glinka Overture: Ruslan and Ludmila, Glazunov Violin Concerto, Shostakovich Symphony No. 10. Esther Yoo (violin), Philharmonia Orchestra/Vladimir Ashkenazy 10-10.45pm Free Thinking 10.45-11pm The Essay 11pm-12.30am Late Junction 2 THURSDAY 6.30-9am Breakfast 9am-12 noon Essential Classics CHOICE 12 noon-1pm Composer of the  Week Amy Beach 1-2pm Lunchtime Concert 2-5pm Afternoon Concert 5-7pm In Tune 7-7.30pm In Tune Mixtape 7.30-10pm Radio 3 in…

Write to: The editor, BBC Music Magazine, Tower House, Fairfax Street, Bristol, BS1 3BN Email: music@classical-music.com Amazing André Following your Welcome letter in the April issue, may I add a few memories of André Previn in the concert hall and on record? I heard live his performance of Prokofiev’s Alexander Nevsky in 1971 and then, the following year, Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast in concert for the composer’s 70th birthday. Both were with the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus. Previn was a superb polymath who could put his hand to anything he did – Rachmaninov’s The Bells at the BBC Proms in 1973 also springs to mind. His greatest skill was encouraging new audiences to enjoy classical music as a thoroughly attentive musician. Andrew Thorpe, Hampshire The new Previn? The Guardian’s obituary…

Our regular readers will remember last year’s Awards issue cover being graced by Bernard Haitink, as the Dutch maestro won the 2018 BBC Music Magazine Recording of the Year. Recently, Haitink was seen celebrating again, this time conducting the LSO in Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 22 and Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony in a concert to mark his 90th birthday. As with last year’s magnificent Mahler recording, the concert at the Barbican revealed that, even as he reaches four score years and ten, Haitink simply gets better with age. ‘This was a magisterial account,’ said the Guardian of the Bruckner in its five-star review, ‘broad and unaffected as always in the familiar Haitink manner, but gradually drawing the listener ever deeper into the symphony’s interior world.’…

Victory at Hastings Fumiya Koido has become £15,000 richer thanks to a fine rendition of Ravel’s Piano Concerto in G. Koido’s performance (above) brought him victory in the Hastings International Piano Competition, the final of which took place in early March. As well as his lucrative cash prize, the Japanese pianist also wins concert engagements with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Dress to unimpress It was Anna Patalong’s outfit as much as her singing that grabbed the attention at a recent concert at the Royal Albert Hall. On the same day as anti-Brexit protesters took to the streets of London, the opera soprano appeared on stage in a yellow and blue dress adorned with yellow stars – a show of pro-Europe sentiment that brought complaints from some audience members. Patalong was…

Birmingham Royal Conservatoire has just announced a new partnership with Naxos that will give six students the chance to make debut recordings at the college’s Bradshaw Hall. In what promises to be an innovative and fascinating project, they will record works by Liszt, Scarlatti and Schumann, plus world premiere recordings of music by Holst, Britten and York Bowen. The Horszowski Trio , fresh from its debut at London’s Wigmore Hall, has recorded an album for Avie Records. The two-disc release sees recordings of Robert Schumann’s complete piano trios. Named after the late Russian pianist, the Horszowski Trio is comprised of pianist Reiko Aizawa, Grammy-nominated violinist Jesse Mills and cellist Raman Ramakrishnan. Trumpeter and BBC New Generation Artist Simon Höfele teamed up with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra recently for…

The hypnotic ostinato, those repeated rhythms or phrases of music, can both drive us totally insane and take us to states of sheer pleasure, as Tom Service explains Ostinato. That’s a word you’re going to read more often in these pages than in the latest issue of Guitar World. The musical principle is the same, though, whether we’re talking about the harmonic cycles of chaconnes in Baroque music from Purcell to Bach, the obsessive mania of a Bruckner scherzo or your favourite guitar riffs and electronic licks from Led Zeppelin to Daft Punk. A large amount of our music is obsessed by these repeated patterns that lodge in our brains with a stubbornly irresistible power. The stubbornness is the clue – that’s what ‘ostinato’ means in Italian – but instead…

