Early, Classical and Beyond

Bach - Un itinéraire
Luc Beauséjour
ATMA ACD2 2912 (atmaclassique.com/produit/bach-un-itineraire/?srsltid=AfmBOoqm5eVKGAQYb1maa7jvfUTKn3Njiks61jsMscFEYtUk2DVg_m3B)

Luc Beauséjour continues to be one of the most internationally respected harpsichord virtuosos and this meticulously assembled Bach programme shows that his playing remains superb. He plays on a sizable Yves Beaupré instrument of 2012 [after Dulcken] using a colourful Kirnberger temperament at the low pitch, A = 415Hz. This gives a somehow relaxed sound, and the tempos are all broad, but there is above all a sense of terrifically wide flow. For once there are not too many actual fugues, but the contrapuntal flow of the pieces is felt broadly with constant subtle expressive eddies and surges in the stream of very connected notes. This is unique playing and the lines are always clearly differentiated. Remarkable how Beauséjour frequently achieves stresses and marcato chords and phrases, on an instrument that is not supposed to be able to produce them, with registration and agogics.

The recording, his first with ATMA after many years with the Analekta label, starts with the Third French Suite, slower than we hear it on the pianoforte lately. The bonus of the disc comes from the early Capriccio on the Departure of his Beloved Brother, one of Bach’s rare affective pieces, showing expressive but subtle grief. The final section picks up with the coachman’s tuneful horn calls. This piece is beautifully felt and notes by Beauséjour make it all the more personal. 

The big Bach redoubt, the Chromatic Fantasia and Fugue, provides the climax of the programme and Beauséjour’s control and clarity really bring it off supremely.

Arc III - Brahms | Schubert
Orion Weiss
First Hand Records FHR129 (firsthandrecords.com/products-page/album/arc-iii-brahms-debussy-schubert)

Joyful music for these troubled times: this release completes a three-album series that traces a journey from the disaster and despair depicted in Arc I and Arc II, moving in Arc III to what American pianist Orion Weiss calls music of “peace, hope, love, ambition, optimism and the divine.” The result is a highly enjoyable recital featuring an attractive mix of rarities alongside established masterpieces for solo piano as Weiss displays his comfort in music written over a span of 160 years. 

The album opens with Louise Talma’s Alleluia in Form of Toccata (1945), sparkling with repeated notes, jagged leaps and offbeat accents. Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy is given a muscular yet poised reading, never rushed or pushed to extremes. The slow movement’s theme, quoting Schubert’s famous song, is a sombre contrast to the extroversion of the surrounding movements, and in Weiss’ hands the fugal finale is exhilarating in its clarity and rhythmic energy. 

Debussy’s L’isle joyeuse contrasts sultry mystery (listen to the central section at 2:45) with blazing virtuosity, a performance that lives up to Weiss’ description of it as “one of the most evocative and thrilling of Debussy’s piano works.” Dohnányi’s Pastorale on a Hungarian Christmas Song (1920) is another valuable re-discovery, and while Brahms’ darkly dramatic early third sonata may not immediately seem to fit the album’s theme, the ecstasy of the second movement love scene and the F major exuberance with which the finale concludes gain resonance from the music that has come before. 

Ligeti’s etude Arc-en-ciel provides an unexpectedly suitable coda, its interweaving lines beautifully shaped. Weiss’ Yamaha CFX is warmly recorded, and this intelligently programmed album is warmly recommended.

Prokofiev - Sonates pour flute et piano
Ariane Brisson; Philip Chiu
ATMA ACD2 2884 (atmaclassique.com/en/product/prokofiev-sonatas-for-flute-and-piano)

Prokofiev may have once defined a modern classical composer as “a madman making works that his generation won’t understand” but he himself achieved significant recognition during his lifetime, and today, remains one of the most renowned composers of the 20th century.

Among his extensive output are a number of chamber works, including two violin sonatas and one for flute, all of them composed during the Second World War. The first Violin Sonata Op.80 in F Minor was actually the second to be written for that instrument, and is presented here in an arrangement for flute by Ariane Brisson. Brisson performs it with pianist Philip Chiu along with the Flute Sonata Op.94 on this ATMA Classique recording. Brisson was first prize-winner in the Prix d’ Europe in 2014 and Chiu is a JUNO award winner and recipient of the Order of Ontario.  

