Cello Concertos.
Pierre Fournier. Concertos by Boccherini (B flat, arr. Grützmacher),
Vivaldi (E minor, arr. Vincent d'Indy), Couperin (Pièces en concert,
arr. Paul Bazelaire), and Haydn (D major). (Testament, 1359)
Fournier & Francescatti.
Live performances of Dvorák Cello Concerto and Brahms Double
Concerto. (BBC Legends, 4149-2)
Listening to Pierre Fournier
across half a century is like hearing two cellists. In the classical
concertos recorded in the early 1950s, such as the newly reissued Cello
Concertos recorded by Decca in 1952 and 1953 with the Stuttgart
Chamber Orchestra conducted by Karl Münchinger, he is impervious
to and uncurious about the simplest stylistic conventions, even while
playing the nominally "original" version of the Haydn. Although
Fournier's tone is always gorgeous and his phrasing occasionally poetic,
the limitations of his heavy-handed approach would be exposed by comparison
with the recordings Maurice Gendron made in 1958 of the Boccherini and
Haydn concertos (unaccountably absent from the catalogue).
The live performances on
the BBC release are a different matter.
Whether in the indifferently
conducted Dvorák or in the Brahms, where he benefits from a profoundly
sympathetic partner in Zino Francescatti and conducting of unusual warmth
and serenity from Sir Malcom Sargent, Fournier's strengths of elegance,
technical command, and a rare ability to imply emotional depth through
a subtle simplicity of rhetoric, shine through undiminished by time
or changing stylistic conventions. The playing is especially impressive
in the Dvorák, recorded in 1973 with the BBC Symphony Orchestra
conducted by Sir Colin Davis, where the 67-year old cellist pulls off
the first-movement octave run with staggering command and fierce intensity.
The Brahms, recorded in 1955 with Francescatti and the BBC Symphony
Orchestra conducted by Sargent, is even more Olympian than the studio
recordings he would later make with Francescatti (conducted by Bruno
Walter) and David Oistrakh (conducted by Alceo Galliera).
The sound on the Testament
reissue hardens with increased volume, but the Brahms has weight and
presence, and the Dvorák is in full-blooded modern stereo. Tully
Potter's liner notes for both releases offer authoritative context,
anecdotes, and insights.
Crossing Bridges.
Mark O'Connor's Appalachia Waltz Trio: Mark O'Connor, violin; Carol
Cook, viola; Natalie Haas, cello. (Omac, 7)
You don't often hear viola
and cello in old-timey-style music, unless it's really old-timey,
like Mozart and Beethoven. But Mark O'Connor has recruited two superb
young players to join him in his new Appalachia Waltz Trio. This CD
is an effort to keep alive, in the absence of disc mates Yo-Yo Ma and
Edgar Meyer, the music he wrote for their hugely popular Appalachia
Waltz and Appalachian Journey albums. O'Connor's arrangements
for this new ensemble sound entirely natural, giving everybody something
interesting to do nearly all the time; the cello, for example, is almost
never relegated to a simple backup role.
Yet the music never sounds
over-arranged, either.
These are spirited three-voice
conversations, and the textures and interweaving melodic lines fit together
perfectly. O'Connor's performance style is well known, and he does after
all own these pieces, but he's met his match in Cook and Haas, both
of them steeped in the traditions of Scottish music and fully comfortable
with O'Connor's nouveau Appalachian sound. Indeed, these performances
may be preferable to the earlier albums, if only because the confident
Haas isn't as deferential as Ma.
—James
Reel
Kremerland.
Kremerata Baltica, Gidon Kremer, violin and conductor. (Deutsche Grammophon,
B0003392-02)
The Latvian violinist and
his powerhouse string ensemble embark on a musical adventure through
uncharted terrain on this scintillating collection of new transcriptions
(most notably Sergei Dreznin's take on Franz Liszt's Concerto quasi
una fantasia "After reading Dante" and Leonid Chizhik's Fantasy
Variations on a Theme by Mozart) and contemporary compositions bristling
with humor and joie de vivre. In Kremerland, which liner-note
writer Julia Bederova describes as "a land created by the imagination
of its interpreters," you get a panorama of constant surprises.
This a fanciful place where roadside attractions include ragtime, café
jazz, samba, and tango, all reinforced by broad stretches of Viennese
Classicism and Romanticism. George Pelecis' superb Meeting with a Friend
alone runs the gamut from the Beatles to Schubert. This is landscape
filled with charm. Book a flight without delay.
