New on Naxos | July 2014
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NEWThe World’s ON Leading ClassicalNAXOS Music Label JULY 2014 © Steve Sherman This Month’s Other Highlights © 2014 Naxos Rights US, Inc. • Contact Us: [email protected] www.naxos.com • www.classicsonline.com • www.naxosmusiclibrary.com • blog.naxos.com NEW ON NAXOS | JULY 2014 8.572763 Playing Time: 58:37 7 47313 27637 0 Paul HINDEMITH (1895–1963) Nobilissima Visione (Complete Ballet) Five Pieces for String Orchestra, Op. 44, No. 4 Seattle Symphony Orchestra • Gerard Schwarz A series of powerful, largely radical works in the early 1920s saw Hindemith established as Germany’s leading young composer. In 1936 he was asked by choreographer and dancer Léonide Massine to collaborate on a ballet project and Hindemith proposed scenes from the life of St Francis of Assisi. The resulting ballet, Nobilissima Visione (The Noblest Vision), is a work of lyricism, elegy and majesty. This is the first recording of the complete ballet score, not the three-movement concert suite that Hindemith later extracted. The Five Pieces for String Orchestra is an earlier, spirited work dating from 1927. Gerard Schwarz © Ben Vanhouten Sales Points: Most recordings of Hindemith’s attractive, moving, and majestic score for the ballet Nobilissima Visione (The Noblest Vision), are of the three-movement concert suite he extracted from it for performance and which lasts only about 20-minutes. This is invariably coupled with The Four Temperaments (as by DePriest on Delos), or the Symphony in E flat (Tortelier/EMI), or with Mathis der Maler, as on Naxos’ own 1995 disc [8.553078] with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra and Franz Paul Decker. The ballet is seldom encountered on disc, and never with the earlier 1927 Suite for Strings, an attractive, short work which Hindemith wrote primarily as a teaching aid. Internationally recognised for his moving performances, innovative programming and extensive catalogue of recordings, American conductor Gerard Schwarz serves as music director of the All-Star © Ben Vanhouten Orchestra, music director of the Eastern Music Festival in North Seattle Symphony Orchestra Carolina and Jack Benaroya conductor laureate of the Seattle Symphony. His considerable discography of nearly 350 releases Companion Titles showcases his collaborations with some of the world’s greatest orchestras including Philadelphia Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic, London Symphony, Orchestre National de France, and Seattle Symphony among others. In his nearly five decades as a respected classical musician and conductor, Schwarz has received hundreds of honours and accolades including Emmy Awards, Grammy® nominations, ASCAP Awards, and the Ditson Conductor’s Award. 8.572748 8.572749 8.572770 8.557812 2 NEW ON NAXOS | JULY 2014 © Donald Dietz Leonard Slatkin Hector BERLIOZ (1803–1869) Harold en Italie* • Rêverie and Caprice** • Le carnaval romain Benvenuto Cellini Overture Lisa Berthaud, Viola* • Giovanni Radivo, Violin** Orchestre National de Lyon • Leonard Slatkin Drawing on the adventures of Byron’s Childe Harold and the composer’s own Italian experiences as a Prix de Rome winner, Harold en Italie was intended for the great violinist Paganini who, having initially rejected the work, later repented, giving it his highest praise. The brilliant concert overtures Benvenuto Cellini and Le carnaval romain are among Berlioz’s most popular works. Quickly taken up by several celebrated violinists of the time, the elegant Rêverie et Caprice is his only work for solo violin and orchestra. Leonard Slatkin’s Lyon recording of Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique (8.572886) has been acclaimed as “quite simply one of the best on disc” by MusicWeb International. Sales Points: Leonard Slatkin and the Orchestre National de Lyon have already booked a remarkable success with their Grammy nominated recording of Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique (8.572886), which was also a MusicWeb International ‘Recording of the Month’ and described as “quite simply one of the best performances of the Symphonic fantastique on disc”. It was also dubbed “the most amazing performance 8.573297 Playing Time: 70:31 and recording of the work I’ve ever heard” by Fanfare. With this kind of response and its young soloist Lise Berthaud unanimously praised as an outstanding rising figure on the music scene you can expect this new 7 47313 32977 9 Harold en Italie to be another of this year’s hottest sellers. Simultaneously available on Blu-ray Internationally renowned conductor Leonard Slatkin is currently music director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra and of the Orchestre National de Lyon and principal guest conductor of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. He is also the author of a new book entitled Conducting Business. His more than 100 recordings have brought seven GRAMMY® Awards and 64 GRAMMY® Award nominations. He has received many other honours, including the 2003 National Medal of Arts, France’s Chevalier of the Legion of Honour and the League of American Orchestras’ Gold Baton for service to American music. NBD0042 