What Classical Music Are You Listening To Tonight?

[Kal Rubinson]

Originally Posted by bart

Berg - Violin Concerto - Seven Early Songs - Three Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 6
San Francisco Symphony, Michael Tilson Thomas
Gil Shaham, violin
Susanna Phillips, soprano
Qobuz 24/192

This is a marvellous album.
Sound and performance (even the German diction of Phillips! ), and of course the music.

Agreed. Better in MCH. Note that the "Three Pieces for Orchestra" included here was recording and released earlier. Still outstanding.

[bart]

Biber - Requiem
Vox Luminis
Freiburger Barockconsort, Lionel Meunier
Qobuz 24/96




Another great album from Vox Luminis, which was the resident orchestra for a couple of years in the Concertgebouw Brugge.
They seem to be better on recordings than live. We could experience this half a dozen times.
Very nice cooperation with the Freiburgers!


With an ever-increasing string of prestigious prizes to Vox Luminis's name – their various Gramophone Awards including winning the 2019 Choral Category for their Buxtehude Abendmusiken – it's impossible not to expect high things of each new offering from this Belgian early music vocal ensemble under the direction of Lionel Meunier. All the more so, though, for this latest exploration of the German Baroque repertoire they've made their calling card, because not only is it the first time they've taken the music of Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber (c1644-1704) into the studio, but this recording also marks the beginning of a collaboration with another internationally acclaimed period ensemble, the Freiburger Barockorchester, which appears here in its consort formation.

The good news is that the results are magnificent. Complementing and bookending the Biber are a handful of works by Christoph Bernhard (1628-1692), Johann Joseph Fux (1660-1741) and Johann Michael Nicolai (1629-1685), and it's Bernhard's Herr, nun lässest du deinen Diener in Friede fahren that sits as the curtain raise – a luxuriously sighing beauty which gives us the pleasure of being introduced to the various artists one by one as it slowly blossoms out from its organ and solo violin opening. Before the voices even arrive, the luminous-toned and lucid-textured FBO have given us a profoundly soulful song without words, after which the gradual layering of fresh voices, everything wonderfully shaped and impeccably blended, is feeling so transcendental that you're almost wondering where they've given us the emotional peak too early, and left themselves nowhere further to go. But no. In fact, the intimate understanding of the texts, the warmed crystal purity of the voices (what a soprano sound....), the corresponding expression from the instrumentalists, the perfect balancing of all of these voices with each other, and the sheer freshness of the readings, don't dip for a second across the hour which follows. Further tutti highlights include the nimble, crisp articulation and urgent energy of the Biber Requiem's Dies Irae, a major-keyed movement more akin to jubilant dance than the sombre-toned hell and brimstone number that these words tends to bring to mind. Also the joyous, easy flow of the concluding Omnis terra adoret, K. 183 by Fux. Treats from the FBO alone meanwhile include the infectious playfulness with which the sweetly earthy-toned strings circle and bow to each other over Fux's Sonata a 6 in A minor; and throughout, the softly unobtrusive colour coming from the brass.

In short, this is feeling like the start of a beautiful relationship. © Charlotte Gardner/Qobuz

[Formerly YB-2]

Mozart's "Sinfonia Concertante for Violin, Viola and Orchestra". Broadcast by the Philadelphia Orchestra with Juliette Kang (violin) & CJ Chang (viola) with Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducting. Very well done.
All Mozart program starting with his 35th and ending with his 40th with the Concertante as the meat in the sandwich.

[bart]

Originally Posted by Formerly YB-2

Mozart's "Sinfonia Concertante for Violin, Viola and Orchestra". Broadcast by the Philadelphia Orchestra with Juliette Kang (violin) & CJ Chang (viola) with Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducting. Very well done.
All Mozart program starting with his 35th and ending with his 40th with the Concertante as the meat in the sandwich.

Glenn... nothing wrong with a good dose of Mozart!

[radio times]

I'm still being stalked by Mozart and his Opera thugs, with more coming...help!

[jimtranr]

Fremaux's reading with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra of William Walton's Facade in 24/96 (EMI). Every bit the spacious you-are-there sonic equal of his traversal of Jules Massenet's Le Cid with the same orchestra.

[AudioNut]

Listening to . . . . Buxtehude and Pachelbel - Chamber Music

Musica Antiqua Koln -
Reinhard Göbel - Conductor

An Archiv Galleria recording



Love at first listen . . . Don't play many, new to me, recordings that my first thought is "I really like this thing" . . . Well, I do like this one.

Our church organist played a couple of Buxtehude organ pieces this morning at "virtual church" and I thought I'd like to hear other things this guy had written so, searching Tidal, I found this and I am impressed, both by the music and the performance.

[Antonmb]

Donizetti: String Quartets Vol. 1
Mitja Quartet
Urania Records (2021)

I’ve always thought of Donizetti as just an opera composer (which I don’t listen to at all), but learned of his quartets from a Classics Today review. This is a pleasant recording.

[bart]

J.S. Bach - Brandenburgische Konzerte BWV 1046 - 1051
La Petite Bande, Sigiswald Kuijken
via Qobuz




This was playing into the practice today.
Outstanding, but I still prefer Kuijken's later version.

[Antonmb]

Schubert: Ländler; Minuets; Écossaises
Daniel Lebhardt, piano
Naxos (2020), via Qobuz

The lighter side of Schubert, perhaps?