Harpsichord Concerti by J S Bach conducted by Karl Ristenpart

This really nice Nonesuch LP was one of my very first records, bought some 30 years ago when I wa in high school. I used to visit the old Strawberries Records (a Boston chain long time gone..I think bought by Sam Goody) on Friday nights as my dad would drive me down to the local mall where it was located. Strawberries had a good selection of $2.95 albums which were perfect for the high school kid on a budget!

Karl Ristenpart recorded a substantial number of Bach recordings during the 60's with his very fine Chamber Orchestra of the Saar. Especially notable was a very popular, and omnipresent item for Nonesuch, of Bach's Magnificat. I think Ristenpart, along with Karl Richter, really dusted the cobwebs off of Bach and their efforts helped to spawn the movement toward period performance practices. Certainly, what we have here are four concertos for one and more harpsichords which are splendidly rendered and very tastefully performed. They really do sparkle and are a joy to listen to some 40 years+ after being recorded.

You know, I really miss the old Nonesuch LP label. I grew up on it and really built a good collection of LP's and performances from it. I still have my first Nonesuch LP, The Art of the Baroque Trumpet with Edward H Tarr - a great, great record. It's too bad that Warner/Elektra (or whatever that conglomerate is called now) lets the awesome collection from Nonesuch rot away in some warehouse. Many gems are in that collection, including this one!

Enjoy...full notes etc. in the download.

DOWNLOAD

The incomparable Clara Haskil playing who else? Mozart!

What better way is there to celebrate Christmas Eve then with a fine bottle of wine and Clara Haskil playing?  Here we have concertos K466 and K488 impeccably rendered by perhaps the greatest interpreter of Mozart during the last century....well in my opinion. Haskil is so...tasteful...that's it in a nutshell. Everything is played with such sensitivity and clarity, it unfolds so naturally with a dose of spontaneity. On top of that, both conductors, Paumgartner and Sacher,  provide vital support as they enter and absorb Haskil's genious with this music. Magnificent!

Merry Christmas!

LINK

Reine Gianoli and Paul Badura Skoda in Mozart's Two Piano Concerto K 242

Charm Nick at Grumpy's Classics Cave recently posted the pianist Reine Gianoli performing Bach. I'm going to piggy back on that with this offering of Mozart's Two Piano Concerto K 242. Unfortunately, the flip side with K 365 was in a bad shape and beyond my restorative abilities.

There is some very fine playing going on here between Gianoli and Badura Skoda. The latter is probably one of the finest Mozartian's of the last century. I think that Hermann Scherchen leads a suitable accompaniment without the mannerisms that he was sometimes known for. Admittedly, I had not heard of Gianoli before I picked up this record. Listening to her here and on Charm Nick's posting in Bach reveals a strong player with good technique who also has an almost willful approach to the music. In fact, I believe that Gianoli imparts a lot of herself in the music, maybe bordering on over the top. Well, you be the judge.

An interesting discovery, nonetheless.

DOWNLOAD

Schubert's Incidental Music to "Rosamunde" conducted by Dean Dixon

I was lucky to find a decent copy of this first ever recording of the Incidental Music to Schubert's Rosamunde led by the fine, and underrated,  Dean Dixon. I've spoken in the past on Dixon; truly a man of great abilities who appeared on the American musical scene "before his time" as the old cliche goes. It's a damn shame that his greatest success was in Europe, with its more liberal racial climate and, not in his home country. Only toward the end of his life did he begin to gain recognition here - he died at the terribly young age of 61.

This recording is a fascinating and satisfying affair. Dixon strives for clarity and his brisk tempos would be more in line with period performance practice then the romantic, big bodied approach that Schubert was typically given during the early 50's when Westminster recorded this performance. I like Dixon's way, he doesn't linger or get overly sentimental and nothing is forced, in short, he lets the music speak for itself. His efforts are well supported by Ferdinand Grossman's fine Academy Chamber Choir and the famed contralto Hilde Roessel-Majden. Interestingly, the overture to Alfonso und Estrella is included as the opening number.

