Stravinsky: Pulcinella Suite

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There is much to admire here, with flowing lines throughout, giving elegance to the lilting sections of Pulchinella and imbuing much of Apollon Musagète with a suitable stylishness. The latter’s... — BBC Music Magazine, September 2016 More…

Release Date: 27th May 2016
Catalogue No: BIS2211
Label: BIS
Length: 64 minutes

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Stravinsky: Pulcinella Suite

Work length21:46

$9.00

$11.70

$15.75

Tapiola Sinfonietta
Masaaki Suzuki
Recorded: April 2015
Recording Venue: Tapiola Concert Hall, Finland

I. Overture: Sinfonia

Track length1:59

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

II. Serenata

Track length2:50

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

III. Scherzino - Allegro - Andantino

Track length4:19

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

IV. Tarantella

Track length1:59

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

V. Toccata

Track length0:57

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

VI. Gavotta - Variation No. 1 - Variation No. 2

Track length3:51

$1.00

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$1.75

VII. Vivo

Track length1:30

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

VIII. Minuetto

Track length2:23

$1.00

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$1.75

IX. Finale

Track length1:58

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$1.75

Stravinsky: Apollon musagète

Work length29:45

$10.00

$13.00

$17.50

Tapiola Sinfonietta
Masaaki Suzuki
Recorded: April 2015
Recording Venue: Tapiola Concert Hall, Finland

Tableau I: Prologue: The Birth of Apollo

Track length4:55

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Tableau II: Apollo's Variation

Track length3:02

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Tableau II: Pas d'action: Apollo and the Muses

Track length4:24

$1.00

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$1.75

Tableau II: Variation of Calliope

Track length1:32

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Tableau II: Variation of Polymnia

Track length1:23

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Tableau II: Variation of Terpsichore

Track length1:42

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Tableau II: Variation of Apollo

Track length2:22

$1.00

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$1.75

Tableau II: Pas de deux: Apollo and Terpsichore

Track length3:47

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Tableau II: Coda: Apollo and the Muses

Track length3:24

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Tableau II: Apotheosis: Apollo and the Muses

Track length3:14

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Stravinsky: Concerto in D for string orchestra 'Basler'

Work length12:28

$3.00

$3.90

$5.25

Tapiola Sinfonietta
Masaaki Suzuki
Recorded: April 2015
Recording Venue: Tapiola Concert Hall, Finland

I. Vivace

Track length5:49

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

II. Arioso: Andantino

Track length2:57

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

III. Rondo: Allegro

Track length3:42

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

About
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About

Masaaki Suzuki is firmly established as a leading authority on the works of Bach, both in his capacity as director of the Bach Collegium Japan and as an organist and harpsichordist. In recent years he has also been appearing in front of eminent orchestras worldwide, however, conducting repertoire as diverse as Britten, Fauré or Mahler. For his first recording of 20th century repertoire, Suzuki has chosen to collaborate with the acclaimed Tapiola Sinfonietta in an all-Stravinsky programme. The disc begins with the music for Pulcinella – here in the concert suite devised by the composer – which Stravinsky later described as ‘the epiphany through which the whole of my later work became possible’. Pulcinella was commissioned in 1919 by the Ballets Russes, for which Stravinsky had already written The Firebird, Petrushka and The Rite of Spring. For this adaptation of an early eighteenth-century commedia dell'arte libretto, he based his score on existing music, initially ascribed to Pergolesi although material by other baroque composers is also included. Stravinsky’s approach is never that of a faithful transcriber, however: in Pulcinella the material is slanted harmonically, rhythmically and texturally in a manner reminiscent of cubism – and it was indeed Picasso who provided the decor and costumes for the ballet's first performance. The neoclassical (or neobaroque) spirit remained a vital part of Stravinsky’s compositional armoury for a long time, and also informs the other two works presented here. The formal design of Concerto in D, composed some 25 years after Pulcinella, pays homage to the baroque concerti grossi of Vivaldi and Bach, while the score for the ballet Apollon musagète (also known as Apollo) contains references to French music from the 17th- and 18th-century – but there are also echoes of Tchaikovskian lushness in the work which is richly scored for a string orchestra which is often subdivided, and with many distinctions between solo and tutti lines.

Reviews

September 2016

There is much to admire here, with flowing lines throughout, giving elegance to the lilting sections of Pulchinella and imbuing much of Apollon Musagète with a suitable stylishness. The latter’s ‘Pas de deux’ is especially affecting, while Suzuki and the Tapiola Sifonietta make the Arioso of the Concerto in D an attractively unassuming passage of sustained reflection

July 2016

Suzuki is a time traveller who restricts string vibrato more than some will like. In Apollo he delights in refreshing Stravinsky’s unexpected chords with a distinctly scrunchy edge, while his nicely animated Pulcinella tends to be voiced à l’ancienne

1st June 2016

A nicely recorded and performed disc

23rd June 2016

There’s a baroque sensibility to their performance of the suite from Pulcinella... Suzuki makes each note count as the individual lines combine and compete, perhaps at the expense of the music’s natural, classical lyricism. And so, while it’s crisp and pleasingly emphatic, there’s a sense that the performance is keeping a lid on the music’s exuberance.

Stravinsky: Pulcinella Suite

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