Fabio Biondi is the violinist on the naïve release Roman: Assaggi per Violino Solo, the unaccompanied works of the Swedish composer Johan Helmich Roman (prestomusic.com/classical/products/9614673--roman-assaggi-per-violino-solo).

Composed mainly in the 1730s, the works have a complicated source situation. Proofs of two movements of the G Minor Assaggio BeRI 314 from an aborted 1740 publication project exist, with a comprehensive but incompletely preserved manuscript collection by Roman’s colleague Per Brant containing about 20 compositions – some only fragmentary – supplemented with several Roman autographs.

The CD booklet doesn’t identify which performing source or edition Bondi uses. Although he adds bass and harmony notes and occasionally embellishes repeats, he essentially follows the 1958 Stockholm edition published by Almqvist & Wiksell, its exhaustive Introduction detailing source notational differences and their implications for performance. All six Assaggi from that edition are here, along with the D Minor Assaggio BeRI 311 in beautifully animated and effortless performances of works that, like the Telemann Fantasies they resemble, often look deceptively easy on the printed page.

The contemporary German composer Sophia Jani wrote her Six Pieces for Solo Violin between 2020 and 2023; they are performed on a new Squama Recordings CD by Jani’s long-time collaborator violinist Teresa Allgaier (sophiajani.bandcamp.com).

There are actually seven tracks on the disc, the slow, quiet Prelude acting as a separate introduction displaying elements – double stops, tremolo, arpeggios, etc. – that feature in the six diverse movements: Scordatura; Arpeggio; Triads; Capriccio; Grandezza; and Ricochet. The booklet notes describe the music as employing a mostly consonant language, unfolding gently and with great delicacy and leisure. The intensely effective build-up throughout the Arpeggio movement, the longest at eight minutes, might belie that, but only the Grandezza hints at any extended technique.

Allgaier is outstanding in what must be regarded as a definitive performance of a work that is a significant addition to the solo violin repertoire.

Violinist Elizabeth Chang describes the early 20th-century works on the new Bridge CD Sonatas & Myths as being by composers at the end of the Romantic period attempting to integrate their Germanic-based schooling with the emergence of new influences and styles. Steven Beck is the excellent accompanist (bridgerecords.com/products/9590).

Karol Szymanowski’s French-influenced Mythes: Trois Poèmes, Op.30 from 1915 opens the disc, with Chang’s bright, clear tone soaring through the mostly very high register writing. Ernst von Dohnányi, on the other hand, for the most part remained in the Romantic style of Brahms and Richard Strauss, his impressive Violin Sonata in C-sharp Minor, Op.21 from 1912 mostly looking backwards rather than forwards, although clearly showing the influence of Hungarian folk music in the second movement.

That folk music influence was even greater for Béla Bartók, who collected and studied Eastern-European folk music while also being influenced by contemporary composers like Schoenberg and Stravinsky. His Violin Sonata No.1 from 1921, though, is a complex work with less folk influence than you might expect.

Chang and Beck are in great form throughout an impressive recital.

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On the PAN CLASSICS disc Arcadia baroque violinist and artistic director Leonor de Lera is joined by Nacho Laguna on theorbo and baroque guitar and Pablo FitzGerald on archlute and baroque guitar in a quite superb recital of predominantly 16th-century music inspired by the pastoral poetry of the Arcadian world (leonordelera.com).

Composers represented are Claudio Monteverdi, Andrea Falconieri, Philippe Verdelot, Bartolomeo Tromboncino, Adrian Willaert, Vincenzo Ruffo, Giammatteo Asola, Giaches de Wert, Giuseppino del Biado, Riccardo Rognoni, Giulio Caccini, Francesco Rognoni and Sigismondo d’India. 

Lera’s use of diminutions – the ornamentation style and practice of Renaissance and Early Baroque Italian music in which long-value notes are broken down into shorter and more rapid notes that move around the melody – results in dazzling performances that simply burst with life, superbly supported by the lutes and guitars and beautifully recorded.

Cantabile: Anthems for Viola, the first album on the Delphian label by the Jamaican-American violist Jordan Bak is a recital built around two substantial 20th-century English works. Richard Uttley is the accompanist (delphianrecords.com/products/cantabile-anthems-for-viola).

The brief and somewhat discordant Chant by English composer Jonathan Harvey provides a subdued opening before Vaughan Williams’ lovely Romance, only discovered after the composer’s death in 1958, and Bright Sheng’s solo viola work The Stream Flows.

The two major works, separated by the premiere recording of Augusta Read Thomas’ Song without Words are the Bax Sonata for Viola and Piano, GP251, written in 1922 for Lionel Tertis and the Britten Lachrymae: Reflections on a Song of Dowland, Op.48, written for William Primrose in 1950. The Bax in particular is a gorgeous work, given a superb performance that is worth the price of this outstanding CD on its own.

