Best of Spring 2013

PS Audio · Jul 17, 2013

Here it is already, our quarterly review of outstanding classical releases. This installment covers (roughly) March through June 2013. Turns out it divides neatly into music that either makes a good introduction to a genre or else provides a good next step in enjoying it. Well, why not? C.P.E. Bach marketed his keyboard music that way, bringing out several sets of sonatas “für Kenner und Liebhaber,” i.e., for aficionados and amateurs. Something for everyone!
Works for me. Feel free to put yourself in either camp or both. I heard some great recordings this spring. It’s a pleasure to share them with you via these capsule reviews.
Orchestral Music
Basic Repertoire: Mahler, Symphony No. 4. Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Riccardo Chailly cond. (Accentus Blu-ray ACC 10257). Having already released outstanding video performances of 2 and 8, the two blockbusters among Mahler’s symphonies, Chailly and the Leipzigers now turn to gentler fare, the Symphony No. 4, a series of pastoral snapshots capped by a child’s view of heaven. But the snapshots darken at times. One is reminded of this composer’s drive to express not only wonder but also pain and paradox in the symphonic universes he created. Because high drama and cosmic issues go largely missing in the 4th, interpreters have to work harder, yet on a more intimate scale to maintain a balance between substance and sweetness.
For Chailly that has meant re-introducing an element of restraint in his Mahler performances. This is not the most swooningly Romantic performance you’ll ever encounter, but it is enormously satisfying. Every member of the orchestra makes richly characterized contributions—given the chamber-like scoring, there’s no way to hide—including soprano Christina Landshamer, whose unaffected, heartfelt delivery of the “heavenly feast” poetry from Des Knaben Wunderhorn provides just the right conclusion. First-rate camera work and sound; exquisite instrumental colors and balances. One feels a real sense of occasion, enveloped in the special ambiance of the Gewandhaus and its great orchestra. Producer Paul Smaczny has given us another disc to cherish.
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Good Next Step: Definitely Stravinsky: Complete Music for Piano & Orchestra, with Steven Osborne and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Ilan Volkov (Hyperion CDA67870). This is a big Stravinsky year, what with the centennial of The Rite of Spring and all. It is a treat and a half to turn away from this composer’s three Romantic-Primitive early ballets and hear some music that’s arguably superior in many respects. Osborne’s disc includes the Concerto for Piano and Wind Instruments (1923–24), Capriccio (1928–29), and Movements (1958–59). As intriguing makeweights we get Song of the Volga Boatmen (1917) for winds and percussion; Concerto in D (1946) for string orchestra; and Canon on a Russian Popular Tune (1965).
Both the Concerto and Capriccio make delicious main courses that deserve much wider recognition. They date from Stravinsky’s neoclassic (“back to Bach”) years, although they chart dissimilar paths within that general style. The Concerto is rhythmic, playful, crackling with ‘20s energy. Give a listen:
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Did you catch that sly quotation from Bach’s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Musical_Offering">Musical Offering</a>?
The Capriccio uses full orchestra as accompaniment, and the strings bring more warmth and lyricism to Stravinsky’s manner here. He was under the “spell” of Carl Maria von Weber at the time, or so he said. At any rate the delicately ornamented traceries of piano and orchestra weave a more fanciful, improvisatory texture:
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This is a delightful collection, one that I’ve enjoyed at home, in the car, and even in various hotel fitness centers over the last few weeks.
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And by the way: Naxos has issued volume 1 of its promising Rossini overtures series as an audio Blu-ray disc (NBD0028). Hearing this new, improved, higher-rez set, it felt like a veil had been lifted from my speakers! <img src="http://www.pstracks.com/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_wink.gif" alt="icon wink Best of Spring 2013" class="wp-smiley" title="Best of Spring 2013" /> Now—volume 2, please!
Early Music
Basic Baroque: There’s something very comforting in the newest Bach collection (Harmonia Mundi HMC 902145) from the Freiburger Barockorchester and the directors who double as violin soloists here, Petra Müllejans and Gottfried von der Goltz. Each gets a solo concerto apiece (BWV 1041, 1042). They join for the famous Bach Double (BWV 1043) and are joined by Anne Katharine Schreiber for a triple (BWV 1064R, reconstructed from the version for three harpsichords). The two solo concertos and the Double are canonic works that have been recorded dozens of times, often by well-known artists.
What sets this set apart might be called the “Goldilocks principle.” It’s not driven by star power or some radical reconception of the music. Instead, these versions achieve a near-ideal balance of elements, offering just-right tempi, balances, dynamics and accents, plus a winning combination of expressivity and tight ensemble. Here’s some of the slow movement from the reconstructed triple concerto:
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One Step Further: For some reason, this quarter brims with recommendable 18th-century music. My favorite? Arte dei Suonatori’s Telemann: Ouvertures pittoresques (BIS-1979; SACD), a sparkling collection of dance movements organized into suites, a very popular instrumental genre of the day. Those on this disc belong to a sub-genre in which Telemann excelled: the “character overture” or programmatic suite. Side by side with “serious,” conventional movements (minuet, loure, gigue) we find national sketches (“Les Turcs,” “Les Moscovites”) and tone-paintings of everyday life (“Les Boiteux,” literally “The Hobblers”). High spirits abound.
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Here is a Harlequinade from the Overture in D Major TWV 55

