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  #23751  
Old 09-19-2021, 04:06 PM
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Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy - Octet E Flat major op. 20 - Quartet D major op. 44 No. 1
Auryn Quartet -
Minguet Quartet

DVD-Audio




This DVD places you in the middle of the ensemble, as if you were a musician, or a 'tourneuse des pages'.
Gorgeous chamber works.
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Originally Posted by Kal Rubinson View Post
One of my favorites. You can get whiplash in the Scherzo!

From time to time, it's big fun to listen to this disc.
Being immersed in the music does add to the experience.
The performance is excellent.
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  #23752  
Old 09-19-2021, 05:32 PM
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This choral music is of sheer beauty.
Very well sung, terrific sonics.
Arvo Pärt was born in '35, in Estonia; he still composes.
This review comes from the CD-version:
I will be the first to admit that I have not been a particular fan of the trend in contemporary choral music that partakes rather heavily of ancient methods--music like that of Pärt and John Tavener--and have tended to steer clear of them after a few exposures. I liked Pärt's 'St. John Passion' but felt it went on too long and was just a bit monochrome. I have also not been a big fan of trance music, of which some of this music seems to take part. But for some reason I have really responded positively to this release of choral music by Pärt. Perhaps it is because the performances are so wonderful. The Elora Festival Singers are a group made up of professional singers from Toronto, mostly from, I think, Toronto's well-known Mendelssohn Choir. I have been impressed with other recordings they have made and I suppose that's why I gave this CD a listen. Some, or even perhaps all, of these pieces have been recorded before, some several times, and some by such wonderful groups as the Hilliard Ensemble, the group that first recorded the 'St. John Passion.' Perhaps my positive response also has something to do with the fact that there are several shorter pieces here, pieces that one can easily imagine being performed as part of a church service, rather than an evening long work like the Passion. Amazon has not, as of the date of this review, listed the individual pieces included here. They are:

Cantate Domino Canticum Novum (Psalm 95) (1977, rev. 1996)
Berliner Messe (1990-91, rev. 1992)
De Profundis (1980)
Summa (1977)
The Beatitudes (1990, rev. 1991)
Magnificat (1989)

The largest piece here (23 minutes long) is the seven-movement 'Berliner Messe' which exists in several versions. The one here is for string orchestra and choir. The orchestral accompaniment is very spare (and very lovely) and, as with most of Pärt's choral music, the choir sings a kind of extended Gregorian chant with much unison singing but also with austere choral harmonies that often include added-note triadic chords. The effect is prayerful and serene. The 'Credo' is a rewriting of the earlier 'Summa,' which also appears here as a separate piece. In both the 'Credo' and the earlier 'Summa' there is a medieval-sounding etiolation of Lutheran chorale tunes. The 'Agnus Dei' is particularly haunting.

The setting of the 'Psalm 95' ('O sing unto the Lord a new song') is a simple chant-like setting for four-part chorus and organ with changing harmonies and spare organ accompaniment. 'De Profundis' ('Out of the depths I have called unto Thee') does indeed rise out of the depths, with tenors and basses intoning the main theme; quiet bass drum strokes and a recurring single tubular chime note against a wavering organ ostinato create an incantatory effect. 'The Beatitudes' and 'Magnificat' (the latter possibly the most performed of all of Pärt's choral pieces) are in like vein. The seven-minute 'Magnificat' alternates solo and choral sections and perhaps provides a bit more contrast than others of his works.

Although I have not heard other recordings of these pieces, I cannot praise too highly the limpid, lightly inflected, and reverent singing of the Elora Festival Singers, along with the excellent support of their partners, the Elora Festival Orchestra and organist Jürgen Petrenko, led by their conductor (and Elora founder) Noel Edison. This is music-making at the highest level.

Recommended.

Scott Morrison
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Originally Posted by bart View Post
Simplicity, geniality, musicality and the warmth of low organ notes that make the house rattle!

I play this regularly.
Pärt is one of my desert island composers.
Even when the internet didn't function for a while, we'd still have our silver discs!
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  #23753  
Old 09-19-2021, 05:49 PM
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Mainstream?! It's the best of the best!
I never tire of hearing the classical top works.
I don't have that with pop music.
But Beethoven's symphonies, or Bach's Cantatas, I can hear them time after time...



This arrived today:

Ravel - Orchestral Works 1
Orchestre National de Lyon, Leonard Slatkin




These works are all masterpieces.
Wonderful surround sound.

This is a real treat in all aspects!
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  #23754  
Old 09-20-2021, 10:19 AM
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J.S. Bach - Brandenburg Concertos
Akademie Für Alte Musik Berlin
Isabelle Faust
Antoine Tamestit

via Qobuz




These are some of my favourite works, brought by one of my favourite ensembles, with one of the best violinists in my opinion.
This is an absolute top performance!
I'm on duty for the moment, so it's via a Dali Katch (which actually sounds decent), but it won't be long until I listen to the 24/192 stream on our living room system!


Buoyancy, elegance, crisp rhythmics, precise articulation, bristling timbres… All modes of description that I’m likely to have at some point used to outline the strengths of a Bach Brandenburgs release, when not only do new recordings of this famous Köthen-composed set appear with a steady regularity, but when there’s also a consistency to both the performance standards, and the performance style and decisions that you’ll hear across especially the more recent offerings. Not because Historically Informed Performance ensembles have no imagination, but because Bach was in fact incredibly precise about what he wanted, meaning very little has been left to the imagination. Also because Baroque performances these days are all able to draw on the received wisdom of what is now decades of HIP scholarship and practice.