Playing Time: 70:30 7 30099 00426 8 Companion Titles © David Duchon-Doris 8.572886 NBD0029 8.572887 8.572888 Orchestre National de Lyon 3 NEW ON NAXOS | JULY 2014 Louis SPOHR (1784-1859) String Quartets Vol. 17 Quartet No.10 in A major, Op. 30* Variations in D minor, Op. 6 Quartet No. 18 in B minor, Op. 61, Quatuor brillant No. 3* Moscow Philharmonic Concertino String Quartet *WORLD PREMIÈRE RECORDINGS The composition of string quartets ran as a continuous thread throughout Louis Spohr’s life, and he used the Quartet No. 10 in A major as his ‘parade horse’, playing it frequently in the Viennese salons to show off his skills both as a violinist and composer to audiences accustomed to Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. Its first violin part matches the bravura display of the Quatuor brillant No. 3, written as Spohr planned to resume life as a touring virtuoso after resigning from his post in charge of the Frankfurt Opera. The Variations, Op. 6 see the soloist covering a wide range of ideas derived from a theme said to be by Haydn. This is the final volume in the Marco Polo complete Spohr String Quartets edition. 8.225352 Playing Time: 67:01 Sales Points: This final volume of our unique collection of the 6 36943 53522 6 entire String Quartets by Louis Spohr is once again in the skilled hands of the Moscow Philharmonic Concertino String Quartet, Companion Titles whose “tuning, intonation, technique, ensemble, sensitivity, and depth of expression result in total musicality” according to the American Record Guide (Vol. 13, 8.225315). As with so many of the other volumes in this comprehensive edition, this release includes two major world première recordings, including that of the Quartet in A major which the composer himself identified as 8.223251 8.223252 8.223253 8.223254 one of his main calling-cards as a performer and composer. 8.223255 8.223256 8.223257 8.223258 8.223259 8.225306 8.225307 8.225316 Moscow Philharmonic Concertino String Quartet 8.225315 8.225982 8.225981 8.225983 4 NEW ON NAXOS | JULY 2014 Zdenĕk FIBICH (1850–1900) Orchestral Works, Vol. 3 Symphonic Poems Othello • Záboj, Slavoj and Ludĕk • Toman and the Wood Nymph The Tempest • Spring Czech National Symphony Orchestra • Marek Štilec Less well known than his compatriots Dvořák and Smetana, Zdenĕk Fibich was however one of the greatest Czech composers of his day. These symphonic poems span the best part of his career, starting with Othello, which emphasizes the intertwined fates of Shakespeare’s main characters. More nationalist in character, Záboj, Slavoj and Luděk impressed Smetana while he was working on Má vlast, while Toman and the Wood Nymph is an evocative and tragic tale of supernatural romantic yearnings. The Tempest encapsulates Shakespeare’s story of storm, shipwreck and reconciliation, and the ‘symphonic picture’ Spring depicts the season in all its variety. Sales Points • This third volume of orchestral works by Zdenĕk Fibich arrives boosted by a positive critical response to its predecessors. This includes comment on the “skilful conducting and first rate recording [which] make this disc a real treat” (MuziekWeb International on Vol. 1, 8.572985), and Vol. 2 (8.573157) which has been given four stars by Audiophile Edition. These fresh recordings with the Czech National Symphony Orchestra maintain the distinctive Fibich sound and Marek Štilec character, while surpassing now somewhat dated alternatives from the Supraphon label. 8.573197 Playing Time: 72:27 Companion Titles 7 47313 31977 0 8.572985 8.573157 Jacques LOUSSIER (b. 1934) Concerto No. 1 for Violin and Percussion* Concerto No. 2 for Violin and Tabla* Adam Kostecki, Violin • Piotr Iwicki, Percussion Polish Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra • Adam Kostecki *WORLD PREMIÈRE RECORDING Ignacy Jan PADEREWSKI (1860 – 1941) Sonata in A minor for Violin and Piano, Op. 13 Adam Kostecki, Violin • Gunther Hauer, Piano Jacques Loussier achieved immense worldwide popular success combining the music of J.S. Bach and jazz improvisation with his Play Bach Trio. Loussier’s focus has since turned more towards composing, his predilection for fusing jazz and classical elements expressed at its most economical in these two Violin Concertos. Eloquent expressiveness and colourful use of percussion characterise the First Concerto, while the Indian influence in the Second Concerto emerges through violin improvisation and rhythmic counterpoint from the tabla. Like Loussier, Paderewski was a piano virtuoso who turned to composition in later life, the Violin Sonata being one of his finest earlier works. Sales Points • The name Jacques Loussier hardly needs any introduction, but even with his famously jazzy forays into the music of Bach and beyond not many will associate his name with ‘serious’ or ‘classical’ composition. Loussier’s First Violin Concerto has appeared before, but in a 2CD compilation along with 8.573200 Playing Time: further trio recordings. This is the first time it has been brought together with the 65:14 Second Violin Concerto from 2006, and Jacques Loussier’s many fans worldwide will be eager to discover his most recent original work in a program of fine new 7 47313 32007 3 performances.