Recording of the Month
Johann Sebastian Bach: The French Suites
Alexandra Papastefanou, piano
Recorded at Dimitris Mitropoulos Hall, Megaron, Athens, March 25 and April 24, 2019
Released on November 15, 2019 by First Hand Records
The second album for FHR by the award-winning, leading interpreter of Johann Sebastian Bach on piano, Alexandra Papastefanou. Here, we are presented with another classic set of keyboard works by the composer, the French Suites.
Papastefanou, Greece's leading pianist, is now regarded worldwide as a leading exponent of Bach on the piano. Her previous recording for FHR (The Well-Tempered Clavier, 2018), did incredibly well with the music press and critics (MusicWeb International Recording of the Month, The Union of Greek Theatre and Music Critics Award: Best Recording of 2018, 5 stars from BBC Music Magazine).
On listening to Alexandra's Well-Tempered Clavier recording, the great pianist Alfred Brendel commented: "I find Papastefanou's Bach riveting. This is Bach playing on a high level – full of life, controlled in all strands of the music, pianistically immaculate, and highly personal. Here is a Bach player who has lived a lifetime with this music".
Amongst the other works featured on the album is the Keyboard Sonata, BWV 964, Bach's own transcription for keyboard of the Sonata in A minor, BWV 1003 for Solo Violin. This is rarely recorded on the piano, so it's a welcome addition to the catalogue.
Source: europadisc.co.uk
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The first cd comprises French Suites 1-4 while the second includes two arrangements for keyboard of sonatas for solo violin. Alexandra Papastefanou plays a modern Steinway and there is no attempt to produce anything other than a crisp contemporary sound. This is actually quite refreshing when set against many versions on original instruments, a wide variety of keyboards and temperaments. It is strangely old-fashioned – the sort of sound I grew up with – but if anything this makes it all the more compelling. I particularly enjoy the balance she brings to the various voices and the clarity of the inter-play.
Source: larkreviews.co.uk
Les Siècles
Conductor: François-Xavier Roth
Recorded at Maison de l'Orchestre national d'Île-de-France, Alfortville, France, on July 16-17, 2019
Released on October 25, 2019 by Harmonia Mundi
You're attending a grand ball. A beautiful young lady has caught your eye. Dare you? Nervously, you inch towards her to request the next waltz. What if she turns you down? That frisson of nervous excitement is palpable from the agitated string shudders, swelling to sforzando, in the introduction to "Un bal" in Les Siècles's outstanding new recording of the Symphonie fantastique – the aural equivalent to butterflies in the stomach. Once the invitation is accepted and you both take to the floor, whirling deliriously, violins sigh with swooning portamentos. Bliss. What could possibly go wrong?
Well, everything. As Leonard Bernstein once warned us, in Berlioz's opium-fuelled Fantastique, "You take a trip, you wind up screaming at your own funeral". François-Xavier Roth and his period-instrument orchestra have taken the trip from rêveries and passions to witches' sabbath before, a live recording on their own label, performed at the festival in the composer's hometown of La Côte-Saint-André in 2009.
But there is a touch of La Côte-Saint-André on this new Harmonia Mundi disc, which is rounded out with a rousing Francs-juges Overture. Among the meticulous orchestral listing in the booklet – everything from Frédéric Triébert oboe to Guatrot ophicleide – there's one strictly non-period entry: church bells cast for the 2013 Berlioz festival... authenticity of another kind.
Much as I enjoyed Les Siècles's earlier recording, this new disc sweeps that, and the rest of the competition, firmly aside. Its sound – recorded in the Maison de l'Orchestre National d'Île-de-France in Alfortville, just outside Paris – is clean and much more closely recorded, revealing much instrumental detail.
The success of this account is not just through the conductor's close study of the autograph manuscript. Roth seems to have an emotional hotline to Berlioz, alive to every twist and turn of the composer's fevered passions. Double basses judder so hard in the first movement (8'54") you can feel the rosin flying. "Un bal" has a wonderful tingle factor, cooing clarinet recalling the idée fixe motif (4'56") associated with the object of our hero's passion. The only movement where Roth is less expansive, a decade on, is the "Scène aux champs". The engineers have perfectly judged the distant oboe (the older recording suffered a lot with extramusical hum at this point) and the woodwinds display bags of character. The string tremolando (6'53") bristles while the clarinet echo at 9'12" is exquisite, followed by a quasi niente which acts as a ghostly reminiscence. There are great thundering timpani as the poor cor anglais's cries go unanswered, the oboe having long since abandoned her lover.
Bassoons sit in gruff judgement over Roth's "March to the Scaffold", a purposeful tread with heavy accenting from cellos and basses. If the orchestral guillotine that slices off the clarinet solo at the end is a bit messy, then I suppose that’s the nature of public executions. The "Songe d'une nuit du sabbat" is pungently psychedelic, flutes and oboes playing their eerie octave glissandos with devilish glee, woodwinds cackling and the bassoon and ophicleide "Dies irae" chants chilling the marrow. The tremolando violins and viola at 6'16" are far fiercer than on other recordings, one of a number of occasions I darted to check the score, but Roth is always right.
There have been several period-instrument recordings over the decades, many of them wonderful, although some suffer fatal flaws. The quest for historical authenticity took John Eliot Gardiner and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique (Philips) to the old hall of the Paris Conservatoire, where the work premiered in 1830, a horrible, dead acoustic. Jos van Immerseel chose to have the bells played as piano chords on his Anima Eterna disc, on the flimsy basis that Berlioz once conducted a performance this way in St Petersburg. Marc Minkowski's Les Musiciens du Louvre now sound pallid (DG). Interestingly, only Gardiner and Immerseel include the obbligato cornet à pistons in the Ball.
Roger Norrington and the London Classical Players have long been my HIP benchmark, a peppery reading, but Roth and Les Siècles surpass them for colour and characterisation. Indeed, this is not just my favourite "historically authentic" recording. I strongly believe this is the finest account of the Fantastique to emerge from France since Charles Munch and the newly formed Orchestre de Paris in 1967... and it probably trumps that too.
Source: Mark Pullinger (gramophone.co.uk)
Iestyn Davies, countertenor (Orfeo)
Sophie Bevan, soprano (Eurydice)
Rebecca Bottone, soprano (Amor)
La Nuova Musica
Conductor: David Bates
Recorded live at St John's Smith Square, London, in May 2018
Released on October 4, 2019 by Pentatone
This is the first version of Gluck's opera, composed for Vienna in 1762, complete on one CD: not quite penny plain, as David Bates has included the "Dance of the Blessed Spirits" from the Paris version of 1774. It comes from Pentatone, Gramophone's 2019 Label of the Year, and it's very fine. It's hard to believe that it was recorded live, as there's not a peep from the audience: no coughing, no applause.
