Jodie Devos / Nicolas Krüger AND LOVE SAID...

 

AND LOVE SAID...

 

Melody Louledjian / Antoine Palloc FLEURS

 

FLEURS

Matt Haimovitz / Mari Kodama MON AMI, MON AMOUR

 

MON AMI, MON AMOUR

 

LES MUSIQUES DE PICASSO

LES MUSIQUES DE PICASSO

 

Anna Fedorova / Dana Zemtsov SILHOUETTES

SILHOUETTES

Claudio Constantini / Louiza Hamadi 20TH CENTURY TANGO

20TH CENTURY TANGO

Les Vents Français MODERNISTE

‘Modern: Designating the most innovative forms of art in a given period, particularly those of the 20th century.’ This definition from the French Larousse dictionary explains the performers’ choice of title – Modernistes – for this new anthology of music for wind instruments: what draws the attention in these works – in different ways at different times and in different fields – are their innovative, progressive and adventurous qualities. Four of the composers featured on this album can legitimately be associated with what is very broadly known as Modernism, referring to the general proliferation of new ideas and new musical aesthetics at the turn of the 20th century and beyond. As for the two works by Philippe Hersant and Thierry Escaich, they call on us to reflect on what modernity means to us today. And, while it is easy to set Modernism in opposition to traditionalism, it is also interesting to distinguish between a composer’s personality and his or her approach to composing.

Hee-Young Lim / London Symphony Orchestra / Scott Yoo FRENCH CELLO CONCERTOS

The young South Korean cellist Hee-Young Lim won her first competition at the tender age of 11 and has been racking up honors ever since. 

It's little wonder. As she showed at the Kennedy Center's Terrace Theater on Saturday night, Lim, now 20, is a deeply gifted musician with a full, singing tone, near-flawless technique and a natural lyricism that infused virtually every note she played. 

Performing entirely from memory, Lim clearly had little use for the theatricality that other wunderkinder often indulge in; in fact, she seemed almost self-effacing onstage, and her playing always favored elegance over indulgence. At first, she almost seemed too well behaved; Boccherini's Sonata in A, No. 6, which opened the program, was decorous to a fault. But she quickly moved into more complex depths with Debussy's Sonata for Cello and Piano in D Minor -- a mercurial, elegantly savage work that she brought off with insight and quiet power.

Orchestre national d'île-de-France / Enrique Mazzola / Rex Lawson DARIUS MILHAUD La Bien-Aimée IGOR STRAVINSKY L'Oiseau de feu

The origins of this CD are unique. e story begins a few years ago, when I met Rex Lawson, an imaginative musician who is probably the world's foremost pianola virtuoso.

The day I visited his studio, which contained thousands of pianola rolls, I felt as though I was entering a cave of Ali Baba. All these old rolls, all this forgotten music, were enough to leave any musician dumbfounded! Rex immediately piqued my curiosity by telling me that a piece for pianola and orchestra composed by Milhaud and first performedin Paris in 1928, on the same evening as Ravel's Bolero, had fallen into oblivion. That's when a kind of treasure hunt began. Rex found the orchestra score (the original!) at Northwestern University, in the United States.

Meanwhile, the publisher Universal came up with the orchestral material, which of course matched up perfectly with the score. Last, but by no means least, Rex Lawson heroically produced a new roll for the pianola part. Next, a conductor had to be found who would want to perform the piece again. That's where I came in! So that's how, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, La Bien-Aimée was brought back to life after going unheard for many years. What a pleasure to discover the pages of this score, which had never been recorded; to sit at the piano and imagine Milhaud developing the bits of piano music of Schubert and Liszt, the orchestration, sometimes comical, sometimes very refined; and then to listen to the roll that Rex had reconstructed. The experience was so exhilarating that we decided to make this recording with the Orchestre national d'Île-de-France. (Enrique Mazzola)

Arsys Bourgogne / Mihály Zeke NAISSANCE DE VÉNUS

Directed by the young conductor Mihály Zeke, Arsys Bourgogne is a vocal ensemble whose mission is to perform everything from early choral music to contemporary compositions. Founded in 1999 by Pierre Cao, who conducted the ensemble for 15 years, Arsys Bourgogne has a rich history filled with quality and excellence. The ensemble is comprised of 8 to 16 singers and takes on six centuries of a cappella vocal repertoire as well as choral works with orchestra.

Since taking on the artistic direction in 2015, Mihály Zeke has brought Arsys Bourgogne into new and original choral music experiences. He is interested in forging links between Early and New music by creating strong relationships with today’s composers, such as Alexandros Markeas and Benoît Menut.

From Claudio Monteverdi to Olivier Messiaen, through Johann Sebastian Bach Giacinto Scelsi and Philippe Hersant, Arsys Bourgogne’s programs showcase composers from different eras in order to bring a new sense of meaning to each work. The ensemble also proposes new multidisciplinary programs that have elements of dramaturgy and staging.

Arsys Bourgogne embarks on a journey through the landscape of secular French 20th century choral music with Naissance de Vénus, a recording featuring emblematic repertoire such as the Trois chansons by Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel, Un soir de neige by Francis Poulenc, as well as the Cinq rechants by Olivier Messiaen. Lesser known jewels, such as Joseph Canteloube’s Chants paysans, Darius Mihaud’s Naissance de Vénus and the virtuosic À contre-voix by Florent Schmitt round out this fine collection of French a cappella works.

Thomas Demenga / Thomas Larcher / Teodoro Anzellotti CHONGURI

Cellist Thomas Demenga offers up a colorful program of encores in Chonguri. From the pizzicato tour de force of the title piece by Sulkhan Tsintsadze, which imitates the selfsame four-stringed instrument of the composer’s native Georgia, it’s clear we’re in for a lively and eclectic treat. Pianist Thomas Larcher accompanies Demenga for most of the program, which includes nods to the familiar and not so. Of the latter, Catalonian composer Gaspar Cassadó’s Danse du diable vert is among the more spirited pins in the album’s geographic and chronographic spread. Two Chopin nocturnes give us a taste of home, in a manner of speaking, with the c-sharp minor presented to us in one of the more beautiful arrangements one is likely to find (though I’ll always be partial to Bela Banfalvi’s). The balance here is superb. A dash of Webern keeps us on our toes, his three Little Pieces sparkling with a charm that is, I daresay, romantic. Of romance we get plenty more in the three Fauré selections sprinkled throughout, of which Après un rêve is a highlight, and in Liszt’s evocative La lugubre gondola.

Four Bach chorales, in Demenga’s arrangements, for which he is joined by accordionist Teodoro Anzellotti form the album’s roof.Sounding somewhere between an organ and a hurdy-gurdy, the sheer depth of tone from Demenga’s cello in these is inspiring.He also offers two pieces of his own, of which the programmatic New York Honk is a delightful end.

Demenga’s playing is such that one can feel the lineage that binds all of this music together into a masterful patchwork as idiosyncratic as it is (seemingly) inevitable. Such programming epitomizes the ECM New Series spirit insofar as it charts the contemporary while paying due respect to the antique in what amounts to one of Demenga’s finest recordings to date and a label landmark. (ECM Reviews)