—Greg
Cahill
Beethoven
(Triple Concerto; Rondo in B flat for piano and orchestra; Choral Fantasy).
Pierre-Laurent Aimard, piano; Thomas Zehetmair, violin; Clemens Hagen,
cello; Nikolaus Harnoncourt conducting the Chamber Orchestra of Europe.
(Warner Classics, 2564 60602-2)
Pierre-Laurent Aimard and
Nikolaus Harnoncourt follow up their controversial survey of the Beethoven
piano concertos with an appendix of interest to string aficionados,
leading off with the concerto for piano, violin, and cello. For once
this agreeable but not great concerto sounds worthy of the Beethoven
pantheon; here's a deeply involving performance, with Grammy-winning
violinist Thomas Zehetmair, by turns lyrical, teasing, and fiery. Cellist
Clemens Hagen, with the other members of the Hagen Quartet, has sometimes
been criticized for a control-freak approach to performance, but here
he is especially elegant and a firm leader of the solo ensemble. (Pianist
Aimard plays with a very light touch, to maintain balance with his partners.)
As usual, Harnoncourt has the modern-instrument Chamber Orchestra of
Europe employ period techniques, meaning among other things very little
vibrato. In all, his contribution is significantly more interesting
than the less detailed work of the conductorless Prague Chamber Orchestra
on the Eroica Trio's 2003 EMI recording of the Triple Concerto. Aimard's
vigorous but not bludgeoning performances of the two other works fill
out an unexpectedly attractive package.
—J.R.
Dvorák: Concerto
pour violon et orchestre, Op. 53; Trio, Op. 65. Isabelle Faust,
violin; Jean-Guihen Queyras, cello; Alexander Melnikov, piano; the Prague
Philharmonia conducted by Jirí Belohlávek. (Harmonia Mundi,
901833)
These very Brahmsian compositions
are well entrenched in the standard repertoire—Yehudi Menuhin,
Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman, Maxim Vengerov, and Midori are among those
to have recorded the Violin Concerto in A minor, Op. 53, which ranks
among the most dramatic, and most beautiful, of orchestral string works.
Faust, who studied with Christoph Poppen and was named Gramophone
magazine's Young Artist of the Year in 1997 for her first recording
of sonatas by Béla Bartók, approaches this emotionally
complex and technically difficult concerto with startling sensitivity.
But she really shines on Dvorák's somber Piano Trio, regarded
by some as the composer's chamber-music pinnacle. This is not a flawless
recording: I yearned for more oomph on sections of the concerto's adagio
movement and at times the violin and piano don't blend well on the trio.
But Faust shows she can burn white-hot and delivers intelligent and
passionate readings of these warhorses.
—G.C.
Solo Baroque.
Music of Bach, Westhoff, Biber, and Pisendel. Rachel Barton Pine, Baroque
violin. (Cedille, 90000 078)
Mainstream violinists used
to play Baroque music out of a sense of duty, but Rachel Barton Pine
clearly does it out of love, and with an original-configuration 1770
Nicola Gagliano instrument, at that. She draws from her violin a warmer
tone than is usually heard from Baroque instruments, but there's nothing
romanticized about her approach, which is full of properly sighing phrases
and expert ornamentation. Bach bookends this collection: the Sonata
No. 1 in G minor and the Partita No. 2 in D minor. Even more interesting
material lies between those two monuments: a suite by Johann Paul von
Westhoff, the superb Passacaglia in G minor by Heinrich Ignaz Franz
von Biber, and a sonata by Johann Georg Pisendel, all close contemporaries
of Bach's.
Throughout, Barton Pine
is especially effective in the introspective movements. She also has
fun with the faster material, especially the gigues that swing (in Bach)
and twitter (in Pisendel). If Barton Pine doesn't quite manage to bring
a unified overall conception to these performances, she clearly understands
that many of these movements must dance, yet she's at her best when
she helps the music sing.
—J.R.
Brahms: String Quartets
(No. 2 in A minor, Op. 51 No. 2, and No. 3 in B flat, Op. 67).
Végh Quartet: Sándor Végh and Sandor Zöldy,
violins; Georges Janzer, viola; Paul Szabo, cello. (Decca Heritage,
475 6155)
The Végh Quartet,
founded by a Hungarian foursome in 1940 and headed for decades by first
violinist Sándor Végh, was never a model of peerless technique.
