EDEN
Joyce DiDonato; Il Pomo D’Oro; Maxim Emelyanychev
Erato (joycedidonato.com/2021/12/07/eden)

Joyce DiDonato’s Eden invites us to examine our relationships and connections to the natural world by exploring themes of identity and belonging as well as our role and purpose in the healing of our planet, ourselves and one another. 

The repertoire offered crosses musical genres and eras, from classical Baroque songs from the 17th century to the modern contemporary and jazzy sounds of the 21st. The songs showcase themes of nature that have fascinated numerous composers, from Handel, Gluck and Mysliveček to Mahler, Ives and Copland. Eden also includes a world premiere recording of The First Morning of the World by Rachel Portman and Gene Scheer, commissioned for the album. 

DiDonato is a well-established versatile singer and little can be added to praise the quality of her voice, her technique, her creativity and her artistry, all equally displayed on Eden. Perhaps most notable is the care in curation which results in a cohesive product offering both vocal and instrumental works that efficiently cross the boundaries of musical genres and eras. 

DiDonato’s partners, Ensemble Il Pomo d’Oro and the conductor Maxim Emelyanychev, are historical performance practice specialists and this is reflected throughout the album. Gluck’s instrumental piece Danza degli spettri e delle furie is especially delightful.

From Rags to Riches – 100 Years of American Song
Stephanie Blythe; William Burden; Steven Blier
NYFOS Records n/a (nyfos.org)

This debut album from the New York Festival of Song’s new in-house label NYFOS Records features mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe and tenor William Burden accompanied on piano by NYFOS artistic director/co-founder Steven Blier, who also arranged some of the songs. It is taken from a March 2000 live concert recording at Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College in New York celebrating 20th-century American songs including art song, musical theatre, jazz and opera. 

The opening track has happy, energetic Blythe solo vocals in a dance-along rendition of Joplin’s Pineapple Rag, arranged by Blier. Blier’s arrangement of Cook’s vaudeville My Lady Frog is amazing, with opening piano leaping frog line, Burden’s musical singing to higher tenor closing pitches and closing ragtime piano riff. Bernstein’s Broadway song Wrong Note Rag provides a fun change of pace with piano “wrong note chords” hilarious under the vocalists. Nice to hear a more classical piece in the mix here with Samuel Barber’s Nocturne for tenor and piano. Other songs include works by Gershwin, Monk, Weill, Rodgers, Sondheim and Bolcom

The 17 songs comprise a comprehensive, stylistically wide-ranging overview of American songs composed in the last century. Blythe and Burden both sing with clear pitch, articulation and musicality in all the diverse styles. Blier’s rock-solid technique, musicality, accompanying and humour is amazing. His arrangements are musically inspiring. This is a superb release from a live production that includes occasional audience applause. Bravo!

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On Early Music
Francesco Tristano
Sony Classical G0100045975984 (sonyclassical.com/releases/releases-details/on-early-music)

Francisco Tristano studied at four conservatories before graduating from the Juilliard School. Here he turns every last facet of his immense talent as a pianist and composer to interpreting eight pieces of early music juxtaposed with as many of his own creations. 

Breathtaking does not begin to describe Tristano’s talents. After his own highly spirited Toccata we are treated to his version of a John Bull Galliard which combines the pianist’s exceptional skills with the taxing sequences one associates with Bull. Other tracks are as complex; what is more, it is difficult to remember that we are listening to a pianist when so much of this CD sounds as if it is being played on a harpsichord.  

Then there are the slower pieces, notably the surprisingly restrained Aria la folia and Pavan. Tristano also has a keen interest in the works of Orlando Gibbons, selecting four pieces, each with its own stately Elizabethan character. Above all, there is the longest track on the CD, Girolamo Frescobaldi’s Cento partite sopra passacaglie, with an intensity highly appropriate for Tristano’s vigorous technique. 

Which leaves us with Tristano’s surely unique pieces. Ritornello offers no respite to its composer/player, what with its inspiring opening and ever more intense later rhythms. Neither does the breathless Ciacona seconda. It is a brave pianist who would seek to emulate him.

Standing ovations have graced many of Tristano’s performances. This reviewer adds one virtually.

Mozart – Flute Quartets
Sonora Slocum; Joel Link; Milena Pajaro-van de Stadt; Brook Speltz
Acis APL98573 (acisproductions.com)

“Recording these quartets was a dream we had as students at Curtis over 12 years ago....” writes flutist Sonora Slocum in her program notes. So it is no surprise that her warmth and depth of feeling also come out in her playing, not as an imposed emotionality but rather as a kind of transparency, through which the message of the music assigned to the flutist can be felt. This is true not only of the slow movements, the sublime Adagio of the D-Major Quartet or the Andante of the G Major, but also, for example, of the brilliant Allegro first movement of the D Major, where Slocum’s effortless virtuosity serves to convey an intensity of feeling no less than that of the slow movements.