I wish the booklet had named the singers and players of La Nuova Musica. The chorus has much to do, and I lost count of the number of times it ravished the ear. When the lament that opens the opera returns, it has a greater urgency. Similarly, the Furies' first chorus is given extra momentum by the crescendo at the repeat of "sull'orme d'Ercole e di Piritoo". When the spirits finally take pity on Orfeo, their hushed singing gives way to a marvellous intensity in another crescendo before the music dies away. When the Blessed Spirits announce the arrival of Euridice the pastoral lightness is just right. I couldn't detect any difference between the first time's Andantino and the second's Allegretto – which presumably implies a slightly faster tempo – but no matter.
The orchestra, too, is extremely accomplished. There's a delightful hint of portamento in the introduction to the first chorus (and again in the postlude). The horns are splendidly prominent, both in the "orribile sinfonia" to Act 2 and in the minore sections of the second Ballo at the end. The dances are all played with fire or grace, as appropriate; and the flute, oboe and cello obbligatos in "Che puro ciel" are beautifully phrased and perfectly balanced. (The recording producer is Gramophone's Jonathan Freeman-Attwood.)
The soloists are magnificent. Iestyn Davies sings smoothly throughout, hitting top Ds and Es with no sense of strain. He could show a greater sense of wonder when entering the Elysian Fields, but his grief in Act 1 and his encounter with the Furies are vividly conveyed. "Che farò" is restrained, quite reasonably: it's the Paris version that has the more emphatic, desperate conclusion. Euridice appears only in Act 3. Sophie Bevan comes across powerfully, getting more and more stroppy as she rails at Orfeo for not looking at her. Rebecca Bottone has a perfect voice for Amore (Cupid), light and bright. "Gli sguardi trattieni" is taken more slowly than usual: the tempo suits the words but not, I think, the tune.
High praise, then, for David Bates and his ensemble. This is a serious rival to the excellent Sony recording conducted by Frieder Bernius, with Michael Chance, Nancy Argenta, the Stuttgart Chamber Choir and the Canadian orchestra Tafelmusik.
Source: Richard Lawrence (gramophone.co.uk)
James Ehnes, violin
Andrew Armstrong, piano
Recorded at Wyastone Concert Hall, Monmouthshire, United Kingdom, on March 10-12, 2019
Released on October 25, 2019 by ONYX Classics
With some discs, you can just tell that everything's going to go like a dream. And it's not just that I've never yet heard a disappointing recording from James Ehnes and Andrew Armstrong. The energy and bounce of the way they play the opening flourish of Beethoven's Sonata Op.12 No.1 initially made me start; but within that opening phrase you can feel Ehnes applying just enough articulation to make it clear that this is going to be part of the musical argument, as well as the dramatic opening gesture that the 27-year-old Beethoven surely intended.
The freshness and spontaneity of these interpretations is unfaltering, as is the instantaneous rapport and subtle, crystal-clear tonal beauty of the pair's playing. They lean into the Andante of No.1 in a way that allows both grace and a lilting sense of momentum, and launch Op.12 No.2 as if in medias res: with a dancing scherzo-like swing in which Armstrong's left hand manages to provide both a rhythmic springboard for his partner's phrasing and a frequently droll punchline to Beethoven's youthful witticisms.
These are, after all, "Sonatas for Pianoforte and Violin" – a paradox that I've rarely heard so masterfully resolved on modern instruments. These players are simply on the same page as each other. The slow movements of Nos. 2 and 3 are simultaneously intimate and pregnant with a sense of greater things; and the central tempest of No.3's first movement is handled without any loss either of tension or clarity. The variations on "Se vuol ballare", deliciously played, make an irresistibly playful encore to a disc which should give all but the most humourless of listeners consistent and unqualified delight.
Source: Richard Bratby (gramophone.co.uk)
Martin Helmchen, piano
Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin
Conductor: Andrew Manze
Recorded at Berliner Philharmonie, Berlin, in May 2019 (Piano Concerto No.5 ), and at Teldex Studio, Berlin, in October 2018 (Piano Concerto No.2)
Released on October 18, 2019 by Alpha Classics
This is Martin Helmchen and Andrew Manze's first volume in a promised complete survey of Beethoven's concertos. Yes, yet another one. Of course, with Beethoven's anniversary year approaching there will doubtless be a surge of merchandise; but we surely have a right to expect something new(-ish) in the process. Leif Ove Andsnes's "Journey", for instance, has already taken conducting the concertos from the piano to a new level; with others, historically informed performance and/or chamber arrangements may refresh our ears; still others may take more eye-catching and contemporary measures (Boris Giltburg's ice-bucket, sorry, Beethoven sonatas challenge for 2020 is likely to attract attention to his forthcoming concertos survey).
Helmchen and Manze take none of these routes. Theirs is to all appearances a straight-down-the-middle approach. Yet it does stand high and proud for its artistry, poetry, stylish musicianship and, perhaps above all, rapport between soloist and conductor. This really does feel like a meeting of minds. Listen to the unusually prolonged state of calm before the return of the main theme in the first movement of the Emperor, or the subtle recovery of tempo for the subsequent transition. Here and in other magical poetic oases that Helmchen incorporates into the virility and heroism of the first movement, his account is comparable to Emil Gilels with Leopold Ludwig, which for many (myself included) remains unsurpassed.
Nothing is routine here. Helmchen makes no excuse for making the climax of the second movement stand out and takes greater pains than most to make it distinct from the surrounding serenity. The result is both startlingly effective and natural. If you have principled objections to flexibility and elasticity in the rhythmical design, you might raise an eyebrow. But there is no danger of self indulgence or mannerism here, and certainly no distortion à la Glenn Gould: just pure individual pianism and freshness of outlook.
Vital energy and connoisseur-level sensitivity to original turns of phrase reign supreme in Helmchen's reading of the Mozart-influenced Second Concerto, and he appropriately exchanges its skittish garments for a serious black frock-coat with the first-movement cadenza, composed much later than the surrounding music, layering the soundscape in something that could have come right out of the Hammerklavier Sonata. The lonely piano recitative of the slow movement is a heart-melting moment. Comparison with Helmchen's own recording of this concerto from the final round of the 2001 Clara Haskil competition (which he won) is the best proof of how much a close affinity between pianist and conductor matters. Not only has Helmchen matured in his pianism but he is given wings by an orchestra that shares intimate moments with the piano at one point and twirls with it at the next. The finale is a joyous pas de deux, and how charming is Helmchen's invitation to the dance when he adds a subtle agogic accent to the very opening of the movement. This is another account to be placed alongside the finest, including Argerich, and for me surpassing Glenn Gould/Bernstein. If this quality of musicianship is sustained through the next volumes, this will be a journey to rival that of Andsnes and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.
