• P.E\ilt:.\.VS R.:VIE'-i'-/S e Instrumental WOMEN Bantock Rediscovered Couperin Women Piano Music Key board works Volume 1 Music by Gubaidulina, ,vlaria Marchan t BertrJ n d Cui lier hps d Saariaho et al SOM M SOIV!MCD1083 HARMO NIA MUN DI H MM9 02 3 7 576 Sofya Me likyan p ***trtr ***** IBS CLASSICAL I8S7201 8 A neglected figure receives All the wo rld's a stage, but ****-ti- committed advocacy Cuiller no mere player Female com posers shine in the hands of an Armenian pianist SirGraiw illc B~ntock (i868-19 46j 13est ofluck to h arpbich ord ist The Organ of St Bavo, v,as prominent in English music al 13ertra11d Cuil k r. Th is disc mar b 1\tmc n ian p ia nist Sofya lvfclikyan Haarlem life in the early 20th cenl u ry, nol th e start of a projected co mplete h Js assemb led a dazzling prog-ram Music by Bach, Mendelssohn ju st as a composer b u las a tireles s Coupe rin keyhoard ser ies, Jt ¼·on 't of styl istically and geogrnp hically Reicha teacher, musical .idministrator and be casy, sin ce it mi.' ans cove 1-ing the and Reubke d iv\"rsc pieces hy 20th -centur y Reicha Rediscovered Vol ume 2 entrepren eur. Like Beecham he Joseph Nolan org 27 ordres ove r fou r b ook s, totall ing­ female comp osers for th is disc. JI lvJ n Ilic p SIGN U l'1CLASSICS SIGCD546 established festivals, choral grnu p s more thai , 220 piece s, op ens with the sole Piano Sona ta CHAN0 0 SC HAN2003 3 and orchestras (he co- founded the Cu.illcr's prog rn tn min g for by Tatar-Ru ssian com po ser Sofia H*** City ofBirmingham Orchestra ). lhis d isc is solid, thoug h slightl y Gu ba i<li1lina , whose mus ic is ***-irlr Arau nd 20 year, ago, Vernon ba i"fling, He calls it a "rnr tai n­ imb ued with a deep devo tio n to Ha ndlev recorded six discs ot rais er" and says th at th e pieces Russia n Ort hodox Chris tian ity. Ilic uncoversReicha's romantic NOLAN GOES DUTCH Ba nlock's orchestral works, creatin g he plays h l'rc all focus on the Comp o&ed in 1965, it employs A rare work of genius gets the performance it deserves renewed inter est in his musi c, th eat re, explicitly or ot herwis e. exten ded techn iqu es, ch ni maticism answer to the Well-Tempered Clavier British pianis t J\1aria .lvl.archant Vv11ile I'll ad mit to b ein g a litt le and per cussive tone dus ters to They may be me re st udi es fo r the "Use o f Yo ung Co mpos ers", gives us 23 of his short pi un o pieces , 8tumped by h is logic b eh in d th e Poor Julius Reubke, A talented pianist, organist losing momentum, As minor switches to major, hypn o tic and cap tiva ling effect bu t t he re is e ndle ss inve nt ion an d d e ligh t t o be fou nd in Czech­ none of which has been recorded th eatrical con n<c'ctio n s (quit e h ow and com poser, Hans van Bulow thought him the storm abates and sunshine floods the sound. Ge ghu ni Ch itchy-an stu d ied bor n French com po se r Ant o ine Reicha's 34 Etudes dans le Genre before. Mos t, li.keth e Cham,on de Berlin Conservat01y's best student. He became It's temporary, but thl- effect is stunning. Les Pavols - The Poppies - rela tes at the Kom itus Cons erw tory-in Fug ue, Se rb ian-Ame rican p ian ist Ivan llic's first volume de vot e d ,\foi (1930) and the Parade March J,jszt's lavourite when he studied with him in Sunlit in it, entirety is Buxtehude's F )>fojar to th e th eatre .. ,), it 's n onethel ess a Yere van, Arm l'nia . relu rt1ing for t o Reich a's so lo p iano wo rks feat u red fa£1t as ie s an d a cap riccio (1936), arc redolent th e pa st: ·weimar. In 1857he completed his masterful ]ciccataaud Fr.1g11e,which Nolandc>spatches Df ch arming sla rt to th e su rvey J len gthy teach in g caree i-the re. from 1803's Practisch e Beispi e/e a nd t h e Grande Son ate