Antoine Tamestit / Cédric Tiberghien JOHANNES BRAHMS Sonatas op. 120 - Zwei Gesänge Op. 91 - Wiegenlied

 

SONATAS OP. 120

 

OLGA NEUWIRTH ...miramondo multiplo... - Remnants of Songs ... An Amphigony - Masaot / Clocks without Hands

OLGA NEUWIRTH

Isabelle Faust / Swedish Symphony Orchestra / Daniel Harding ARNOLD SCHOENBERG Violin Concerto - Verklärte Nacht

                                       VIOLIN CONCERTO - VERKLÄRTE NACHT

Antoine Tamestit / Masato Suzuki J.S. BACH Sonatas for Viola (da Gamba) and Harpsichord

Peter Wollny writes the liner notes to these arrangements for viola and harpsichord to make the case for rearranging gamba music for the viola, Bach’s known preferred instrument for ensemble playing. But, apart from the obvious similarities in tessitura and the fun to be had playing the gamba parts on the viola if that is your instrument, there are not many convincing arguments. We can indeed imagine JSB picking up his viola and playing one of these pieces to improve his children’s keyboard skills, but . . . 

One of the casualties of these kinds of arrangement which is perhaps most obvious in the G major BWV 1027 sonata is that the tones of the viola are so luscious that the right hand of the harpsichord – recorded rather more reticently – doesn’t really stand a chance against the viola. This is not a true marriage of equal tones, as it is on a thinner-toned viola da gamba, nor does Tamestit on the ‘Mahler’ Stradivarius of 1672 he was loaned for this recording really display much HIP awareness. It isn’t just the rubati and the fulsome tone: it’s those little give-away tricks like swelling through long notes and giving us a concernedly subservient tone for the ‘less important’ counter-subjects.

The tenor aria BWV 5iii is one of the few that is likely to have a viola obligato; though no instrument is specified the part is written in the alto clef. But however much this is a true trio sonata, the right hand of the harpsichord only becomes a true partner for a few bars at the start of the middle section from bar 69 onwards.

They are both fine players, but not well matched here. They play at A=415, but there is no information on matters like temperament. Viola players may be glad to hear these plausible arrangements, but many listeners will think that Bach’s music is best served by his chosen scoring.

(David Stancliffe)

Trio Zimmermann JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH Goldberg Variations

For close to 300 years Bach’s Goldberg Variations have awed performers as well as listeners, through an unparalleled combination of a dazzling variety of expression and breath-taking virtuosity with stupendous polyphonic mastery. No wonder then that other musicians than harpsichordists have wanted to make it their own – pianists, first and foremost, but also accordion players and guitarists, flautists and harpists. 

Having performed and recorded much of the classical as well as the modern string trio repertoire, Trio Zimmermann began working on the Goldberg Variations several years ago, playing an existing arrangement. But in their own words, the three members – among the leading string players of our time – ‘soon became captivated by the original score and its innumerable beauties and details’. As a result they have jointly prepared a performing version which here receives its first recording. Playing an important part on this disc are also the Trio’s instruments – all by Antonio Stradivarius, and featured in close-up on the cover.

Antoine Tamestit / Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks / Daniel Harding WIDMANN Viola Concerto

Antoine Tamestit's recording of Jörg Widmann Viola Concerto is released on Harmonia Mundi on 23 February 2018. Tamestit gave the world premiere of the concerto in 2015 with the Orchestre de Paris and Paavo Järvi. “One of the most gifted French musicians of the era,” wrote Le Figaro, “the work is made to measure for Tamestit, his style of playing, his tone, his personality.” The work was co-commissioned by the Swedish Radio Symphony and Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks with conductor Daniel Harding, who play on the recording. 
As well as Widmann’s Viola Concerto, the disc features chamber works performed by Tamestit and Bruno Philippe, Marc Bouchkov and the Signum Quartet. 
The theatrical concerto sees the soloist exploring a range of positions on the stage. Initially seated behind the harp players the soloist moves towards the centre of the orchestra and eventually ‘front and centre’ assuming the traditional position for the soloist. 
Tamestit has already performed the concerto widely, and it has proved popular with audiences at subsequent performances with the Danish National Symphony Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Stavanger Symphony Orchestra, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra.

Martin Helmchen FRANZ SCHUBERT Forellen Quintet

With hundreds of recorded performances of Schubert's "Trout" Quintet available, what is it that distinguished this 2009 PentaTone disc from the rest? Partially the playing, partially the couplings, and partially the sound. Played by pianist Martin Helmchen, violinist Christian Tetzlaff, violist Antoine Tamestit, cellist Marie Elisabeth Hecker, and double bassist Alois Posch, this "Trout" is light, lively, and lyrical, with a singing tone, a smiling interpretation, and a vivacious feeling for rhythm. The players are first-rate by themselves and outstanding as an ensemble, with a tight but relaxed grasp of form and an intuitive sense of tempo. The couplings here are rather unusual: the Variations on Trockne Blumen for flute and piano and the Notturno for piano trio, the former receiving a polished and appealing account by pianist Helmchen with wooden flutist Aldo Baerten and the latter getting a broadly paced but beautifully sculpted reading by Helmchen, Tetzlaff, and Hecker. And the super audio sound by the Dutch PentaTone label is so realistic one cannot only hear Baerten breathe, one can almost smell the wood of his flute. Longtime listeners may already have their favorite recordings of the "Trout" Quintet, but by virtue of the playing, the couplings, and the sound, this one deserves to be at least sampled. (James Leonard)

Antoine Tamestit / Cédric Tiberghien BEL CANTO

Going well beyond mere historical interest, this album unveils the charms of a repertoire that delighted Parisian concert halls and salons throughout the 19th century. It demonstrates how the viola finally emerged from the violin’s shadow thanks to virtuoso playing, now resuscitated by the talent of Antoine Tamestit and Cédric Tiberghien in pieces which offer much more than the exquisite languors of bel canto. Italian for 'beautiful singing' or 'beautiful song', the term remains vague and ambiguous but is commonly used to evoke a lost singing tradition; in this case the famed singing tone of Antoine Tamestit's viola, a 1672 Stradivarius, loaned by the Habisreutinger Foundation.