Source: Michelle Assay (gramophone.co.uk)
Andrew Tyson, piano
Recorded at Teldex Studio, Berlin, in March 2019
Released on September 13, 2019 by Alpha Classics
The headstrong temperament characterising Andrew Tyson's previous two albums (3/15, 6/17) reaches affettuoso heights throughout his latest release. He can't let two or three measures go by without spraying interpretative graffiti – a prolonged tenuto on this note, a sudden dynamic dip on that note, unpredictable gearshifts, phrases that lurch like a capsizing canoe or that wind down like a sputtering auto fresh out of petrol.
And yet (and this is a big "and yet") genuinely musical impulses nearly always govern Tyson's transgressions, in contrast to, say, the calculated and self-aware Ivo Pogorelich, the cynically mannered Tzimon Barto or the restless vapidity of Khatia Buniatishvili. Imagine Cyprien Katsaris fuelled by extra caffeine, or John Cleese's wild comedic brain welded to Benjamin Grosvenor's staggering, utterly inborn keyboard gifts, and you'll understand what Andrew Tyson is about.
You listen to the Scarlatti sonatas not for grace and insouciant style but rather to ponder just what Tyson will do next. Then again, you can sort of predict the dynamic gradations in the Scarlatti/Tausig E major Sonata. Purists may cringe at the Schubert "little" A major's petulant accentuations and thrill-a-minute voicings but Tyson's irreverence seduces you as much as Richter's antipodal austerity. In Albéniz's Iberia Book 1, Tyson exchanges the stylish "duende" of "El puerto" for giddy recklessness. The usually meditative "Evocación" takes unfettered wing, with the kind of rubato you'd associate more with Frank Sinatra than Alicia de Larrocha. Even in the best hands, the extended climaxes of "Fête-Dieu à Séville" wear out their welcome, but not in Tyson's supple, light-footed and playful reading. Perhaps the sensuous Mompou pieces benefit most from Tyson's free-spirited style and boundless tonal resources.
I'll go out on a limb to call Andrew Tyson the Willy Wonka of pianists. And best of all, you don't need a golden ticket to enter his artistic realm.
Source: Jed Distler (gramophone.co.uk)
Johan Dalene, violin
Norrköping Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Daniel Blendulf
Recorded at the Louis de Geer Concert Hall, Norrköping, Sweden, in January 2019
Released on December 6, 2019 by BIS
Born in 2000, Swedish violinist Johan Dalene is already making an impact on the international scene. His refreshingly honest musicality, combined with an ability to engage with musicians and audiences alike, has won him many admirers. Johan began playing the violin at the age of four and made his professional concerto debut three years later. A student at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm, he has also worked closely with mentors including Janine Jansen, Leif Ove Andsnes and Gidon Kremer. Johan has been a prize winner at a number of competitions, most recently the prestigious Carl Nielsen Competition at which he won First Prize.
During the finals of the Nielsen competition Johan performed Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto in D major, a work which he had already recorded for BIS two months earlier, in January 2019. Heard on the present disc, the recording was made with the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra, known from many acclaimed recordings on BIS but also Johan's "local" band: born and raised in the town of Norrköping, Johan has performed with the orchestra several times and was its artist-in-residence 2018-2019. The disc closes with Samuel Barber's lyrical and contemplative Violin Concerto from 1939.
Source: bis.se
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Tamsin Waley-Cohen, violin
James Baillieu, piano
Recorded at the Britten Studio, Snape Maltings, Snape, Suffolk, United Kingdom, on September 10-12 & October 13-14, 2018
Released on October 11, 2019 by Signum Records
Purists may object to the combination of a modernised Stradivarius and a modern Steinway grand piano in music originally intended for the harpsichord (actually specified for the Sinfonia, Wq.74) or fortepiano. I would normally find myself among their number: I originally decided to give this set a miss until I heard an extract on BBC Radio 3 and changed my mind.
If you must have period instruments, Duo Belder Kimura on baroque violin and fortepiano or harpsichord (Resonus) will do very well. For a shorter selection on period instruments, there's Amandine Beyer and Edna Stern on mid-price Alpha Collection (Alpha329, Wq.76, 77 and 78 and H545).
Modern instruments these may be on the new Signum, but Tamsin Waley-Cohen and James Baillieu play with a real sense of period style; the piano, even when acting as the senior partner, is never allowed to get too big for its boots. Readers may recall that, though I much prefer the keyboard music of CPE's father on the harpsichord, I make honourable exceptions in the case of Glenn Gould and Angela Hewitt. Now Baillieu joins their ranks and Waley-Cohen, whom I associate with music from a later period, joins those violinists who, while not baroque or classical specialists, plays the music of the period convincingly.
In fact, CPE's music spans the baroque and classical styles, moving over a period of more than 50 years from early works in the manner of his father and his godfather Telemann, to anticipations of Haydn and Mozart. I'm not even sure that "anticipations" is the right word for the Arioso, Wq.79 and the free fantasy, Wq.80. The notes, jointly written by the performers, remind us that Mozart hailed CPE as "the father of us all" and that his works in the Empfindsamer Stil, with its emphasis on feeling, even anticipate the romantic movement in many respects. After all, as O.A. Lovejoy's essay On the Discrimination of Romanticisms (plural) reminded us long ago, there are many forms of the latter, and F.L. Lucas counted over 11,000 definitions of the term, one of which might well be applied to CPE.
Even the early Wq.71, unusually in four movements, is made to sound attractive here, but it's the later works where both the music and performances come into their own. I'm pleased to see that, unlike the Resonus recording, Signum have given us the music in chronological order, with Wq.79 and Wq.80 the logical conclusion. Originally composed for keyboard alone, it's not over-fanciful to compare Wq.80 with Beethoven's late piano sonatas and quartets. Here I'm even prepared to concede that the modern Steinway not just equals the fortepiano on Resonus but makes more sense. If the sonatas from 1763 reflect at least in part the conservative tastes of his employer, Frederick of Prussia, by 1787 he was able to compose in the much freer style specified in the work's title, "free fantasy".
