MENDELSSOHN - VIOLIN CONCERTO     DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON  4778575

The violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter was born in Rheinfelden in Baden in 1963 and embarked on her international career as a soloist in 1976 at the Lucerne Festival. A year later she made her Salzburg debut at the Whitsun Concerts under Herbert von Karajan and has gone on to have a glittering international career both in concert and in the recording studio, making her first with Deutsche Grammophon at the age of 14 with Mozart’s Violin Concertos nos. 3 and 5. Over 25 years after her first recording of the Mendelssohn Concerto with Herbert von Karajan, Anne-Sophie Mutter here presents a fresh and stunning new take on one of the most popular concertos in the violin repertoire. This unique DVD/CD project was produced in Mendelssohn’s home town of Leipzig to celebrate the 200th anniversary of his birth in 2009 and offers not only a state-of-the-art audio recording, but also a separate full-length DVD with an exclusive documentary. The extremely popular Violin Concerto was recorded live in concert at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig under the direction of the Kurt Masur, one of the most knowledgeable and experienced Mendelssohn interpreters alive. As the long-time chief conductor of Mendelssohn’s own orchestra, Masur stands for a great tradition and sound which is happily distinguished on these recordings. The chamber music featured on the disc was recorded at the beautiful Brahms-Saal in the Vienna Musikverein and with the Piano Trio No. 1 and the demanding Sonata in F major, Mutter has chosen masterpieces from Mendelssohn’s chamber music repertoire to broaden the picture. Here too she collaborates with long-term chamber music partners André Previn and Lynn Harrell.Anne-Sophie Mutter’s superb technique is always at the service of the music, in this superb recordings of Mendelssohn’s concerto. Her sensuous playing elicits all the moods of this wondrous music, by turns passionate, reflective, gentle, impulsive and joyful. The DVD performance finds her in a stunning long blue dress that adds to the eroticism inherent in this great music. ‘Intense, rapturous, poised, exquisite.’ - FT.

JAQUES-DALCROZE - CONCERTO FOR VIOLIN AND ORCHESTRA   GUILD GMCD 7336

Émile Jaques-Dalcroze (1865 - 1950), was a Swiss musician and an inspiring music educator. He studied composition with Anton Bruckner, Gabriel Fauré and Léo Delibes, and in 1892 he became professor of harmony at the Geneva Conservatory. In the early twentieth century he invented eurhythmics, an experimental and highly successful method of learning that involves teaching musical concepts through movement to develop an integrated and natural feel for musical expression. Turning the body into a well-tuned musical instrument, Dalcroze thought, was the best way to provide a solid musical foundation. As well as being an outstanding teacher - eventually founding his own Institut in Geneva in 1915 - Jaques-Dalcroze was an accomplished composer, writing operas such as Le Violon maudit, Sancho Panza and Les Jumeaux de Bergame, as well as songs, choral and chamber works, and music for orchestra. This outstanding CD features his two beautiful Violin Concertos, which show him to be a master of his craft. These committed, vibrant performances were recorded recently in Moscow by the gifted young Russian violinist Rodion Zamuruev with the Moscow Symphony Orchestra conducted by Alexander Anissimov. Highly recommended.

GRIEG - PIANO CONCERTO           2L  2L60SABD

The Piano Concerto in A minor, Edvard Grieg’s only completed concerto, was among his earliest important works. It was written by the 24 year old composer in 1868 in Denmark, where he found the climate warmer than in his native Norway. He revised the concerto at least seven times and the final version was completed only a few weeks before his death 1907. It was the first piano concerto ever to be recorded, by pianist Wilhelm Backhaus in 1909, though due to the technology of the time it was drastically abridged to only six minutes. In 2007, conductor Rolf Gupta gave the first Norwegian performance of the concerto with the legendary Australian pianist Percy Grainger as the posthumous soloist. On this recording, the Kristiansand Symphony Orchestra accompanies Grainger’s original and controversial interpretation of the concerto. In addition, the violinist Øyvind Bjorå and pianolist Rex Lawson perform Grieg’s Violin Sonata in C minor. The recording also includes a handful of Grieg’s Lyric Pieces, performed by the composer himself. Astonishingly, these performances have not been available to the public until now. Two different instruments have facilitated Grainger’s and Grieg’s encounters with the KSO/Gupta. Grainger plays on a form of musical time machine, the Duo-Art reproducing piano, which is something like an analogue predecessor of the computer, powered by an electric suction pump, and controlled automatically by perforated rolls of paper. Grieg, on the other hand, has been restored to life by means of a foot-pedalled pianola, played by Rex Lawson. For this recording, both instruments were fitted in front of a Steinway concert grand piano and re-performed the playing of Grainger in 1921 and Grieg in 1906. These fascinating Hybrid SACD + Pure Audio Blu-ray recordings bring new insights to one of the most popular piano concertos ever written.