The Sonata Op.80 was completed in 1946 and was awarded the Stalin Prize the following year. This a dark and intense four-movement work opening with a mysterious Andante Assai which the composer likened to “wind passing through a graveyard.” Together, the two artists comprise a formidable pairing with Brisson’s warm tone aptly conveying the dramatic mood with Chiu providing a sensitive partnership. The strident second movement is followed by a lyrical Andante and a finale with an unexpectedly calm conclusion. 

In comparison, the Flute Sonata Op.94 is decidedly more optimistic in spirit. Completed in 1943, the work is a demanding one, but the two performers easily meet the innumerable challenges with respect to technique and nuance. The score is affable and pleasant from the languorous opening to the sprightly finale demonstrating formidable interaction between the performers, as is the case throughout this exemplary disc.

Échos
Charles Richard-Hamelin
Analekta AN 2 9149 (charlesrichardhamelin.com/en/discography)

Charles Richard-Hamelin has accomplished much during the past decade or so. Not only did the Quebec-born pianist win third prize at the Seoul International Music Competition in South Korea in 2014, but was also silver medallist at the International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw the following year. Since then, he has appeared in concert with such orchestras as the Warsaw Philharmonic and the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony and was described by a Montreal critic as “a national treasure.”

Richard-Hamelin’s newest recording, Échos, is the 11th on the Analekta label and features an appealing programme of music by Granados, Chopin, and Albéniz. The set of eight Valses Poéticos Op.43 by Enrique Granados is aptly named – the music is indeed poetic and evocative, and Richard-Hamelin does it full justice. The playing is elegantly conceived, at all times displaying a keen sense of phrasing.

Chopin’s Allegro de Concert in A Major Op.46 is a bit of a curiosity. Originally intended as a piano concerto, the orchestral part was never written and despite some brilliant pianistic writing and numerous revisions, the work has languished in relative obscurity

Albéniz’ La Vega from 1897 and the Allegro de concierto in C-sharp Major Op.46 by Granados are further proof of Richard-Hamelin’s affinity for Spanish repertoire. He deftly captures the highly impressionist mood of La Vega, while the Concierto radiates freshness and vitality. Rounding out the programme is a selection of eight waltzes by Chopin, a fitting conclusion to a most satisfying recording.

It’s hard to believe that it’s been almost ten years since we lost violinist Jacques Israelievitch. To mark the anniversary the Navona label has reissued as a set the six volumes of Mozart: Complete Sonatas & Variations for Piano & Violin (Navona NV6697 navonarecords.com/catalog/nv6697) recorded in partnership with Christina Petrowska Quilico at York University between November 2014 and May 2015 and originally released on the Fleur de Son Classics label.

Retiring after 20 years as concertmaster of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Israelievitch joined the faculty at York in 2008 where he formed a duo with Petrowska Quilico that resulted in their wanting to record all the Mozart sonatas. Part way through the project he was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer, and after a break for hospital treatment was able to find the strength to complete the project just four months before his death. The last six sonatas were recorded in less than four hours, but there’s no hint of physical weakness in his playing, although the final sessions were apparently marked by extreme pain and fatigue.

The early juvenile sonatas are essentially piano sonatas with violin embellishments, Israelievitch weaving delightful lines around Petrowska Quilico’s finely measured playing, but the mature sonatas see a genuine partnership, two players clearly of one mind.

There’s no booklet with the set, but information can be accessed at the Navona Records website, including Petrowska Quilico’s touching memories of that final summer.

It’s truly a worthy and lasting memorial tribute to a fine and greatly missed violinist and what was clearly a very special musical and personal partnership and friendship.

Kinetic is the remarkable solo album by violinist Michael Jinsoo Lim, who as concertmaster and soloist with the Pacific Northwest Ballet felt himself to be “at the intersection of music and dance” for over 15 years; each piece here has a dance connection (Planet M Records PMR-006 planetmrecords.bandcamp.com/album/michael-jinsoo-lim-kinetic).

