Max Reger Cello

Though a quick perusal of the score to his F-minor Piano Quintet (op. 95) immediately whets the appetite for more, Wilhelm Berger (1861–1911) is completely unknown today, even among musicologists. Almost an exact contemporary of Gustav Mahler, he does not even appear on the periphery of the standard music histories of fin de siècle Germany. Berger is a truly forgotten figure who is at best occasionally mentioned in the statistics of the period’s art music.

Gidon Kremer … his tone colour changing in chameleon fashion to match mood and style. He is wispy and wiry in the spare, fugal opening, but as the music blossoms into Straussian warmth, he plays with a creamy, ripe sweetness that could grace an old Hollywood weepy. Yet there is always clarity in the playing, a feeling for the contours of the music and where they are leading. –Tim Homfray, The Strad, about Kremer s Bartók Violin Concerto

Hindemith was not only a composer but also a hugely talented viola player who wrote a number of remarkable, innovative works for his instrument. The piano-accompanied sonatas are relatively wellknown, so too the Trauermusik composed in a single evening to mark the death of King George V. The solo viola works have had less attention: Hindemith referred to them as Gebrauchsmusik, by which he meant compositions with simple, linear structures, often intended for amateur players: music that responded to a particular need or use.

Never aging and always giving peace and pleasure … A magical combination of notes, Great sorcerers … Here is the music that sounds in this release, presented to us by Madacy Special Mkts, giving you the opportunity to once again join with a beautiful, in a kind of selection, seemed to have long been familiar to all of us, works …