4008 Dutch Cello Sonatas Vol.1 :24/07 Muffat / La Stravaganza 12.08.2008 1 Dutch Cello Sonatas Pijper · Ponse Escher Doris Hochscheid violoncello VOL. 1 Frans van Ruth piano Dutch Sonatas for Violoncello and Piano Vol. 1 Doris Hochscheid, violoncello Production: Werner Dabringhaus, Niederländische Sonaten für Violoncello und Klavier Vol. 1 Frans van Ruth, piano Reimund Grimm Tonmeister: Friedrich Wilhelm Rödding Willem Pijper (1894-1947) Recording: January, 21-23, 2008, Ehem. Sonata for Violoncello and Piano (1919) 17’13 Ackerhaus der Abtei Marienmünster 1 Maestoso (Lento ma non troppo) 6’11 Piano Tuning: Eduard Unrau 2 Nocturne 5’00 © Text: Prof. Frans van Ruth 3 Finale. Maestoso (Andante moderato.) 6’01 Editor / Redaktion: Dr. Irmlind Capelle Luctor Ponse (1914-1998) Dabringhaus und Grimm Audiovision Sonata for Violoncello and Piano (1943) 23’16 GmbH, Bachstr. 35, D-32756 Detmold 4 Allegro con moto 5’54 Tel.: +49-(0)5231-93890 5 Vivace 3’08 Fax: +49-(0)5231-26186 6 Lento 9’46 email: [email protected] 7 Allegro 4’26 Internet: http://www.mdg.de Willem Pijper (1894-1947) ©+® 2008, MDG, Made in Germany Sonata No. 2 12’10 for Violoncello and Piano (1924) Audiomax 903 1534-6 8 Larghetto grazioso 4’51 9 Allegro pesante, ma agitato 2’41 10 Molto lento 4’37 Diese CD wurde ermöglicht durch: Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds, Rudolf Escher (1912-1980) G.H.G. von Brucken Fock Fonds, Sonata concertante 22’53 Nederlands Muziek Instituut, for Violoncello and Piano (1943, rev. 1955) Muziekcentrum Nederland, 11 Allegro agitato 7’20 Stichting Werk Luctor Ponse, 12 Largo 9’09 Willem Pijper Stichting. 13 Lento – Allegrissimo 6’22 Total Time: 75’56 is a trademark of 2+2+2 AG in 4452 Itingen Switzerland 2 3 The Belgian cellist Marix Loevensohn (1892-1981), and in 1930 he premiered the developments in France and especially for (1880-1943) was appointed the new solo sonata (1928) by Pijper’s very gifted pupil the music of Claude Debussy. MDG - cellist of the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Piet Ketting (1904-84) – on both occasions Debussy’s significance for innovators Our Sound Ideal Orchestra in 1915. Loevensohn was sin- again accompanied by the composer at the such as Matthijs Vermeulen (1888-1967) cerely devoted to the music of his time. piano. Finally, in 1936 Loevensohn bade and Willem Pijper as well as for the All MDG recordings are produced in When in 1919 he organized ten concerts on farewell to the Concertgebouw Orchestra generation following them can hardly be the natural acoustics of spe cially behalf of the »Independents,« a society of with Willem Pijper’s cello concerto (1936), overestimated and in part explains why chosen concert halls. It goes without artists presenting its thirteenth exhibition in a work dedicated to him, in a performance our general impression continues to be that saying that our audio phile label the City Museum, he asked Dutch compos- conducted by Willem Mengelberg. Dutch music then exchanged a German refrains from any sort of soundmodi- ers to work along with him, »with ample Dutch music had worked its way out orientation for a French one. Debussy had fying manipulation with reverb eration, room for the younger ones« and »without of its identity crisis after the 1840s through died on 27 March 1918, and the Concert- sound filters, or limiters. preference for any current or school.« It was a one-sided orientation to German music. gebouw Orchestra dedicated a memorial thus that within seven days, on 13 and 19 German musicians were invited to the Neth- concert to him already on 14 April. In May September, the premieres of two sonatas erlands as teachers or music directors; at 1918 Vermeulen began work on his First We aim at genuine reproduction with today belonging to the canon of Dutch the same time, many talented young Dutch Cello Sonata, an undertaking that in all precise depth gradation, original music for cello and piano were held: the musicians made their way to Germany and likelihood had been directly inspired by dynamics, and natural tone colors. It sonata by Henriëtte Bosmans (1895-1952) especially to Leipzig. Dutch critics holding a performance of Debussy’s cello sonata is thus that each work acquires its and the First Sonata by Willem Pijper (1894- their dogmatic red pencils watched very (1915) presented by Thomas Canivez and musically appropriate spatial dimen- 1947). Both composers dedicated their closely to see if new Dutch compositions Evert Cornelis not too long before. »That sion and that the artistic interpretation sonatas to Loevensohn and accompanied were in line with the theories of the Leipzig everything that Debussy designed is fantas- attains to the greatest possible natural- him at the piano. The Amsterdam music professor Jadassohn and his colleagues. tically new,« Vermeulen wrote, »is shown ness and vividness. shop Broekmans & van