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See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Britten: Violin Concerto & Double Concerto
Long recognized as an outstanding chamber musician, Anthony Marwood has more recently been making waves as a concerto soloist, with two contributions to the Romantic Violin Concerto series and now a disc of Britten with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and Ilan Volkov. The youthful Violin Concerto, with its mix of anguished lyricism and changeability of mood nods to both Berg (whose own Violin Concerto had made a profound impression on Britten) and Prokofiev but the result is entirely personal. The still earlier Double Concerto, for violin and viola, is impressive above all for its precocious confidence; written when Britten was just eighteen and still a student at the Royal College of Music, it had to wait sixty-five years before receiving its belated premiere in 1997 at the 50th Aldeburgh Festival. Anthony Marwood is joined by star violist Lawrence Power (who makes two appearances in Hyperion’s new releases this month). The viola was Britten’s own instrument and his Lachrymae, inspired by a Dowland song, brings us to the other end of his career, for though it was composed in 1950, it wasn’t orchestrated until 1976, the year of his death. “This latest version is one of the best so far. Anthony Marwood's slightly detached, rhythmically incisive playing suits the dry, distantly neoclassical world of the Concerto perfectly, and Ilan Volkov marshals an equally crisp accompaniment. Nevertheless, the performance of the Double Concerto for violin, viola and strings seems even more remarkable...it [is] made to seem a wonderfully distinctive and characterful work.” The Guardian, 2nd February 2012 **** “Anthony Marwood can hold his bowing arm high...with this bittersweet, sinuously virtuosic account of a work that repays repeated listening and vindicates Britten’s faith in it. He is joined by Lawrence Power for a sumptuous account of the early (1932) Double Concerto...A brilliantly planned, played and recorded release.” Sunday Times, 12th February 2012 “This is a lithe, spiky rhythmical performance, bristling with satire in the Shostakovich style, at speeds well ahead of Britten's own. There is some lack of aural beauty...but every phrase is highly charged...Could this be a more telling depiction of the 1930s than the bittersweet sentiment found on the composer's own recording decades later?” Gramophone Magazine, March 2012 “Has the opening Moderato’s edgy lyricism ever sounded so tantalisingly seductive? Marwood goes on to capture the sinewy vitality of the middle movement and, no less brilliantly, the quixotic moods of the closing Passacaglia...Power’s big tone and bewitching agility give [Lachrymae] a stature that belies its modest duration.” Financial Times, 24th February 2012 **** “This is a highly distinguished recording, very intelligently planned and exceptionally well executed...For me, the greatest revelation on this disc is the Double Concerto...the performance on this disc by Marwood and Lawrence Power reveals it to be an astonishing achievement as a work of art on several levels...Volkov has this style of composition almost in his blood and follows Power admirably [in Lachrymae].” International Record Review, February 2012 “Aided by the alert Ilan Volkov, Anthony Marwood and Lawrence Power form a persuasive partnership...we are left in no doubt about the levels of searing commitment behind Marwood's performance. It's rounded off by Power's deeply thoughtful and refined account of the Lachrymae.” BBC Music Magazine, April 2012 **** “[Lachrymae is] exquisite, beautifully played here by Lawrence Power...Volkov’s BBC Scottish SO relish the first movement’s spiky, quirky invention and are a superb foil for Anthony Marwood in the central danse macabre [of the Violin Concerto]...It’s a compelling work, and this is a wonderful recording.” The Arts Desk, 17th March 2012 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Lachrymae: Music For Strings
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| |  | Edward Gardner conducts Britten
The repertoire on this CD is written across a period of more than forty-five years, from the year Britten entered the Royal College of Music at the age of sixteen, to the very last year of his life. The works are performed by the BBC Symphony Orchestra, and they are conducted by Edward Gardner, whose Britten release in March 2011 (CHAN10658) was made Disc of the Month in the April issue of BBC Music. They are joined by two extraordinary soloists. Sarah Connolly CBE is one of the foremost British mezzo-sopranos and a fellow of the Royal College of Music. She has been nominated for a Laurence Olivier Award, a TMA Award, and two Grammy awards – and won Edison, Gramophone, and South Bank awards. The violist Maxim Rysanov is one of the up-and-coming stars on today’s classical music scene. In the words of Gramophone: ‘It is rare for a musician featured as our One to Watch, already to be on his second Editor’s Choice…, but such is the pace of viola-player Maxim Rysanov’s rise that it’s difficult to keep up.’ The earliest of the works recorded here is Britten’s Two Portraits for strings. Written around the time Britten joined the Royal College of Music, this work remained unpublished during his lifetime. It was published only posthumously, in 1997. The first ‘portrait’ is an exuberant character-study of a childhood friend. The second, by contrast, is a characteristically introspective self-portrait, with the plaintive voice of the viola (the string instrument that Britten himself played) taking the lead. The soloist in the Two Portraits and Lachrymae is Maxim Rysanov. The cantata Phaedra, Op. 93 is one of the very last works written by the composer before his death in 1976. Britten modelled the work on the Italian baroque cantatas of Handel, but it is also strongly influenced by Purcell, especially in the quality of the word setting. Phaedra is based on Robert Lowell’s acclaimed verse translation of Racine’s classical tragedy Phèdre, in which Phaedra, who is suffering from unrequited love for Hippolytus, the son of her husband by his former wife, causes his death, before, devastated by remorse, she takes her own life. Originally written for the mezzo-soprano Janet Baker, the tragic part of Phaedra is here sung by Sarah Connolly (also featured in A Charm of Lullabies). This is an extremely taut and economical work, very intense, and emotionally charged. “[Connolly's] plush mezzo is in prime condition. This