In his excellent booklet essay for the new Le Palais des Dégustateurs recording Chopin Brahms CD featuring violist Ettore Causa and pianist Boris Berman (lepalaisdesdegustateurs.com) Paul Berry suggests that by ignoring arrangements and transcriptions in favour of precisely executed original works modern practice inadvertently eliminates an essential element of reimagination.

Successful transcriptions need no justification, though, and that’s clearly the case here with the performers’ own beautiful transcriptions of Chopin’s Cello Sonata in G Minor, Op.65 and Brahms’ Violin Sonata in G Major, Op.78. The keyboard parts remain virtually unchanged, with the viola’s adjustments up or down an octave to compensate for the cello’s lowest compass and the violin’s highest register respectively resulting in both pieces being imbued with what Berry calls “an unfamiliar delicacy.”

While some strength and depth are consequently lost in the Chopin, the opposite is true in the Brahms, the viola’s broader and warmer tone seemingly adding to the emotional effect.

ATMA Classique’s Images Retrouvées is the second issue in the Images Oubliées project by cellist Stéphane Tétrault and pianist Olivier Hébert-Bouchard that focuses on the genius of Claude Debussy (atmaclassique.com/en).

The performers cite Debussy’s interest in transcription – creating piano reductions of his own orchestral works and entrusting the orchestration of his piano works to colleagues – as the spur for their desire to create and reinvent; their arrangements for cello and piano of pieces predominantly for piano solo, give the music a new range of tone colours.

The 15 tracks are arranged chronologically, and include Deux arabesques, D’un cahier d’esquisses, L’isle joyeuse and Golliwog’s Cakewalk. Tétrault plays with a warm, even tone across the cello’s entire range, sensitively accompanied by Hébert-Bouchard in a recital of few dynamic peaks. In truth, it’s much of a muchness, but when the “muchness” is presented so beautifully, who can object?

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Works involving violin, cello and piano are presented on the new First Hand Records CD Ravel featuring violinist Klara Flieder, cellist Christophe Pantillon and pianist Massimo Giuseppe Bianchi (firsthandrecords.com).

Ravel’s Violin Sonata No.2 in G Major, M77 was written between 1923 and 1927, and has a second movement with a decidedly bluesy nature. His Sonata in A Minor for Violin and Cello, M73 from 1920-22 was dedicated to Debussy, who had died in 1918, and references his music along with a Hungarian influence which may well have been provided by Kodály’s 1914 sonata for the same instruments. The Piano Trio in A Minor, M67 from 1914 completes the disc.

There’s plenty of fine playing here, although the violin seems to be set back a bit in the two works with piano, with the latter particularly prominent in the Trio.

Any CD by the superb Takács Quartet is always guaranteed to provide performances of the highest quality, and this is proven again with their new Hyperion CD of quartets from each end of the composer’s life on Schubert String Quartets D112 & D887 (hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA68423).

The String Quartet No.15 in G Major, D887 from June of 1826 was the last quartet Schubert wrote, not being published until 1851, 23 years after his death. Described here as being one of the composer’s most ambitious and far-reaching chamber works, its extremely challenging technical difficulties and emotional turbulence have tended to restrict its performances. Not that you would guess that for a moment, given the deep and richly-nuanced performance here.

The String Quartet No.8 in B-flat Major, D112 was written in 1814 when Schubert was only 17  and clearly shows the influence of Haydn and Mozart. Again, the Takács players are outstanding on another terrific CD to add to their already impressive discography.

Mendelssohn String Quartets Nos. 4, 5 & 6 is the second volume in the series by Brazil’s Quarteto Carlos Gomes on the Azul label (azulmusic.com.br/en).

The works are the last three quartets that Mendelssohn wrote: No.4 in E Minor, Op.44 No.2 from 1837, revised in 1839; No.5 in E-flat, Op.44 No.3 from 1837-38; and No.6 in F Minor, Op.80 from 1847, the last major work that he completed. The latter in particular is an intensely personal work, written in a period of mourning following the death of his sister Fannie in May, and only two months before his own death in November.

Strong performances, full-bodied, warm, full of feeling and resonantly recorded, more than hold their own in a highly competitive field.

There’s yet another terrific recording of the Four Seasons on Antonio Vivaldi: Le Quattro Stagioni, a 2CD issue priced as a single disc with Jordi Savall directing soloist Alfia Bakieva and the all-female Les Musiciennes du Concert des Nations, which takes its inspiration from Vivaldi’s girls’ orchestra at the Ospedale della Pietá in Venice (alia-vox.com/en/producte/antonio-vivaldi-le-quattro-stagion).

