Enescu

This record pairs two composers linked by personal and stylistic association with two performers ideally suited to their music technically and temperamentally. Both composer were attracted to gypsy music, as is shown in the works included here: one early and one late work each.

Before Felix Mendelssohn produced his Octet for strings in 1825, only Louis Spohr had composed for a similar combination of instruments. Rather than an octet, however, Spohrs work was a double quartet written for two equal but independent string quartets. Mendelssohn, on the other hand, treated the eight instruments as a single unit, collaborating in symphonic orchestral style, as he himself put it. He was only sixteen when he composed the Octet, full of a youthful ardour that has made it one of his most popular works. It is a farewell to the Mozartian style that had characterized Mendelssohns early production and at the same time a first step on the way to Romanticism.

After the great success of its GENUIN debut album, which was highly acclaimed by the press, the Duo Brüggen-Plank is now following suit: The violinist Marie Radauer-Plank and the pianist Henrike Brüggen play works by the Romanian national composer George Enescu, opening up exciting and unknown worlds for us. Enescu covered a long distance from his first salon pieces to his later works. Genuinely unique, he was both modern and influenced by the ancient, exotic rhythms and harmonies of his homeland. The two musicians approach Enescu's colorful soundscapes with verve and musical splendor, refinement, and expansiveness. A folkloristic discovery—and much more!

One of Germany’s most prominent pianists, Alexander Krichel from Hamburg, has brought together a couple of heavyweights for his first album with Berlin Classics. He combines the “Pictures at an Exhibition” by Modest Mussorgsky, a central work of the piano literature, with a rarely heard gem by the Romanian composer George Enescu. Enescu’s Second Piano Suite enhances the formal language of the Baroque with Romantic and Impressionist tim-bres, and entrances the listener with a rich palette of tone colours. To round off the pro-gramme, Alexander Krichel plays another work by a composer from Russia’s “mighty hand-ful”, the Nocturne from the Petite Suite by Alexander Borodin.

Hyperion is delighted to introduce the highly sought-after German cellist Alban Gerhardt to the label with these dazzling performances of three cello concertos written within the span of five years either side of the close of the nineteenth century. This disc is a fitting start to Hyperion’s new series of Romantic Cello Concertos; a follow-up to the highly successful Romantic Piano Concerto series and Romantic Violin Concerto series.

Roland Pöntinen is a virtuoso pianist whose busy concert and recording schedule would seem to preclude work as a composer and arranger, but he has managed to produce a substantial and worthwhile output in both those creative roles. As a pianist Pöntinen has developed a vast repertory of standards by J.S. Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Schumann, Grieg, Rachmaninov, and Prokofiev, to name just some.

The solo violin recital is something of a black belt for violinists, as the fact of the violin playing alone tends to overwhelm in pieces that were not necessarily intended to be played together. Violinist Carolin Widmann does well here, and it's all the more impressive that there are few extended techniques of any kind, just a bit of pizzicato in one of the Three Miniatures for solo violin of George Benjamin. One thing that has attracted buyers to this commercially successful release is the presence of unusual pieces, not only the Benjamin but also the Fantaisie concertante of George Enescu.

Les danses hongroises n°5 et 6 de Brahms (respectivement captées en 1967 et 1966) mettent d'entrée de jeu l'auditeur au parfum : c'est à une démonstration de dynamisme et de lyrisme que le grand chef américain nous convie. Ces danses de Brahms se hissent parmi les meilleures, et ne font poindre qu'un seul regret : qu'il n'y en ait que deux !
Les Préludes de Liszt (1963) nous rappellent alors quelles formidables affinités Bernstein trouvait dans l'univers lisztien (il faut connaitre absolument sa fantastique Faust-Symphonie ).