is the highlight of an unusual programme of five works spanning more than 40 years of Britten’s career...The prodigious Sinfonietta, which Britten was proud to call his Op 1, completes this surprisingly successful collection of his short works.” Sunday Times, 1st May 2011 **** “Gardner’s sympathy for the music of Britten is fully displayed in a programme ranging from juvenilia to the late Phaedra, a short cantata with the force of an opera. But the dominating artist is the mezzo Sarah Connolly, compelling as Racine’s heroine in the grip of a tragic passion. In a quieter mood, Maxim Rysanov’s viola shines in the melancholic reflections of Lachrymae” The Times, 7th May 2011 **** “Sarah Connolly is tremendous is this new recording...her diction is impeccable and her sense of dramatic involvement is enormously impressive. She is also accompanied with exceptional sensitivity, attention to detail and theatrical flair by Edward Gardner and members of the BBC Symphony Orchestra...This disc, part of a series that clearly deserves the most serious attention from Britten collectors, is very strongly recommended.” International Record Review, May 2011 “Connolly reveals Phaedra’s stature, summoning such word-sensitivity, rhetorical flourish and classical poise that you wonder why this remarkable piece is not heard more often in the concert hall. Better still the stage: Connolly turns Racine’s heroine into the protagonist of an imaginary monodrama” Financial Times, 28th May 2011 **** “Gardner's sensitivity to the bittersweet Thirties idiom of the first portrait and the elegiac eloquence of viola soloist Maxim Rysanov in the second combine to highly atmospheric effect...Spurred on by Gardner's keen sense of theatre, Sarah Connolly goes straight for the drama...creat[ing] a veritable operatic scena...Rysanov returns as solost in a deeply thoughtful performance of Lachrymae...Imaginative programme, highly recommended.” Gramophone Magazine, July 2011 “[Rysanov] gives an outstanding reading of these 'reflections on a song of Dowland'...[Connolly's] ravishing accounts of A Charm of Lullabies and Phaedra subtly suggest in their colourations the singers Britten originally composed for: Nancy Evans and Janet Baker.” Classic FM Magazine, July 2011 **** “The real stunner...is Lachrymae...[which] benefits immensely from Edward Gardner's lean conducting and the sparse intensity of Maxim Rysanov's playing. Connolly is notably haunting in Colin Matthews's orchestration of the 1947 song cycle A Charm of Lullabies...Gardner and the BBC Symphony Orchestra are particularly good in the second movement [of the Sinfonietta]” The Guardian, 9th June 2011 **** “The Charm is a total winner, wrapped by Matthews in string woodwind sleep-music so familiar from the Nocturne and phrased by Connolly with alternate tenderness and edginess. Maxim Rysanov compels in introspective conversation with the excellent BBC Symphony strings in Lachrymae and is also behind the very fine self-portait of the teenage composer in Two Portraits.” BBC Music Magazine, July 2011 ***** | | | (also available to download from $10.50) | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. (Available now to download.) |
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| |  | British Viola Concertos
An enticing collection of British works brought together by the Tatjana Masurenko, who besides being on the European concert tour circuit as a guest soloist, is also a professor Viola at the oldest German ‘Hochschule für Musik’ in Leipzig. Garry Walker holds the position of Principal Guest Conductor of the Scottish National Orchestra and Permanent Guest Conductor of the RPO. “…Tatjana Masurenko… reading of Walton's masterpiece combines impressive technical acumen and no mean interpretative flair. The NDR Radiophilharmonie, too, respond with polish and keen vigour for Edinburgh-born Garry Walker… powerfully involving renderings of Britten's wondrous Lachrymae and Sally Beamish's First Concerto of 1995...” Gramophone Magazine, October 2009 | | | (also available to download from $10.50) | Usually despatched in 4 - 5 working days. (Available now to download.) |
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| |  | Britten - Variations on a theme of Frank Bridge
Jean-Paul Minali-Bella (arpegina) European Camerata, Laurent Quénelle The European Camerata was founded in 1995, to continue the work of the Youth Orchestra of the European Community, from which all members originate. It is conducted by violinist Laurent Quénelle, the orchestra plays standing up and this is only their second recording. Fuga Libera is delighted to welcome the European Camerata into its catalogue with four early works of Benjamin Britten.The Lachrimae, in the orchestral version first heard in 1976, is performed here on the arpegina, a large dissymmetrical viol, created by lutenist Bernard Sabatier for Jean-Paul Minali-Bella. “To find a continental ensemble concentrating on Britten is something of a novelty, but this disc of string music contains performances of superb sensitivity. The Frank Bridge variations and the Simple Symphony
are given the edge of spectacular brilliance they demand and a depth of feeling to boot. ..the sound is haunting.” Sunday Times | | | (also available to download from $10.50) | Usually despatched in 4 - 5 working days. (Available now to download.) |
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| |  | Britten: Phaedra, Lachrymae and other works
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“Steuart Bedford elicits great detail and character from the Simple Symphony, but most valuable is his account of the English Folk Tunes Suite, a late and strangely haunting composition. Unmissable value.” BBC Music Magazine, May 2005 **** | | | (also available to download from $6.00) | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. (Available now to download.) |
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| |  | Britten: Orchestral and String Works
Britten: | Four Sea Interludes and Passacaglia from Peter Grimes, Op. 33 Ulster Orchestra, Vernon Handley Young Apollo, Op. 16 I Musici de Montreal, Yuli Turovsky Death in Venice: suite English Chamber Orchestra, Steuart Bedford Variations on a theme of Frank Bridge, Op. 10 I Musici de Montreal, Yuli Turovsky Lachrymae for viola & strings, Op. 48a Rivka Golani(viola) I Musici de Montreal, Yuli Turovsky Simple Symphony, Op. 4 I Musici de Montreal, Yuli Turovsky |
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| |  | Britten: Lachrymae
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Gramophone Magazine