There are in fact two recordings of the work here, with and without the sonnets that are written in the score: CD1 opens with the sonnets read in Italian (full translations in the booklet) and CD2 closes with the music-only performance. 

The other works on CD1 are the Concerto in F Major, Il Proteo o sia il mondo al rovescio, RV544 and the Concerto in E-flat Major, La Tempesta di mare, RV253. CD2 opens with the L’Estro armonico, Op.3, Concerto No.10 in B Minor, RV580, and the second movement Andante from the Concerto in B-flat Major, RV583. All performances are beautifully judged throughout this outstanding release.

On PIAZZOLLA: Buenos Aires violinist Tomás Cotik pays homage to his birth city with his third Piazzolla CD for Naxos, accompanied by the Martingale Ensemble under Ken Seldon (tomascotik.com).

The central work on the CD is the now familiar Leonid Desyatnikov concerto arrangement of Las cuatro estaciones porteñas (“The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires”), the four movements of which were written in 1961 and 1969 and originally conceived as individual compositions rather than a single suite. Desyatnikov’s arrangement incorporates quotes from the Vivaldi work. The remaining seven pieces are all 2021 arrangements by Ken Seldon of pieces that Piazzolla wrote for his Quinteto Nuevo Tango: Chin, Chin; Ressurreción del Ángel; Mumuki; Soledad; Zita; Celos; and Fugata. Transcribed from printed sources but incorporating improvisations from original Piazzolla recordings, they work brilliantly.

Cotik, as usual, is in his element here on a CD of just over an hour of gorgeous playing of captivating music. 

Yuri Zhislin is the outstanding violin and viola soloist on BARTÓK, an Orchid Classics CD featuring one early and one late concerto that were both premiered after the composer’s death. Valery Poliansky conducts the State Symphony Capella of Russia (orchidclassics.com/releases/orc100304-bartok).

Bartók had moved to the USA in 1940, and by late1944 was in failing health and poor financial straits. William Primrose commissioned a viola work from him, and by early September 1945 Bartók reported that a concerto was “ready in draft . . . only the score has to be written.” He died on September 26 with the work unorchestrated, leaving piles of un-numbered pages and scraps of paper with corrections and revisions. Tibor Serly undertook the enormous task of shaping and orchestrating the concerto, which was premiered by Primrose in December 1949, Primrose feeling that the finished work was “very, very close” to what Bartók intended. The work was revised by the composer’s son Peter and violist Paul Neubauer in 1995, with that edition now foremost.

The Violin Concerto No.1 was written in 1907-08 for the young violinist Stefi Geyer, with whom Bartók was in love; his feelings were not reciprocated, however, and she rejected the concerto. He presented Geyer with the manuscript, but it was not published until 1958 after both principals had died. The first of the two movements is rhapsodic and simply gorgeous.

Zhislin’s own arrangement for violin and string orchestra of the Six Romanian Folk Dances from 1915 completes a disc full of superb playing by all concerned.

On the ECM New Series release Songs of Fate violinist Gidon Kremer, along with his Kremerata Baltica and soprano Vida Miknevičiūtė, presents works by three contemporary Baltic composers and by Mieczysław Weinberg. Many of them are premiere recordings in a programme that has its roots in Kremer’s Jewish heritage and his personal ties to the Baltic states (ecmrecords.com/product/songs-of-fate-gidon-kremer-kremerata-baltica-vida-mikneviciute).

This too shall pass, a recent work for violin, cello, vibraphone and strings by Raminta Šerkšnytė (b.1975) opens the disc. Giedrius Kuprevičius (b.1944) is represented by David’s Lamentation for soprano and orchestra and Postlude: The Luminous Lament for soprano and violin, both from 2018’s Chamber Symphony “The Star of David” and by Kaddish-Prelude for violin and percussion and Penultimate Kaddish for soprano and orchestra.

The Weinberg pieces – Nocturne for violin and strings (1948/49), Aria, Op.9 for string quartet (1942), Kujawiak for violin and orchestra (1952) and three excerpts from Jewish Songs, Op.13 for soprano and strings (1943) – are strongly tonal and quite lovely.

Lignum (2017) for string orchestra and wind chimes by Jēkabs Jančevskis (b.1992) provides a gentle ending to an immensely satisfying CD.

Haydn: Cello Concertos and Hétu: Rondo is the latest ATMA Classique CD from Canadian cellist Cameron Crozman, with Nicolas Ellis leading Les Violons du Roy (atmaclassique.com/en).

Haydn’s Cello Concerto No.1 in C Major was written in the early 1760s and presumed lost for 200 years before a copy of the score was discovered in the National Museum in Prague in 1961. The Cello Concerto No.2 in D Major, conversely, was not lost but believed to have been written by Anton Kraft before the 1951 discovery of a Haydn autograph manuscript. The warmth and grace of Crozman’s playing make for delightful performances, with idiomatic support from Les Violons du Roy that features some particularly nice continuo touches.