KORNGOLD, ROZSA - HOLLYWOOD           ORCHID ORC100005

Violinist Matthew Trusler’s first concerto recording features two pieces premièred by Jascha Heifetz – the violin concertos of Erich Korngold and Miklós Rózsa, together with three short pieces that Heifetz popularised - Ponce/Heifetz: Estrellita; Benjamin/Primrose: Jamaican Rumba; Foster/Heifetz: Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair. At the end of the Second World War, Korngold retired from films to concentrate on music for the concert hall. His lush Violin Concerto lyrical idiom reminiscent of fin de siècle Vienna was the first such work and it quickly became the composer’s most popular piece. It was premiered in 1947 by Heifetz and the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, receiving an enthusiastic ovation. Rózsa’s passionate, Hungarian-inspired Violin Concerto was written in 1953-54 for Heifetz, who collaborated with the composer in fine-tuning it. Rózsa later adapted parts of the concerto for the score of Billy Wilder’s 1970 film The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, the plot of which, Wilder has said, was inspired by Rózsa’s music. Matthew Trusler is a passionate lover of the style and approach to violin playing during the Heifetz era, and he (Trusler) has a particular affinity for the composers of that period, receiving much acclaim for his performances of concertos by Walton, Berg, Britten, Prokofiev and Korngold. Yasuo Shinozaki conducts the excellent Düsseldorf Symphony Orchestra. ‘Trusler assumes the Heifetz (and Perlman) mantle with ease’ - Daily Telegraph. Orchid Classics has also released SCHUBERT: DIE SCHONE MULLERIN (ORC100006), the composer’s masterly setting of poems by Wilhelm Müller. The acclaimed British tenor, James Gilchrist, has performed this cycle many times in concert, usually in partnership with the exciting young pianist Anna Tilbrook, but this is the first time that they have recorded the work. The CD booklet contains full German text with English translation, and an essay by Richard Morrison of The Times providing fascinating insights into both Schubert and Die Schöne Müllerin.

MACKENZIE - VIOLIN CONCERTO/PIBROCH SUITE     HELIOS CDH55343

Sir Alexander Campbell Mackenzie (1847–1935) was the son of an eminent Edinburgh violinist and conductor. On the advice of a member of Gungls band who had taken up his residence in Edinburgh, Mackenzie was sent for his musical education to Sondershausen, Germany, where he entered the conservatorium under Ulrich and Stein, remaining there from 1857 to 1861, when he entered the ducal orchestra as second violin. At this time he made Liszt’s acquaintance. On his return, he won the King’s Scholarship at the Royal Academy of Music, London, where he studied violin, composition and piano. before establishing himself as a teacher of the piano in Edinburgh. He also performed as a violinist and was appointed precentor of St. George’s Church in 1870. On the advice of von Bülow, Mackenzie settled in Florence, Tuscany, in 1879 to concentrate on composing, writing the cantatas The Bride and Jason as well as his first opera, Colomba. The violin always played a major role in his life and his Violin Concerto was written in 1884 while he was resident at the castle of Borgo alla Collina, Casentino. The work was conducted by the composer, with Pablo de Sarasate as soloist, at its Birmingham Festival premiere in 1885 and acclaimed by the critics. The Pibroche Suite for violin and orchestra was composed four years later, written at the request of Sarasate for inclusion in the Leeds Festival programme of 1889. The composer completed the score during a summer vacation in Braemar and the work premiered under the baton of the composer at the Victoria (Town) Hall, Leeds. Inspired by traditional Scottish melodies, the piece is musically related to the idea of a theme and variations. Like Parry and Stanford, Mackenzie was part of the renaissance of ‘English’ music in the late nineteenth century. The melodic and attractive works of this late-Romantic composer are inexplicably rarely performed today so this is a welcome release featuring bold and persuasive performances by the excellent Malcolm Stewart, with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra conducted by Vernon Handley and David Davies. Highly recommended.

