Strings 2011

Danish composer Niels Wilhelm Gade is the sole composer on this album by the Århus Chamber Orchestra (Århus Kammerorkester), conducted by Ove Vedsten Larsen. Just two pieces are featured on the album: the Novellette No. 1 in F, Op. 53, and the Novellette No. 2 in E, Op. 58, yet each is a charming work, made of four movements, unto itself. Novellette No. 1 commences with lush strings performing richly textured music. While all of the instruments are unarguably strong, the sweeping cellos truly stand out.

Victor Herbert, Irish by birth, moved to Germany when he was eight and came to America when both he and his wife landed gigs with the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in New York. Operetta was plainly his strength, and his works in that medium remain his best known. But he soaked up enough of the German tradition (in 1883 he played in a tribute concert to Liszt, with Brahms of all people conducting) to want to write serious music, and he notched several major disasters in that field. That in turn has led to neglect of smaller works like the ones on this album, which contains several gems.

Rick Braun is known for making his trumpet do the singing. Although he has used his voice, like he did with the popular “Love Will Find a Way” from Body and Soul, he has never made it the focal point of a recording. That changes with Sings With Strings.Braun has chosen for this set 11 vocal ballads – several well-known standards as well as a few obscure titles. In addition to singing, he plays flugelhorn.

It is a familiar fact that Antonio Vivaldi was a prime mover in the creation of the solo concerto, but what is less well known is that he also was the leading exponent of the older concerto a quattro – music in four parts, with several players to a part, intended for what we nowadays would call a string orchestra with continuo. As Vivaldi expert Michael Talbot explains in his informative liner notes, these works are notable not only for their beauty, but also for their experimental character and for providing the most important examples of fugal writing in Vivaldi’s instrumental music. It is not known when Vivaldi started to write them, but most of the almost fifty concertos probably originate from the 1720s and 1730s. .

This 29CD set provides a superb introduction to this master of the Barock. He is often suffers in comparison to Bach, Handel and Vivaldi mainly because it is so difficult to know where to start with such a vast body of work. This Brilliant Classics box set makes the Telemann experience all the more enjoyable by making this selection and providing a wonderful window into the world of this great composer.

This 29CD set provides a superb introduction to this master of the Barock. He is often suffers in comparison to Bach, Handel and Vivaldi mainly because it is so difficult to know where to start with such a vast body of work. This Brilliant Classics box set makes the Telemann experience all the more enjoyable by making this selection and providing a wonderful window into the world of this great composer.

In the early phase of the movement for authentic period practice, Trevor Pinnock and the English Concert were practically household names – in early music households, anyway – because of their critically acclaimed performances of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and other Baroque composers. These exciting recordings of the Brandenburg Concertos, the orchestral suites, the harpsichord concertos, the violin concertos, and concertos for various instruments were made between 1979 and 1984, so they are a mix of ADD and DDD recordings.

The first of the Artemis Quartet’s Virgin Classics CDs of Beethoven Quartets was released in Autumn 2005. Now, nearly six years later, the complete Beethoven cycle becomes available in a box of 7 CDs which includes two previously unreleased items: the quartet No 10, op 74, known as the ‘Harp’, and a transcription for string quartet, proudly made by Beethoven himself, of the Piano Sonata No 9, op 14.

The acclaimed Polish period band Arte dei Suonatori perform eight of Vivaldi’s concertos a Quattro. Their version of Handel’s 12 Concerto grossi Op. 6 was awarded ‘Orchestral Choice of the Month’ in BBC Music Magazine, alongside further critical acclaim from the international music press. As well as being a major composer in the formation of the solo concerto, he also was the leading exponent of the older concerto a quattro – music in four parts, with several players to a part. His works in this genre are notable not only for their beauty, but also for their experimental character and for providing the most important examples of fugal writing in Vivaldi’s instrumental music.