This recording, however, also raises the question: are these quartets flute solos with string trio accompaniment or string quartets with the first violin part given to the flutist? Unfortunately whoever mastered the recording chose the former, consistently putting the flute in the foreground and the strings in the background. As an example, in measures 26 and 27 of the G-Major Andante movement the flute and the cello have a brief duo in contrary motion, in which the flute dominates and the cello is in the background, when the sound from both instruments should be equal. 

So while Slocum’s playing is exemplary, the production values of the album do not, in my opinion, do justice to these wonderful works.

Paris 1847 – La Musique d’Eugène Jancourt
Mathieu Lussier; Camille Roy-Paquette; Sylvain Bergeron; Valérie Milot
ATMA ACD2 2834 (atmaclassique.com/en)

Most classical music enthusiasts know that Johann Sebastian Bach was, during his lifetime, better known as a church organist and music educator than as the composer of some of the finest and most canonic pieces of Western Art Music. While the classical world has Felix Mendelssohn to thank for not only contributing his own fine work to the aforementioned canon, but for his rediscovery of Bach’s music. The circuitous path that at least some of Bach’s pieces took from dashed-off manuscript sketchings for the pedagogical purposes of instructing his many students, to sacrosanct artifacts of musical genius, says as much about what society values, collects and ordains as symbols of high culture, as it does of Bach’s considerable genius.

Simply put, beauty and musical inspiration abound in exercise and method books, as well as in etudes composed for didactic and instructive purposes. And that is certainly the case here on this fine ATMA recording by Mathieu Lussier, Camille Roy-Paquette, Sylvain Bergeron and Valérie Milot. Collectively, they mine the beautiful repertoire of Eugène Jancourt, a 19th-century French bassoonist and educator, much of which originated in his 1847 method book. While Lussier, who remains a central figure in promulgating the solo bassoon as a concertizing instrument, acknowledges that this recording “may be of interest to anyone wishing to learn more about historically informed wind playing in the 19th century,” Paris 1847 is no archival recording or historical exercise. Rather the pieces, presented here as the first recording entirely devoted to Jancourt’s music, leaps from the speakers with energy, effervescence and a joie de vivre, capturing this unique and beautiful music from such an intriguing place and time in music history.

Chopin
Bruce Liu (Winner of the 2021 Chopin Competition)
Deutsche Grammophon (deutschegrammophon.com/en/catalogue/products/chopin-bruce-liu-12506)

One of the few silver linings to arise out of this incessant pandemic has been the boundless, world-class music events made available (often for free) for livestreaming on a variety of platforms. Taking advantage of as many of these musical offerings as my Zoomed-out brain has allowed, one day last October I spent a few sublime hours on YouTube watching the livestream of the 2021 Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw. I was enthralled, in particular, by Bruce Liu, who in fact, went on to become the first Canadian to win the prestigious competition! 

Shortly thereafter, Deutsche Grammophon (DG) released this CD featuring live highlights of Liu’s solo performances from the competition’s various rounds. According to Liu, DG chose the playlist: the entire round one recital of two Etudes (Op.10 No.4; Op.25 No.4), a Nocturne (Op.27 No.1) and the fourth Scherzo; the Andante Spianato and Grand Polonaise Brillante, and a Waltz (Op.42) from the second round; the Op.33 Mazurkas and the Variations on “La ci darem la mano” from round three. 

Rather than parse out bits and pieces from those performances, I wish to say this about Bruce Liu: the to-be-expected and breathtaking technical prowess aside, what sets Liu apart from the others is his risk-taking spontaneity. His interpretations are revelatory; his joy in playing, palpable. He is a sparkling, elegant and original virtuoso. A true sensation!

Bruce Liu will continue to enchant a worldwide audience. This keepsake CD will continue to remind us why.

Clara Robert Johannes – Lyrical Echoes
Adrianne Pieczonka; Liz Upchurch; Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra; Alexander Shelley
Analekta AN 2 8880-1 (analekta.com/en)

Is it by accident that the lead-in to the album title Lyrical Echoes begins with the name of Clara Schumann – ahead of her more celebrated peers, husband Robert and Johannes Brahms? Even if the avowed aim of the proposed four-part series is to show how “closely intertwined personal and artistic connections between the three musical giants” were, I prefer to think it as poetic justice.