Steve Shults, Atlanta, GA, US I grew up in the San Francisco Bay area and lived there for 55 years but, after we moved to the Atlanta area last June, I am missing my home town and its orchestra. Orff’s Carmina Burana is one of many fine recordings that Herbert Blomstedt made as music director of the San Francisco Symphony. It’s probably my favourite disc of this old warhorse, with wonderful soloists and choral singing – and top-drawer Decca recording. Luke Dorr, Cambridge, NY, US I have been listening to James Whitbourn’s Annelies, a modern choral masterpiece that is timely and chilling when placed in the context of our current world situation. Not unlike Ralph Vaughan Williams’s 1930s Dona nobis pacem, which drew upon Whitman’s poetic lament of…

Like a perfect, crisp autumn leaf, Víkingur Ólafsson’s disc of JS Bach dropped onto our desks in September. From its opening seconds, it was clear that this was something exceptional: the programme both familiar yet unexpected, Ólafsson’s performance style delicately balancing fashions old and new, the recorded sound intimate and warm. Everything just so. In the BBC Music Magazine Awards jury meeting, it was the only disc we barely talked about. Because all eight of the jury were in agreement – Johann Sebastian Bach should go straight through to the next round, to be voted on by the public. Of the words we did use to describe the album, however, ‘fresh’ and ‘exciting’ were among them, so impressed were we that what, on the surface, seemed like just another disc…

Widmann Viola Concerto Antoine Tamestit (viola); Signum Quartet, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra/ Daniel Harding Harmonia Mundi HMM902268 JURY AWARD If writing a concerto for the viola wasn’t a challenge enough, Jörg Widmann has pushed the instrument to its technical and theatrical extremes in his fiery new work. It opens with the violist appearing from within the orchestra, hitting the wood of the instrument before embarking on more than ten minutes of pizzicato. When violist Antoine Tamestit first read through Widmann’s score, his first reaction was an incredulous ‘Will the pizzicato ever stop?!’. In fact, the bow of the viola doesn’t get used until halfway through the piece, at which point the soloist brandishes it above him like a sword. Tamestit commissioned the concerto, working with Widmann to explore fully his…

Recording of the Year and Instrumental Award Johann Sebastian Bach Víkingur Ólafsson (piano) Deutsche Grammophon 483 5022 Orchestral Award Mahler Symphony No. 1 Düsseldorf Symphony Orchestra/Adám Fischer Avi AVI8553390 Concerto Award Rachmaninov Piano Concertos Nos 2 & 4 Daniil Trifonov (piano); Philadelphia Orchestra/Yannick Nézet-Séguin Deutsche Grammophon 483 5335 Chamber Award Debussy The Late Works Magali Mosnier (flute), Isabelle Faust (violin), Antoine Tamestit (viola), Jean-Guihen Queyras (cello), Xavier de Maistre (harp), Alexander Melnikov, Tanguy de Williencourt, Javier Perianes (piano) Harmonia Mundi HMM 902303 Opera Award Handel Acis and Galatea Lucy Crowe, Rowan Pierce, Allan Clayton, Benjamin Hulett, Jeremy Budd, Neal Davies; Early Opera Company/Christian Curnyn Chandos CHSA 0404 Vocal Award Schumann & Mahler Lieder Florian Boesch (baritone), Malcolm Martineau (piano) Linn CKD 511 Choral Award A Rose Magnificat Gabrieli Consort/Paul McCreesh…

• Fourteen US orchestras have co-commissioned Transcend, a piece by Chinese-American composer Zhou Tian. Nevada’s Reno Philharmonic will give the first performances on 27 and 28 April. renophil.com • The Utah Opera will premiere four ten-minute operas related to the 150th anniversary by composers Lisa DeSpain, Jacob Lee, Tony Solitro and Michael Ching (all of whom have links to Utah) on 20-22 May in Salt Lake City. utahopera.org • The Spike 150 Chorus, young students from every county in Utah, will perform at Promontory Point, Utah on 10 May. spike150chorus. weebly.com • The Utah Museum of Fine Arts at the University of Utah hosts ‘The Race to Promontory: The Transcontinental Railroad and the American West’, featuring the three ceremonial spikes that completed the railroad, along with around 150 photographs and…