BRITTEN - WORKS FOR PIANO AND ORCHESTRA     HYPERION CDA67625

As well as operas such as Peter Grimes and Death in Venice, Benjamin Britten wrote many solo works, a great choral War Requiem and music for orchestra and chamber ensembles, including symphonies and concerti. His ‘simple and direct’ Piano Concerto was originally designated ‘No. 1’, although it was the only one he composed. Dedicated to his friend and fellow composer Lennox Berkeley, it was written to exploit various qualities of the piano, such as its range and percussive qualities, as well as Britten’s skills as a pianist. The concerto was first performed with the twenty-four year old composer as soloist at a Henry Wood Promenade Concert at the Queen’s Hall, London, in 1938. Britten subsequently rewrote the concerto in 1945, making minor revisions to three of the four movements and replacing the third with completely new music. The tightly constructed work as usually performed today consists of four movements: a lengthy Toccata, an elegant Waltz, a marvelously orchestrated Impromptu and a satirical, swaggering March. This CD also includes a recording of that rarely heard original third movement - an beautiful Messiaen-like recitative and aria that only a composer of Britten’s genius could afford to discard. Soloist Steven Osborne and the Scottish Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Ilan Volkov, give an exhilaratingly bravura performance of this underrated concerto, together with the virtuosic Diversions for piano (left-hand)  and orchestra (written for the one-armed pianist Paul Wittgenstein in 1940) and Young Apollo, a virtuosic piece composed for piano, string quartet and string orchestra (1939). These thrilling, revelatory performances confirm Britten’s reputation as English music’s greatest composer since Henry Purcell.

NIGEL HESS - PIANO CONCERTO     UCJ 1774850

Nigel Hess is an award-winning British composer best known for his television, theatre and film soundtracks, including the theme tunes to Wycliffe, Dangerfield and Ladies in Lavender. He studied music at Cambridge University, where he was music director of the Footlights Revue, and went on to become music director and house composer for the Royal Shakespeare Company, where he contributed twenty scores and  was awarded the New York Drama Desk Award for his work on Much Ado About Nothing and Cyrano de Bergerac. In 2007, The Prince of Wales commissioned Hess to write a piano concerto in memory of his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother. One of the composer’s earliest memories is watching the Humphrey Jennings wartime documentary, Listen To Britain, and seeing his great-aunt Dame Myra Hess playing Mozart in London’s National Gallery during one of the famous lunchtime concerts, with the then Queen Elizabeth in the audience. His new twenty-three minute composition is made up of three movements which reflect key aspects of The Queen Mother’s personality. The first one is light and gay, the second quietly reflective, and the third opens with echoes of the dark days of the Blitz before finishing in a celebration of her extraordinary life. The concerto received its world premiere at a concert dedicated to the memory of the Queen Mother and organised by Music in Country Churches, of which the Prince of Wales is patron. The soloist then and on this recording is the phenomenal Chinese pianist Lang Lang, who gives a characteristically exhilarating performance with the London Chamber Orchestra under Christopher Warren-Green. This attractive, neo-Romantic music is tuneful and highly accessible - clearly influenced by Rachmaninov and Richard Addinsell’s Warsaw Concerto, appropriately written for the 1941 film, Dangerous Moonlight.

GERSHWIN – COMPLETE MUSIC FOR PIANO & ORCHESTRA   BRIDGE 9252

The great American composer George Gershwin wrote many vocal and theatrical works as well as several classics for piano and orchestra. Rhapsody in Blue, written in 1924 for solo piano and jazz band, combines elements of classical music with jazz-influenced effects. The piece received its premiere in a concert entitled An Experiment in Modern Music, given in 1924 in Aeolian Hall, New York, by Paul Whiteman and his band with Gershwin playing the piano. Rhapsody in Blue was orchestrated three times by Ferde Grofé and the final 1942 version for piano and symphony has become one of the most popular American concert works. Gershwin’s Concerto in F, written in 1925 on a commission for the New York Symphony Orchestra from the conductor and director Walter Damrosch, who had been present at the Aeolian Hall concert. This piece is closer in form to a traditional concerto than Rhapsody in Blue. Both works are include here, together with Gershwin’s Second Rhapsody and ‘I Got Rhythm’ Variations. Anne-Marie McDermott is the excellent soloist with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra in this recording made in Dallas’s superb Meyerson Hall. Conductor Justin Brown directs bold and emotive performances that have the bracing vitality of the Paul Whiteman originals without sacrificing the lush sound of the full orchestral versions.