15.
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And here’s a bit of “L’hypocondre” (The Hypochondriac), an absent-minded sarabande. I will not spell out its obvious comedy for you but only note that it gives way to a grandiose little march labeled “Remède: Souffrance héroïque” (Remedy: Heroic Suffering) in the Ouverture, Jointes d’une Suite Tragi-comique in D Major, TWV 44

22:
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And further still: While we’re in Bach territory, how about some lute music? Bach wrote or arranged a few pieces for lute, a popular instrument well into the 18th century. And his solo violin works lend themselves well to transcription for a polyphonic instrument, because they so often suggest multi-voice textures themselves. So here we have Miguel Rincón offering his own transcriptions of the Sonata BWV 1001 and Partita BWV 1004 (Carpe Diem CD-16295). He’s not the first to do this—you can still obtain Nigel North’s very well-received recordings (Linn, various configurations). Like North, Rincón tunes his lute to a lower-than-modern pitch and avoids equal temperament like the plague. This results in a mellower tone and a marked difference in the “affect” of the music, depending on the particular key it’s in. Here is an excerpt from the first movement of BWV 1001, Rincón’s arrangement of the G-minor violin sonata:
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Sounds utterly right, doesn’t it? Get the album!
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Chamber Music
Basics: Here’s a recording that puts it all together, combining period instruments with modern; orchestral works with chamber music; and rising young musicians with cornerstones of the repertoire. The Storioni Trio’s newest release couples Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with his “Archduke” Trio (Challenge Classics CC72579). The Storionis are no strangers to multichannel high-rez, having done very fine work already with PentaTone and Ars Produktion. This would hardly matter if they were not also exceptional musicians who bring a sense of total commitment to every project.
For these works that commitment includes the use of gut strings on Wouter Vossen’s violin and his brother Marc’s cello, plus pianist Bart van de Roer’s use of a sumptuously reconditioned Lagrasse 1815 fortepiano from the collection of Edwin Beunk. The Netherlands Symphony Orchestra, which accompanies the trio in the Triple Concerto, uses period brass and hard timpani mallets.
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The Triple Concerto bears away the prize, in fact. I have never heard a recording that so clarifies the contrasts between orchestra and solo group in this work, while firmly establishing that this work is a piano trio with orchestral accompaniment, not an orchestral work with occasional soloists. The Storionis, conductor Jan Willem de Vriend, and Bert van der Wolf’s NorthStar Recording Services deserve equal praise for their efforts. Orchestral tuttis strike forth in the thrilling, dramatic way they should, while trio passages emerge with a tenderness and unity that can only come about with many years of ensemble collaboration, i.e., with two brothers and a friend who can virtually read one another’s minds at this point. Forget all those big-name, one-off discs that are undoubtedly gathering dust on your shelves. This is the real thing. Listen:
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The “Archduke” performance is good, too, although I confess to being disappointed in the occasional limitations of the fortepiano as an expressive voice—there are effects it just can’t bring to the table. Still, the trio’s performance is razor-sharp and heartfelt, and it’s useful to hear the work as it may have sounded in 1808. Beethoven didn’t have a nine-foot Steinway either.
Opera
Basic Verdi: Very late in 2012 C Major Entertainment released its entire Tutto Verdi collection, which I had described in a November column, “Young Verdi.” So now for around $700 you can own all the Verdi operas plus the Requiem, in state-of-the-art Blu-ray sight and sound. Is it time to pull out your credit card?
That depends. I’ve spent the last few days bingeing on Tutto Verdi’s Macbeth, Il corsaro, Luisa Miller, and Rigoletto. They’re all good, although some are better than others. Maybe I have also gotten to appreciate Verdi’s work just a bit more because of this immersion.
I am not an opera fanatic. As an instrumentalist and a choral singer, I came to opera relatively late in my musical development. A good chunk of the repertoire still strikes me as unforgivably long or precious or predictable or histrionic, and perhaps it always will. But I’ve tried to keep an open mind. Someday I may actually enjoy Elektra.
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In the meantime, there’s Rigoletto. This was the first opera I ever saw in live performance (in high school, via Boris Goldovsky’s venerable touring company), and it still tops my all-time favorites list. In other words, it’s basic: if you are an absolute beginner, this is the Verdi opera for you. It’s got a great story, with characters of surprising depth and humanity. It boasts phenomenal tunes, set for vocal types that epitomize the bel canto genre as Verdi developed it: a lyric-coloratura soprano (the virginal Gilda), a lyric tenor capable of some power (the attractive but corrupt Duke of Mantua), a “Verdi baritone” (the title character, a hunchbacked court jester) whose paternal authority anchors the drama. (For an excellent longer introduction to the opera, click <a href="http://www.vaopera.org/attachments/article/39/Rigoletto.pdf">here</a>.)
In a decent production, the potency of this music and story virtually guarantees success, especially if you have good singing actors in the principal roles. That is certainly the case for Tutto Verdi’s offering. As with the other operas, it was produced by the Teatro Regio di Parma, a good regional company with a long connection to Verdi. The staging is lavish and traditional—no skimping on silk, velvet, or wind-and-thunder here! Leo Nucci, the leading Verdi baritone of his generation, gives it all he’s got, which is considerable. Rising tenor talent Francesco Demuro portrays the Duke as an eager but vulnerable cad. (His occasional vocal tightness and insecurity, like his faintly clumsy movement onstage, coax an empathetic response from us in spite of his character’s willful behavior.)
The real find here, though, is the Gilda of Nino Machaidze. I have never seen a “Caro nome” more beautifully acted. The beauty and skill of her singing match the characterization perfectly. We see not only a young woman in love, but also someone discovering that she is a young woman, fully embracing grown-up emotions for the first time. Her YouTube clip for that has been taken down, but you can catch other glimpses of her thrilling performance there, including this, the “Vendetta” duet that ends Act 2 (with Leo Nucci):

