In every issue the German magazine Toccata/Alte Musik Aktuell has a survey with news from the recording studios. This seems to me of interest to lovers of early music, so I am going to forward the most interesting things here on a regular basis. I also add some information about upcoming events, like festivals.
Let us start in the renaissance. The repertoire from Spain is quite popular, but it is mostly Tomás Luis de Victoria whom is given attention. And even from his oeuvre only a handful of pieces are regularly performed. The German label Archiv has started an interesting project, containing the release of a series of 10 discs with about 90 compositions by Victoria. They are performed by the Ensemble Plus Ultra, directed by Michael Noone. Also participating are His Majestys Sagbutts and Cornetts, the ensemble Schola Antiqua and the organist Andrés Cea Galan. Still, I can't help feeling a little sceptical about the interpretation. Some years ago I heard Plus Ultra in the early music festival in Utrecht, performing music by Cristóbal de Morales, and that was a bit disappointing. But we may at least expect to hear some hardly-known or even unknown pieces.
The Tallis Scholars also recorded Spanish music. The 30-year existence of their label Gimell was celebrated with a recording of Lamentations by Victoria and Padilla. I haven't heard it yet, but everyone knows what the performances of this ensemble are like: technically perfect, but hardly historically informed.
One of the main compositions of the early baroque is Monteverdi's Vespro della Beata Vergine. There was a time music like this was performed with boys' voices, but today that is the exception rather than the rule. So it is noticeable that the Knabenchor Hannover is going to perform this work later this month, with Concerto Palatino and Musica Alta Ripa. The solo parts are sung by adult soloists, though: the members of the German vocal ensemble Himlische Cantorey, with which the choir regularly cooperates. The performance will be recorded by the North-German radio (NDR). Hopefully this performance is going to be released on disc.
In recent years the operas of Francesco Cavalli are enjoying great popularity. A rare opera is Artemisia, which was rediscovered in the 1960's. Claudio Cavina, with his ensemble La Venexiana, is going to give a scenic performance this summer. I noted a performance in the festival KunstFestSpiele Herrenhausen in Hanover. I assume it will performed elsewhere as well.
More interesting opera news also comes from Germany: during the Musikfestpiele Potsdam-Sanssouci an opera by Carl Heinrich Graun is performed: Montezuma, which was composed in 1755. It is a scenic performance, directed by Geoffrey Layton; the Kammerakademie Potsdam will be conducted by Sergio Azzolini. In the cast are Florin Cezar Ouatu in the title role, Mireille Delunsch, Raquel Andueza, Makoto Sakurada, Mark Chambers, Gerald Thompson and the male soprano Paolo Lopez.
Also at this festival a scenic performance of Gluck's serenade Le Cinesi. It is a co-production of the ensemble L'Arte del Mondo and the China National Peking Opera Company. There will be intermezzi "in the style of the Peking Opera of the 18th century". I'm not sure what to make of this as a mixture of 'east' and 'west' in early music seldom works.
In the pipeline are two opera recordings under the direction of Diego Fasolis, with Max Emanuel Cencic and the orchestra I Barocchisti: Vivaldi's Farnace and an opera by the Neapolitan composer Leonardo Vinci, both to be released by Virgin Classics.
Recently I have written an enthusiastic review of a disc with Polish music by the ensemble alla polacca. It contained mostly pieces never recorded before. Considering the quality of that disc I am looking forward to its next release, which was recorded last December. It contains "music at the court of Hanover", with music by Handel and Steffani but also first recordings of pieces by Nicolaus Adam Strungk (1640-1700), Antonio Sartorio (1630-1680) and Vincenzo de Grandis II (1631-1708). That definitely looks very interesting.
The exploration of the vocal oeuvre of Georg Philipp Telemann goes on. Last March Hermann Max, with his ensembles Rheinische Kantorei and Das Kleine Konzert, gave the first modern performance of his St Luke Passion of 1748. It will be released shortly by CPO.