VIVALDI – CONCERTOS AND SONATAS       WARNER 2564 64320-2

Antonio Lucio Vivaldi was born in Venice in 1678. He became a priest in 1703 and was nicknamed Il Prete Rosso, ‘The Red Priest’, because of his red hair. Ill-health (apparently asthma) caused him to leave the priesthood to become a violin teacher at an orphanage for girls called the Pio Ospedale della Pietà. Vivaldi wrote most of his concertos, cantatas, and sacred music for them, and in 1713 became responsible for the musical activity of the institute. His talents were soon recognised beyond Venice and he was one of the composers who enabled Baroque music to evolve into an impressionist style as a precursor to the Romantic style. After years of neglect, Vivaldi’s works were resurrected in the 20th century, thanks largely to the efforts of Alfredo Casella, and more of his music continues to be rediscovered. Astonishingly prolific, he composed over 500 concertos, 46 operas, 73 sonatas, sinfonias, chamber music and much inspiring church music. Of his concertos, approximately 350 are for solo instrument and strings, and of these about 230 are for violin. The others are for bassoon, cello, oboe, flute, viola d’amore, recorder, lute, and mandolin. About 40 concertos are for two instruments and strings, and approximately 30 are for three or more instruments and strings. This splendid 18 disc box set features Vivaldi’s published concertos and sonatas, opp.1-12, six sonatas for cello and harpsichord (without opus number) and Nicolas Chedeville’s ‘Il Pastor Fido’ - six sonatas for flute and harpsichord (attributed to Vivaldi).The soloists are Piero Toso, Giuliano Carmignola and Juan Carlos Rybin (violins), Gianni Chiampan and the great Paul Tortelier (cellos), Jean Pierre Rampal (flute), Pierre Pierlot (oboe), Edoardo Farina and Robert Veyron-Lacroix (harsichord). I Solisti Veneti are directed in dynamic style by Claudio Scimone and bring a freshness and authority to this irresistible music.

MOZART – PIANO CONCERTOS       BERLIN CLASSICS  0002462CCC

Harpsichord concertos were written throughout the Baroque era, most notably by J S Bach, but in the 18th century the piano became a more popular choice. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was an amazingly prolific composer and was the most important figure in the early development of the piano concerto, writing many of his 27 solo piano concerti for himself to perform. The first four concertos are arrangements of other early works and contain no original material, but the Concerto No. 5 in D (composed in 1773 when Mozart was only 17) is an ambitious work and No.9 in E Flat (the ‘Jeunehomme’). This magnificent 10-CD box set contains all of Mozart’s piano concertos from 5 to 27, apart from the 7th (a less serious piece for three pianos, written for a countess and her two daughters) and the 10th (composed for two pianos). The CDs include some of the greatest piano concertos ever written, such as No.15 in B Flat with its ‘hunting’ finale, the graceful No.17 in G, No.19 in F  and one of Mozart’s best known works, No.21 in C, the haunting slow movement of which was used for the film Elvira Madigan. Kurt Masur was ppointed conductor of the Dresden Philharmonic in 1955 and in 1967 he became the  Orchestra’s chief conductor, a post he held until 1972. They can be heard in fine form together on these 1970s recordings with East German soloist Annerose Schmidt. Her intelligent musicianship and sympathetic phrasing is particularly evident in the grand Concerto No.25 in C, with its imposing first movement that would later influence Beethoven's fourth piano fifth symphony, and the ethereal No. 27. Also included are two delightful Rondos for piano and orchestra. Highly recommended.

