All Reviews articles – Page 179
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ArticleDancla: Petite école de la mélodie op.123. Saint-Saëns: Violin Sonata no.1 in D minor op.75. Massenet: Méditation from ‘Thaïs’
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Guido Rimonda (violin) Cristina Canziani (piano)Composer: Dancla, Saint-Saëns, MassenetListening even blindfolded you would immediately identify Guido Rimonda as a player in the Italian tradition. His lithe, relatively lightweight, cantabile, seamlessly pure sound, sustained by a fast, narrow vibrato is straight out of ...
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ArticleArthur Butterworth: Viola Concerto op.82, Symphonies no.1 op.15* & no.4 op.72, plus interview feature
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Sarah-Jane Bradley (viola) Royal Scottish National Orchestra/Arthur Butterworth, Hallé Orchestra/John Barbirolli* Composer: Arthur ButterworthAs so many works of Mancunian composer Arthur Butterworth, the Viola Concerto was several years in the making before its premiere in 1993. Butterworth, who as a student ...
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ArticleDuo Virtuoso. Mozart: Duo in G major K423. Boccherini: Allegretto spiritoso from Sonata in D major HAYDN (attrib.) Poco adagio from Duo in D major Hob.VI:D1. Beethoven: Duo in C major WoO 27. Kodály:
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Elaris DuoComposer: Mozart, Boccherini, Haydn (attrib.), Beethoven, Halvorsen, KodályIn the 18th and early 19th centuries music for instrumental duos grew in popularity, much of it composed because a keyboard remained the domain of the wealthy. To maximise the sale of sheet music ...
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ArticlePaganini: 24 Caprices for solo violin op.1
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Tanja Becker-Bender (violin)Composer: PaganiniThe young German violinist Tanja Becker-Bender, who has just been touring Britain, thoroughly deserves the chance to record these cornerstones of the repertoire. She is captured quite close-up in a Stuttgart chapel – you hear intakes of breath – ...
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ArticleCreith: Violin Concerto in G minor. Pitfield: Concerto lyrico. Arnell: Violin Concerto in One Movement op.9
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Lorraine McAslan (violin) Royal Scottish National Orchestra/MartinuYates Composer: Creith, Pitfield, ArnellAs all three pieces featured here are likely to be as unfamiliar to readers as they were to me, some historical background may prove helpful. Guirne Creith was the nom ...
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ArticleMozart: Violin Sonatas in B flat major K454, in G major K379 & in C major K296, Six Variations on ‘Au bord d’une fontaine’ K360
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Petra Müllejans (violin) Kristian Bezuidenhout (fortepiano)Composer: MozartAccording to the CD packaging, Petra Müllejans and Kristian Bezuidenhout play these pieces in a way that ‘recaptures the freshness and volatility’ of their early performances. Those first airings, with Mozart sometimes playing a keyboard part ...
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ArticleSzymanowski: Nocturne and Tarantella op.28, Mythes op.30, Romance in D major op.23, Violin Sonata in D minor op.9, Three Paganini Caprices op.40, La berceuse d’Aïtacho Enia op.52
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Alina Ibragimova (violin) Cédric Tiberghien (piano)Composer: SzymanowskiMuch of this music is deeply poetic, diffuse, difficult to capture for listener and performers alike. Its extended rhapsodies and soliloquies, often extremely beautiful, twist around in amorphous lines that can too easily become meandering and ...
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ArticleBach: Solo Violin Sonatas & Partitas BWV1001-6
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Viktoria Mullova (violin)Composer: BachThere is more to playing Bach’s sonatas and partitas than fitting your 1750 Guadagnini with gut strings and acquiring a fine Baroque bow, especially so when your career has been established on Romantic violin concertos. Viktoria Mullova has already ...
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ArticleShostakovich: Cello Concertos no.1 op.107 & no.2 op.126
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Dimitri Maslennikov (cello) NDR Symphony Orchestra/Christoph EschenbachComposer: Shostakovich Shostakovich would surely have been gratified with the increasing prominence being given to his Second Cello Concerto, at least in terms of recording releases. It’s certainly a testing work, presenting the soloist ...
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ArticleRoberts: Trios for Deep Voices
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Christopher Roberts (double bass) Mark Morton (double bass) James Bergman (double bass)Composer: Roberts Double bassist and composer Christopher Roberts studied at the Juilliard School and has long taken an interest in non-Western musics, ...