As I am a great lover of the music of Haydn it was nice to see last year that the recording industry has paid much attention to his oeuvre. But it seems one needs a Haydn year to see lesser-known compositions being released. I'm afraid that in the time to come we return to common practice, meaning that only the well-known repertoire will be recorded. We just have seen a new release of the London symphonies, conducted by Marc Minkowski - as if there aren't enough recordings of these symphonies available - and now the first volume of a new recording by Ton Koopman has been released. This is especially regrettable as their are still so many Haydn symphonies which are never performed and recorded.
It is simply a disgrace that still no complete recording of Haydn's symphonies on period instruments is available.
Showing posts with label recordings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label recordings. Show all posts
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Sunday, March 7, 2010
From the recording studios
Some music magazines regularly give information about what is going to be released in the near future. I always like to read stuff like that because it can whet your appetite for what is to come. But this kind of information also gives reason to be critical about the choice of repertoire.
There is much talk about the crisis of the recording industry. One of the causes of this crisis is that too much repertoire is recorded too often. This probably explains why there seems to be no crisis in the recording of early music. There is so much repertoire which has never been explored yet that there is no excuse for recording the same stuff time and again. And fortunately there are ensembles and musicians who are enterprising enough to go off the beaten track.
One of them is the German conductor Hermann Max. In recent years he has recorded a number of unknown German oratorios of the late 18th and early 19th century. Last year he brought a hitherto forgotten Passion: the Große Passion by Carl Heinrich Graun, a really great work which is an important addition to the repertoire for Passiontide. The Italian keyboard player Lorenzo Ghielmi has just recorded another excellent Passion, on a Latin text, by the Neapolitan composer Francesco Feo. Both recordings will be reviewed on musica Dei donum shortly.
Also interesting are two recent recordings of music for the theatre by Haydn which is a still underrated aspect of his oeuvre. Andreas Spering recorded the marionette Singspiel Die Feuersbrunst (CPO), whereas Michi Gaigg recorded a late version of his opera L'Isola disabitata with a German text which dates from shortly after 1800 (deutsche harmonia mundi). To the same category belong the opera Le disgrazie d'Amore by Antonio Cesti (Carlo Ipata; Hyperion) as well as two oratorios by the German composer and theorist Johann Mattheson: Der liebreiche und geduldige David, and Das größte Kind (Willens; CPO).
But the habit of recording the same stuff over and over again doesn't pass the early music scene completely. In recent years I have heard and reviewed a handful of new recordings of Bach's motets. Recently I received another three. The discography contains a whole list of recordings of these works, and one wonders whether all these new performances - which I haven't heard yet - are really worthwhile, let alone indispensable, additions to the catalogue.
And then there are the Brandenburg Concertos. Recently four new versions have been released, by Trevor Pinnock, Richard Egarr, John Eliot Gardiner and Masaaki Suzuki. Trevor Pinnock's explanation for recording them once again was simple: I liked to do it. That's understandable, but performers should also ask whether the music world really needs them. And this year Concerto Köln is going to record Bach's orchestral suites - don't we have enough of those?
There is some good news, though. In one of my previous contributions I wrote about the growing interest in the music of Christoph Graupner. As he died in 1760 it is Graupner year, so we may expect some new productions with music by this German master. Hermann Max - he again - recorded Christmas cantatas which will appear later this year on CPO. Interestingly he has recorded them with one singer per part, a practice he has so far ignored in his recordings of German baroque repertoire. I am curious to see whether this is an omen of a change of mind in regard to the vocal scoring of German music.
The Austrian violinist Gunar Letzbor is also an enterprising artist. With his ensemble Ars Antiqua Austria he has recorded 10 concertos in 5 parts by Charles Mouthon who seems to be the same whose name is usually spelled as 'Mouton' and who so far is only known as a composer of lute music. Upcoming is a recording by Letzbor of the six sonatas for violin solo by the German violin virtuoso Johann Paul von Westhoff (1656-1705). That is something to look forward to, and it is surprising that it has taken so long until these brilliant pieces were recorded.
