School Major

Recently there seems to be an increasing interest in the music of Johann Michael Haydn. For a long time he was only mentioned as being the younger brother of Franz Joseph, and a good friend of Mozart, but his music was almost completely ignored. From time to time a record with sacred music or chamber music was released, but he was't appearing on concert programmes and in the record catalogue frequently. 2006 was the bicentennial of his death, and this apparently led to a number of new recordings with his music. One must hope this isn't a temporary wave, but the beginning of a thorough and serious exploration of his oeuvre.

The unpublished CD features the pianist Pierpaola Porqueddu in a tribute to the immortal art of Franz Joseph Haydn: 4 Piano Sonatas, n. 31 in A-flat major, No. 33 in C minor, No. 47 in B minor, no. 53 in E minor; Andante with Variations in F minor; Fantasy in C major.

The Symphony No. 9 in C major, D. 944, known as the Great (published in 1840 as “Symphony No. 7 in C Major”, listed as No. 8 in the Neue Schubert-Ausgabe), is the final symphony completed by Franz Schubert. Originally called The Great C major to distinguish it from his Symphony No. 6, the Little C major, the subtitle is now usually taken as a reference to the symphony's majesty. Unusually long for a symphony of its time, a typical performance of The Great takes around 55 minutes, though it can also be played in as little as 45 minutes by employing a faster tempo and not repeating sections as indicated in the score. Franz Schubert's Symphony No. 8 in B minor, D.759 commonly known as the "Unfinished Symphony" , is a musical composition that Schubert started in 1822 but left with only two movements—though he lived for another six years.

Between his early “post-Mozartean” sonatas and late masterpieces of symphonic proportions, Schubert spent the years 1817 and 1818 exploring the possibilities of the piano sonata, through unusual harmonic relationships, intensive use of trills, heightened virtuosity, lengthy chord repetitions, and extreme dynamic contrasts. The Sonata in F Minor, D. 625, is one of the fi nest examples of this second manner, with its committed Romanticism and quest for direct emotional communication allied with robust structural features. Its first movement, much like the Sonata in F-sharp Minor, D. 571, stands as one of Schubert’s most exquisitely lyrical works. Its slow movement, an “Adagio” in D-fl at major, succeeds in melding astonishing modulations in its development section, while still maintaining continuity of tone. The “Scherzo & Trio” in the distant key of E major is among the composer’s most energetic movements, alternating between repeated chord progressions and meteoric flights of scales.

Their recording of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 is the long-awaited sister-recording to Teodor Currentzis’ and musicAeterna’s Beethoven Symphony No. 5 album. Recorded at the Vienna Konzerthaus in August 2018, both albums are the Russia-based musicians’ seminal contribution to the composer’s 250th anniversary celebrations.

A 2004 Chandos release, this recording of Johann Nepomuk Hummel's Piano Concerto in C major, Op. 34, and two concertante works is a charming exploration of early nineteenth century music at the crossroads of Classicism and Romanticism. Dating from 1809, Hummel's Concerto was contemporary with Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 in E flat major, "Emperor," and bears some comparison with that work in terms of its expansive length, heroic piano part, and martial atmosphere, attributable to Napoleon's occupation of Vienna that year.

A stunning pairing of Mozart’s glorious ‘Gran Partita’ Serenade with a work written specifically to be performed alongside it, Geysir by the exceptional clarinettist-composer, Mark Simpson. Mark Simpson’s simmering, volcanic Geysir was inspired by the rich opening chord of Mozart’s ‘Gran Partita’, and by its bubbling clarinet writing, which develop into what Simpson describes as a “flurry of colour and harmonic shifts”.