The Duo Belder Kimura end the first of their two Resonus CDs with Wq.80. Though the fortepiano on that recording is a copy of a Walter instrument of 1795, thus post-dating by several years the Fantasie, it fails to make as much impact as Baillieu's modern instrument, even with the volume turned up. The copy of another Walter fortepiano, as played on the Alpha selection would have sounded better in this work; it's a shame they didn't include it there. Where the Resonus Duo's lighter approach to the music is marginally preferable in the earlier works, the new Signum scores here and in the Arioso, Wq.79.
The Signum CDs are sold for around the price of two discs, about £19, making them competitive with the 2-CD Resonus set. Beware, however, that one dealer, who has currently reduced the CDs to £17.50, is asking £33.12 for the 16-bit download and £41.40 for the 24-bit. Follow the Hyperion link (above) for a more reasonable £15.99 and £24.00 respectively. You may even find the download for less elsewhere, but without the booklet.
The single-CD Alpha selection is well worth considering, but it doesn't contain CPE's best works for violin and keyboard. Out-and-out advocates of period performance will want the Resonus set but my money is on the new Signum in preference to either.
Source: Brian Wilson (musicweb-international.com)
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Contrary to the suggestion of its title, Daniel Dennett's book From Bacteria to Bach and Back: The Evolution of Minds hardly discusses Bach at all. But the composer's name is not there just for alliteration or pun. Bach has become a symbol of genius, the apex of human endeavour; the very furthest from a unicellular organism that we can get. It is with this currency that the New York Times was able to run two articles earlier this year entitled "Saturdays in the Bronx with Bach" and "Yo Yo Ma Wants Bach to Save the World". Bach's name has become a signifier for social miracle, purportedly possessing the power to mend political division and rebalance racial inequality.
But the Bach that these writers refer to is, of course, Johann Sebastian. His sons rarely get a look-in. This three-disc set from Tamsin Waley-Cohen and James Baillieu of the complete works for violin and keyboard by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach nudges us in the right direction. What we discover – immediately and sustained for 153 minutes and 12 seconds – is that CPE not only does justice to his father but also is a superb composer in his own right. We would do well to remember that for most of the 18th century, talk of "the great Bach" referred to CPE and not JS.
Not much work has gone into organising the sonatas. They are presented in chronological order – or at least in order of their "Wq" numbers, the catalogue system established by Alfred Wotquenne in 1905 (it has since fallen out of favour, to be superseded by the "H number" system). As a result, the listening experience tracks the chapters of CPE's life, a journey which moves from the galant to the strange, experimental fantasia genre via Sturm und Drang. And yet, by serendipity, each disc has a stunning "opener", disclosing a sound world perfect unto itself. Baillieu's touch in the Adagio ma non molto of the opening D major Sonata (Wq.71 H502) is something remarkable. His lines are full of breath, intimate and expansive, shaped with a microscopic sensitivity. Trills glisten over Waley-Cohen, the perfect partner to transform this into bowed song. Waley-Cohen's achievement of pure legato is wondrous (though an unnecessary ornament disrupts the otherwise impeccably sustained broadness and reciprocity of counterpoint) and her sound is tinged with golden frailty. And though this sound world speaks of something more like a serene Schwanengesang than it does of a work by a hormonal teenager – CPE was only 17 years old when he composed the first three sonatas – it thoroughly works. My knees go weak at how the pair navigate the interrupted cadence towards the end of the movement, a gesture which spins out into nostalgic arioso and an ending of exquisite vulnerability.
That's the first movement of 27. We're also treated to a sublime Largo in the Sonata in B flat (Wq.77 H513): Waley-Cohen transforms melancholy into sumptuous heartbreak, a moment of F major where the earth stops spinning for an appoggiatura – a "but I love you" – and then tries to resume life as it was, but knows in meandering melody that it simply can't once those words have been spoken. The loveliness is unceasing. The Arioso theme of the Variations in A (Wq.79 H535) is enough to unharden the most hardened of hearts – and these eight bars alone make the entire listening experience worth it. Baillieu's rhythmic variation in the repeat is lined with thoughtfulness and honesty, the subtlest smell of inégale lingers over his unravelling quavers, while Waley-Cohen purrs beneath with con sordino velvet. Three discs of wonderful music-making, enough to make any father proud.
Source: Mark Seow (gramophone.co.uk)
Adriana Gonzalez, soprano
Julien Behr, tenor
Andreas Wolf, bass
Le Concert Spirituel Choir and Orchestra
Conductor: Hervé Niquet
Recorded in June 2019, at Chapelle Royale du Château de Versailles
Released on November 15, 2019 by Alpha
Composed in 1824 by Hector Berlioz at the age of twenty-one and premiered at the church of Saint-Roch in Paris in 1825, the Messe solennelle has come down to us following an eventful history. After Berlioz declared that he had destroyed the score, the mass was considered lost until it was rediscovered in Antwerp in 1992. This remarkable work helps us both to appreciate the development of Berlioz's style – already revolutionary in his early years – and to understand what he owed to his contemporaries, notably Cherubini, whose monumental Requiem Hervé Niquet has already recorded (Alpha 251). Scored for three soloists (soprano, tenor and bass), chorus and orchestra, the work consists of thirteen movements, material from which Berlioz was to reuse in several later works, notably in the "Scène aux champs" of the Symphonie fantastique, which quotes the "Gratias". On the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Berlioz's death, Hervé Niquet, fascinated by this work – "There's nothing he doesn't know about dramaturgy and vocal style. At the age of twenty!" – decided to programme it (the concert at the famous Berlioz Festival of La Côte Saint-André was a memorable occasion) and record it in the Chapelle Royale of the Château de Versailles.
Source: outhere-music.com
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My LP set of Berlioz's Messe Solennelle was from the first days of 33 rpm albums, on Cetra Records. I forgot who was on it, but it had a cavernous sound that gave you a very "big picture" yet then obscured some of the sound staging details. It gave me a good look at a masterful work that reminded me just how original Berlioz always managed to be regardless of the project at hand. It was not perfect. It is long gone so I have done without the music for a time.
These many years later I no longer have most of my vinyl (or slate) anymore and so when a new version with Herve Niquet conducting Le Concert Spirituel presented itself (Alpha Classics) I gladly availed myself of the chance. Not surprisingly it of course has the detailed soundstaging you expect today, with a natural ambiance and closer miking combined to get a good-location-in-the-house, catbird's seat take on the music and its highly dramatic ark of presentation. No other Mass sounds quite like this one and the detailed sonics and high-level performances we hear on this version reminds us how good all that can be with the right circumstances. This is such a one.