Going further: The other early Verdi operas I sampled this time around share most of the strengths of the Parma Rigoletto.*I can recommend*Macbeth*largely because of its leading lady, the charismatic Sylvie Valayre, but also for capable direction from Liliana Cavani. Case in point: the witches, who often pose a staging problem because Verdi’s scoring encourages the use of a sizable female chorus. Here they are turned into village washerwomen, working girls (or rather working-class girls) who dabble in sorcery for pin money and amusement. Some of them are dancers, who make a nice meal of the Act 3 ballet Verdi wrote for the opera’s first Paris performances.
And then there’s Leo Nucci. He barks, he scoops, he croons. He’s a force of nature. Italian audiences love him—just listen to them react after any of his big numbers. (Corollary: anything Nucci sings will become a big number). Yet Nucci can’t completely paper over the one-dimensional nature of this operatic Macbeth. Even some of his music inevitably strikes the listener as a warm-up for later, more fully developed Verdi baritones.
That’s one reason I so enjoyed Luisa Miller. Here Nucci gets to portray a gentle, “ordinary” father—a retired soldier concerned about his daughter’s romantic entanglement with a young nobleman. Class consciousness and snobbery drive the story line, and Verdi seems to have reacted more strongly and instinctively to that dramatic situation than he had to the supernatural skullduggery of Macbeth. In any case the opera’s intimate portrayal of individuals fatally bound by repressive social codes both foreshadows the themes of La Traviata and hints at the fervent nationalism on the rise in what would become a unified Italy. Fiorenza Cedolins, in the title role, and Marcelo Álvarez, who portrays her lover Rodolfo, generate genuine electricity together and apart. The villains of the piece, Giorgio Surian (Count Walter) and Rafa

[Source: http://www.pstracks.com/classical_corner/spring-2013/11102/]

Best of Spring 2013

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