POULENC/MILHAUD/BARTOK       BRIDGE 9224

Susan Grace and Alice Rybak are two distinguished pianists who have earned acclaim as soloists and chamber musicians in the United States and abroad. They share a special interest in the vast repertoire for two pianos and the unique collaboration involved in its performance. Playing together as Quattro Mani, their special interest has been in twentieth century repertoire, collaborating with composers such as George Crumb, Joan Tower and Frederic Rzewski and playing in contemporary music festivals throughout the USA, Asia and Europe. On this attractively produced CD from Bridge, the duo join Scott Yoo and the Colorado College Festival Orchestra (together with percussionists David Colson, Peter Cooper, John Kinzie and Michael Tetreault) to perform three brilliant twentieth century concertos - Francis Poulenc’s sparkling Concerto in D minor for Two Pianos and Orchestra, Darius Milhaud’s rarely heard Second Concerto for Two Pianos and Percussion, and Béla Bartók’s superb Concerto for Two Pianos, Percussion and Orchestra. The Milhaud concerto was influenced by the Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion by Bartók, a composer he greatly admired, and Bartók himself scored this sonata as a concerto with orchestra, adding woodwinds, four horns, trumpets, three trombones, celesta and strings to bring even more colour and intensity to a piece. All of the famous Bartók trademarks are present: ‘night music’, fugal sections, original instrumental effects and joyous dance music. Highly recommended.

PORTRAITS – JENNIFER KOH           CEDILLE CDR 90000 089

Born in Chicago of Korean parents, the internationally acclaimed violinist Jennifer Koh now lives in New York City. A precocious childhood talent - she played alongside the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at the age of eleven - Koh won the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow in 1994 and has become a master of her instrument. An elegant, intelligent performer, she combines lightness of touch with an often adventurous and innovative repertoire. On this new CD she plays three demanding works for violin and orchestra by Bela Bartok, Bohuslav Martinu, and Karol Szymanowski. The recording quality is excellent and the Grant Park Orchestra, conducted by Carlos Kalmar, has a perfect understanding with the soloist. Szymanowski’s Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. 35 is perhaps the most accessible piece here and Jennifer Koh brings out all its lush lyricism. Martinu’s dynamic Violin Concerto No. 2 receives a suitably extrovert performance, and the revolutionary Two Portraits, Op. 5, by Bartok were inspired by his love for the violinist Steffi Geyer. Assured virtuosity and bold repertoire make this a memorable and rewarding album that will further enhance Jennifer Koh’s enviable reputation. ‘She’s exciting to watch, a petite firebrand who revels in emotional display’ - Chicago Tribune.

STUART MACRAE - VIOLIN CONCERTO & OTHER WORKS     NMC D115

The acclaimed young Scottish composer Stuart MacRae was born in Inverness, in 1976, and first came to public attention as a finalist in the 1996 Lloyd’s Bank Young Composer’s Workshop with his orchestral piece Boeraig. In 2001 his remarkable Violin Concerto was premièred at the BBC Proms, performed by soloist Tasmin Little and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Martyn Brabbins. Between 1999 and 2003, MacRae was Composer-in-Association with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, who can be heard on this recording under its chief conductor Ilan Volkov. The soloist in MacRae’s intense and challenging Violin Concerto is the internationally-renowned Christian Tetzlaff. The orchestra also gives a rugged performance of Stirling Choruses, written for the brass section of the BBC SSO, which resoundingly reflects upon the ‘dark and foreboding’ Stirling Castle. These works are joined by Motus, a processional for six instruments, written for and outstandingly played by the excellent Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, conducted by Susanna Malkki. This ensemble also perform Two Scenes from the Death of Count Ugolino, a piece based on a gruesome section of Dante Alghieri’s Inferno and featuring the mezzo-soprano Loré Lixenberg. Stuart MacRae recently completed his first opera (The Assassin Tree) and is the Edinburgh Festival’s Creative Fellow for 2005/6.