Jacques Hétu’s brief but animated Rondo for Cello and String Orchestra Op.9 was written in 1965, when the composer was 27 years old; this is its world premiere recording.

With this impressive and highly enjoyable release Crozman continues to establish himself as simply one of the finest young cellists around.

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Marie Hubert: Fille du Roy
Karina Gauvin; Pierre McLean; Valerie Milot; Etienne Lafrance; Quatuor Molinari; Pentaedre; Clauce Lapalme
ATMA ACD2 2827 (atmaclassique.com/en)

In 1889, Oscar Wilde asserted: “Life imitates art far more than art imitates life,” arguing that rather than merely copy, life imitates art because life craves the expression found in great art. Karina Gauvin has turned this maxim on its head playing one of the most fascinating dramatic roles. Indeed, in Gauvin’s case, “art imitates life” – the life of Marie Hubert. 

Gauvin traced her lineage to Hubert, one of the 46 (of 327) “Filles du roi” that Monsieur de Bretonvilliers priest of the parish of Saint-Sulpice, selected to sail from Dieppe to New France, by royal decree of King Louis XIV. This is an enthralling story, and Gauvin tells it eloquently – before a single note, or phrase is sung – with charming booklet notes based on her great-ancestor’s diary entries. Gauvin then employs her fabled lyric soprano to turn the diary entries – 21 in all – into songs, the lyrics and music of which propel them into a rarefied realm. 

Gauvin is a priceless gift to music, an artist of the first order, broadening out from the Baroque repertory for which she is celebrated across the world. Her instrument is gorgeous: lustrous, precise and feather-light. Her musicianship is fierce as she digs into the expression of each word, brings ceaseless variety to soft dynamics and gives every phrase grace. 

She is accompanied by pianist Pierre McLean, harpist Valérie Milot, contrabassist Étienne LaFrance, Quatuor Molinari and the wind quintet Pentaédre. Claude LaPalme conducts and arranged the music.

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Murray Schafer – You Are Illuminated
Coro Volante; Brett Scott; Krista Cornish Scott
Centrediscs CMCCD 31523 (cmccanada.org/shop/cmccd-31523)

This terrific new album of choral music by the late R. Murray Schafer stands simultaneously in both the past and present. I suppose this blurring of old and new is one reason why Schafer is often referred to as a postmodernist (in addition to being called an avant-gardist who coined the term schizophonia, a soundscapist or an acoustic ecologist). But with You Are Illuminated, a beautifully captured 2024 recording by the Cincinnati-based choir Coro Volante under the keen direction of conductor Brett Scott, the music not only defies classification, but requires little explanation or illumination beyond what a simple listen can provide. 

Although eminently enjoyable, Schafer’s music often challenges listeners to expand beyond their comfort zones and to confront his above-mentioned musical theories and concepts. But with Scott at the helm, who, in 2019 penned an authorized biography of Schafer and who enjoyed a two-decade long friendship and musical relationship with the Canadian composer, listeners are in expert hands. As such, Scott, along with an impressive roster of soloists, ensemble choral singers and an excellent percussionist, has put together a stylistically divergent, but always musical program of Schafer’s choral works that span 45 years of compositional creativity. A self-described “labour of love,” this valuable new addition to the Canadian Music Centre’s already impressive discographic output focuses primarily on works of Schafer’s that have never before been recorded (or in some cases even performed), adding much to both the legacy of Schafer’s contributions to the choral canon, and to Canadian music more generally. 

Messiaen
Barbara Hannigan; Bertrand Chamayou; Vilde Frang; Charles Sy
Alpha Classics ALPHA 1033 (outhere-music.com/en/albums/messiaen)

Sensuality and – yes – spirituality don’t so much ripple as burst in the waves of ecstatic, convulsive melisma from Barbara Hannigan and Bertrand Chamayou’s magical, mystical Messiaen recording. It is in the imagination of the programming and the bold, almost cheeky intelligence that guides the choice and juxtaposition of repertoire, and the duo’s homage to the greatest 20th-century French composer after Debussy and Ravel.

Terms of endearment and hallelujahs tumble, rise and fall from Hannigan’s pliant lips through the sparkling song cycles. Chants de Terre et de Ciel is aglow, particularly in Bail avec Mi, Danse du bébé-Pilule, Antienne du silence and the ecstatic Résurrection. 

The music Is incandescent right out of the gate. And it only gets better with Poèmes Pour Mi before reaching the tidal crescendos of La Mort du Nombre with the eloquent sonorities of Vilde Frang’s violin and Charles Sy’s magnificent tenor.  