Clara Schumann (nee Wieck) was one of the world’s leading pianists of her day, admired by Goethe, Mendelssohn, Paganini and others. As a young woman she was known for her inclination to melancholy. She was proclaimed wundermädchen by the Emperor of Austria and praised by Liszt for her “complete technical mastery, depth and sincerity of feeling.”

Indeed her songs here highlight the ravishing daintiness and poetic feeling of her work. Her skilful use of rhythm, harmony and pianistic colours raises these miniatures to the divine, with the lustrous soprano Adrianne Pieczonka and masterful pianist Liz Upchurch performing them with such a whispered intimacy that you feel almost like an eavesdropper throughout.     

Robert Schumann was a genius in his own right, albeit feeling himself a failure throughout his life. The Symphony No.2 is the darkest work he ever wrote. In each section of this poetic work the National Arts Centre Orchestra soars under Alexander Shelley. The orchestra’s Brahms Symphony No.2 is refined and lustrous, capturing the composer’s epic vision as Shelley maintains its flow and noble grandeur.

ARC I: Granados; Janáček; Scriabin
Orion Weiss
First Hand Records FHR127 (firsthandrecords.com)

American pianist Orion Weiss delivers a powerful musical statement with his new album, ARC I: Granados, Janáček, Scriabin. Please note that I am using the term album, rather than recording. This is purposeful. Without generalizing, or hopefully sounding overly pedantic, much of what exists in both classical (and jazz) discographies are recordings; a sound capture of what, essentially, is a live musical event documented in such a way as to preserve and remember a concertizing moment in time. An album, conversely, has, at the very least, an extra musical purpose to it, cognizant of track order, narrative arc and overall presentation. 

What Weiss has created, by connecting music written by Enrique Granados, Leoš Janáček and Alexander Scriabin (historically congruent, but stylistically and nationalistically disparate composers), through their zeitgeist-appropriate shared aesthetic of writing bleak, self-referential and globally aware music shortly before the world plunged into a devastating and worldwide war, is creative, programmatic and most definitely, album worthy.

As the first of three recordings in a projected ARC trilogy, Weiss here finds the commonalities of modernism, despair and haunting beauty that unites Granados’ Goyescas, Janáček’s In the Mists and Scriabin’s Piano Sonata No.9 “Black Mass,” mining historically prescient meaning from these pieces, as our world watches what seems likely to be an impending Russian invasion of Ukraine. Weiss’ album is beautifully played, captured with sonic elegance and presents an eerie programmatic message in musical form of what creatively was in the air between 1911 and 1913. The world should listen. Not only for the beauty of this recording, but for the message therein.

Bruckner – Symphony No.2 in C Minor
Wiener Philharmoniker; Christian Thielemann
Sony Classical G010004595494F (naxosdirect.com/search/19439914122)

Bruckner is not everybody’s cup of tea. Some worship him and some outright despise him. And he is so easy to ridicule. He was a country bumpkin, a peasant. The funny story goes that he even gave a thaler to Hans Richter, his conductor, as a reward to buy himself a beer. His reputation was also hampered by the British critics calling his symphonies “boa constrictors” and so he had difficulties gaining acceptance in England or North America. Today however, his reputation has never been higher. His symphonies are a step-by-step progression towards an ultimate goal and the last three are works of a genius.

Due to the COVID pandemic all concert activities were stopped so Christian Thielemann, onetime assistant to Karajan, famous as general music director of the Bayreuth Festival and principal conductor of the Dresden Staatskapelle, decided to record all nine of Bruckner’s symphonies in a leisurely manner with plenty of time now being available. The Vienna Philharmonic was the obvious choice, since it was they who had premiered those works, and in the Musikvereinssaal with its legendary acoustics. This recording is part of that series.

After the turbulent, sturm und drang First Symphony, the Second is entirely different. It is notable as the first time Bruckner opens with a tremolo on the high strings pianissimo, which has been described as a “primeval mist” that Thielemann renders nearly inaudibly. From this tremolo a sinuous cello theme emerges which returns in many guises throughout as a leitmotiv. Another new idea is the so-called “Bruckner rhythm” of two beats followed by three that appears here for the first time. 

Thielemann takes a relaxed approach, a slower tempo than some, so all the details come out beautifully and the climaxes are shattering.

Debussy Orchestrated
Pascal Rophé; Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire
BIS BIS-2622 (naxosdirect.com/search/bis-2622)

Who better than a French orchestra – in this case, the Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire conducted by Pascal Rophé – to pay homage to the music of Claude Debussy in this delightful recording on the BIS label? Two of the works here – the Petite Suite and the Children’s Corner Suite  were originally composed for piano and later orchestrated by Henri Büsser while the ballet scenario La Boîte à joujoux  (The Toy- Box) existed only in a piano version at the time of Debussy’s death in 1918, but was later orchestrated by his friend André Caplet. 

