Béla Bartók: The Miraculous Mandarin; Dance Suite; Contrasts (2016)
Philharmonia Orchestra; Philharmonia Voices; Esa-Pekka Salonen, conductor
Yefim Bronfman, piano; Zsolt-Tihamér Visontay, violin; Mark Van de Wiel, clarinet
EAC | FLAC | Image (Cue&Log) ~ 289 Mb | Mp3 (CBR320) ~ 163 Mb | Artwork included
Genre: Classical | Label: Signum Records | # SIGCD466 | Time: 01:08:31
Recorded as part of their critically praised ‘Infernal Dance’ season, the Philharmonia Orchestra under Esa-Pekka Salonen explore three contrasting works by Bela Bartok – the chamber piece Contrasts, and the orchestral works Dance Suite and The Miraculous Mandarin. Contrasts is one of Bela Bartok’s most imaginative forays into the world of chamber music. His only chamber work involving a woodwind instrument (for Piano, Clarinet and Violin), Contrasts originated in a commission from the American ‘King of Swing’, Benny Goodman. Composed to mark the 50th anniversary of Budapest in 1923, Bartok’s Dance Suite is a rhapsodic collection of folk inspired tunes that marked a sonorous change in direction from the composer’s more dissonant works up to that point. The ballet-pantomime The Miraculous Mandarin is raw, dangerous, exotic and elemental: using the rarely performed full ballet score it is frenzied music, percussive, sensuous and violent, telling a shocking story of desire and death.