Sibelius and Prokofiev: Violin Concertos
Janine Jansen, violin; Oslo Philharmonic; Klaus Mäkelä, conductor (Decca)
Whereas the conductor Klaus Mäkelä, 28 years old makes a elegant and visceral affect within the live performance corridor, the recordings he has launched thus far in his meteoric profession haven’t proven him to his finest benefit. There was blunt, inert Stravinsky with the Paris Orchestra and a politely listless cycle of Sibelius symphonies with the Oslo Philharmonic. (He’ll quickly go away these ensembles to steer extra well-known ones: the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.)
Now, for the primary time, the main target of considered one of his albums is not squarely on him, and it is one of the best of the middling bunch. Violinist Janine Jansen stands out in concert events by Sibelius and Prokofiev (his First) with Mäkelä and the Oslo orchestra. With out ever seeming indulgent, Jansen might be alternately subtly delicate and thrillingly energetic, however at all times singsong and human. Within the Prokofiev, it’s simply the right combination of playful and sinister, and gently intimate within the urbane third motion. The musicians sound wonderful, led by Mäkelä with a form of passionate restraint, an successfully managed hearth. The grandeur of the finale of Sibelius’s concerto steadily will increase, and the tip of Prokofiev’s first motion has the candy ambiance of a fairy story. ZACHARY WOOLFE
Vijay Iyer: ‘Troubles’
Jennifer Koh, violin; Boston Fashionable Orchestra Venture; Gil Rose, conductor (BMOP/sound)
Pianist Vijay Iyer, an acclaimed determine in improvised music, additionally composes works “round” the classical custom, as he places it within the notes of this primary recorded assortment of his orchestral music. There’s nothing programmatic or explicitly political, however all of the items replicate, not directly, the tensions of the time wherein they have been created, from 2017 to 2019.
The most important work is the half-hour “Bother”, for violin and orchestra, written for the good Jennifer Koh. It may be heard as a meditation on the connection between the person and the collective: not like a standard concerto, Koh’s nuanced and extremely assorted sound swirls out and in of a spacious orchestral texture. There’s a collective sense of mourning within the third motion, an agonizing memorial to Vincent Chin, a Chinese-American man murdered in Detroit in 1982. And within the lengthy, closing motion, “Meeting,” a number of musical strands come collectively – at first uncertainly, however in the end in triumph.
“Disaster Modes,” for percussion and strings—which Iyer calls “an SOS from this scarred planet”—includes a ghostly center motion crammed with Bartokian nocturnal sounds. Minimalism is an audible touchpoint for the orchestral piece “Asunder,” which has a buoyancy that transcends the darkness of its time. The gathering leaves you grateful for the Boston Fashionable Orchestra Venture’s common assured performances and wanting to listen to extra from composer Iyer. DAVID WEININGER
Zemlinsky: ‘Eine Florentinische Tragödie’
Ausrine Stundyte, John Lundgren, Nikolai Schukoff, vocalists; Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra; Marc Albrecht, conductor (Pentatone)
Alexander von Zemlinsky lived between late Romanticism and early Modernism. Though his music languished lengthy after it was banned in Nazi Germany, defenders have mounted a profitable rediscovery marketing campaign in recent times. An opera, “Eine Florentinische Tragödie” – a narrative a few love triangle primarily based on a German translation of “A Florentine Tragedy” by Oscar Wilde – emerged from this.
Marc Albrecht, the conductor of this Dutch Nationwide Opera recording, is a devotee of the Zemlinsky interval and makes probably the most of his task right here. A number of different sturdy photographs within the work emphasised the romantic scope. However Albrecht dwells on among the music’s acidic qualities. All through, insinuating riffs for oboes, clarinets, and trumpets are given acceptable area to supply their reducing observations.
Just like the shopkeeper Simone, baritone John Lundgren doesn’t begin out full steam forward. As an alternative, he performs the half: at occasions, he’s being successfully overwhelmed by his wayward spouse and a calculating prince; at others, he’s giving a deluded air to some excessive notes whereas saving his most honest ardor for the merchandise he’s hawking or the cash he stands to make. Pentatone booklet consists of the German libretto and the English textual content, aspect by aspect. In brief, Wilde’s drama – as soon as criticized for its fast turns – thrives once more within the frothy after which turbulent sound baths of those forces. SETH COLTER WALLS
Henselt and Bronsart: Piano Concertos
Paul Wee, piano; Swedish Chamber Orchestra; Michael Collins, conductor (Encore)
To illustrate this for Adolf von Henselt’s Piano Concerto: it received off to a good begin: Clara Schumann was the soloist at its premiere in 1845, and Felix Mendelssohn was on the rostrum. There was additionally a time when the work attracted nice pianists equivalent to Liszt, Busoni and Rachmaninoff. However over the past century, solely a handful of musicians who possessed an inquisitive thoughts and a method equal to the composer – “a god on the piano,” mentioned Clara’s husband, Robert – tried. Beforehand acquired three recordings, together with one by Marc-André Hamelin.
Paul Wee’s new account is extraordinary. A lawyer who performs the piano part-time, he makes the concerto’s absurd and constant difficulties appear solely manageable – a lot in order that provided that you seek the advice of the rating do its formidable hidden challenges turn into as imposing as its double octaves that decision consideration. Identical to at Wee’s previous recording from Liszt’s transcription of “Eroica” Symphony, the sensitivity of contact and depth of characterization are as exceptional because the virtuoso thunder; observe the versatile shaping of the left hand accompaniment within the gradual motion. He’s no much less spectacular in Hans Bronsart von Schellendorf’s showier later concerto, combining to gorgeous impact with the energetic Swedish Chamber Orchestra in its stirring finale. David Allen
Ives: Piano Sonata No. 2 and ‘The St.
Donald Berman, piano (Avie)
Like all notable performances of Charles Ives’s Second Piano Sonata, “Harmony, Mass., 1840-1860,” a tribute to Transcendentalism, Donald Berman’s proves expansive.
The sonata consists of florid experimentalism (within the first couple of minutes of the “Emerson” motion) in addition to extra inside moods of contemplation (as within the closing “Thoreau”). Elsewhere, you’ll find traces of parlor-song amiability (“The Alcotts”) and ragtime-influenced abandon (“Hawthorne”). Ives additionally makes room for European echoes, quoting and transmuting the opening of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony and the marriage march of “Lohengrin”.
Berman, the president of the Ives Society, offers splendidly with the distinctive number of kinds; he does not shrink back from troublesome density, nor does he pay brief shrift to melodic magnificence. He additionally absorbs the elective flute half close to the tip of “Thoreau” in its solo piano model.
Most notably, Berman celebrates Ives the fixer. Ives oversaw two printed editions of “Harmony,” many years aside. Berman replaces the primary few pages of the revised “Emerson” motion with passages from the “First Transcription of ‘Emerson,’” which Ives wrote between the publication of the “Harmony” variations (and later famous could also be preferable to each introductions). Some extremities of register and gesture could seem jarring, however to my ears, it’s an alternate and gratifying Ivesian thought, one which appears to be linked to the stirring creativeness of contemporary American jazz styles. SETH COLTER WALLS