Tippett’s first professionally performed and published work was his rhythmically and polyphonically complex String Quartet No. 1 of 1935 (rev. 1943). Sixty years later the London Symphony Orchestra premiered The Rose Lake at a 90th birthday concert in 1995; it was intended to be his final work, but he then penned Caliban’s Song for the Purcell tercentenary celebrations that year. Between these bookends, his style evolved from the florid writing of the Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli through the terse opera King Priam to the more lyrical, luminous later music. His works include four piano sonatas, five string quartets, four symphonies and five operas. His 1951 The Heart’s Assurance is an important contribution to 20th-century song. His music – the oratorio A Child of our Time aside –…

Micro-macro Stockhausen set out to create a unified music – the tiniest detail related to the whole. His search took him from scientific rationalism to visionary mysticism, through strict and open forms, all founded on a serialism forged in the creative heat of postwar Germany. Space and time In the 1950s, new technology expanded sonic horizons, helping Stockhausen to explore musical space as well as time. ‘The directions and speeds of the sounds are as important as the pitches and the durations’, he declared. Pointism to super formula Stockhausen continually shattered musical boundaries, composing in a dazzling array of styles, from the ‘pointism’ of Punkte (1952) to the ‘super formula’ of LICHT (1977-2002) and beyond. Cosmic communication Radio shaped Stockhausen’s early thinking as a conduit for communication. Deep-rooted in music…

The bearded, avuncular Brahms familiar from photos dates from 1878 onwards, when he surprised friends with a change of look. The last years of his life, during which he wrote his Clarinet Quintet, saw the German composer enjoying the close friendship of Johann Strauss II and spending summers at his residence in Bad Ischl, Austria, where he wrote much of his later music. His initial announcement that he was to retire from composing in 1890 (see right) was followed by another one in 1894. In fact his final works, written in 1896, were his Eleven Chorale Preludes for organ.…

What was your vision for this enticing programme? We came up with the idea that Ysaÿe should be the central figure; he was a very important composer in the violin repertoire. There are so many connections to him and these were only a few that we found; there’s also the Chausson Poème and other works that we just couldn’t fit on the disc, so we had to make a choice. The Vierne sonata is so rarely played and the Boulanger was just a little encore that we did in concert when we played this programme. It seems to have become a tradition now to find little pieces like that – actually it’s Cédric who finds them. We always enjoy them so much that it’s a shame not to put them…

Jewels of French Ballet Excerpts from Coppélia, Les Sylphides etc  Alto ALC 1386 (1960/62) 79:00 mins High-rev performances from Georg Solti and the Royal Opera House Orchestra – Offenbach’s Gaieté parisienn scintillates – plus creamier Coppélia from Herbert von Karajan and the Berlin Phil. ★★★★ Joseph Marx Orchestral Works, Vol. 2 Naxos 8.573832 (2003) 75:11 mins The style of this Graz-born 20th-century composer is attractive, like Tippett heard through an Austrian filter. Quality Bochum Symphony Orchestra playing; overcautious conducting from Steven Sloane. ★★★ Moyzes Symphonies Nos 9 & 10 Naxos 8.573654 (1994-95) 69:59 mins This Slovakian composer’s idiom resembles a more modernistic, lower-octane Shostakovich: Symphony No. 10 is the most convincing here. Decent, if rather earthbound Slovak Radio Symphony accounts. ★★★ Respighi Roman Trilogy Alto ALC 1396 (1955-61) 76:26 mins…