The four-movement Petite Suite from 1899 was inspired by the “fêtes galantes” paintings of Watteau and Fragonard as portrayed in poems by Paul Verlaine. The suite may have originated from a request for music that would appeal to skilled amateurs, and its simplistic and affable style stands in contrast to the more progressive music Debussy was creating at the time. 

Debussy adored his young daughter “Chou-Chou” and she was undoubtedly the inspiration for the ballet-scenario La Boîte à joujoux devised by writer André Hellé. The plot in this highly descriptive six-movement score revolves around three principle characters, and in the end, love triumphs over adversity. It was for Chou-Chou that Debussy composed the Children’s Corner Suite in 1908. More than 100 years later, the music continues to charm, with movements such as Serenade for the Doll, Jimbo’s Lullaby and The Snow is Dancing, a poignant and wistful glimpse of childhood in a more innocent age. Throughout, the ONPL delivers a polished and elegant performance, at all times thoughtfully nuanced. This is a fine recording of some familiar (and less-than-familiar) repertoire. Debussy – and quite probably Chou-Chou as well – would have heartily approved!

Popov – Schulhoff
Quartet Berlin-Tokyo
QBT Collection QBT 001 (quartetberlintokyo.com)

Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Khachaturian – in 1948, the USSR’s three leading composers were denounced as “formalists” by the Communist Party’s Central Committee, removed from official positions, many of their works banned. Now almost forgotten is that along with unspecified “others,” three less-celebrated composers were also named in the condemnation – Nikolai Myaskovsky, Vissarion Shebalin and Gavriil Popov. In the following years, the fearful composers tended to employ the folk-flavoured, patriotic or “optimistic” styles demanded by the authorities.

Popov’s whopping, 57-minute String Quartet in C Minor, Op.61, subtitled “Quartet-Symphony,” premiered in 1951 and here receives its first recording. There’s no evident folk music but, following the Party line, it’s unremittingly cheerful. In the first movement, lasting nearly 25 minutes, muscular buoyancy frames extended sweet violin melodies bordering on sentimentality. The six-minute scherzo, propelled by cello pizzicati, dances lightheartedly. A dreamy violin solo over slow pulsations begins the 15-minute Adagio cantabile colla dolcezza poetico. As the other instruments join in, the music becomes more animated and festive, then subsides with an eloquent cello melody. The 11-minute Allegro giocoso opens with graceful pizzicati before repetitions of the five notes of “bin-de-en wie-der” from the Ode to Joy slowly build to the quartet’s own joyful conclusion.

Included on this CD is Erwin Schulhoff’s tuneful, heavily rhythmic, 14-minute Five Pieces for String Quartet (1923). Each of these playful, satiric miniatures would make a superb concert encore piece. Superb, too, is the playing of the multi-award-winning Quartet Berlin-Tokyo. Bravi!

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Uncovered Volume 2 – Florence B. Price
Catalyst Quartet
Azica (catalystquartet.com/uncovered)

It is a proverbial travesty that we are “discovering” the work of an important Black composer – such as Florence B. Price – almost a hundred years after her career began. And that too, even as the music continuum has now been propelled into the 21st century. After all, it’s no secret that over three hundred years ago the it was a celebrated Black English violinist, George Bridgetower who, in 1803, performed Beethoven’s Violin Sonata No.9 in A Minor (Op.47) much to the composer’s delight. 

Happily, Azica Records has taken action again with the Grammy Award-winning Catalyst Quartet’s Uncovered Vol.2, featuring Price’s stellar chamber works. 

A measure of how remarkable a recording this is is heard not only on Price’s re-invention of Negro Spirituals – such as Go Down Moses – in her elegant chamber works, Negro Folksongs in Counterpoint and Negro Folksongs for String Quartet. Even more remarkable is that five of these works are world premieres on this album that includes the Quartets and Quintets for Piano and Strings, which carry the heft of this recording. 

The Catalyst penetrates the skins of these melodies and harmonies with deep passion and uncommon eloquence. The nobility of this music is quite beyond reproach. Each piece seems to speak to the musicians like a secret revealed from the heart. The Negro Folksongs in Counterpoint are bittersweet and often even exhilarating. This is a delicate, perfectly weighted performance by the Catalyst; a recording to die for.