Born in Paris, Antoine Tamestit studied with Jesse Levine at Yale University and with Tabea Zimmermann. He has won several coveted prizes including the William Primrose Competition, first prize at the Young Concert Artists (YCAT) international auditions, a place on BBC Radio 3’s New Generation Artists Scheme and a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award.

Antoine Tamestit’s distinguished discography includes Berlioz’s 'Harold en Italie', which was recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra and Valery Gergiev and released in 2015 by LSO Live. For Naïve he has recorded three of the Bach Suites, Hindemith solo and concertante works recorded with the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra and Paavo Järvi, and an earlier recording of 'Harold' with Marc Minkowski and Les Musicians du Louvre.

This particular diva is the viola; its servant is Antoine Tamestit, here making his first solo recording for harmonia mundi. (Presto Classical)

Andreas Ottensamer BRAHMS The Hungarian Connection

This album explores Brahms’s lifelong fascination with Hungarian idioms. The programme, following the Quintet, comprises a series of arrangements by the group’s cellist Stephan Koncz, which gradually loosen the strict discipline of a classical chamber group, moving towards the freely expressive style of a Hungarian restaurant band. The arrangements are marvellously well done, and the sequence ranges from the comfortable warmth of Brahms waltzes to the distinctly exotic sound of the Transylvanian medley. (Listeners will find some of these melodies familiar; they appear in Bartók’s Romanian Dances.) The Leó Weiner pieces, originally for clarinet and piano, transmit an atmosphere of peasant music, while the Hungarian Dances are arranged to give the impression of a gypsy band, with spectacular solo contributions from clarinet, violin and cimbalom.

The performance of the Quintet is a fine one, with lovely clarinet tone, excellent overall sound and a deep understanding of the work’s varied character. Andreas Ottensamer appreciates the need for some rhythmic freedom, not least in the elaborate Hungarian music in the Adagio, but I don’t find his rubato as convincing as Reginald Kell’s in his wonderful 1937 recording with the Busch Quartet – Kell is better at keeping the listener aware of the underlying rhythmic framework. And in the finale, I feel there’s a miscalculation in slowing up for the third and fourth variations; this takes away from the tragic effect of the poco meno mosso marked when the first movement’s theme is recalled. But it’s a fascinating issue, with playing of mastery and versatility. (Gramophone) 

Antoine Tamestit HINDEMITH Bratsche!

Born in Paris in 1979, Antoine Tamestit was initially inspired by his teachers Jean Sulem, Jesse Levine and Tabea Zimmermann, and soon came to international prominence by winning, in rapid succession, the Maurice Vieux Competition, the William Primrose Competition, the Young Concert Artists Competition in New York, and the ARD Competition in Munich. With the support of the Borletti-Buitoni Trust Foundation and several important awards (Deutschlandfunk-Förderpreis, Victoires de la Musique, Crédit Suisse), he quickly became one of the most sought-after violists of his generation.

In his ceaseless search for musical encounters, Antoine Tamestit nourishes a passion for chamber music which has taken him from Lockenhaus to Verbier, Nantes, Kronberg, Lucerne, Schwarzenberg, and Jerusalem. His multiple collaborations with such musicians as the soprano Sandrine Piau in Schubert, the Hagen Quartet in Mozart and the pianist Nicholas Angelich in Brahms, to name but a few, have become his daily inspiration. He has explored the fascinating repertoire of the duo sonata with Markus Hadulla for more than ten years now, and in 2008 he finally realised his dream of a string trio by founding the Trio Zimmermann with Frank Peter Zimmermann and Christian Poltera. He also likes to champion the unique concerto repertoire for viola, from Mozart to Schnittke by way of Hindemith, Bartók and Berlioz, whom he rediscovered with Marc Minkowski. He delights in appearing with the great orchestras of Leipzig, Munich, Berlin, Paris, and Tokyo, under such conductors as Marek Janowski, Louis Langrée, Paavo Järvi, and Myung-Whun Chung, not to mention the Vienna Philharmonic under the direction of Riccardo Muti.

Having premiered new compositions by his father Gérard Tamestit from very early in his career, he has developed an insatiable curiosity about new music. With Tabea Zimmermann he has recorded George Benjamin’s Viola, Viola and Mantovani’s Double Concerto; he has given the first performances in several capital cities of Olga Neuwirth’s Remnants of Songs and works by Betsy Jolas, and has commissioned a forthcoming concerto from Jörg Widmann. In his teaching at the Musikhochschule in Cologne, he shares with his students a vision of an instrument with an infinite sound-palette.

Since 2008 he has found his voice with one of the very few Stradivarius violas, the ‘Mahler’, made in 1672, which is generously loaned to him by the Habisreutinger Foundation.