JS Bach Concertos for Organ and Strings; Sinfonias from Cantatas BWV 75 & 156 Bart Jacobs (organ); Les Muffatti Ramée RAM 1804 79:59 mins Bach’s 1725 concert on the new Silbermann organ in Dresden’s Sophienkirche attracted much local critical acclaim, particularly for the ‘various concertos with sweet underlying instrumental music.’ None of these survive, but from the mists of Saxony, Bart Jacobs and Les Muffatti reconstruct four concertos and three sinfonias, entirely plausible candidates for Bach’s impressive recital. Their evidence, from stylistic similarities to manuscripts with evidence of transposition and precedents in other concertos, is compelling and, post tactical transposition, instrument substitution, and source amalgamation, the results are alluring. Have no fear of obscure repertoire though: clothed in different keys and contexts, popular favourites just keep coming. Naturally movements from…

Adès The Exterminating Angel (DVD) Audrey Luna, Amanda Echalaz, Sally Matthews, Sophie Bevan, Alice Coote, Christine Rice, Iestyn Davies, Joseph Kaiser, Frédéric Antoun, David Portillo, Rod Gilfry, John Tomlinson; Metropolitan Opera Chorus & Orchestra/Thomas Adès; dir. Gary Halvorson (New York, 2017) Erato DVD: 9029552550; Blu-ray: 9029552549 128 mins It’s only a short cultural step from Dr Johnson’s ‘irrational and exotic entertainment’ to Surrealism. Thomas Adès like other composers, notably Martinu, knows that dreams and nightmares seeping out of the unconscious are the very stuff of music drama. So The Exterminating Angel, based upon Luis Buñuel’s film in which a party of bourgeois guests find themselves unable to leave a dinner party and descend into barbarism and madness, becomes a profoundly unsettling opera. And in this recording of the production from…

This festival recording of Judas Maccabaeus might well be the new benchmark, says Berta Joncus Handel Judas Maccabaeus, HWV 63 Deanna Breiwick (soprano), Sophie Harmsen (mezzo-soprano), Owen Willetts (countertenor), João Fernandes (bass); NDR Chor; FestspielOrchester Göttingen/ Laurence Cummings Accent ACC 26410 137:00 mins (2 discs) No choir has done justice to Handel’s writing like the NDR This is one of the best Judas Maccabaeus performances ever. As artistic director of the festival where this recording was made, Laurence Cummings brought together top soloists, band and choir, all of whom blaze forth in this masterpiece. If only the oratorio weren’t such rank propaganda! In the spring of 1746, the Duke of Cumberland committed extensive war crimes in the process of crushing the Jacobite rebellion; Judas Maccabaeus celebrates Cumberland’s ‘triumph’ by showing…

Myaskovsky • Rachmaninov Rachmaninov: Cello Sonata; Two Pieces, Op. 2; Prelude in C sharp minor, Op. 3/2; Cello Sonata; Myaskovsky: Cello Sonata No. 1 Bruno Philippe (cello), Jérôme Ducros (piano) Harmonia Mundi HMM 902340 70:52 mins Bruno Philippe inflects the music with great fervour It’s difficult to understand why Nikolai Myaskovsky’s First Cello Sonata remains so neglected. The work has so many ingredients that should guarantee it instant appeal, not least a gloriously lyrical melody that opens and closes the Sonata and some finely wrought material with exciting and dynamic musical interaction between cello and piano. Young French cellist Bruno Philippe inflects the music with great fervour, strongly supported by Jérôme Ducros’s impressive mastery of the demanding piano part and an admirably balanced recording. Philippe and Ducros are just as…

Beethoven 11 Bagatelles; 33 Variations on a Waltz by Diabelli; Für Elise Imogen Cooper (piano) Chandos CHAN 20085 78:32 mins Cooper never goes for effect per se: her goal is purely expressiveness Look at the autograph manuscript for Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations and you will see, visually reflected, all the emotions he experienced during its composition. Some are written out in a calm, almost calligraphic hand, while others are covered in frantic crossings-out; when he came to Variation 32 he clearly knocked over his ink bottle. And pianists bring their own emotions to bear. Imogen Cooper describes the work as ‘a wonderful journey… I am instantly in a good mood when practising or performing this piece’. And that is what overwhelmingly comes over in her superb recording. The first few variations…