Yet its recordings—notably, Beethoven and Bartók cycles—have
long been prized for their generous expressivity and varied tone colors.
Decca has reissued the quartet's 1954 mono treatment of two Brahms quartets,
complete with the original ugly cover art and a miniscule reproduction
of the LP liner notes. There's nothing ugly or small-scaled about the
performances, though. From beginning to end, we hear impassioned playing
at moderate tempos. Although Végh's own tone can be piercing
at forte and above, the ensemble is anchored by the firm, rich bass
line of cellist Paul Szabo. The group's conception of the A-minor quartet
is essentially tragic (listen to the slashing chords midway through
the finale), but pierced with rays of hope. The treatment of the B flat
quartet is more good-natured, full of warmth and spirit. It's good to
have these very central-European performances back in the catalog.
—J.R.
A Blue Thing.
Tom Rigney, fiddle; Bob Brozman, Anthony Paule, Roy Rogers, Danny Caron,
and Jerry Cortez, guitars; Norton Buffalo, harmonica; John R. Burr,
organ; and Caroline Dahl, piano. (Parhelion, 50015)
Tom Rigney is a fixture
on the San Francisco Bay Area roots-music scene. This talented fiddler
has been the driving force behind such popular local trad and Cajun
bands as Back in the Saddle, Queen Ida & Her Bon Temps Zydeco Band,
the Sundogs, and most recently Flambeau. This outing pairs him with
his Flambeau rhythm section and some of the region's top blues players
for an engaging set of originals and standards that run the gamut from
barnstorming powerhouse blues to gentle Western swing to a wistful version
of "Wayfaring Stranger." It's a mixed bag of sound, all with
a blue hue, that may leave you wishing he'd settle in to a single groove
for an entire album. But Rigney adds lots of personal touches along
the way (like the haunting Middle Eastern intro to "House of the
Rising Sun").
—G.C.
Beethoven (String
Quartet No. 12 in E flat, Op. 127; Piano Sonata No. 28). Murray
Perahia conducting the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. (Sony, 93043)
Murray Perahia has been
principal conductor of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields since
2000, but only now has he recorded with the group from the podium instead
of the piano. His debut choice: a string-orchestra expansion of Beethoven's
Op. 127 Quartet. There's no question of filling out harmonies or adding
touches of color; the score is merely played as is, by lots more musicians,
with Paul Marrion contributing a bass line that doubles the cello or
sometimes viola part. In string-orchestra guise, the quartet sounds
like a slightly gentler, unprepossessing piece; the first movement in
particular could pass as a Mendelssohn string symphony. The beginning
of the slow movement, interestingly, sounds exactly like the Adagietto
of Mahler's Symphony No. 5. In general, Perahia and the ASMF offer a
mellow interpretation, but one with some biting accents in the development
section of the first movement. The slow movement, nuanced and unfussy,
lacks the heaviness that can bog down quartet performances—not
a matter of tempo so much as tone and articulation. The Scherzo sounds
less mercurial than usual, but the Finale is suitably impulsive.
Adding further interest
to this attractive disc is Perahia alone at the piano performing his
own critical edition of Beethoven's Op. 101 Sonata, a work that, remarkably,
Perahia had not recorded previously.
—J.R.
Bass
Blast on DVD
More and more, DVDs are
bringing an extra dimension to music fans by offering a visual glimpse
of their favorite players, often through rare archival footage that
catches past masters in performance. Charles Mingus, Live at Montreux,
1975 (Eagle Eye Media, 39047-9) captures one of the legends of
jazz bass in concert just 40 months before his death. Here Mingus leads
a small combo, featuring saxophonist Gerry Mulligan and trumpeter Benny
Bailey, through such signature tunes as "Goodbye Pork Pie Hat."
Norman Granz Jazz in Montreux Presents Oscar Peterson Trio
'77 (Eagle Eye Media, 39050-9) is a 75-minute live set that
finds the pianist in an unusual trio setting with two jazz-bass giants:
Ray Brown and Niels Pedersen. Norman Granz Jazz in Montreux Presents
Milt Jackson & Ray Brown '77 (Eagle Eye Media, 39052-9)
teams bassist Brown with vibraphonist and bandleader Milt Jackson on
a swinging set that also includes Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis on
tenor sax, Clark Terry on trumpet, and Monty Alexander on piano. The
latter two titles are recorded in PCM stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1, and
DTS Surround Sound. They also include commentary by jazz critic Nat
Hentoff.
—G.C.
