Three Pieces

Hans Fryba (24 April 1899 – 3 January 1986) – an Austrian composer and double bassist. He graduated in Vienna in the double bass class of Eduard Madenski. He continued his instrumental career, performing with orchestras such as the Vienna Symphony Orchestra and the Orchestra of Megaron Mousikis. Due to his outstanding performance skills, Fryba requires similar virtuosity from the instrumentalist in his compositions. Despite the fact that his work includes only three pieces for double bass, each of them contains an individual compositional feature and a number of technical and musical difficulties. To this day, the most frequently performed work is the Old Style Suite, which, also due to its sound qualities, is often performed during international double bass competitions.

When producer Mary Ann Topper teamed Petrucciani with Hall in late 1985, it was a truly inspired choice. Hall, the consummate accompanist and thoughtful soloist, is the kind of player who can work with just about anyone and find a way to gracefully inject his own gentle presence. And if the Petrucciani/Hall pairing was inspiration, adding Shorter for the final three pieces of the performance was pure genius. Working together, on the strength of this Montreux performance recorded on July, 14, 1986, yielded the kind of incredible interplay that most musicians dream of. Hall's tone has always been warm, but blends an acoustic brightness that yields an incredible feeling of intimacy; regardless of where you are, you feel like you're sitting only a few feet away.

In 2007, the 50th anniversary of Sibelius’s death, BIS begins the release of a 13-volume edition of all the music that the great master ever created – from the symphonies and tone poems to chamber works and songs. As well as the published works, the edition includes rare original versions and world première recordings of works from his youth – material which to a large extent is unique to BIS. The edition – a grand total of some 65 discs – contains previously released as well as new material, in volumes of 4-6 discs sorted by genre.

Vol. 2 in BIS' complete Sibelius Edition is given over the Finnish master's chamber music for strings and for strings and piano. Fifty years earlier, this release would've included only the "Voces intimae" string quartet. But BIS' 2007 release includes all four quartets and all four piano trios, plus 35 other works or substantial fragments lasting between 13 seconds to 32 minutes. One thing is instantly clear: Sibelius scholarship has made enormous strides since the mid-twentieth century.