This year interesting live events can be expected, which hopefully will be recorded at some stage. Examples are Grétry's opera Andromaque in Schwetzingen and Rossini's operas La Cenerentola (Concerto Köln; Paris) and La scala di seta (Michi Gaigg; Graz). Which record company is taking the risk?
There is much talk about the crisis of the recording industry. One of the causes of this crisis is that too much repertoire is recorded too often. This probably explains why there seems to be no crisis in the recording of early music. There is so much repertoire which has never been explored yet that there is no excuse for recording the same stuff time and again. And fortunately there are ensembles and musicians who are enterprising enough to go off the beaten track.
One of them is the German conductor Hermann Max. In recent years he has recorded a number of unknown German oratorios of the late 18th and early 19th century. Last year he brought a hitherto forgotten Passion: the Große Passion by Carl Heinrich Graun, a really great work which is an important addition to the repertoire for Passiontide. The Italian keyboard player Lorenzo Ghielmi has just recorded another excellent Passion, on a Latin text, by the Neapolitan composer Francesco Feo. Both recordings will be reviewed on musica Dei donum shortly.
Also interesting are two recent recordings of music for the theatre by Haydn which is a still underrated aspect of his oeuvre. Andreas Spering recorded the marionette Singspiel Die Feuersbrunst (CPO), whereas Michi Gaigg recorded a late version of his opera L'Isola disabitata with a German text which dates from shortly after 1800 (deutsche harmonia mundi). To the same category belong the opera Le disgrazie d'Amore by Antonio Cesti (Carlo Ipata; Hyperion) as well as two oratorios by the German composer and theorist Johann Mattheson: Der liebreiche und geduldige David, and Das größte Kind (Willens; CPO).
But the habit of recording the same stuff over and over again doesn't pass the early music scene completely. In recent years I have heard and reviewed a handful of new recordings of Bach's motets. Recently I received another three. The discography contains a whole list of recordings of these works, and one wonders whether all these new performances - which I haven't heard yet - are really worthwhile, let alone indispensable, additions to the catalogue.
And then there are the Brandenburg Concertos. Recently four new versions have been released, by Trevor Pinnock, Richard Egarr, John Eliot Gardiner and Masaaki Suzuki. Trevor Pinnock's explanation for recording them once again was simple: I liked to do it. That's understandable, but performers should also ask whether the music world really needs them. And this year Concerto Köln is going to record Bach's orchestral suites - don't we have enough of those?
There is some good news, though. In one of my previous contributions I wrote about the growing interest in the music of Christoph Graupner. As he died in 1760 it is Graupner year, so we may expect some new productions with music by this German master. Hermann Max - he again - recorded Christmas cantatas which will appear later this year on CPO. Interestingly he has recorded them with one singer per part, a practice he has so far ignored in his recordings of German baroque repertoire. I am curious to see whether this is an omen of a change of mind in regard to the vocal scoring of German music.
The Austrian violinist Gunar Letzbor is also an enterprising artist. With his ensemble Ars Antiqua Austria he has recorded 10 concertos in 5 parts by Charles Mouthon who seems to be the same whose name is usually spelled as 'Mouton' and who so far is only known as a composer of lute music. Upcoming is a recording by Letzbor of the six sonatas for violin solo by the German violin virtuoso Johann Paul von Westhoff (1656-1705). That is something to look forward to, and it is surprising that it has taken so long until these brilliant pieces were recorded.
This year interesting live events can be expected, which hopefully will be recorded at some stage. Examples are Grétry's opera Andromaque in Schwetzingen and Rossini's operas La Cenerentola (Concerto Köln; Paris) and La scala di seta (Michi Gaigg; Graz). Which record company is taking the risk?
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