Praise is due for the fine performances of soprano Adriana Gonzalez, tenor Julien Behr and bass Andreas Wolf, all with a heroic demeanor that seems just right for this masterwork. The choir and orchestra sound perfectly matched and attuned to the special requirements of this music. It is neither too much nor too little, which means it neither throttles the music nor does it shake down the house, so to say. And that to my mind is an excellent reading for our "Modern" world.
It reminds us that the best Berlioz is so very French and so originally outside of the Beethoven Romantic Germanic orbit to stand on its own. Niquet works hard to ensure that the Berlioz vision rings out and rings true. There are no doubt others out there that may equal this recording for consistency and inspiration, but I must say that after quite a few listens I am satisfied that Niquet gets it all quite right and keeps it all very much alive.
Is Berlioz to Beethoven as Konitz was to Bird? Something to ponder.
Highly and gladly recommended as an essential.
Source: classicalmodernmusic.blogspot.com
Concerto Italiano
Harpsichord & Conductor: Rinaldo Alessandrini
Recorded on December 1-9, 2018, at Pontificio Istituro di Musica Sacra, Sala Accademica, Rome, Italy
Released on November 8, 2019 by Naïve
Like the Brandenburg Concertos and other instrumental works of Johann Sebastian Bach, the four Orchestral Suites are available in mainstream and period versions, and listeners have a variety of valid interpretations to explore. This 2019 release by Rinaldo Alessandrini and Concerto Italiano definitely belongs to the period category, and fans of original instrumentation and researched historical practices will find this album not only true to Baroque style but also as robust and energetic as any performance on modern instruments. What sets this double-disc package from Naïve apart from other recordings of the suites (also called ouvertures) is the inclusion of comparable works by two of Bach's second cousins, the Ouverture in E minor of Johann Bernhard Bach and the Ouverture in G major of Johann Ludwig Bach, members of the extended family of composers who collectively made their surname a synonym for musician. Because these obscure pieces are positioned between the much more familiar suites of the master, it is clear that Alessandrini wants to draw special attention to them and to avoid any treatment of them as mere curiosities or footnotes. To be sure, Bach held both composers in high esteem, and regarded their music positively, as his performances and preservation of their scores confirm. Listeners might prefer to hear them first, in order to appreciate them with fresh ears, before venturing into the greater suites, which are gloriously rendered in resonant sound at the Pontifical Institute of Sacred Music, Rome.
Source: Blair Sanderson (allmusic.com)
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For several decades, as solo harpsichordist and director of his ensemble Concerto Italiano, Rinaldo Alessandrini has been exploring not just the Italian repertoire that he is so passionate about but also the works of Bach – as in his benchmark recording of the Brandenburg Concertos in 2005. In this new recording, Alessandrini has mounted a challenge to all currently available recordings of those four Orchestral Suites that Bach called "Overtures", after their imposing opening movements. It's uncertain when these dance suites were composed or where they were first performed but they were certainly played in Leipzig at the time Bach was directing its celebrated Collegium Musicum.
Here Alessandrini has once again sifted all available sources, putting the composer's entire output under the microscope to identify the most authentic details of style and orchestration. The result is a subtle balance between Bach's intricate contrapuntal writing and the spontaneity of his dances, with their French and Italian influences. Together with these majestic, festive, radiant works by JS Bach, Concerto Italiano presents two Overtures in the same instrumental mould by Johann Bernhard and Johann Ludwig Bach – two composer cousins with whom Johann Sebastian enjoyed lifelong ties of mutual friendship and esteem. During his Leipzig years he had their Overtures copied out, so he could perform them with the Collegium Musicum. Here then is a welcome opportunity to hear these two superb orchestral pieces in the contemporary context of Bach's own music.
Source: prestomusic.com
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Opinion, as demonstrated by the names given on recordings, seems to be divided between Ouverture and Orchestral Suite for these four works. Given the French style of the works, the former would seem the more appropriate, and is used here and also in one of my comparison recordings, that by Bach Collegium Japan (BIS). My other comparison (for Numbers 1, 3 & 4) is Tafelmusik (Analekta) which rather perversely given its French-Canadian origins, employs the other term.
The origins of the four works by Johann Sebastian are not entirely clear. The material in Bach's hand derives from his Leipzig period, but there is no definitive proof that he wrote them during this time. What is fairly sure is that they were performed in Collegium Musicum concerts at Zimmermann's coffee house in Leipzig.
Concerto Italiano and their leader Rinaldo Alessandrini are among the most respected names in historically informed performance Baroque music. In their very extensive discography are numerous Vivaldi recordings, but much that is well off the beaten track, such as Bononcini and Melani. Here they are on well-trodden ground in the four works by JS Bach, but straying off the path with two of his second cousins, Johann Bernhard and Johann Ludwig. I have only one other recording by them, a set of Vivaldi concertos, to which I haven't listened for a while, as my go-to artists in Vivaldi are Europa Galante and Fabio Biondi.
Alessandrini and his band are renowned for brisk tempos and energetic readings, which given my predilection for Biondi/Galante in Vivaldi doesn't concern me. I wondered how this approach might lend itself to JSB. Bach's music seems infinitely versatile – the extraordinary range of transcriptions bears testimony to this – but I was concerned that a headlong dash through the complexities of his counterpoint and the glorious melodies contained therein wouldn't be a success. I shouldn't have worried: these are wonderfully alive but sensitive readings that have given the four Ouvertures new life for me. The Suzuki readings now seem a little pedestrian, perhaps too respectful, and this is from someone who adores their cantatas. Tafelmusik falls somewhere in between, more energy than Suzuki but less character than Alessandrini.
It is not that Concerto Italiano are always faster. In the opening movement of the Ouverture No.1, they are slower than both my comparisons, imparting a quite beautiful, poetic quality to the music. In the famous Air from No.3, they don't linger, being almost a minute faster than the comparisons, but not at the expense of the melody. Both ways seem equally valid, and might depend on one's mood. The other movement where the different approaches really struck me was the Gigue from No.3. BCJ and Tafelmusik gave it an almost stately grandeur, whereas CI's version was rustic, a country dance in fact.
