For the Love of Brahms

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Here’s an unconducted Double Concerto transformed into pure chamber music, in which two old friends spar amicably with the lithe support of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields. There’s an... — BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 2016, 5 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 30th Sep 2016
Catalogue No: 88985321792
Label: Sony
Length: 76 minutes

BBC Music Magazine

Concerto Choice
Presto Recordings of the Year

Finalist 2016

Brahms: Double Concerto in A Minor, Op. 102 for Violin, Cello and Orchestra

Work length33:03

Album only

Academy of St Martin in the Fields, Steven Isserlis (cello), Timothy Brown (horn), David Stark (bass), Matthew Featherstone (flute), Sarah Newbold (flute), Christopher Cowie (oboe), Rachel Ingleton (oboe), James Burke (clarinet), Tom Lessels (clarinet), Paul Boyes (bassoon), Graham Hobbs (bassoon), Joanna Hensel (horn), Lynda Houghton (bass), Emma Witney (horn), Mark David (trumpet), Imogen Hancock (trumpet), Adrian Bending (timpani), Caroline O'Connell (horn), Martin Loveday (cello), Rowena Calvert (cello), Jennifer Godson (violin), Joshua Bell (violin), Jeremy Denk, Harvey de Souza (violin), Gabrielle Painter (violin), Katie Stillman (violin), Robert Salter (violin), Fiona Brett (violin), Amanda Smith (violin), Catherine Morgan (violin), Jeremy Morris (violin), Will Schofield (cello), Helena Smart (violin), Matthew Ward (violin), Clare Hoffman (violin), Raja Halder (violin), Robert Smissen (viola), Fiona Bonds (viola), Ian Rathbone (viola), Alex Koustas (viola), Stephen Orton (cello)
Joshua Bell

I. Allegro

Track length16:50

Album only

II. Andante

Track length7:34

$1.30

$1.70

$2.00

III. Vivace non troppo

Track length8:39

$1.30

$1.70

$2.00

Excerpt, Schumann: Violin Concerto in D minor Op. posth.

Work length6:21

$1.30

$1.70

$2.00

Academy of St Martin in the Fields, Joshua Bell (violin), Steven Isserlis (cello), Timothy Brown (horn), David Stark (bass), Matthew Featherstone (flute), Sarah Newbold (flute), Christopher Cowie (oboe), Rachel Ingleton (oboe), James Burke (clarinet), Tom Lessels (clarinet), Paul Boyes (bassoon), Graham Hobbs (bassoon), Joanna Hensel (horn), Lynda Houghton (bass), Emma Witney (horn), Mark David (trumpet), Imogen Hancock (trumpet), Adrian Bending (timpani), Caroline O'Connell (horn), Martin Loveday (cello), Rowena Calvert (cello), Jennifer Godson (violin), Jeremy Denk, Harvey de Souza (violin), Gabrielle Painter (violin), Katie Stillman (violin), Robert Salter (violin), Fiona Brett (violin), Amanda Smith (violin), Catherine Morgan (violin), Jeremy Morris (violin), Will Schofield (cello), Helena Smart (violin), Matthew Ward (violin), Clare Hoffman (violin), Raja Halder (violin), Robert Smissen (viola), Fiona Bonds (viola), Ian Rathbone (viola), Alex Koustas (viola), Stephen Orton (cello)

II. Langsam (coda by Benjamin Britten)

Track length6:21

$1.30

$1.70

$2.00

Brahms: Piano Trio No. 1 in B major, Op. 8

Work length36:56

Album only

Joshua Bell (violin), Jeremy Denk (piano), Steven Isserlis (cello)

Allegro con moto - Tempo un poco più Moderato

Track length13:16

Album only

Scherzo: Allegro molto - Trio: Più lento - Tempo primo

Track length6:34

$1.30

$1.70

$2.00

Adagio non troppo - Allegro - Tempo primo

Track length8:04

$1.30

$1.70

$2.00

Finale: Allegro molto agitato - Un poco più lento - Tempo primo

Track length9:02

$1.30

$1.70

$2.00

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Violinist Joshua Bell and cellist Steven Isserlis are joined by two acclaimed musical forces - pianist Jeremy Denk and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, of which Bell is Music Director – in a landmark joint recording, For the Love of Brahms (Sony Classical). Available September 30, 2016, the new album is a unique project that features works of Brahms and Schumann that Bell calls “music about love and friendship.”

Bell, Isserlis and Denk unite here in Brahms’s first published chamber work, the Piano Trio in B Major, Op. 8 in its rarely performed original 1854 version. Isserlis also joins Bell – as violin soloist and director – and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields in Brahms’s last orchestral work, the celebrated Double Concerto (for Violin and Cello) in A Minor, Op. 102. Bell, Isserlis and members of the Academy also offer the first recording of an unusual coupling: the slow movement of Schumann’s rarely heard Violin Concerto, in a version for string orchestra made by Benjamin Britten, who also added a short coda.

“I met Steven almost 30 years ago at a music festival, and he has been my close friend and frequent chamber music partner ever since. Jeremy and I have also shared a long-lasting friendship and we have recorded and performed together for more than a decade,” states Bell. “Therefore it is fitting that we all come together on this record to play music that is so deeply rooted in love and friendship.” Earlier this year, Bell, Isserlis and the Academy performed the Brahms Double Concerto to critical acclaim on an 11-date European tour, which Bell play-directed. The tour also featured the Schumann, and this recording followed. “Steven and I have performed the Double concerto of Brahms many times over the years, and I am so pleased that we found the perfect collaborators in the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields so we could finally record this piece that means so much to us,” adds Bell.

For the Love of Brahms continues Joshua Bell’s long and acclaimed partnership with the London-based Academy of St Martin in the Fields. Since 2011, Bell has been the orchestra’s principal conductor, succeeding its founder Sir Neville Marriner and the only other person to hold that title. Bell’s most recent Sony Classical recordings with the orchestra include Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, a Bach concerto collection, and Bell’s first recording solely as a conductor, of Beethoven’s Fourth and Seventh Symphonies.

Reviews

Christmas 2016

Here’s an unconducted Double Concerto transformed into pure chamber music, in which two old friends spar amicably with the lithe support of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields. There’s an intriguing, subtly competitive friction between violinist Joshua Bell and cellist Stephen Isserlis, the one so glossy and fluent, the latter more gnarly and individual, each audibly inspiring – and often provoking – the other

Awards Issue 2016

[Bell and Isserlis] are distinct musical personalities yet they work together extremely well in Brahms’s interpretatively perilous Double Concerto – Bell’s sweet-toned ardour is at once anchored and buoyed by Isserlis’s gruffer, more ruminative style

For the Love of Brahms

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