The scintillating elegance of Olivier Messiaen’s music is incandescent as it comes from an explosion at the heart of the nuclear corona of the sun. The luminescence of Hannigan’s voice gives these works an operatic freedom and scope that makes sense of these fragrant texts and their amplified emotions. It seems unimaginable that anyone but Hannigan, with her lustrous lyric soprano and unbridled dramatic abilities, could give the song cycles by Messiaen such life. She is marvellously served by Chamayou’s shimmering pianism throughout.

Lainie Fefferman – Here I Am
Vocal Soloists; Transit New Music
New Focus Recordings FCR403 (newfocusrecordings.com/catalogue/lainie-fefferman-here-i-am)

Who do you report to when you wake up in the morning? We have had anywhere between two thousand and seven thousand or so years to think about it. 

Lainie Fefferman, the composer of this deeply meditative big ensemble piece didn’t always punch in the “right name” when she woke up until the political climate in the USA (and far and wide) began to take its toll on her state of mind. Her short introduction describes the rude awakening of American Jews. 

There are six people in ancient scripture who uttered the words: “Here I Am (Lord).” The patriarchs Abraham and Jacob, the prophets Moses, Samuel, Isaih and Ananias, who was called to minister to Saul. However, Fefferman has expertly woven the miniatures that make up Here I Am with episodes from Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The cantors, led by Fefferman, nestle cheek-by-jowl with an accomplished improvising septet and the powerful neo-psalmody of a vocal trio to tell the story.

The words, “Here I Am” are pivotal to that story, and the unification of the tribes of Israel. This is Fefferman’s operatic “Here I am Lord.” A story of faith, expertly told from the brimstone and fire of Lot’s Daughters, And their Bloodguilt Shall Be Upon Them to the ultimate test of that faith in the story of Abrahan and Issac in Take Thy Son.

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Bravura – Works for Natural Horn and Piano
Louis-Pierre Bergeron; Meagan Milatz
ATMA ACD2 2864 (atmaclassique.com/en)

The natural horn, like its successor the French horn, has, in the right hands, a buttery, full and round timbre and tone that makes one wonder why you would ever again listen to the more strident trumpet. And on ATMA Classique’s terrific 2024 recording, Bravura: Works for Natural Horn and Piano, that question is indeed put to the test. 

Making his recording debut as a leader, the virtuosic Canadian hornist Louis-Pierre Bergeron demonstrates just how beautiful and expressive this pre-19th century brass instrument can be. Ably accompanied by Meagan Milatz on the Classical-era Fortepiano, this sympatico duo mines a set of repertoire that includes impressive works, largely new to me, by Franz Xaver Süssmayr, Ludwig van Beethoven, Nikolaus Freiherr von Krufft and Vincenzo Righini in order to feature this unique instrumental pairing. Take, for example, Cipriani Potter’s Sonata di bravura for Horn and Piano in E-flat Major that captures Bergeron and Milatz at their most expressive and playful. Over 20 minutes in length, this multi-themed piece affords both principals space to showcase their renowned musical abilities, while offering room for the antiquated instruments to interact within a decidedly modern recording context.

As a studio musician, hornist with the National Arts Centre Orchestra and a frequent collaborator with Tafelmusik and various pop ensembles, Bergeron is clearly used to this blending of the old with the new. But for listeners new to the instrumental pairing here, Bravura is unexpectedly refreshing, exciting and musically satisfying.

Mozart – Piano Concertos 9 & 24
Lars Vogt; Orchestre de chamber de Paris
Ondine ODE 1414-2 (naxos.com/Search/KeywordSearchResults/?q=ODE1414-2)

In a sad loss to the music world, in September 2021 at age 51 a remarkable German pianist, conductor and wonderful human being, Lars Vogt passed away leaving behind an impressive career and a worldwide reputation. He appeared as soloist with many major orchestras (including Berlin and Vienna), created his own Music Festival, won numerous awards and had a distinguished discography. Unfortunately, this is his last recording. It has already acquired numerous awards (e.g. Critic’s Choice, Gramophone) and I just couldn’t stop listening. I would include it among my “desert island” discs.

 Vogt had such love for these two Mozart concertos that he felt compelled to record them even in the midst of medical treatments. The two are as different as can be. The first piece, the bold and youthful No.9 in E-flat, Mozart’s first major statement in the genre, has a well-fitting nickname Jeunehomme. It is a concerto of contrasts. After the elegant and optimistic major key first movement, the second is in the relative C minor key and has a tragic, somber atmosphere while the final Rondo is joyful and exuberant.