For many potential purchasers, it will be the non-JS works that create the most interest. They are not first recordings, but are certainly not well-known. They too were performed by the Collegium Musicum, their inclusion apparently aided by JS’s recommendation. Of the two, Johann Bernhard's – for strings and harpsichord only as far as I can tell – is more substantial, though perhaps a little more old-fashioned. Conversely, Johann Ludwig's is dominated by the wind instruments. I prefer the former, but that is perhaps because the wind dominance isn't to my taste. There are four suites by JB – it would have been good to fill some of the space with another. Nevertheless, the inclusion of these works makes for better value than many of its competitors which only provide the four JSB works.
The sound quality is very immediate, especially for the winds, but not tiring. The notes, which run to nine pages on the music, are erudite, tracing in detail the history of the JSB works and their connection to the Leipzig Collegium Musicum.
Fans of these players won't need much encouragement to purchase this; for those, such as myself, who had looked elsewhere for Baroque recordings, this should act as a reminder that Concerto Italiano and Rinaldo Alessandrini haven't gained their reputation without good reason. I shall certainly be investigating some of their other recordings, because it seems that I have been ignoring them unjustly and unwisely.
Source: David Barker (musicweb-international.com)
Angela Hewitt, piano
Recorded in Das Kulturzentrum Grand Hotel, Dobbiaco, Italy, on December 1-6, 2018
Released on November 29, 2019 by Hyperion Records
Back in 2014, when the director of London's Wigmore Hall, John Gilhooly, approached me to perform the complete solo keyboard works of Johann Sebastian Bach in twelve recitals over four years, my first reaction was to say no. I had already spent so much time with Bach – both in performance and in the recording studio – and there is much else I still wish to do. But it didn't take long to change my mind, and the subsequent "Bach Odyssey" (which began in September 2016, ending in June 2020) is proving to be one of the highlights of my life.
It never bothered me to be associated so closely with Bach. How could it? There is no greater music, and to develop in his company one's musical intelligence, technique, beauty of sound, and spirit is a great gift and a lifelong adventure. The offer from Hyperion Records, back in 1994, to record all his major keyboard works gave my career a purpose and direction that have been profoundly fulfilling.
In the second year of the "Bach Odyssey", I presented the six partitas in concert around the world, once more marvelling at their inventiveness, range of expression, and sheer brilliance – not just in technique but also in perfection of form. No wonder these suites have stood the test of time and are among the most frequently played of his keyboard compositions.
As my first recording of them was done over twenty years ago (1996-1997), I thought it time to record them again – this time on my own Fazioli piano, and in the beautiful acoustics of the Kulturzentrum Gustav Mahler in Toblach/Dobbiaco. The sound engineer for the first album of that "early" recording, Ludger Böckenhoff, took over also as producer for the second one in that box set – and now at the time of writing we have worked together for twenty-five years. It has been a relationship in which we have both grown tremendously, which has kept me on my toes, and for which I am hugely grateful.
So what's different this time? Well, you'll have to listen to find out! Don't expect huge differences of Gouldian proportions. An allemande is still an allemande; a French courante should still not be rushed; a gigue must remain danceable. Twenty years of life have intervened – twenty years spent practising his music, always trying to do better, to bring it to life even more. The older we get, the more music means to us, and it gives me great joy to share these partitas with you once again.
Source: Angela Hewitt (hyperion-records.co.uk)
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Critics and piano mavens will likely evaluate Angela Hewitt's new 2018 recording of the Bach Partitas alongside her 1996-1997 version. The most noticeable difference concerns the piano itself. The earlier recording's Steinway possesses a uniform beauty and warmth that contrasts with the somewhat brighter tone and more pronounced timbral distinctions between registers characterising the pianist's own Fazioli. While Hewitt's stylish integrity, superb finger independence and deep feeling for the music's roots in dance remains a constant, there's now a greater level of interplay between hands, with added variety of articulation and rhythmic flexibility. Compare both Partita No.3 recordings back to back, and you'll immediately notice this. One also perceives more expressive gestures by way of dynamic hairpins, caesuras, breath pauses and myriad accentuations that will strike listeners as either spontaneous or self-aware, depending on personal taste.
I find Partita No.1's faster movements more vibrantly delineated and shapely than before, while the Sarabande has gained welcome breadth and introspection. No question that the new Partita No.2's outer movements hold a decisive dramatic edge over their earlier, relatively studio-bound counterparts. Its Rondeaux remains unusually deliberate, but I prefer the 1996 reading's simpler inflections. In the introduction to Partita No.4's Ouverture, Hewitt now tempers the rocket-like crescendos she once favoured in the upward scales but the added woodwind-like definition to the fugal section's staccato phrasing compensates: here is where the Fazioli's responsiveness comes into its own. If Hewitt's earlier Allemande evoked a gentle lute solo, the new version unfolds like a vocalise. Conversely, she enlivens the little Aria with playful left-hand jabs and thrusts.
To my ears, Hewitt overthinks No.5's Praeambulum, sectionalising its contrasts, whereas the earlier traversal conveys a more natural flow. Yet her slower Allemande remake boasts a steadier overall pulse and heightened projection of the imitative writing. Her added intensity in the Corrente and Minuetta, again, may account for the immediacy of the Fazioli's note attacks, in contrast to the Steinway's rounder patina. The pianist, however, clearly makes the difference via her more specified handling of the arpeggios in Partita No.6's first-movement introduction and altogether darker fugue. She now keeps the Air on a tight, austere leash and digs deeper into the Sarabande's dissonances while bringing the bass line to the fore. And her deliberation in the final Gigue conveys palpable harmonic tension this time around. As with her Well-Tempered Clavier and Goldberg Variations remakes (6/09, 11/16), Angela Hewitt's Bach Partitas have not so much changed as evolved.
Source: Jed Distler (gramophone.co.uk)
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As a specialist in Johann Sebastian Bach's keyboard music, Angela Hewitt has recorded some of his works more than once, as she did with the Well-Tempered Clavier and the Goldberg Variations. It's not surprising that she has recorded the Six Partitas on two occasions for Hyperion, the first time in 1996-1997, and then this double-disc late in 2018, as part of her "Bach Odyssey" recital series. This interpretation doesn't differ greatly from her earlier set, but mostly in small matters of dynamics and phrasing, so the listener may have to flip a coin to choose between them. Even so, something must be said for a performer who periodically revisits the touchstones of her career, and lets the differences arise naturally from her years of thinking, playing, and recording, rather than by introducing radical changes or distracting novelties. Hewitt's consistent expressions have given her performances an organic quality, so the music always feels particularly shaped according to her sound and touch. This recording was made on Hewitt's own Fazioli piano, so the personal connection between the artist and a favorite instrument must not be overlooked. Hyperion's sound is immaculate, recorded in the Kulturzentrum Grand Hotel in Dobbiaco, Italy, and the recording is fully audible with credible presence.
