03 Classical 05 Schubert  LewisSchubert – The Late Piano Sonatas
Paul Lewis
Harmonia Mundi HMC 902165.66

For explicable reasons I have a special affinity for Schubert’s piano works, including the Impromptus, the Moments Musicaux and others, but especially the sonatas. Particularly the final three which were all composed in 1828, the year following his visit to the dying Beethoven. Schubert himself was deathly ill but in his last months he also managed to complete the C Major Symphony, the song cycle Schwanengesang and give a concert on the anniversary of the death of Beethoven. He died on November 19, 1828 aged 31 and was buried, as he had wished, very close to Beethoven in Wahring. In the 1860s both bodies were disinterred and taken to Vienna where they lie, side by side in the Central Cemetery.

Lewis is a front-rank interpreter of Beethoven as his recordings of the five concertos and the complete piano sonatas will attest, but his realizations of Schubert are no less commanding. He recorded the D784 and D958 in 2013 and the last two in 2002. Lewis does far more than give us exactly what is written in the score, seeming to express the composer’s own thoughts. This is nowhere more evident than in the opening movement of the D960. A couple of comparisons: Clifford Curzon is smooth, fluid and melodic while Radu Lupu is somewhat thoughtful. Neither those nor others has the innigkeit (sincerity, honesty, warmth, intensity and intimacy) displayed by Lewis. And so it is across the four sonatas. For Lewis there are no throwaways; every note is significant and important and placed exactly right. An essential recording of this repertoire.

 

 

03 Classical 06 Hough in the NightIn the Night
Stephen Hough
Hyperion CDA67996

Pianist Stephen Hough is absolutely brilliant in his solo release In the Night where the many aspects of night, from nightmares to insomnia to deep sleep to bliss, are given a pianistic rendition. Beethoven’s Piano Sonata in C sharp minor “Moonlight” is an obvious inclusion here. Hough begins with thoughtful reflection and a mournful lyrical melodic statement which weaves around a steady rhythmic framework and sets the stage for an emotionally dark yet hopeful performance. Likewise his performances of Frederic Chopin’s Two Nocturnes Op.27 are charged and driven by deep musical maturity. Both Robert Schumann’s In der Nacht from Fantasiestucke, Op.12 and Carnaval are performed with technical and musical wizardry.

The pianist’s own composition Piano Sonata No.2 “notturno luminoso” is a tour de force. It is always such a joy to hear composers perform their own work. Though clearly steeped in romantic attributes, Hough chooses more modern jazz-evoking harmonies, witty repartees between high and low pitches, and excursions into sharp, flat and natural sections to evoke the many sides of nighttime living. From crashing percussion chords which never overwhelm, to sudden silences, to a soothing final cadence lulling one to sleep, Hough musically evokes nighttime at its very, very best and very, very worst.

Superb production qualities, well-written liner notes, a great performer and a great choice in repertoire make In the Night piano music to listen to any time of day.

 

03 Classical 07 Honens TchaikovskyTchaikovsky – The Seasons
Pavel Kolesnikov
Hyperion CDA68028

While Tchaikovsky is most famous for his ballets, operas and orchestral music, he also completed a large number of pieces for solo piano. These may not be as well known, but they bear the same attention to detail and finely crafted melodies as his larger works – and these characteristics are very evident in the two sets Op.37b and Op.19 found on this Hyperion recording performed by Siberian-born pianist Pavel Kolesnikov.

Still only in his early 20s, Kolesnikov was a first-prize winner in the Honens piano competition in 2012, and is currently pursuing musical studies at Moscow State Conservatory in addition to private lessons with Maria João Pires in Brussels. To date, he has performed at Carnegie Hall, Berlin’s Konzerthaus and the Banff Summer Festival.

The Seasons (1876) initially appeared as individual movements in a musical journal spanning the course of a year, each one representing a different month. Charming and graceful music, each movement is characterized by its own unique character, from the quiet reflection of “January (By the fireside)” and the exuberance ofFebruary (Carnaval)” to the gracefulness of “December (Valse).” Kolesnikov’s approach to the music is thoughtful and intuitive, demonstrating an understated sensitivity combined with a formidable technique.

The Six Morceaux, composed three years earlier, is also a study in contrasts. Once again, Kolesnikov effortlessly conveys the ever-changing moods, right up until the striking “Thème original et Variations” which concludes the set and the disc with a fine flourish.

Well done, young man, you’ve already accomplished much in your short life and if this fine recording is any indication, you’re headed for greatness.

02 early 01 caccini euridiceCaccini – L’Euridice
Soloists; Concerto Italiano; Rinaldo Alessandrini
Naïve OP 30552

In 1607 Carlo Magno wrote to his brother that there would soon be a performance of “a piece that will be unique because all the performers speak musically.” The piece was Monteverdi’s Orfeo and the letter clearly shows that a work that was sung throughout or, as we would call it, an opera, was felt to be a new thing. The earliest opera was Jacopo Peri’s Dafne (1597 or 1598) but, since the music for that work has not survived, opera is generally thought to begin with the two Eurydice operas (written to the same libretto) by Peri and Giulio Caccini, both of which date from 1600. Musicologists have usually dismissed the Caccini version. On the other hand, the printed material that comes with an earlier recording of the Caccini (conducted by Nicholas Achten, on the Ricercar label) claims that Caccini, not Peri, was the true founder of the new genre.