Out of Mozart’s 27 piano concertos nine are undisputed masterpieces, all of them written in the last two years of his tragically short life. Among these, only two were in a minor key and No.24 is arguably his greatest. The dark C minor chords dominate the first movement which is in a very unusual 3/4 measure, obviously meant to be close to the composer’s heartbeat. (The long virtuoso cadenza at the very end of the first movement was composed by Vogt). The heavenly second movement brings some happiness, but the last one is again in a minor key. Its set of variations on a simple theme brings a virtuoso, brilliant ending.

My feeling concurs with Vogt that “this idea that despite everything things aren’t so horrible in this world… It always plays a role in Mozart.”

Schumann – Dichterliebe
Kristjan Randalu
Berlin Classics 0303295BC (prestomusic.com/classical/products/9609352--dichterliebe)

This recording of Robert Schumann’s Dichterliebe by Kristjan Randalu is one of the most ingenious piano recordings not only of anything Schumann that I have heard but possibly any recent solo piano recording. And there have been many recordings by classical pianists far more celebrated than Randalu. All is explained in the final paragraphs below. 

Dichterliebe (Poet’s Love), a cycle of 16 songs, takes its text from Henrich Heine. It introduces to German song a mingling of sentiment and irony, much as Heine’s poems had done for German verse. This is a world of disillusionment in which nature acts as an adjunct and reflection to a bittersweet love story. 

Perhaps the most immortal interpretation of this song-cycle is baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and pianist Alfred Brendel’s (Philips, 1986). In this (and every other version) the piano becomes an equal partner with the singer, appearing sometimes as a combatant, sometimes as commentator, and given the long preludes and postludes, the instrument adds an extra dimension to the possibilities of the lieder genre. Randalu makes all of the above happen by masterfully employing his insolent virtuosity and febrile imagination to Dichterliebe.

Randalu’s right hand cadenzas are “the singer” adding “vocalastics” through improvisation, a second layer of colour, liberating the lyrical element of Dichterliebe, and defining the emotional element more precisely. His left-hand acts as combatant and commentator. Together they offer Dichterliebe as Schumann dreamed: “a deeper insight into my inner musical workings.”

Breaking Glass Ceilings – Music by Unruly Women
Rose Wollman; Dror Baitel
SBOVMusic (sbovmusic.com)

Expansions of the classical canon are always welcome. Offering much needed opportunities to infuse new and diverse voices into the ongoing history of this music not only provides revitalized repertoire for potentially warhorse weary ears, but such fresh compositional contributions underscore just how relevant, vibrant and still meaningful an art form classical music remains. All of the above is most certainly the case with violist Rose Wollman and pianist Dror Baitel’s excellent 2024 duo recording, Breaking Glass Ceilings, a collection of fine music from the pens of four women composers: Florence Price, Libby Larsen, Rebecca Clarke and Amy Beach.

Released on Sounds Better on Viola (SBOV) records, Breaking Glass Ceilings showcases not only an exciting program of lesser-known pieces by three deceased and one still-living composer, but traverses style (from the lush Romantic-era inspired sounds of Beach to the contemporary and decidedly American influenced compositions of Larsen), and, perhaps most of all, offers up an exciting new duo set of viola and piano performances with impressive results. 

While described as a musical celebration of “women who were told ‘no’ and did it anyway,” the recording may have an agenda to correct long standing historical omissions but there is nothing didactic here. Instead, what we have is an effervescent contemporary recording featuring excellent interplay and blue-chip musicianship from two accomplished soloists and performers. An excellent addition to the collection for fans of the genre.

Tchaikovsky – Symphonies 4, 5 & 6
Park Avenue Chamber Orchestra; David Bernard
Recursive Classics RC4789671 (chambersymphony.com/recordings)

Conductor David Bernard has organized and conducted orchestras such as this Park Avenue Chamber Symphony, bringing them up to excellence in concerts and recordings recognized by audiences worldwide and to critical acclaim by the likes of the New York Times and Gramophone magazine. There is a photo of Bernard as a young kid getting a conducting lesson from the great Serghiu Chelibidache and I consider this his highest recommendation. By the way, chamber symphony is a misnomer. They are full size and have all the instruments of a complete symphony orchestra.

Tchaikovsky’s late symphonies, the Mighty Three, are cornerstones of musical literature. These are divinely inspired and among the most important and beautiful works of the master (and perhaps of all Russian composers). I have been in love with the passionate Fourth Symphony in F Minor since seeing Rudolf Kempe doing it so beautifully at Massey Hall back in the 60s with the Royal Philharmonic. In the entire symphonic literature there are few other works that test all sections of an orchestra and its individual instruments in technical brilliance: just think of the virtuoso pizzicato third movement that requires the entire string section to be in perfect unison and coordinated like a giant balalaika. These Park Avenue Chamber players are having a lot of fun with it and can be congratulated on passing the test very well. The sunny, optimistic, heroic and arguably the most beautiful of the three, Symphony No.5 in E Minor and the soul-searching gut wrenching but noble and magnificent Symphony No.6 in B Minor, the “Pathetique” are given equally fine performances.

