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Presto News - 24th May 2010Shostakovich Preludes & Fugues from Melnikov |
 Russian composer Dmitri Shostakovich went to Leipzig in 1950 for a music festival marking the two-hundredth anniversary of the death of J.S. Bach. In addition to enjoying a lot of Bach’s music, he was also on the judging panel for the first International Bach Competition. It was in this competition that he first came into contact with the remarkable Russian pianist Tatiana Nikolayeva (then aged 26 and virtually unknown). One of the requirements of the competition was that each competitor would play one of Bach’s 48 Preludes and Fugues. Nikolayeva had come prepared to play all of them so asked the jury which one they’d like to hear! She won the first prize, but more importantly started a lifelong friendship with Shostakovich.  Alexander Melnikov Inspired by the music of Bach, and also the playing of his new young pianist friend, Shostakovich returned to Moscow and set about the composition of his own 24 Preludes and Fugues. He completed them at great speed - taking just three and a half months to write about two and half hours music - and every time he completed one he would invite Nikolayeva (who also lived in Moscow) round in order to play it to her. On completion the cycle was dedicated to Nikolayeva and she gave the first public performance in 1952. She went on to make three recordings of the work, and it is therefore not surprising that her name has become almost synonymous with it. There have however been other notable recordings – not least from Vladimir Ashkenazy and Keith Jarrett. But over the last few weeks I’ve been enjoying a new recording from the outstanding Russian pianist Alexander Melnikov. It is on 3 CDs and the reverse side of the third disc features a short DVD film of Melnikov talking about and demonstrating some of his thoughts on the work. He also writes a very detailed and illuminating booklet note which goes further into the background of the Preludes and Fugues and also the perception of the work today. The cycle as a whole contains a huge range of emotions and styles and therefore demands a considerable technical and musical armoury from the performer. Melnikov demonstrates this throughout – weight and solemnity, mysterious and atmospheric, fast and furious, light and brilliant - all easily within his range. But the really impressive thing about it is that it all sounds so natural and fresh. He is not scared of trying to get to the heart of the music and demonstrates throughout his complete love and devotion to it. The recorded sound is excellent, in a rich and full acoustic, but never to the detriment of detail. All in all a superb achievement, and thoroughly recommended both to those familiar with the Preludes and Fugues and to those new to them (where the background you get from the DVD and booklet is hugely valuable). I’ve put a short excerpt from the DVD on the website to give you an idea.
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 Shostakovich: Preludes & Fugues for piano (24), Op. 87 (complete)Alexander Melnikov (piano) |
Chris O'Reilly - chris@prestoclassical.co.uk |
Watch a short video trailerNew Releases24th May 2010 |
This is just the pick of the recent releases. The New Releases and Future Releases pages are always available for browsing all the new and forthcoming releases. |
 El Nuevo MundoMontserrat Figueras, La Capella Reial de Catalunya, Hespèrion XXI & Tembembe Ensamble Continuo, Jordi SavallAfter meeting the musical traditions of the New World, the European Baroque repertoire enriched itself with new colours and rhythms, which make it irresistible. Jordi Savall invites us to an unprecedented instrumental and vocal journey from Spain to Peru to Mexico, playing for the first time with virtuoso Mexican musicians… Get ready ! |
 Mahler: Symphony No. 9 in D majorPhilharmonia Orchestra, Esa-Pekka SalonenSignum’s third disc with the Philharmonia Orchestra and their Principal Conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen is drawn again from their celebrated Vienna: City of Dreams series of 2008-9. The Ninth Symphony is often interpreted as a farewell to the world, in part because Mahler never had the chance to hear it performed. As one critic wrote, “If you want to learn to weep, you should listen to the first movement of the Ninth, the great, magnificent song of ultimate farewell”. Other releases this year with the Philharmonia orchestra will include Mahler’s Sixth Symphony with Esa-Pekka Salonen, and Mahler’s Fourth Symphony with Sir Charles Mackerras. |
 Stravinsky - Les Noces and Oedipus RexMariinsky Soloists, Orchestra and Chorus, Valery GergievEach release from the Mariinsky label to date has featured music by some of the great Russian composers with whom the Mariinsky Theatre has enjoyed close relationships. For the label’s sixth release, Valery Gergiev turns to the music of Igor Stravinsky, a composer who grew up in St Petersburg, attending performances at the Mariinsky Theatre where his father sang. Less than four years separate the premieres of Les Noces and Oedipus Rex, yet they each represent high-points in two distinct phases of Stravinsky’s career. |