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ArticleIn My Own Voice. Works by Kreisler, Suk, Ysaÿe, Bach, Saint-Saëns, Still & Baker
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Kelly Hall-Tompkins (violin) Craig Ketter (piano) Anna Reinersman (harp)Composer: Kreisler, Suk, Ysaÿe, Bach, Saint-Saëns, Still & Baker This is a particularly varied recital disc, mixing bonbons like Josef Suk’s Liebeslied and William Grant Still’s little Summerland with heavyweights like Ysaÿe’s ...
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ArticleDavid Matthews: Concerto in azzurro, The Music of Dawn, A Vision and a Journey
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Guy Johnston (cello) BBC Philharmonic, Rumon Gamba (conductor)Composer: David Matthews David Matthews describes his Concerto in azzurro, written in 2002 for Steven Isserlis and inspired by a haloed vision of the island of Lundy in the Bristol Channel, as ...
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ArticleSchubert: Arpeggione Sonata in A minor D821. Gedizlio?lu: The Mediterranean. Say: Violin Sonata. Yakar: Variations on the Sorrowful Flagolet. Liszt: Sonata quasi fantasia ‘Après une lecture du Dante’
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: zcan Ulucan (violin) Aysen Ulucan (viola) Birsen Ulucan (piano)Composer: Schubert, Gedizlio?lu, Say, Yakar, Liszt The three members of the Ulucan family here were born in Bulgaria, emigrated with their parents to Turkey and have since followed very diverse educational ...
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ArticleRaymond Hanson: Violin Sonata op.5, Three Fancies, Seascape, Idyll op.2, An Etching, Legende, Portrait of Australia op.46
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Susan Collins (violin) David Miller (piano)Composer: Raymond Hanson Australian Raymond Hanson (1913–76) looks set to become one of those composers whose music, freed from the stylistic constraints of time and place, enjoys a posthumous reputation way beyond anything ...
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ArticleAriosti: Stockholm Sonatas vol.3: Sonatas nos.15–21, Cantata ‘Pur alfin gentil viola’
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Thomas Georgi (viola d’amore) Mime Yamahiro Brinkmann (cello) Lucas Harris (archlute/guitar) Emma Kirkby (soprano) Composer: AriostiWith this CD, Thomas Georgi completes his magisterial survey of the music for viola d’amore by Handel’s contemporary Attilio Ariosti (1666–1729). The manuscript of his Recueil de ...
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ArticleBeethoven: String Quartets in E flat major op.127, in B flat major op.130, in C sharp minor op.131, in A minor op.132 & in F major op.135, Grosse Fuge in B flat major op.133
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Wihan Quartet Composer: BeethovenBeethoven’s so-called ‘late quartets’ have an inevitably large and long discography. The 1928 recordings by the Rosé Quartet (including op.131 on Biddulph) are perhaps the closest on disc to the sound world familiar in 19th-century Germany (although the Klingler ...
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ArticleBach: Concerto in D minor for 2 violins BWV1043, Concerto in D minor for violin & oboe BWV1060, Violin Concertos in A minor BWV1041 & in E major BWV1042
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Julia Fischer (violin/director) Alexander Sitkovetsky (violin) Andrey Rubtsov (oboe) Academy of St Martinuin the FieldsComposer: Bach Although Julia Fischer is no advocate of historically informed performance, she has clearly absorbed some of the hallmarks of Baroque ...
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ArticleStrauss Cello Sonata in F major op.6, Romanze in F major, Morgen op.27 no.4 (arr. Maisky). Dvorák: Sonatina in G major op.100, Romantic Piece op.75 no.4, Rondo in G minor op.94
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Mischa Maisky (cello) Pavel Gililov (piano)Composer: Strauss, Dvorák On the surface Dvo?ák and Strauss might appear an unlikely pairing. Their connection here rests with the Czech cellist Hanus Wihan, the fortunate dedicatee both of Strauss’s Cello Sonata ...
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ArticleBritten's Cello Suites nos.1–3
The Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Denise Djokic (cello)Composer: BrittenNova Scotia-born cellist Denise Djokic, a student of Richard Aaron at the Cleveland Institute of Music who later studied in Boston with Paul Katz and Laurence Lesser, emerges as a serious artist with a distinctive identity in this her ...
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ArticleScandinavia. Maier: Violin Sonata in B minor. Aulin: Four Watercolours. Grieg: Violin Sonata no.1 in F major op.8
THE STRAD RECOMMENDSThe Strad Issue: January 2009Musicians: Gregory Maytan (violin) Nicole Lee (piano) Composer: Maier, Aulin, GriegThe most familiar piece here by some distance is Grieg’s op.8 Sonata in F major, a delightfully exuberant confirmation of the Norwegian’s burgeoning creative powers. Gregory Maytan, ...