As a distinguishing feature I noticed the conductor’s obvious effort to bring out all that’s written down in the score thus exposing internal voices I’ve not heard before. But what impressed me most is Bernard and his orchestra’s tremendous enthusiasm and love of this music that one can feel. It shows as if it were a live performance which is not easy to achieve. All in all, not a Mravinsky, nor a Karajan, but lovingly played and a sincere noble effort and that could be the most important element.

Prokofiev – Piano Sonatas Vol.II
David Jalbert
ATMA ACD2 2462 (atmaclassique.com/en)

One of the 20th century’s most significant composers, Sergei Prokofiev’s music continues to challenge performers and listeners alike with its thrilling rhythms, complex harmonies and technically demanding scores. An expert pianist himself, Prokofiev’s piano music is notoriously challenging, notably demonstrated in his first two piano concertos.

A prolific writer, Prokofiev composed nine piano sonatas in addition to seven completed operas, seven symphonies, eight ballets, five piano concertos and a number of other large-scale works. Featuring Piano Sonatas 5-7, Canadian pianist David Jalbert gives a commanding survey of Prokofiev’s powerhouse writing for piano in this, his second installment in a series of the complete piano sonatas.

Piano Sonata No.5 in C Major is the least-performed of all Prokofiev’s sonatas, largely due to its cumbersome history. Accused of “formalism” by the Stalin regime in 1948, Prokofiev re-composed the third movement, simplifying his music in accordance with Stalin’s dictates. These unwanted, detrimental changes weakened the structure of the sonata, so much so that Prokofiev issued it a new opus number. Despite these political-compositional accommodations, Jalbert injects great energy and conviction into his interpretation, overcoming any weakness in the score with a strong and captivating performance.

Sonatas six and seven, written in 1940 and 1942 respectively, are known as the War Sonatas (along with Sonata No.8, composed in 1944). These works are at once thrilling, expressive and devastating, effectively distilling the angst and anguish of the time into one piano and two hands. This music needs to be attacked and thrust upon the audience, and Jalbert achieves this with gripping success, making this recording essential listening for pianophiles everywhere.

The Lost Generation
The Orchestra Now; Leon Botstein
Avie Records AV2684 (avie-records.com/releases/the-lost-generation-hugo-kauder-•-hans-erich-apostel-•-adolph-busch)

Leon Botstein (founder-conductor of Orchestra Now, a graduate-level, multi-year program at Bard College in Red Hook, New York) enjoys rediscovering and performing unfairly neglected works. Here, works by three composers of “the lost generation” – those born between 1888 and 1901 – receive their first available recordings.

Hans Erich Apostel’s Variations on a Theme by Haydn (1940) utilizes a graceful theme from Haydn’s Symphony No.103. Apostel’s variations, while not completely atonal, reflect his studies with Schoenberg and Berg. Despite their melodic aridity and astringent harmonies, listener engagement is maintained by Apostel’s imaginative changes of tempo, rhythm and orchestration.

Renowned violinist Adolf Busch composed his sentimental, cheerful Variations on an Original Theme for piano four-hands (1944) as a Christmas gift for his wife. Often played by his son-in-law Rudolf Serkin and grandson Peter, they’re heard here in Peter Serkin’s orchestration.

The CD’s major offering, Hugo Kauder’s 40-minute Symphony No.1 (1920-1921), opens with Bewegt. As per its title, it’s emotionally agitated, Brucknerian in sonority and drama. The following scherzo is a wryly rustic Mahlerian dance (Kauder dedicated the symphony to Alma Mahler), interrupted by a lyrically nostalgic trio. The gorgeous slow movement is very much in the Bruckner-Mahler mould, featuring long-lined, yearning melodies and noble, hymn-like crescendos. The finale, a passacaglia, begins skulkingly, with alternating playful and solemn variations before ending abruptly. Amazingly, it took 100 years since its creation for Botstein to conduct this fine symphony’s U.S. premiere at Carnegie Hall in 2022.

Cuando el Fuego Abrasa
Ensemble Bayona; Eros Jaca
Eudora Records EUD-SACD-2403 (eudorarecords.com)

At first glance, the cultural connection between Spain and Switzerland may seem a tenuous one. Nevertheless, the two countries work closely together on political, economic and cultural levels and this premier recording by the Spanish-based quintet Ensemble Bayona is an intriguing demonstration of this close alignment. Titled Cuando el Fuego Abras (When the Fire Burns), it features works by both Swiss and Spanish composers, all of them first recordings.