an d the se woul d fit neatly in to an B Flat Piano Sonata and C Mi nor Sonata on with a cheerful virtt1osity before leading us VI/h en Iti l'!lt sat down lo llstm , A rmeninn Bas-Rdie_fsis a suite of Sonata on o Theme of Mozart {both c.1805), Th is seco nd vo lume evening of Victoriana, though they the 94th Psalm for oi:ga n, A year later he i.nto the more dappled light ofl3ach 's Nun l was rnnv inced that Cuille r w as five lively m in iatu res strongl y comp rises search ing, sens iti ve ly -craf t ed perfo rma nces of t he po~t-datc the work of Schoenb erg was dead at just 28. Reubke's monolithic, Komm, di'r Heiden TTeiland- gentle - and Trio ovcr-orn am enli ng every p iece. infl uenced by J\ rm enian folk firs t 13 p re lu d es an d fug ues fr o m Re icha 's Op . 9 7, pu b l ishc d in and Stravinsky by decades, Th e Su re, the Fren ch Baroqu e tends to monothematic, programmatic organ scmata Jesus Christus Un;;erHei!and - slightly agitated. trad itions, inco rp orating local 1817, as we ll as an ear ly fug ue from h is 1807 O p. 36 set.Aga in, overture Saul is a piano redu ction fonns the centrepiece 0£\,Vest Australian­ These last three works feel I ike stops go pretty heavy on th e m orde nts mo t ifs an d mod al har mon ies. Pa ris­ Ilic pe rfo rms fr o m mo d ern edi t ions p ub lishe d by Sy me t rie and thot clearlv works better in its based Joseph Nolan's tenth organ - no pun intended - along the way and trills, but I w.is so sure th at it ba sed Kaija Saa ri a ho '8 Prelude, ed it ed by mus ico log ist Michae l Su lley. orchestra l garb, debpite )>larch.ant's wa s excessive th al Twa s surpr ised recital for Signum Classics, part of between the forbidding edifice of com p o&ed in 2007, "seem s lo p ay A child hoo d fr iend o f Beetho ve n, Reicha was no o rd inary com mitted advoca,·y. to read that Cui lle r here follows a significant body of recordings Influenced by the Chaconneand Mendc>lssohn's ho m age to a lin eage of Fren ch t e ache r, d evo t ed t o tr adit ion bu t alway s o pe n t o in riova t ion. " perhap, finest ,vork for org an, hls The best p icn'S arc ~ rnon g Coupe rin's em bellish m.enb including a highly-acdnimcd Liszt, Reubkcpaints mu sic ran gin g from sp ectra lis m to His coun t e rp o int st ude nt s included Liszt , Berl io z., Go un od and the miniatures: Ban tock 's nod to tmversal of the complete solo ~hudder!ng visions Sonata in D Mi nor, its submerged prec isely Coup erin ap pa ren tly imp ressio nism, " as Jorg e Fernandez Franck , As Ilic w rites: "On e m ig ht g uess t hat a co mpo ser w h o cf trepidatkm and passion brought to the surface th e French Impressi onis ts in the thou ght play ers ignorin g or organ music of \Vidor, Gu err a obs,~rw s in h is liner no tes, spen t so m u ch ti me t eac hin g the rules of a st rict , co mp lex triumph atmospheric Like the other works here, by -'Johm with as much elegance Cloistm; at Midnight replacing his orname nt&w as with wa terfa Us of no tes ca,cad i ng mu sical st y le wo u ld w rit e d ry, life less mus ic. The rea lit y is the fou re--like the Sonata on the 94th Psalm is as clan. Mendelssohn's relative (1920), Barcaralle an '\m pa rdo nable ne gligence>" ' in timb ral drople t, _Raq uel Qu iaro t hat h is mus ic is fu ll of w it a nd charm," (1894), and ,\1mnnries of Sapphire, performed on Christian l'vffiller and conservatism serves as c1nideal Th ere's still plent y of Cuillcr 's is a Ven ezu elan com p oser now ·' Inde e d it is. Ma ny of t he p re Iu de s. su ch as t he no ct u rn e­ Jan van Logteren's magnificent 1738 organ '' introduction to, and foil for, Reubke's composed in Colorado for a lady pe rsonality in the playing here, based in Ma d rid.