 William Hayes: The PassionsEvelyn Tubb, Ulrike Hofbauer (sopranos), Sumihito Uesugi (countertenor), David Munderloh (tenor) & Lisandro Abadie (bass), Chor der Schola Cantorum Basiliensis & La Cetra Barockorchester Basel, Anthony Rooley (direction)During the course of the Age of Enlightenment a rather special, indeed unique, occasion took place (on July 6, 1750, to be exact) with the first performance – in Oxford as part of a University celebration there – of a composition by William Hayes to a well-known humanist text: The Passions, An Ode for Music (written in 1746 by William Collins). Anthony Rooley is responsible for the rediscovery of this significant work and here leads a performance with soloists and ensembles closely linked with the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, in the first release of a new collection directed by Glossa and the Swiss establishment, the leading educational and research centre in the field of early music. |
 Egon Wellesz - Choral MusicClive Driskill-Smith (organ), Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Stephen Darlington (director)A Catholic convert from Judaism, Wellesz composed a significant amount of sacred music, including five masses, two of which – the first and the last – feature on this disc. Wellesz’s operas of the 1920s contain a significant amount of virtuoso choral writing, and this quality carries over into his church music, although on the whole they are written in a simpler, more traditionally tonal idiom. |
 Poulenc - Music for Piano & WindEnsemble 360Music in the Round is Britain’s leading chamber music promoter outside London. Based in Sheffield, it began in 1984 as a two week long festival in its ‘in the round’ home of the Sheffield Theatres Studio. The Festival is still running along with Autumn and Spring series, a large and expanding education and community programme Music in the Community, a national touring programme, series across South Yorkshire and resident group Ensemble 360. Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK not only for the quality and integrity of their playing, but also for their ability to communicate the music to a range of different audiences. Formed in 2005, as eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in Sheffield with Music in the Round establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist. |
 Wagner: Lohengrin - DVDJonas Kaufmann (Lohengrin), Anja Harteros (Elsa), Wolfgang Koch (Telramund), Michaela Schuster (Ortrud), Christof Fischesser (König Heinrich), Evgeny Nikitin (Herald), Bavarian State Opera, Kent NaganoJonas Kaufmann’s sensational role debut as Wagner’s Lohengrin was the talk of the 2009 Munich Festival, and is a logical follow-up to the success of his German arias album (4781463), described by Hugh Canning in International Record Review as “one of the vocal records of the year [2009], if not the decade” His sound, a unique combination of torrid sensuality and radiant, crystalline purity, serves a musico-dramatic intelligence that makes a unity of Lohengrin’s often difficult to reconcile heroic and lyric elements. Partnered by Anja Harteros, Kaufmann heads a stellar cast conducted by Kent Nagano |
 12 New Brilliant Classics issuesAnother excellent batch of Brilliant Classics releases including re-issues of Salvatore Accardo playing Elgar, The Britten Quartet playing Britten, a rare recording for Tchaikovsky's The Snow Maiden, the Lasalle Quartet playing the late Beethoven Quartets and Sinopoli's excellent reading of Schumann's Das Paradies und die Peri. Also this month are some new recordings of C.P.E. Bach and Roslavets. |
 BBC Radio 3 CD ReviewSaturday 22nd May 2010 |
Building a Library Special Feature - Recent Mahler Symphony Recordings |
 Mahler: Symphony No 9Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart des SWR, Roger Norrington |
 Mahler: Symphony No 4Laura Claycomb (soprano), London Symphony Orchestra, Valery Gergiev |
 Mahler: Symphony No 4Miah Persson (soprano), Budapest Festival Orchestra, Ivan Fischer |
Mahler: Symphony No 1Christine Schafer (soprano), Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, Christoph Eschenbach |
 Mahler: Symphony No 2Yvonne Kenny (soprano), Jard van Nes (mezzo soprano), London Philharmonic Orchestra, Klaus Tennstedt |
 Mahler: Symphony No 2Anne Schwanewilms (soprano), Lioba Braun (contralto), Chor der Bamberger Symphoniker, Bamberger Symphoniker, Jonathan Nott |
 Mahler: Symphony No 8Various soloists, Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, David Zinman |
 Mahler: Symphony No 8Various soloists, San Francisco Symphony, Michael Tilson Thomas |
Disc of the Week |
 Monteverdi: L'incoronazione di PoppeaNaples manuscript versionEmanuela Galli (Poppea), Roberta Mameli (Nerone), Josè Maria Lo Monaco (Ottone), Xenia Meijer (Ottavia), Ian Honeyman (Arnalta) & Raffaele Costantini (Seneca), La Venexiana, Claudio Cavina (direction) |
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