Focusing on music from the first half of the 20th century, the ensemble made its debut in Berlin in 2021 having won the Dwight and Ursula Mamlok Prize the previous year. 

The disc opens with the Piano Quintet in F Major Op.6 by Swiss composer Joseph Lauber, music very much in the German late romantic style. What a fine sound these musicians produce, the warm tone of the strings – particularly from cellist and artistic director Eros Jaca – perfectly blending with the solid and assured playing by pianist Camile Sublet.

In contrast are two contemporary compositions, the Variations on a Swiss Theme for string trio by Swiss-born Christoph Blum and the Cantos for string quartet by Valencian composer Francisco Coll. The variations are a true study in contrasts with alternating pizzicati and glissandi and the use of vocal parts throughout, while the Cantos is quietly introspective.

The program returns to 20th century Spain with a 12-movement suite from Manual de Falla’s 1915 ballet El Amor Brujo specifically arranged for the ensemble by the Spanish composer José Luis Turina. The ensemble approaches the music with much bravado with vocalist Maria José Pérez further enhancing this fine performance of De Falla’s colourful and sensuous score.

With outstanding playing and a melding of two musical cultures, this disc is well worth investigating.

Solace
Kormaz Can Saglam
Sono Luminus DSL-92272 (sonoluminus.com/store/solace)

The name Korkmaz Can Sağlam may not be an overly familiar one, but this up and coming Turkish pianist already has much to his credit. Born in Ankara in 1999, he was the Grand Prize winner of the 2022 Alexis Gregory Vendome Prize, having received his bachelor’s degree from the Juilliard School. While there, he was also recipient of the Ahmet Ertegün Memorial Scholarship and the Susan W. Rose Piano Fellowship. Sağlam is currently pursuing his master’s degree at the Cleveland Institute and this premiere recording, featuring works by Handel, Rachmaninoff and Turkish composer Ilayda Deniz Oguz, is worthy proof of his stature.  

Handel’s six-movement Suite in D Minor (c.1720) is a set of stylized dance movements, each a musical miniature. Sağlam delivers a polished and elegant performance, from the expansive opening Prelude to the virtuosic presto finale, easily demonstrating that baroque keyboard repertoire can sound as convincing on a concert grand as it does on a harpsichord.

History has never been too kind to the Rachmaninoff Piano Sonata No.1 Op.28. Very much in the grand late romantic tradition; it was written for the composer’s tour to the U.S. in 1909, yet he never performed it in public again. Nevertheless, Sağlam approaches the score with a particular vitality, always clearly focused throughout the myriad technical complexities.

In contrast is Rachmaninoff’s lyrical In the Silence of the Secret Night, the third of his Six Romances Op.4. Of even greater dissimilarity is Bozluk, a contemporary composition by Sağlam’s friend Ilayda Deniz Oguz, where the use of prepared piano demonstrates yet another facet of Sağlam’s musical capabilities.

Canadian Suite Celebrations
Duo Majoya
Centrediscs CMCCD 32423 (cmccanada.org/shop/cmccd-32423)

The talents of five veteran Canadian keyboardists combine in listener-friendly music for the unusual pairing of piano and organ, championed by Edmonton-based Duo Majoya – pianist Joachim Segger and organist Marnie Giesbrecht, both now retired from university posts in Edmonton.

From 1969 to 2021, Denis Bédard (b.Quebec City 1950) served as a church organist in Quebec and Vancouver. His charming five-minute Capriccio (2007) made me smile. The four brief movements of his Duet Suite (1999) are, in turn, dramatic, playful, stately-ceremonial and celebratory. Bédard’s 27-minute Grande Suite (2016) is, by far, the CD’s longest work. Overture moves from solemnity to cheerfulness. Evocation (Des prairies canadiennes) is a haunting soundscape of hushed repeated piano arpeggios over moody organ chords. Ritournelle is a piquant folk dance, Dialogue an echoing children’s song, Intermezzo a hesitant waltz, followed by the mock-courtly Menuet and jubilant Marche.

Pianist-organist Ruth Watson Henderson (b.Toronto 1932) was, for many years, accompanist for the Festival Singers and Toronto Children’s Chorus, composing over 200 choral pieces. Her Suite (2011) is in four brief movements – a portentous Prelude, gentle Intermezzo, a searching, ambulating Romance and rollicking Dance.

In 1976, Jacobus Kloppers (b.1937) left his native South Africa, settling in Edmonton where he chaired Kings College’s music department (1979-2005), also teaching organ at the University of Alberta. In The Last Rose of Summer – Reminiscences in Autumn (2011), he quotes the title song in music surging with sentiment, ending in an aura of quiet nostalgia.

Listen to 'Canadian Suite Celebrations' Now in the Listening Room