There are personal connections with all but one of the composers: Lim and his wife, the violist/composer Melia Watras, were founding members of the Corigliano Quartet, named for American composer John Corigliano; Watras has collaborated with fellow violist/composer Leilehua Lanzilotti; Lim has known Paola Prestini since their Juilliard days. 

All three works by Watras - Doppelgänger Dances, A dance of honey and inexorable delight and Homage to Swan Lake – were written for this project and are world-premiere recordings, as are Lanzilotti’s where we used to be and Prestini’s A Jarful of Bees. Corigliano is represented by The Red Violin Caprices and the glorious fiddle-inspired Stomp, which requires the player to do exactly that.

Piazzolla’s Tango-Études Nos.1, 3 and 4 are interspersed throughout a fascinating recital of quite brilliant playing by Lim.

Listen to 'Kinetic' Now in the Listening Room

On BACH | ABEL | HUME, her first solo album for the ECM label, cellist Anja Lechner brings together three different composers from two centuries for an intriguing musical recital inspired by the tonal language of the viola da gamba (ECM New Series 2806 ecmrecords.com/product/bach-abel-hume-anja-lechner).

Little is known about the Scottish composer Tobias Hume (c.1579-1645) whose skill on the viola da gamba contributed significantly to its establishment as a solo instrument. His short pieces, seven of which are heard here, were mostly notated in tablature and appeared in The First Book of Ayres printed in 1605.

The German Carl Friedrich Abel (1723-87), represented by an Arpeggio and an Adagio, both in D minor, helped the instrument achieve renewed prominence before it finally faded from regular usage.

At the heart of the CD are Bach’s Suites for Violoncello Solo No.1 in G Major, BWV1007 and No.2 in D Minor, BWV1008, written when the solo cello was establishing independence but incorporating much of the sound and language of the declining viola da gamba – in fact, they may possibly have been written for Abel’s father, a cellist and gambist in Bach’s Köthen court orchestra.

Lechner’s effortless and sensitive playing, resonantly recorded, makes for a delightful disc.

There’s some fascinating content on Mozart String Duos, violinist Catherine Cosbey and violinist/violist Dorian Komanoff Bandy presenting period-instrument performances of the two Duos for Violin and Viola in G Major, K423 and in B-flat Major, K424, alongside newly discovered historical arrangements of a Mozart violin sonata and several arias from a late opera (Leaf Music LM297 leaf-music.ca/music/lm297).

Cosbey and Bandy apparently insert “extensive embellishments and cadenzas” into their performances, although they are not particularly noticeable. The two Duos receive idiomatic readings, but while there are numerous alternative recordings available you won’t have heard any of the fascinating violin duets here before. 

The Violin Sonata in A Major K305 was transcribed for two violins by an anonymous Parisian arranger in 1799 and it’s really effective, drawing some of the best playing on the CD from the duo. Mozart’s opera La Clemenza di Tito was premiered in September 1791, just three months before the composer’s death; five arias were arranged for two violins by Johann Christian Stumpf, a German composer active in Parisian publishing in the 1780s who died in 1801. 

The duets were discovered in rare book libraries in Texas and Germany, and have in all probability not been heard since the early 1800s. Who knows what other gems we’ve been missing?

Listen to 'Mozart String Duos' Now in the Listening Room

You’d have to go a long way to find a more exciting duo than violinist Alina Ibragimova and her long-time partner of 16 years, pianist Cédric Tiberghien. Sparks fly when they play together, and their latest CD of the Schumann Violin Sonatas adds another dazzling recital to their discography (Hyperion CDA68354 hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA68354).

The Violin Sonata No.1 in A Minor Op.105 and the Violin Sonata No.2 in D Minor Op.121 were both written in 1851. The Violin Sonata No.3 in A Minor, Wo027 has had a varied history. In late 1853 Schumann suggested the composition of a collaborative sonata for violinist Joseph Joachim to be written by himself, Brahms and Albert Dietrich and based on the initial letters of Joachim’s personal motto: F-A-E for “Frei aber einsam” (Free but lonely). Schumann contributed the slow movement and finale, shortly afterwards adding two new movements to replace those of Brahms and Dietrich, hence completing a third sonata, his last surviving major work. 

