Siesta Ensemble & Ovidio Gimenez Bassoon Delights

The Melos Ensemble was formed by musicians who wanted to play chamber music scored for a larger ensemble in a combination of strings, winds and other instruments with the quality of musical rapport only regular groups can achieve. All its members were excellent musicians who held positions in notable orchestras and appeared as soloists. The clarinetist Gervase de Peyer, flautist Richard Adeney, viola player Cecil Aronowitz and cellist Terence Weil were the founding members.

The Omega Ensemble is one of Australia’s most dynamic chamber groups, with a dedication to commissioning new works and reviving lost ones.

Jørgen Jersild - Ensemble MidtVest - Chamber Music
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 278 MB | Artwork | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: Dacapo # 8.226072 | Country/Year: Denmark 2013
Genre: Classical | Style: Early 20th century, Contemporary

"The music on this CD confirms the special position of the composer Jørgen Jersild (1913-2004) in Danish music. It is captivating chamber music written over a half-century during which the composer underwent great musical development, but at the same time persisted in his own personal style – from the early works from the 1930s and 1940s to the later string quartet showing us a courageous, mature composer seeking out new musical areas."

The circle of musicians surrounding Germany's audiophile MDG label has been responsible for several important discoveries in the music of the late 18th century, and this pair of chamber works for winds and strings, unearthed by bassoonist Rainer Schottstädt of the Calamus Ensemble, must rank among the nicest. Composer Luigi Gatti crossed paths with Mozart several times; in 1783, after Mozart had left Salzburg, he become court music director to the infamous Archbishop Colloredo.

Fame is a strange thing. Although Johann Friedrich Fasch was highly esteemed by his contemporaries and the generations of musicians who followed him, in the concert repertoire of today he is grouped together with many minor masters who wrote a lot of works that sadly communicate very little. Yet music scholar Johann Adolf Scheibe put Fasch into the same class as Telemann, and J.S. Bach possessed copies of several of the composer's works. This release therefore aims to expose the genius of Fasch, and in doing so to help restore appreciation for what has become a largely forgotten corpus of deftly written, utterly absorbing music.

This is the Galliard Ensemble's 5th recording for Deux- Elles. To celebrate their 30th anniversary, they are joined by pianist Sam Haywood in an epic programme bookended by two pillars of the repertoire, Mozart's Quintet for Piano and Winds and Poulenc's Trio for Oboe, Bassoon and Piano. Featured prominently in the middle is the marvellously expansive and much less recorded Sextet for Piano and Winds by Ludwig Thuille, a close colleague of Richard Strauss. This album is a melting pot of colours, textures and timbres, beautifully captured and balanced by sound engineer Matthew Wadsworth.