Prokofiev – Piano Sonatas Vol.1
David Jalbert
ATMA ACD2 2461 (atmaclassique.com/en)

Sergei Prokofiev began his career as a concert pianist, so perhaps it’s not surprising that music for piano would comprise such an important part of his output. Undoubtedly his finest keyboard writing is to be found in the nine piano sonatas composed between 1907 and 1953, four of which are presented on this ATMA recording with pianist David Jalbert.  A graduate of the Conservatoire de musique du Québec, the Glenn Gould School and the Juilliard School, Jalbert is currently head of the piano department at the University of Ottawa.

The brief Sonata Op.1 in F Minor from 1907 went through numerous revisions and is very much steeped in the late-Romantic tradition. From the outset, Jalbert demonstrates keen understanding of this daunting repertoire tempered by a flawless technique.

While the first sonata has roots in the 19th century, the second from 1914 is clearly a product of the 20th, with its biting dissonance and angular melodies. Very much the music of a young composer finding his own voice, the work embodies a spirit of buoyant enthusiasm. The single-movement Sonata No.3 completed in 1917 contains a variety of contrasting moods all within a seven-minute timeframe.

Jalbert admits his partiality towards the Fourth Sonata, Op.29, also finished in 1917. Again, the work is a study in contrasts, from the restrained and darkly introspective first movement to the exuberant finale, which Jalbert performs with great panache.

An added bonus is the inclusion of four miniatures, the Marche, the Gavotte and the Prelude from the set Op.12 and the Suggestion diabolique from Op.4, which further enhance an already satisfying program. This is a stellar performance of engaging repertoire and we look forward to future additions in this series.

Memory in Motion; Percussion in Surround (Xenakis; Mâche; lanza; Tan)
Percussion Ensemble; Aiyun Huang
Mode Records mode325 DVD (moderecords.com)

Renowned percussion virtuoso Aiyun Huang and the Memory in Motion Ensemble release a recording project representing Huang’s recent research into how percussionists memorize musical actions within ensembles. The album begins with François-Bernard Mâche’s goosebump-inducing Aera. This work undulates with a welcomed anxiousness that brings warmth and beauty amid its numerous menacing arrivals. Glacial sonic behemoths envelop and serrated swarms cascade upward – all working harmoniously toward Promethean attempts at an apogee. 

alcides lanza’s sensor VI is an excited wild ride with an unrelenting hornet’s nest of activity. Here, the performers are able to place their incredible virtuosity on display. Sorites, one of two commissions for the project (and meant as a companion piece to Xenakis’ Persephassa – a work that appears later on the album), is a dusty scratchy expanse composed by Zihua Tan. Emerging from the haze is the occasional clarity of ringing bells – much like ephemeral shimmering grains flickering in brilliance but for a moment in a sunbeam strewn across a room. Next, lanza’s mnais mnemes is the murmuration of starlings beyond which storm clouds signal their approach: the endeepening of rumbling light in the distance. 

Lastly, the Ensemble’s interpretation of Xenakis’ Persephassa – a masterpiece of percussion repertoire – is outstanding and worth the price of admission alone. It is always a question for performers how to phrase contemporary music outside of what is taught when performing works of the common practice. The Ensemble brings a staggering interpretive quality that will surely propel this recording of Xenakis’ well-known work into definitive territory. The culmination of breathtaking musicianship and powerful performance mastery makes this album a must listen.

Marimba Collage – Open Score Works by Jordan Nobles
Nicholas Papador; University of Windsor Percussion Ensemble
Redshift Records TK 512 (redshiftrecords.org)

The music of Jordan Nobles draws you in from the first note – one immediately feels invited into an expanse that is gentle in its complexity. This Redshift recording represents the culmination of a longstanding collaboration between Nobles, percussionist Nicholas Papador and the University of Windsor School of Creative Arts where the composer’s Open Score Works for marimbas have been regularly programmed. As with many projects in the pandemic, this recording was achieved through each musician capturing their performance remotely, later to be multitracked for the finished album. 

Nobles’ Open Score Works are indeterminate in their structure leaving many performance attributes – such as number of musicians, combinations of instruments, pitch, and duration – to be determined by the performers themselves. The result is a series of haunting intermixtures where the marimba gladly offers its deepest resonant brilliance. Throughout the 12 works on the recording the listener passes through a series of enchanting moods that shift like sand storms, as seen from miles above, that are somehow at once violently gripping across the landscape and also frozen in time. Works like Still Life, aether, Stasis and Nocturne paint sonic geomorphologies that propagate amid shimmering ephemera while works like Quickening, Ostinati and Kinetics rely on charming rhythmic interplay. 

It is clear through listening to this release that Nobles’ Open Score Works are a pleasure to perform. The unmistakable gratification inherent in this recording only adds to what Nobles continues to offer through his music: a gift.

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