VIVALDI - CELLO CONCERTOS                 HYPERION  CDA67553

Like most instruments, the cello has a mixed and anonymous parentage, developing out of the viol da gamba, the viola di fagotto and bass viols of various descriptions. Most such viols had six or seven strings where the cello today has four, is tuned in fifths rather than fourths, and has no frets on the fingerboard. The first cellos were produced in the town of Cremona, in 16th Century Italy, and perfected by the Amati, Guarneri and Stradivari families. Antonio Vivaldi wrote more cello concertos (at least twenty-eight) than anyone else to date. This new recording includes six of his most accomplished works as well as one particularly fine concerto whose attribution is open to question. All seven are wonderful examples of the form to which Vivaldi continually returned throughout his long composing career. He is not known to have been a cellist, but his interest in the instrument can be ascribed to a distinguished list of virtuosic performers at the Pietà, the Venetian orphanage whose musical prowess was the envy of contemporary Europe. Vivaldi himself worked for the institution for many years, continuing to supply fresh compositions long after other engagements took him further afield. The music here is performed by the versatile young British cellist, Jonathan Cohen, accompanied by Robert King and The King’s Consort, acknowledged leaders in the interpretation of Vivaldi. They are joined by Sarah McMahon in the three-part Concerto for two cellos in which the two solo instruments maintain a wonderful balance, each in perfect proportion to the other and often sharing exact notes.

MENDELSSOHN - VIOLIN CONCERTO     DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON  476 3159

This disc is the follow up recording from the remarkable young Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti to her first CD with Deutsche Grammophon, which featured her outstanding performance of the challenging Szymanowski Concerto No 1. The BBC’s Young Musician of the Year for 2004 now turns to the more mainstream Mendelssohn Violin Concerto and her playing is again as assured, fresh and lively as we have come to expect. As well as the Mendelssohn masterpiece, the new album also includes the World Premiere recording of an atmospheric two-movement piece by her fellow-Scot, James MacMillan, composed especially for Benedetti. The title ‘From Ayreshire’ is a reference to the musicians’ shared home county. Both of these pieces as well as an arrangement of Schubert’s Serenade (Leise flehen meine Lieder, D957) are conducted by James MacMillan with the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. Completing the disc are a harp and violin arrangement by Skaila Kanga of Schubert’s ever popular Ave Maria and two short Mozart pieces (Rondo K.373 & Adagio K.261) directed by Benedetti from the violin. This is elegant musicianship from a performer who is still not quite 19 years old, and although Nicola Benedetti failed to win the two awards she was nominated for at the recent Classical Brit Awards she will surely gather many others before too long.

SHOSTAKOVICH - VIOLIN CONCERTOS NOS. 1 & 2     WARNER 2564 62546-2

Dmitri Shostakovich was working on this wonderful Violin Concerto No. 1 in 1948 when Stalin’s cultural apparatchik made a speech denouncing him along with Prokofiev and others, charging them with ‘formalism’. Shostakovich therefore put away the concerto until a more propitious time, which was shortly after Stalin’s death. In the mid-1950s, he completed two of his most acclaimed works: the great Tenth Symphony and this first Violin Concerto. Although there are similarities, the inward-looking, introspective Concerto in A minor, is very different from the outward looking, expansive symphony. Its first movement, called ‘Nocturne’, is supremely beautiful and meditative. The second is an amazing Scherzo and the third a complex movement containing thematic references to the Tenth Symphony. The fourth movement, entitled ‘Burlesca’, is an exciting whirlwind of dance-like themes. This concerto, together with Shostakovich’s Violin Concerto No. 2 and the Romance from The Gadfly, is performed here by Daniel Hope with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Maxim Shostakovich - the composer’s eldest son, for whom he wrote his second piano concerto. Born in 1974, the British violinist Daniel Hope has won many awards, including the Classical Brit Award for Young British Classical Performer in 2004, and became the youngest ever member of the legendary Beaux Arts Trio. His music-making has explored a wide variety of musical ideas, including jazz and Indian music, and he actively commissions works by young composers. ‘The future of the contemporary violin is indeed safe in his hands’ - BBC Music Magazine.

