Passagerare Till Frankfurt

Telemann wrote wind concertos for up to four solo instruments. A majority of the concertos (including all but one on this recording) are in four movements, usually slow-fast-slow-fast format, though there are many in the Italian three-movement style of fast-slow-fast.

How admirably Telemann succeeds may be heard listening to these concertos. Eschewing the Italian three-movement model of fast-slow-fast, he adheres to the German layout of four movements: slow-fast-slow-fast. Also in contrast to the works of his Italian counterparts, who not infrequently fell into the lazy habit of writing the same concerto over and over again, each of Telemann’s examples is strikingly different, not just in its instrumentation, but in its melodic and harmonic content and in the patterning of its passagework. Nonetheless, exquisitely beautiful as some of his slow movements are—listen to the Largo of the A-Major Oboe d’amore Concerto—it would be disingenuous to pretend that Telemann (or German Baroque composers in general) ever mastered the art of the Italian instrumental cantilena that grew out of the melodiousness of the language and Italy’s long vocal tradition. Nothing in these concertos can compare, for example, to the timeless beauty of the Adagio from Albinoni’s D-Minor Oboe Concerto, op. 9/2, written at approximately the same time as the Telemann.

The son of expatriot English Lord Edward Onslow and noble French woman Marie-Rosalie de Boudeilles of the Brantôme family, the prize pupil of Bohemian composer Antoine Reicha, and the director of the Académie des Beaux-Arts - and thus the highest official representative of instrumental music in France - George Onslow (1784-1863) was nearly completely forgotten shortly after his death and remains barely remembered today.

The release of Mahler´s Symphonies Nos. 1 + 2 starts the release the complete Mahler cycle with Paavo Järvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra on DVD and Blu-ray. Each Symphony will have an introduction by Paavo Järvi.

The release of Mahler´s Symphonies Nos. 1 + 2 starts the release the complete Mahler cycle with Paavo Järvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra on DVD and Blu-ray. Each Symphony will have an introduction by Paavo Järvi.

Following the first instalment from this series Symphonies Nos. 3 & 4 will continue the release of the complete Gustav Mahler symphony cycle with Paavo Järvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra. The performances also feature the outstanding soloists Waltraud Meier and Genia Kühmeier. Bonus material includes introductions to both symphonies, given by Paavo Järvi.

Following the first instalment from this series Symphonies Nos. 3 & 4 will continue the release of the complete Gustav Mahler symphony cycle with Paavo Järvi and the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra. The performances also feature the outstanding soloists Waltraud Meier and Genia Kühmeier. Bonus material includes introductions to both symphonies, given by Paavo Järvi.