Although originally delighted with the sonata, Clara Schumann and Joachim grew to view it negatively; it was not included in the Collected Edition prepared by Clara, Joachim and Brahms, and remained unpublished until 1956. 

Described as a poignant tribute to resilience and artistic reassembly, the new CD Witraż - the Polish word for Stained-Glass Window – references the shattered windows of Winchester Cathedral during the English Civil War and the rearranging of the shards into mosaics by the local people, comparing it to the way beliefs and values were shattered in Eastern Europe between the two World Wars. Shannon Lee is the excellent violinist and pianist Arseniy Gusev her equal partner (Azica ACD-71373 shannonleeviolin.com/projects/witraz).

Szymanowski’s shimmeringly beautiful Mythes – La fontaine d’Arethuse (actually from 1915) opens a recital of the highest quality, book-ended by the two major works, Bartók’s Violin Sonata No.1 from 1922 (with a really terrific Allegro finale) and Stravinsky’s 1932 Duo Concertante. In between are several short works: Gusev’s arrangement of Come di lontananza, No.5 of the 1925 piano solo Reflections Op.16 by Ukrainian composer Boris Lyatoshynsky (1895-1968); Bohuslav Martinů’s 1927 Impromptu H.116 and two items by Grażyna Bacewicz, her Kolysanka (Cradle Song) and the CD’s 1932 title track.

I’m not sure if the works always fit with the purported inspiration for the CD, but there’s no doubting the standard of the playing.

Listen to 'Witraż' Now in the Listening Room

Francisco Mignone (1897-1986) was a leading figure in 20th-century Brazilian music and part of the first generation of modernist Brazilian composers. The excellent new CD of his Complete Violin Sonatas in the Naxos Music of Brazil series features violinist Emmanuele Baldini and pianist Lucas Thomazinho (8.574595 naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=8.574595).

The three numbered sonatas – No.1 from 1964 and Nos.2 & 3, both from 1966, a period when Mignone was writing atonal music – are all world premiere recordings, and not exactly what you might expect from mid-century Brazilian chamber music, the first two being quite strident, experimental and fragmented in character and technically challenging. No.3 was reworked from 1962’s Sonata for Flute and Piano, and shows less fragmentation and a greater clarity of form.

Two early unnumbered sonatas complete the disc, the substantial three-movement Sonata in A Major from 1919 and the quite lovely single remaining movement from the 1916 Sonata in G Major both belonging to a different world, one infused with the French influence of Fauré and Debussy.

With Debussy – The Nash Ensemble the British chamber group celebrates its 60th anniversary season with a recital of Debussy’s three late sonatas and his early string quartet (Hyperion CDA 68463 hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDA68463).

The Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune in a really effective arrangement for wind quintet, string quartet, harp and crotales by the French composer David Walter opens the disc, followed by the three sonatas from 1915-17 that Debussy completed from a planned set of six. 

Stephanie Gonley is the violinist and Alasdair Beatson the pianist in a simply beautiful performance of the Violin Sonata in G Minor, and the standard never drops through the Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp – Philippa Davies, Lawrence Power and Lucy Wakeford the respective soloists – and the Cello Sonata, with cellist Adrian Brendel and pianist Simon Crawford-Phillips the excellent performers. 

A passionate and immensely satisfying performance of the 1893 String Quartet, Debussy’s first mature chamber music work, completes a CD of the highest quality.

The Calidore String Quartet completes its Beethoven project with Beethoven: The Early Quartets, a 3-CD set that ends their release of the complete cycle of Beethoven’s string quartets (Signum Classics SIGCD883 signumrecords.com/product/beethoven-the-early-quartets/SIGCCD883).

Although the six Op.18 quartets are often the first ones that players tackle, the Calidore members note that “they are by no means the easiest. Their transparency, elegance and robust shifts of character demand the most exacting levels of execution, poise and feeling,” and that’s exactly what you get in these outstanding performances. When The Middle Quartets was reviewed in this column a few months ago I commented that the unity of the ensemble playing was of the highest quality, and that there was a wonderfully varied dynamic range, and exactly the same can be said of this issue as well.

Hopefully the three volumes will be issued as a box set at some point, when they would offer an exceptionally strong option for a complete set.