HARTY - PIANO CONCERTO         NAXOS 8.557731

The composer Sir Herbert Hamilton Harty was born the son of a church organist in Hillsborough, Northern Ireland, in 1879. Hamilton played viola, piano and organ as a child, and followed in his father’s footsteps by becoming a church organist from the age of 12. After moving to London in 1901 he worked as accompanist to an impressive range of soloists, including John McCormack, Joseph Szigeti, Fritz Kreisler and the soprano Agnes Nicholls, whom he later married. As well as being one of the leading accompanists of his day, Harty was also a fine conductor and an accomplished composer of works such as An Irish Symphony, the tone poems With the Wild Geese and The Children of Lir, his Violin Concerto, and a setting of Ode to a Nightingale for soprano and orchestra. He was permanent conductor of the Halle Orchestra from 1920 until 1933, during which time it became one of the country’s premier orchestras. He was knighted in 1925 and died on February 19, 1941, since when his compositions have been unfairly neglected. The Ulster Orchestra under the direction of Takuo Yuasa perform Harty’s Piano Concerto in B minor (with the excellent soloist Peter Donohoe), Fantasy Scene, and Comedy Overture. The Romantic Piano Concerto is reminiscent of Rachmaninov and was composed at Fiesole in Italy in 1922 before being first performed the following year. A Comedy Overture was one of Harty’s most popular early works and Fantasy Scenes (From an Eastern Romance) paints the conventional ‘Arabian Nights’ picture in four movements: The Laughing Juggler, A Dancer’s Reverie, Lonely in Moonlight and In the Slave Market.  This new release from Naxos is particularly welcome and should bring Harty’s impressive music to a wider audience.

MUSIC OF ELLIOTT CARTER, VOL. 7     BRIDGE 9184

Born in New York City in 1908, Elliott Carter became interested in music in high school and was encouraged by Charles Ives. He later studied with Walter Piston at Harvard University and with Nadia Boulanger in Paris before returning to New York to devote his time to composing and teaching. He is widely recognised today as one of the great innovators of 20th century music, with challenging works such as the Variations for Orchestra, Symphony of Three Orchestras, and his many fine concertos and string quartets. Carter received his first of his two Pulitzer Prizes for his contributions to the string quartet tradition. Stravinsky greatly admired his orchestral works, such as the Double Concerto for harpsichord, piano and two chamber orchestras (1961) and Piano Concerto (1967), and Aaron Copland called him ‘one of America's most distinguished creative artists’. Carter has been awarded the Gold Medal for Music by the National Institute of Arts and Letters, the National Medal of Arts, membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and honorary degrees from many universities. This latest edition in the excellent Bridge series celebrates his centenary by featuring the BBC Symphony Orchestra in premiere recordings of four Carter compositions from the past six years. Conducted by Oliver Knussen, these remarkable works reveal a composer still at the peak of his powers. The magnificent Dialogues for piano and chamber orchestra was a BBC Radio 3 commission for the outstanding young British pianist Nicolas Hodges and is written for piano solo and chamber orchestra. Boston Concerto is based on a William Carlos Williams poem, ‘Rain’, chosen to convey the composer’s love for his wife Helen. The Cello Concerto, played by Carter specialist Fred Sherry, is scored for a large orchestra. The light-hearted 12 minute ASKO Concerto was commissioned by the Asko Ensemble of Amsterdam and the recording here is of its first performance public in the Concertgebouw in 2000. Bridge also recently issued Volume Six of this series, featuring Rolf Schulte’s performance of Carter’s Violin Concerto (BRIDGE 9177).

HALFFTER - SINFONIETTA/GUITAR CONCERTO         ESSAY CD1092

Ernesto Halffter was one of Spain’s leading 20th-century composers and is best known for his Sinfonietta, which typically combines the various influences on Spanish composers at that time (1927). Halffter was much influenced by Manuel de Falla, with whom he co-author his cantata Atlantida, and was also a friend of and collaborator with Dali, Garcia Lorca, Alberti, Bunuel and others of the ‘Generation of 1927’. His works also reveal the influence neo-classicism as well as of Stravinsky, Ravel (with whom he studied) and French composers such as Milhaud, Poulenc and Honegger. Ernesto Halffter was born in Madrid in 1905 and composed his first piano music at the age thirteen. He later took composition lessons with Manuel de Falla in Granada. Halffter’s Sinfonietta quickly won him international acclaim and his career subsequently combined composing, conducting and teaching (he was professor to the Spanish Institute in Lisbon). Ernesto Halffter was among the talented Spanish artists of his generation and this excellent CD brings together two of his most enduring works. Richard Kapp conducts the Philharmonia Virtuosi in a concert performance of the impressive Sinfonietta and the outstanding American guitarist Eliot Fisk joins them as soloist in an earlier (1987) concert recording of the graceful Concerto for Guitar and Orchestra, first played at Town Hall in New York in 1969. Fisk’s technique is dazzling and the orchestra performs with great vivacity throughout. Highly recommended.