Poppel kindly pub- Although performances of music by even by the last works that he wrote shortly lished these works. Mahler and Strauss did occur in Amsterdam prior to his death. Just imagine how every Loevensohn remained true to his during the first decades of the twentieth composer in the world would conceive or composers and to his calling. He incorpo- century, with these performances still rank- has conceived a cello sonata, and compare rated all three concertante compositions ing with the best of all, and of Schönberg’s this with that by Debussy, where every by Bosmans and her complete chamber Gurre-Lieder, Verklärte Nacht, Pelleas und measure shows how a genial mind fashions Complete information about MDG music with cello (with the exception of Melisande, and Five Orchestral Pieces, many dreams and wonders, opens possibilities, productions - cata logue, booklets, the string quartet) into his repertoire. In composers born in the 1880s or 1890s in such an old-fashioned combination as table of contents - are available for 1924 Pijper also dedicated his Second Cello aimed at a much more radical innovation, piano and cello« (4 April 1918). consultation by the visually im paired Sonata to Loevensohn. At the end of the at a liberation. The key figure for them Pijper’s First Cello Sonata would also be in Braille and on data bases. 1920s Loevensohn was one of the first was Alphonse Diepenbrock (1862-1921), difficult to understand without Debussy’s to perform the Sonata (1926) written for who was a close friend of Mahler but at music. In this respect it is more modern Thomas Canivez by Hendrik Andriessen the same time had an open ear for musical as well as more provocative than his First 4 5 Violin Sonata from the same year, which not necessarily maintaining its solo status more clearly bears traces of Mahler. Matt- during this process. The primacy of the hijs Vermeulen wrote, »I have not heard in melody is nevertheless always upheld. In a long time music so surprising, gripping, 1929 he wrote, »Music arises exclusively and impressive as the beginning of the noc- from melodic elements; musical value is turne of his cello sonata, with that new and melodic value.« original cello voice of the sautillé combined During these years Pijper, as if in a with unarticulated glissandos. That is the state of creative transport, composed most expressive instrumentation of night almost all his important chamber works: noise blown away in gusts that I know.« the Septet for Piano, Wind Quintet, and Both quotations by Vermeulen show how Double Bass and Second String Quartet in important »innovation« was in that epoch 1920, the Second Piano Trio in 1921, the for the new generation of composers. Second Violin Sonata in 1922, the Sextet It is a remarkable fact that both sonatas for Piano and Wind Quintet and Third String by Pijper found their place in the programs of Quartet in 1923, the Second Cello Sonata the Verein für musikalische Privataufführun- in 1924, the Second Piano Sonatina, Third gen in Vienna in 1921. The violin sonata Piano Sonatina, and Flute Sonata in 1925, was performed a total of three times by the Fourth String Quartet in 1928, and the Rudolf Kolisch and Elly Lüttmann and the Piano Sonata in 1930. At the same time cello sonata by Wilhelm Winkler and Selma his international star increasingly rose. Stampfler on 7 November. By the way, Performances of his Second Violin Sonata Schönberg, the midpoint of the Vienna and Second Piano Trio in London in 1924 Verein, resided in Zandvoort, near Amster- motivated the Oxford University Press to dam, from October 1920 to March 1921. publish some of his works, including the Beginning in 1920 Pijper developed his Second Cello Sonata. His friendship with »germ-cell technique« on the basis of the Pierre Monteux, the French guest con- biological principle of the seed from which ductor of the Concertgebouw Orchestra, a whole plant grows. It was precisely the occasioned him to compose his Third employment of a little melodic cell that Symphony (1926). He also performed his Willem Pijper in den offered him countless opportunities to Piano Concerto (1927) under Monteux. 1920er Jahren develop his music organically, in continu- He was the founder and president of the (Archiv Nederlands ous transformations, and in a great many Dutch section of the International Society Muziek Instituut Den polytonal and polymetrical ramifications for Contemporary Music and served as the Haag) – with the traditional solo instrument first Dutch jury member during the 1929 6 7 festival in Geneva. During the same year he destroyed by fire. Rudolf Escher lost almost to say that I absolutely do not regard it as formulated as follows just how strongly his all his compositions, poems and paintings, inimical to the emotional sources of the feeling for innovation was geared toward and almost his whole library.