It wasn’t only with the creation of symphonies that Johannes Brahms felt the heavy tread of Beethoven holding him back: he admitted that he had destroyed over 20 string quartets before publicly presenting his two Op.51 quartets in 1873, when he was 40 years old. On the 2CD release Brahms The Complete String Quartets the Korean Novus Quartet gives absolutely ravishing performances of the composer’s three completed quartets (Aparte AP366 apartemusic.com/en/album-details/brahms-string-quartets).

CD1 has String Quartets No.1 in C Minor, Op.51 No.1 and No.2 in A Minor, Op.51 No.2, while the second CD is devoted to the String Quartet No.3 in B-flat Major, Op.67 from 1876. This is Brahms playing of the highest quality – warm, vibrant, rich and passionate, and beautifully recorded. I’ve never heard them sound better – it’s a simply outstanding release.

The Finnish composer Kalevi Aho (b.1949) started writing string quartets at the very beginning of his composing career, although he did not return to the form until 2021. His early works in the genre are presented on Kalevi Aho String Quartets 1-3 in powerful performances by the Stenhammar Quartet (BIS-2609 SACD bisrecords.lnk.to/2609).

Initially self-taught and taking inspiration from essentially tonal music heard on the radio, Aho wrote his String Quartet No.1 in 1967 at the age of 18, an earlier work from 1966 not being included in his official quartet canon. Even so, a self-imposed performance ban on the newer work resulted in its not being premiered until June 2019.

The String Quartet No.2 from 1970 was written in his second year of studies with Einojuhani Rautavaara at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, its lovely opening Adagio and short, slow Adagio finale book-ending a brilliant, fugal and virtuosic middle Presto that brings Shostakovich to mind.

The String Quartet No.3 from 1971 marked the end of his studies with Rautavaara and the emergence of a personal language, its eight short, continuous movements forming a symmetrical journey from innocence to increasing complexity.

The Marmen Quartet was formed in 2013 at London’s Royal College of Music, and is committed to contemporary music. Their new CD Ligeti – Bartók, featuring strong and committed performances of three major 20th-century string quartets is their first recording for the BIS label (BIS-2693 SACD bisrecords.lnk.to/2693).

Ligeti’s String Quartet No.1, Métamorphoses nocturnes is a work of eight short movements from 1953-54, representing the peak of his “Hungarian” period before leaving the country for the West in 1956. Bartók’s middle quartets were a big influence on Ligeti, and one of them – the String Quartet No.4 from 1928 – is the middle work of the CD. Performances of the work were strictly forbidden in communist Hungary, and Ligeti knew it only from the score.

Ligeti’s String Quartet No.2 from 1968 is from his second period, and is a challenging work accurately described here as being calculated anarchy, with dynamic extremes and sublime climaxes.

You can always expect something different, inventive, insightful and immensely satisfying from violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja, and so it proves yet again with her latest CD Exile, described as bringing together composers who for the most part were compelled to flee their homeland, and featuring cellist Thomas Kaufmann and the Camerata Bern (ALPHA1110 outhere-music.com/en/albums/exile).

Alfred Schnittke left Soviet Russia in 1990. His 1978 Cello Sonata No.1 is heard here in the 2020 version for cello, strings and harpsichord by Martin Merker, the haunting tonal picture of the opening Largo followed by a dazzling Presto with remarkable playing by Kaufmann.

Soviet oppression and the banning of his works forced Andrzej Panufnik to flee Poland in 1954. His Concerto for Violin and Strings is a charming work commissioned by Yehudi Menuhin. Ivan Wyschnegradsky (1893-1979), known for his use of quarter tones and micro intervals was another composer to flee Russia, in his case to Paris in 1920. His three-movement String Quartet No.2, Op.18 from 1931 is a delight.

Eugene Ysaÿe left Belgium at the start of the Great War, ending up in the U.S.A. via England; his Exil! Poème symphonique for high strings, Op.25 from 1917 is a passionately elegiac work for four violins and four violas. Two folk tunes and a short Schubert quartet movement arranged for strings by Kopatchinskaja complete the disc.

Performance and recording levels are superb throughout.