VIOTTI - THE COMPLETE VIOLIN CONCERTOS     DYNAMIC CDS498/1-10

Giovanni Battista Viotti was born in 1755 in Fontanetto da Po, Piedmont, Italy. He must have been an outstanding young violinist because by the age of eleven he joined the court of Prince Alfonso dal Pozzo della Cisterna in Turin. Alfonso financed his training and one of his teachers was Giulio Gaetano Pugnani. Viotti made his first concert tour abroad with Pugnani in 1780 then moved to Paris, where he made a strong impression as a musician and entered the service of Marie-Antoinette. The Revolution in 1792 caused him to seek refuge in London, where he played at concerts in which Haydn was involved during his  visits to London in the 1790s. Political exile from London took Viotti to Germany and on his return to London at the beginning of the new century he occupied himself with the wine trade, rarely playing in public. In 1819 he was appointed director of the Paris Opéra, a position he relinquished two years later, when he returned to London, dying there in 1824. His career as a performer was short, but his influence on violin-playing was considerable, inspiring a new generation of players such as Rode, Kreutzer and Baillot. Viotti’s orchestral music consists principally of his violin concertos, written in a style that develops from the compositions of the early 1780s to the romantic lyricism of the later concertos. This magnificent 10-CD box set is the culmination of a fifteen-year-long project by Dynamic, featuring all 29 of Viotti’s elegant and imaginative Violin Concertos. In many cases these are world première recordings of works that are virtually unknown. Franco Mezzana is the soloist and also conducts the Viotti Chamber Orchestra and Orchestra da Camera Milano Classica. This is an indispensable collection of music that provides a fascinating link between 18th-century violin tradition and the imminent Paganini revolution.

FEURMANN IN CONCERT       CELLO CLASSICS CC1013

Emanuel (‘Munio’) Feuermann was born in Kolomea, Galicia (then part of the Austrian Empire, now part of the Soviet Union) on 22 November 1902 and died in New York City aged only 39 and at the height of his powers. At the time of his tragically early death, he was recognised by Pablo Casals and many others as one of the finest cellists of the twentieth century.  This new release features Feuermann playing the Saint-Saëns Concerto No.1 with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, originally broadcast live in 1939. This is the only recording of the work by Feuermann and has survived incomplete. It has been re-mastered for this enhanced CD and completed with the help of cellist Steven Isserlis (playing the same Stradivarius cello used by Feuermann) and some exceptionally clever technical wizardry. Also included as an encore is the only recording of unaccompanied Bach that Feuermann ever made, as well as previously un-heard takes of works by Bach and Fauré. An unusual feature of this CD, accessible by playing the disc on a computer, is unique film footage of the great cellist in a short film made in 1939, with two popular works from his repertoire: Dvorak’s Rondo and Popper’s Spinning Song. This is essential listening for admirers of a remarkable virtuoso and anyone interested in the history of cello music.

LES SAISONS AMUSANTES - VIVALDI/CHEDEVILLE       LINN CKD 070

Nicolas Chédeville (1705-82) ingeniously adapted Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons to create a new seasonal cycle of six concertos. They are arranged from various movements of the original but only ‘Spring’ is used in its entirety. ‘Summer is omitted completely and the outer movements of ‘Autumn’ embrace the central largo from ‘Winter’. The remaining material is borrowed from other concertos and simplified, with solo parts arranged for violin, recorder, the wheezing hurdy-gurdy and the musette (a variety of bagpipe). The inventiveness of this delightful novelty should appeal to anyone overexposed to to the standard Four Seasons. The Palladian Ensemble are Pamela Thorby (recorders), Rodolfo Richter (violin), Susanne Heinrich (viola da gamba) and William Carter (archlute, theorbo, guitar), with guest musicians Richard Egarr (harpsichord, organ), Nigel Eaton (hurdy-gurdy) and Jean-Pierre Rasle (baroque musette). This acclaimed period-instrument group’s sparkling performance on this recording is irresistible. ‘The Palladian Ensemble and their guests make the most of their opportunities with verve, virtuosity and varied instrumental colour’ - Gramophone.