Source: Blair Sanderson (allmusic.com)
Marlis Petersen, soprano (Leonore)
Maximilian Schmitt, tenor (Florestan)
Dimitry Ivashchenko, bass (Rocco)
Robin Johannsen, soprano (Marzelline)
Johannes Weisser, baritone (Don Pizarro)
Tareq Nazmi, bass (Don Fernando)
Johannes Chum, tenor (Jaquino)
Zürcher Sing-Akademie (Florian Helgath, chorus master)
Freiburger Barockorchester
Conductor: René Jacobs
Recorded live at Philharmonie de Paris, on November 7, 2017
Released on November 29, 2019 by Harmonia Mundi
Amid the plethora of recordings anticipating the 250th anniversary of his birth next year, I was starting to feel in danger of Beethoven fatigue before 2020 had even arrived until René Jacobs's enthralling, idiosyncratic account of the composer's only opera in its original 1805 version grabbed me by the scruff of the neck last weekend. Following an inauspicious premiere dogged by overtaxed singers and an audience dominated by French military officers, Beethoven revised and streamlined the score twice before it opened as Fidelio in 1814, but Jacobs gives us the raw material in all its wonderful and slightly weird glory.
Not only are recordings of this version few and far between, but period-instrument accounts of the opera in any of its incarnations are surprisingly rare – I remember trying to track one down without success after hearing Simon Rattle conduct a revelatory performance with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment at the 2001 Proms, and since then most new recordings (including Rattle's own, with the Berliner Philharmoniker) have employed big bands and big, often Wagnerian voices. What a joy, then, to hear the rasping natural horns and dry timpani of the Freiburger Barockorchester conjuring Florestan's dungeon into eerie life and lighter-voiced Classical specialists (several of them alumni of Jacobs's Mozart opera series) taking the more florid vocal writing of this original draft entirely in their strides. Leonore's music is even more murderously demanding here than in Fidelio and Marlis Petersen, who will sing Fidelio for Kirill Petrenko in Baden-Baden next year, tackles the additional volleys of triplets and exposed high Cs with aplomb; the fine Bach and Mozart tenor Maximilian Schmitt, however, is spared the more strenuous tortures which Beethoven would later devise for the imprisoned Florestan.
This three-act version is less concise than its successor but is never in danger of dragging here: Jacobs hurtles through the score at breakneck speed so that the adrenaline-level never drops and the action unfolds like a pacey thriller. For the most part it works brilliantly in service of the drama and characterisation – the breathless eroticism of Marzelline's day-dreams about "Fidelio" as she tackles the ironing comes across loud and clear, and high-stakes moments like the great confrontation between Pizarro and Leonore in the dungeon have a real edge-of-the-seat quality. Occasionally I did long for just a little breathing-space, notably in the Prisoners' Chorus (which sounds rather like the inmates are enjoying a brisk jog around the exercise-yard) and the glorious "last supper" trio in which Leonore and Rocco share bread and wine with the starving Florestan. The one moment when Jacobs does step off the gas, though, is all the more special because of its unexpectedness: Florestan and Leonore's rapturous duet "O namenlose Freude!" (often interpreted as a near-hysterical outpouring of relief) is taken at an unusually steady tempo, and their reunion's all the more tender and profound for it. The preceding passage, which Beethoven cut from the final version, is one of the few points where the dramatic momentum of the score does flag a little, but somehow Jacobs' decision to dial down the tension here rather than motoring on through mitigates this rather than underlining it.
Elsewhere, though, it seems a pity that so much was consigned to the cutting-room floor by 1814 – take the wonderful Act Two duet with obbligato violin for Marzelline and Leonore, fleshing out a relationship which gets relatively short shrift in the final version. And I mean no backhanded compliment when I say that hearing Beethoven's original thoughts often throws the strangeness and genius of the revised score into even starker relief: Florestan's opening monologue, for instance, is a little acorn here rather than the great oak which it would become in 1814, and the relatively four-square final chorus has a homely, very human charm all of its own in comparison with the monumental grandeur of its later incarnation. (Dramatic loose ends are all neatly tied up in 1805, with Marzelline pragmatically rebounding onto Jaquino, and Pizarro's fate signed over to the King).
Prepare yourself for a white-knuckle ride, then, but this is a must-have for anyone who's interested in the genesis of Beethoven's masterpiece, and a thrilling sequel to Jacobs' superb Mozart series from the 2000s.
Source: Katherine Cooper (prestomusic.com)
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As we know it today, Fidelio, Beethoven's only opera, was first performed in 1814. But it had begun life in 1805 as Leonore, when its premiere in Vienna, to an audience largely made up of French officers from Napoleon's occupying army who could not understand any of the German text, had been a disaster. Beethoven revised the score immediately, cutting swathes and recasting the original three acts into two, but he was still unhappy with the result, which was withdrawn after two performances the following year. When it emerged again, eight years later, both the music and the words had been even more substantially altered, and this time the premiere was a huge success.
Yet though Fidelio is now a central part of the operatic repertory, some insist that the 1805 Leonore is the better, more dramatically convincing work. One of those is John Eliot Gardiner, who in 1997 conducted one of the three previous recordings of the original score, and another is René Jacobs, who is responsible for this latest one. According to Jacobs, not only does the 1805 three-act version have the better, more musically daring overture (now known in the concert hall as Leonore No.2) but Beethoven's revisions and compressions removed first-rate music from the score, notably an entire aria in the first act for Rocco, and a duet for Leonore and Marzelline in the second, doing severe damage to the work's dramaturgy.
Jacobs' recording, taken from a live performance in Paris a year ago, makes his case for him eloquently enough. His tempi are generally on the fast side, though the superb, crisp playing of the period-instrument Freiburg Baroque Orchestra ensures they never seem too hectic. But though the dialogue has been rewritten and apparently abridged, there still seems an awful lot of it, with the spoken voices just a bit too far forward in the stereo picture and sound effects rather self-consciously prominent, too. And if the cast, led by Marlis Petersen as Leonore and Maximilian Schmitt as Florestan, does not include any voices to compare to those on some of the great Fidelio recordings of the last century, their general lightness and flexibility puts the opera more convincingly into its proper context.
As Jacobs and his singers present it, this is Beethoven's opera as a descendant of the 18th-century Singspiel tradition, especially that of Mozart's Entführung and Zauberflöte. Leonore may not be the great celebration of political freedom that later generations have valued in Fidelio, but historically perhaps it's something more interesting.