My opinion is that had Dixon lived, he would've achieved greater fame in the US and been counted as one of the major podium presences of his time. Instead, we have here a document of an immensely talented man whom the fates dealt not the best hand.

DOWNLOAD

George Singer conducts Dvorak's New World Symphony with the Tonkuenstler Orchestra

The name of George Singer is probably all but forgotten today, however we are fortunate to have this well interpreted Dvorak "New World" Symphony as a momento of his work.

Singer was a Czech born musician of Jewish heritage who emigrated to what was then Palestine prior to WW II. He was a very important part of the musical establishment in Palestine, later Israel, and conducted virtually all the orchestras and opera companies there. After the war, he was contacted by Don Gabor of Remington Records to conduct a number of recordings, most made with the reconstituted Tonkuenstler Orchestra, often referred to as the Austrian Symphony, Viennese Symphonic Society and a whole lot of other pseudonyms. Among Singer's recordings were this one, a good Les Preludes and some fine renditions of a handful of Slavonic Dances by Dvorak.

The recording here is well interpreted and it is evident that Singer was comfortable with this very Czech music since he himself grew up with it. Everything sounds very right, not forced and natural though the orchestra is decidedly second tier, often dropping into third tier status. The real problem, admittedly is the brittle sound of this Plymouth re-release of  a Remington original. Plymouth was a bargain label and what deficiencies Remington had in pressings are magnified here. Still, I encourage everyone to have a listen to this fine performance by a solid, an unfortunately, rather forgotten musician.

DOWNLOAD

Mitropoulos + Minneapolis = FUN!

Here's a fun one...from Harmony HL 7129, the great Dimitri Mitropoulos conducting his Minneapolis Symphony in The Sorcerer's Apprentice, a couple Slavonic Dances by Dvorak, the coronation march from Meyerbeer's 'The Prophet," Lalo's overture to Le roi d'Ys, and Gliere's Russian Sailors Dance.

I love the work of Mitropoulos. Everything he put his hand to created a kind of electricity and nervous energy. These "lollipops" as Beecham would say, positively sparkle under Mitropoulos. The orchestra is with him every step of the way and these pieces come off sounding more important then they really are.

Enjoy!

DOWNLOAD

Gunther Schuller conducts Beethoven and Brahms

About a dozen years ago, Gunther Schuller wrote a brilliant, but controversial, book called "The Compleat Conductor." In the book, Schuller analyzed, with score in hand, a selection of musical works by listening and comparing  various conductor's approaches of the works. The results are often surprising, critical, and not without throwing a few literary punches.

As a companion to the book, Schuller recorded the Beethoven 5th and Brahms 1st symphonies with a handpicked New York pickup orchestra and here Schuller took great pains to offer a realization, as he calls it, that is meticulously faithful to the score and the composer's instructions.

I picked up this disc the other day at my favorite used music store for two bucks and was, totally blown away by what I heard: details emerged that had been submerged for years, orchestral warmth was stressed, and the muisicans sounded like they were playing these warhorses  with a fresh new face.

Below is a review by Michael McDonough which speaks, with great eloquence, on what Schuller has accomplished. I'd like to share this with you, the reader.

Do we really need another recording of these two symphonies? There are, after all, countless others by legendary conductors, and didn't Claudio Abbado's recent Fifth on Deutsche Grammophon sell only 500 copies?

Composer-conductor Gunther Schuller has thought long and hard about these things, and his recording of the two most famous C minor symphonies ever written has a different aim than most: he wants to get to the core of these scores. But that's not easy when you consider the interpretive excesses visited upon them, and the "tradition" these have spawned.
 
Schuller clears these away: he takes Beethoven's metronome markings at face value and makes them work. Much of the Fifth's dynamism, of course, comes from its rhythm, and its speeds -- and their relation to each other -- clarify its structure. Schuller also gets his players, drawn from New York's finest orchestras, to pay special attention to dynamics so that you hear the rightness of Beethoven's scoring -- not flashy but completely effective. His no-nonsense approach shows how Beethoven's form gets its weight from carefully balanced instrumental color, and the nuances Schuller draws from his players is amazing. Rarely has this hoary old war-horse sounded so vigorous.