The musical language of Caccini’s opera, the stile rappresentativo, is based on the impassioned speech of the solo voice. It is more melodious than mere recitative but it never develops into aria. Nor does it have the musical inventiveness or instrumental variety that characterize Monteverdi’s opera only a few years later. Whether or not the Caccini is inferior to Peri’s version, it has a great deal of dramatic power and is certainly worth listening to, especially when it is sung and played as well as it is here. Rinaldo Alessandrini and the Concerto Italiano have given us many fine recordings, particularly of the Monteverdi Madrigals, and this CD does not disappoint.

 

02 early 02 leclair 2 violinsLeclair – Complete Sonatas for Two Violins
Greg Ewer; Adam Lamotte
Sono Luminus DSL-92176
(sonoluminus.com)

This two-CD set does indeed include all 12 violin duos by the French violin virtuoso Jean-Marie Leclair, six each in his Opp.3 and 12 collections. Leclair’s compositional brilliance is in marrying Italian and French styles with endlessly interesting and entertaining results. A dancer in his younger life, Leclair has an innate sense of dance rhythms and even the most ferocious of his allegro movements possesses grace, elegance and warmth. His writing for two violins, in particular, makes full use of the sonic possibilities of each instrument. Each part has equal prominence and there is an intricate relationship of soloistic and accompaniament duty-sharing as one finds in the gamba duos of Marais from a generation before. Along with Leclair’s sonatas and concertos, these duos deserve wider recognition and more frequent performance.

Ewer and Lamotte display an obvious fondness for this repertoire and take great care to bring out the expressiveness and line in each of these delightful sonatas. My one minor wish is that they might have occasionally made a more extreme tempo choice, either on the fast or slow side of the equation. That being said, their performances are poised, elegant and full of colour, contrast and life. It was a pleasant surprise to read the informative program notes by Montreal’s Matthias Maute.

 

02 early 03 telemann miriwaysTelemann – Miriways
Markus Volpert; Ulrika Hofbauer; L’Orfeo Barockorchester; Michi Gaigg
CPO 777 752-2

The Opera House in Hamburg, the first public opera house in the German-speaking world, opened in 1678. The operas it staged were in German, although they sometimes included Italian arias. Initially the major composer was Reinhold Keiser; later younger composers like Handel and Johann Mattheson gained their start in Hamburg. Telemann settled in Hamburg in 1721. He soon became the director of the company and wrote many operas for it. Most Hamburg operas dealt with mythology or ancient history but occasionally more topical subjects were introduced: Keiser wrote Masaniello Furioso in 1706; its subject was the 1647 Neapolitan revolt against the Spanish rulers of the city. Mattheson wrote an opera about Boris Godunov in 1710. Telemann’s 1728 Miriways was more topical than either. Its main character is a Pashtun emir from Kandahar, who, supposedly, defeated the Persians and conquered Isfahan in 1709.

Although the opera is in German, it is based on the Italian opera seria pattern with elaborate da capo arias. There is some interesting experimentation: in the first act the Persian Nisibis sings an aria, in which she invokes sleep, and appropriately falls asleep in the middle, in the B section, on the dominant! An oriental colouring is provided by the brilliant and taxing parts for the corni da caccia. In this performance recorded live in Theatre Magdeburg the opera is well sung and well played. Magdeburg was Telemann’s home town and the Magdeburg theatre is committed to performing all his works. Telemann’s operas are not well known and this lively (and live) performance can be wholeheartedly welcomed.

 

02 early 04 handel tamerlanoHandel – Tamerlano
Xavier Sabata; Max Emanuel Cenčić; John Mark Ainsley; Karina Gauvin; Ruxandra Donose; Pavel Kudinov; Il Pomo D’Oro; Riccardo Minasi
Naïve V 5373

The story of Tamerlano, or Timur the Lame, and his victory over the Ottoman sultan Bajazet provided perfect fodder for the operas of Baroque’s greatest masters (Handel and Vivaldi), as well as a slew of lesser composers, Gasparini amongst them. The peasant who rose to rule most of Asia, from Anatolia to northern India, and claimed to be a descendant of Genghis Khan, was essentially a 15th-century version of Alexander the Great. His defeat of the Ottoman Empire offered Europe a 50-year breather from a war on its eastern flank. His imprisonment and killing of Bajazet was already being used in Great Britain as a political metaphor for the struggle against the house of Stuart and plays on the theme were staged in early November of each year before Handel wrote his opera. In 1724, at its premiere, Tamerlano was joined by two other plays on the subject. It proved to be one of Handel’s great successes, in no small part because of numerous, brilliant arias and the dramatic tension of Bajazet’s suicide. In this recording, as in most if not all Naïve productions (the label is famous for recording all of the works by Vivaldi), the playing is meticulous and the voices… The voices are, to be frank, fantastic! If we only had such an ensemble in the recent COC production of Hercules! Karina Gauvin astounds with her ongoing vocal development, and Sabata and Cenčić are both delightful discoveries for this reviewer. Bravi!

 

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