Source: Andrew Clements (theguardian.com)
Geoffroy Couteau, piano
Amaury Coeytaux, violin
Raphaël Perraud, cello
Nicolas Baldeyrou, clarinet
Released on November 29, 2019 by La Dolce Volta
Amaury Coeytaux, Raphaël Perraud and Geoffroy Couteau are stars in the current firmament of French musicians, linked by a longstanding musical and human rapport. Here they pay tribute to the most universal of Romantic composers. Their complete set of the piano trios of Johannes Brahms is an exceptional achievement, the tribute of three proudly independent musicians to a composer who consistently rejected social conventions. Their keen advocacy for Brahms's masterpieces throughout this programme gives these artists ample opportunity to display their high musical standards.
Written in 1891 for the famous clarinettist Richard Mühlfeld, the "Clarinet Trio" marked a new turning in the final creative period of Brahms, who had recently decided to abandon composition. This work, which ranks among his finest chamber compositions, is raised to the sublime by the talents of Nicolas Baldeyrou.
Source: prostudiomasters.com
Nelson Goerner, piano
Recorded at Teldex Studio, Berlin, in March 2019
Released on October 26, 2019 by Alpha Classics
Given the warm reception accorded his 2009 Brahms B flat Concerto with Tadaaki Otaka and the NHK SO (7/18), it is perhaps surprising that Nelson Goerner has waited so long to record some of the solo music. Never a pianist to do things by half measures, he's chosen arguably two of the most formidable works from Brahms' relatively circumscribed solo oeuvre.
If ever there were a piano sonata with a symphony lurking inside, it is the Brahms F minor. To Goerner's immense credit, he doesn't detonate the instrument in an effort to accommodate the occasionally overblown writing but has mastered its details so thoroughly that, for all the breadth and heft of the musical ideas, the piece sounds proportionate to the piano.
The opening Allegro maestoso unfolds almost exclusively in chords – straight, arpeggiated, broken, embellished. Whether robust or quiet, Goerner gives them shape by sensitive voicing and unwavering attention to the larger phrase contours. Heroic and lyric passages are vividly contrasted, and Brahms' plentiful expressive and agogic annotations scrupulously observed. Yet the signal moments in Goerner's reading occur in the chaste Andante espressivo. Rather than yielding to the temptations of heaven-storming youthful ardour early on, he lets Brahms' relatively thin textures speak with beguiling simplicity. This aura of touching tenderness allows space for amplification and expansion without overplaying in the movement's passionate yet contained conclusion. Following an animated Scherzo and atmospheric Intermezzo, Goerner brings the finale's diffuse elements into a cohesive, satisfying whole.
In Goerner's hands the Paganini Variations, Brahms' tribute to the virtuosity of his friend Carl Tausig, becomes an exploration of the piano's expressive and sonorous potential. In Book 1 the treacherous right-hand octave glissandos of Var 13 are tossed off without ostentation, while the dazzling Var 14 fairly dances with delight. In Book 2, Var 8 brings to mind a danseur noble nonchalantly demonstrating the perfection of his fouettés. The quieter variations, such as Vars 12 and 13, exude intimacy and mystery. Perhaps the highest praise is that, far from being the arduous progress through an obstacle course that the Variations often seem, this performance is a seamless traversal of variegated terrain, effortlessly accomplished, emerging finally as a showcase for artistic finesse rather than technical display.
My sole reservation is a technical one: at times microphone placement seems unnecessarily close to the instrument. That said, this F minor Sonata is magisterial in purview and distinctive in its compelling musicality. I suspect that, with time, the Paganini Variations will take their place beside the best of them, Petri's (12/15) and Richter's (Decca) included.
Source: Patrick Rucker (gramophone.co.uk)
Pierre Hantaï, harpsichord
Recorded in June 2018 in Haarlem, Netherlands
Released on September 27, 2019 by Mirare
Who could complain that Pierre Hantaï is taking his time to roam among Scarlatti's sonatas – 26 years after the appearance of his first Scarlatti disc for Astrée Auvidis (4/93), this (Vol. 6 of the Mirare series) is still only the seventh – when by doing so he allows us to savour each one, to feel that each new disc is an individually curated gift to us? Perhaps only three of the 17 sonatas included here are at all widely known: Kk119, with its acrobatic leaps, almost like a circus act complete with "ta das" and "allez oops"; the proud-gestured Kk6; and Kk18, with its frothing presto semiquavers. But naturally there are plenty of other gems to discover. The lilting dance measures, fizzing rockets and dazzling octaves of Kk43 – Scarlatti at his most brilliant – suggest some wild choreographic fantasy; Kk69 has a smoothly coordinated spider-like crawl similar to the better-known Kk87; the capricious Kk273 whirs gently like a mechanical toy before springing off into swirling scales, plunging arpeggios and then a harmonically dense gigue; and Kk487 opens with the massive, attention-grabbing chords and textural contrasts of an orchestral overture. There's so much more – there always is in Scarlatti – but there simply isn’t room here to describe it all.
Hantaï never makes the mistake of tearing into these pieces and wrestling them. If the music itself seems to approach organised chaos in places, his playing is always controlled, seeking out lyricism and humanity, no matter how fast the notes fly. And when Scarlatti explicitly sings his soul, so does Hantaï, for instance in the tenderly spun affettuoso of Kk384. He can do all this because of a superb technique that puts him in command of all the virtuoso fireworks but also enables him to let every note speak eloquently with perfect placement and tone. It really is playing of the highest order.
When Hantaï started recording Scarlatti in 1993 he tended to get overlooked in favour of the spectacularly virtuoso but harder-fingered Andreas Staier. But now, with every superb new release, the Frenchman is laying further claim to a position as perhaps the best Scarlatti harpsichordist of all.
Source: Lindsay Kemp (gramophone.co.uk)
The albums were chosen by the owner and blog editor of "Faces of Classical Music", Alexandros Arvanitakis.
More photos
See also
The best new classical albums: January 2020
The best new classical albums: November 2019
The best new classical albums: October 2019
The best new classical albums: September 2019
The best new classical albums: August 2019
The best new classical albums: July 2019
The best new classical albums: June 2019
The best new classical albums: May 2019
The best new classical albums: April 2019
The best new classical albums: March 2019
The best new classical albums: February 2019
The best new classical albums: January 2019
The Faces of Classical Music Choose the 20 Best Albums of 2019
The Faces of Classical Music Choose the 20 Best Albums of 2018
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