Volume 21 Issue 2 - October 2015

octaves higher. A sense of wide-open spaces
extends our comfort zone – in dynamic range
and variability, pitch register (including
note-to-note and between-hands distances
in the piano part), and implied landscape.
Barenboim displays complete confidence
technically and musically. Stretched-out
phrases convey longing; even over-emphasizing
accents in the first movement’s
exposition is justified by the weary climb
of the melodic line. Dudamel and players
equal Barenboim’s expressive level and
finesse, including tender passages and delicate
passage work. Of many highlights I
will mention one: the magnificent “starry
night” suggested by single, high piano notes
over hushed strings towards the Andante’s
end, paced beautifully by Dudamel and
Barenboim.
The Concerto No.1 in D Minor is also a
wonderful work of large dimensions and
endless inventiveness. In the first movement
the pianist has chosen the most apt structural
points to broaden the tempo. Barenboim’s
pedalling is clear throughout, including the
rapid filigree passages. The slow movement
is a model of expression and colour; in the
finale, Barenboim and Dudamel capture well
the serious rhetorical interplay within and
between piano and orchestra parts.
Roger Knox
Schoenberg – Gurrelieder
Barbara Haveman; Brandon Jovanovich;
Thomas Bauer; Gerhard Siegel; Claudia
Mahnke; Johannes Martin Kränzle;
Gürzenich-Orchester, Köln; Markus Stenz
Hyperion CDA68081/2
Schoenberg – Pierrot Lunaire;
Documentary: Solar Plexus of Modernism
Salzburg Festival
Belvedere 10125
!!
Gurrelieder, songs
of Gurre, is one of the
most exotic expressions
of the late
romantic era. The
work, set to Jens Peter
Jacobsen’s Gurre
Sange, grew from a
modest song cycle
for two voices and piano into a giant cantata
demanding an orchestra of twice the normal
size, a triple male choir, a full choir and five
soloists of post-Wagnerian capabilities. Not to
mention a kitchen of iron chains. Beginning
with the 1932 live Stokowski/Philadelphia
and then the 1953 René Leibowitz (a pupil
of Schoenberg)/Paris recordings, there are
now 24 versions on CD and another on one
DVD, almost all recorded in public concerts.
For decades the work was considered unperformable
and probably unsaleable (as did our
own TSO in 2000, abruptly cancelling scheduled
performances), undoubtedly because
of Schoenberg’s role as the high priest of
modernism whose music would not attract
audiences. Nothing could be further from the
truth, for this is the crowning glory of the
high romantic, post-Wagnerian period.
This new performance is a product of the
highest refinement of every aspect from individual
players and ensembles inspired by
a conductor who most clearly understands
the innermost workings of this piece. The
five soloists, whose names are not familiar,
are perfectly cast and well understand the
nuances of their roles. As the work resolves,
the additional Sprechstimme role here
receives a definitive performance, Kranzle
naturally observing the implied pitches and
occasionally breaking into actual singing as
he announces the most glorious sunrise in all
music. Quite an event. This whole production
is a triumph not only for the performance
but for the work itself which is now actually
becoming popular.
The entire experience is captured in a
recording of extraordinary clarity, balance
and dynamics including the thunder of this
vast array. It’s all there without any audible
spotlighting. I consider this to be a most
significant release and thoroughly
recommendable.
When Igor
Stravinsky was asked
to name an important
musical work of the
beginning of the 20th
century, he replied
that “Pierrot Lunaire
is the solar plexus of
20th century music.”
Schoenberg’s melodrama
and its era
are discussed and
illustrated on the DVD including illuminating
commentaries by an impassioned
Mitsuko Uchida and the four other members
of the chamber group that she assembled
for this live performance from the 2011
Salzburg Festival.
The actual performance has all the intensity
and passion imaginable; however, vocalist
Barbara Sukowa is not a trained singer but
an actress. Without the discipline of a finely
tuned vocal technique so essential in this
complex genre, she is but an actress playing
a role. Not even close to good enough. Pity,
because the well-prepared documentary
is valuable.
Bruce Surtees
Shostakovich – Piano Concertos
Anna Vinnitskaya; Kremerata Baltica
Alpha 203
!!
This is a remarkable
debut disc
from Russian-
German pianist Anna
Vinnitskaya. The two
Shostakovich piano
concertos are brilliant
and entertaining,
parodic and pensive in turn. In the Concerto
in C Minor for Piano, Trumpet and Strings,
Op.35 (1933) soloist-director Vinnitskaya
maintains tight ensemble and clear articulation
with the Kremerata Baltica string orchestra
and trumpeter Tobias Willner. The first
movement illustrates Shostakovich’s method
of assembling triads, scales and popular songs
or classical themes into an ironic crazy-quilt
whole, featuring harmonic sidesteps into new
keys. In the second movement strings play
a wide-ranging lyrical melody with poise,
as a muted trumpet in dialogue with the
piano does later. The virtuosic finale features
Vinnitskaya’s still more rapid-fire piano and
Willner’s matching double-tonguing.
In the Piano Concerto No.2 in F Major,
Op.102 (1957), Omer Meir Wellber conducts
the Winds of Staatskapelle Dresden together
with Kremerata Baltica. The first and third
major-key movements are tuneful in accordance
with Soviet expectations, with military
band-style flourishes and plenty of
piano scales. The third however has sufficient
contrast: it is largely in 7/4 metre,
woodwinds are brilliant and French horns
a standout, and there is even a quoted
Hanon piano finger exercise! Best of all for
me is Anna Vinnitskaya’s sensitive high-register
playing in the the middle movement,
which seems like a reminiscence
of childhood. In the disc’s last two works
pianist Ivan Rudin joins Vinnitskaya in idiomatic
playing of Shostakovich’s Concertino
(1954) and Tarantella (1955) for two pianos.
Recommended for Shostakovich lovers.
Roger Knox
MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY
Fancies and Interludes
Jacques Israelievitch; Christina Petrowska
Quilico
Centrediscs CMCCD 21315
!!
Fancies and
Interludes is both a
labour of love and
musical declaration,
intuited and played
by two ingenious and
accomplished musicians
– former Toronto
Symphony concertmaster
Jacques Israelievitch and pianist
Christina Petrowska Quilico. Recorded live
at York University’s Tribute Communities
Recital Hall, it has the immediacy and the
vigour of a live performance (background
sounds of pages being turned included),
which makes the music come alive with the
splendour of the excitement (or the sorrow)
of each precious phrase as it was played in
the moment.
Fancies and Interludes includes four
duos for violin and piano by contemporary
Canadian composers. The title track belongs
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