 The story of Brahms' struggles with his First -- he was cowering in Beethoven's shadow, etc. -- have obscured its magnificence. It's also probably a harder nut to crack than the Fifth because Brahms' wrote no metronome markings. Schuller therefore had to arrive at workable speeds on his own -- c 92 for Movement 1, c 50-55 for 2, c 92-76 for 3, c 100-126 for 4 -- which feel organic. Brahms has marked 1 and 2 as un poco sostenuto (somewhat sustained) and sostenuto (sustained), and Schuller follows this tempo description but finds lots of variety within it. His players also get the tension between repression and revelation -- Brahms the bourgeois vs. Brahms the man of passion -- which is at the heart of this music. And, unlike many conductors, he doesn't soup up the big string tune beginning in measure 28 of the Andante, which is Movement 2, but lets its intensity grow naturally which is ultimately more thrilling.

 Schuller's performers also articulate the rhythm with great precision, observing Brahms' minutely detailed syncopations and his frequent use of two against three. This allows the percussive character of the music, which is also a large part of its modernity, to come through. Schuller's scrupulous attention to both spirit and letter lets Brahms' orchestra, whether at full tilt or up close and personal, make its expressive points. Symphonies, after all, are objective, public affairs and private ones, too, and Schuller and his band happily make both sides matter. I also doubt you'll ever hear a contrabassoon with this much bite.

Since this recording is in print, I will decline to post a transfer. The recording is on Maestro Schuller's own label and I certainly don't want to infringe on his much deserved sales. I do encourage you to visit the site and buy this disc. It will be the best $15 that you ever spend!
 
Link to GM Recordings Site

Bach's Cantata BWV 30 performed by the Brattleboro Bach Festival under Blanche Honegger Moyse

Here's my second posting from Vermont: Blanche Honegger Moyse conducting soloists Benita Valente, Mary Burgess, Seth McCoy and Leslie Guinn along with the orchestra and chorus of the Brattleboro VT Bach Festival in Bach's Cantata BWV 30. The recording on the Ars Nova label dates from the early 70's.

Moyse was a longtime participant and fixture in Vermont musical life. Along with directing the Brattleboro Bach Festival she was closely associated with the Marlboro Music Festival and with the college where the festival takes place. Among her admirers, and close colleagues were Rudolf Serkin, Alexander Schneider and Pablo Casals to name a few. She was, I believe, a niece or cousin of Arthur Honegger and she was married to the great flutist Louis Moyse, son of another great flutist Marcel Moyse.

Moyse was one of the pioneers in performance of Bach cantatas in the Northeast United States. Along with Craig Smith at Emmanuel Church in Boston, she introduced the masterpieces of Bach during a time when much of his body of work was unknown. Though her chorus in Brattleboro is decidedly on the amateur side and much of the orchestra is pickup in nature, the fervor and commitment of her work is readily apparent. This is inspired music making.

LINK

Music from Marlboro - Haydn and Beethoven Trios with Rudolf Serkin

I'm heading north into Vermont with the next two post offerings.

The Marlboro Music Festival takes place in the village of Marlboro Vermont and it is one of the great summer music festivals. Throughout the years it has featured some of the greatest musicians of our times from Rudolf Serkin, Alexander Schneider, Louis Moyse and of course, the supreme artistry of Pau Casals. Casals loved Marlboro for the bucolic setting and the ability to iimmerse himself fully with his beloved chamber music.

Here we have a recording issued by the Marlboro Recording Society of Beethoven and Haydn trios. The artists featured are Rudolf Serkin and Richard Stoltzman. I do not think this LP has ever been issued in CD format and I place the recording date somewhere around 1980. Further details are listed in the download.

I hope that you enjoy it. Serkin is effervescent.

LINK