May round-up Like Branford Marsalis, the Californian trumpeter Ralph Alessi also retains a long-term working band. The quintet members, which include Ravi Coltrane on saxophones, have an easy familiarity with one another that allows them to make music of a restrained, even fragile beauty. The scene is set on Imaginary Friends, Alessi’s third album as leader for ECM, with ‘Iram Issela’, an ethereal transport for Alessi’s extended, full toned storytelling. Coltrane’s tenor sax insinuates itself so subtly into the music he practically redefines the notion of soloing. Andy Milne (piano), Drew Gress (bass) and Marker Ferber (drums) create a shifting, ephemeral sound that permeates the whole album. (ECM 770 1817 ★★★★ ) By way of contrast, drummer Anton Eger drafted in nearly a dozen contributors for his sparkling debut as…

The Notebooks of Alexander Skryabin Trans. Simon Nicholls & Michael Pushkin Oxford University Press 978-0-190-86366-1 263pp (hb) £53 This slim yet scholarly volume is truly an essential addition to Scriabin literature. The composer’s notebooks – covering virtually all his major works – are lucidly translated and richly annotated by pianist and scholar Simon Nicholls, who also includes a pithily informative biography, plenty of photographs, and a detailed account of the intellectual ferment from which Scriabin drew his ideas: a heady mix of Symbolism, philosophy, new theories on psychology, and the then influential teachings of Theosophy. All these ideas led to this talented and intelligent young man to believe he would transform mankind through a musical happening of his own creation. Was Scriabin mad? Nicholls shows how Scriabin’s onetime acolyte and…

21. Alexandra Palace Theatre Where: Muswell Hill, London Opened: 1875; 2018 Seats: 900 Few concert venues have been put to quite as many different uses over the course of their existence as has the Alexandra Palace Theatre. And that’s when it’s been in use at all. The 2018 reopening of this magnificently ornate auditorium – first with a BBC Prom in September and then on a permanent basis in December – marked the end of years of decline. Originally built in 1875 as part of the Alexandra Palace centre for entertainment and sports, the theatre opened with a performance of Offenbach’s operetta Breaking the Spell. Able to hold over 2,000 people, it became a popular venue for opera, theatre, concerts and, increasingly, film showings. Temporarily repurposed as a chapel for…

Alan Davey , the controller of BBC Radio 3, picks out three great moments to tune into this May BBC SO Total Immersion The BBC Symphony Orchestra is turning its attention to the music of Lili and Nadia Boulanger for a full day of film, talks and events. This concert is the finale, with Lili Boulanger’s Faust et Hélène – the magnificent cantata that made her the first woman to win the Prix de Rome – as the centrepiece. Radio 3 in Concert; 8 May, 7.30pm River series After the success of last year’s series on forests, we’re exploring nature again, this time focussing on rivers. Breakfast will be broadcast live from different locations along the River Severn every day for a week, tracing its path from source to sea.…

A Vilar Young Artist at the Royal Opera House and a BBC New Generation Artist, Irish soprano Ailish Tynan won the Rosenblatt Song Prize at BBC Cardiff Singer in 2003. She has sung opera around the world and is a regular recitalist at Wigmore Hall. She is recording and performing a programme of Ravel and Judith Weir with the Hebrides Ensemble this May. I came to music fairly late – my parents didn’t listen to classical music and we didn’t even have a record player. So the first pieces of music I remember hitting me between the eyes, and getting into my heart, came when I was already a singer. Not long after I met my future husband, [Keith McNicoll, principal bass trombone at the Royal Opera] he played me…

Joy Webb ‘Share My Yoke’ Black Dyke Band/Watson Doyen DOY CD060 Judith Weir The Welcome Arrival of Rain Ailish Tynan; BBC Singers, BBC Symphony Orchestra/Martyn Brabbins NMC D137 Gliére Concerto for Coloratura Soprano Joan Sutherland; London Symphony Orchestra/Richard Bonynge Decca 430 0062 Fauré Mélodies Ailish Tynan (soprano), Iain Burnside (piano) Opus Arte OACD9018D Puccini La bohème Mirella Freni, Luciano Pavarotti; Berlin Philharmonic/Herbert von Karajan Decca 421 0492…