All that said, this new offering from the Akademie fűr Alte Musik Berlin under its concertmasters Georg Kallweit and Bernhard Forck, feels different. For starters it’s different to the ensemble’s earlier Brandenburgs recording, which now is almost twenty-five years old. Partly this is down to tools, when a quarter of a century ago the instrument-making world hadn’t quite caught up with period performance no longer being a niche enterprise, meaning fewer high-class period copies to be found, and thus more mediocre instruments sitting in the world’s baroque bands. Then it’s also partly due to a change in the continuo department, because this time there’s no double bass – a reflection of the belief that, at time of composition, the “violone grosso” was yet to arrive in Köthen.

Yet it’s not just a matter of lighter continuo textures or an orchestra of top-drawer instruments. Or even of the range of light and shade the orchestra are bringing to their colouring. More, it’s the sense of joyous intimacy and excitement radiating from absolutely everyone, combined with the sheer effortless of the virtuosity you’re hearing at every fresh turn. No doubt this is due in no small part to the presence of the ensemble’s longtime collaborator, violinist Isabelle Faust, and its recent new collaborator violist Antoine Tamestit; because while theirs are hardly “prima donna” star turns (after all, these are democratic, multi-instrument concertos, and Faust and Tamestit have correspondingly submerged themselves into the ensemble), it’s also true that Faust’s solo pyrotechnics in No. 4, and her lovely interplay with the recorders, had me wanting to rewind; and that No. 6 for two violas, two gambas and obligato cello is especially ringing with tonal beauty and sprightly vim. What’s more, the aforementioned lack of double bass has yielded a concluding Allegro for No. 6 that stands as one of the set’s absolute highlights: notably warmly climactic and uplifting, but equally notably light of tread and transparent of texture in a way that’s strikingly, surprisingly successful.

Worth emphasising also is that the sense of occasion is by no means limited to where Faust and Tamestit have their solo turns. For instance, I can’t remember having ever been so captivated by the tonal beauty and shaping of the harpsichord’s virtuosities in No. 5’s opening Allegro as I am here by Raphael Alpermann’s glittering figures.

In short, don’t hesitate. This is superb from start to finish. © Charlotte Gardner/Qobuz
Bart, thanks for the recommendation

I have saved a few more recordings by the Akademie Für Alte Musik Berlin on Harmonia Mundi for later listening
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Last edited by joel_hifi; 09-20-2021 at 10:21 AM.
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  #23755  
Old 09-20-2021, 12:09 PM
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This is a real treat in all aspects!


This is a favorite - I think it may be the first download I purchased from Qobuz.
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  #23756  
Old 09-20-2021, 12:13 PM
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Buxtehude: Trio Sonatas Op.2
Arcangelo: Sophie Gent, Jonathan Manson, Thomas Dunford, Jonathan Cohen
Alpha (2021), via Qobuz

Very nice.

IMG_1158.jpg
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  #23757  
Old 09-23-2021, 03:58 PM
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We didn't finish this.
It was a bit too much of the same thing.

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  #23758  
Old 09-23-2021, 04:02 PM
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Buxtehude - Trio Sonatas Op. 1
Arcangelo
Qobuz 24/96




Because I liked their recent Buxtehude so much, I went to the first volume.
It is equally good!

For this recording of music by Buxtehude, Jonathan Cohen, founder of the ensemble Arcangelo, is joined by a distinguished trio, including two regulars on the Alpha label, Sophie Gent and Thomas Dunford, alongside the gambist Jonathan Manson. Although Dietrich Buxtehude is famous above all for his organ music and cantatas, and for the long journey the young Bach undertook to meet him, his chamber music is virtually unknown. In the mid-1690s, at the height of his fame, Buxtehude published two collections in rapid succession, each comprising seven sonatas for violin, viola da gamba and basso continuo. It is the works of the first collection (1694) – designated Opus 1 in the print – that Arcangelo has recorded here. These sonatas are characterised by pronounced experimental features in both the scoring and the handling of the instruments. © Outhere Music
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  #23759  
Old 09-23-2021, 04:48 PM
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Ravel - Orchestral Works 2
Orchestre National de Lyon, Leonard Slatkin
Qobuz 24/96




Following the excellent Blu-ray version of volume 1 of this series.
This is equally outstanding.
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  #23760  
Old 09-25-2021, 05:48 PM
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Originally Posted by bart View Post
J.S. Bach - Brandenburg Concertos
Akademie Für Alte Musik Berlin
Isabelle Faust
Antoine Tamestit

via Qobuz




These are some of my favourite works, brought by one of my favourite ensembles, with one of the best violinists in my opinion.
This is an absolute top performance!
I'm on duty for the moment, so it's via a Dali Katch (which actually sounds decent), but it won't be long until I listen to the 24/192 stream on our living room system!


Buoyancy, elegance, crisp rhythmics, precise articulation, bristling timbres… All modes of description that I’m likely to have at some point used to outline the strengths of a Bach Brandenburgs release, when not only do new recordings of this famous Köthen-composed set appear with a steady regularity, but when there’s also a consistency to both the performance standards, and the performance style and decisions that you’ll hear across especially the more recent offerings. Not because Historically Informed Performance ensembles have no imagination, but because Bach was in fact incredibly precise about what he wanted, meaning very little has been left to the imagination. Also because Baroque performances these days are all able to draw on the received wisdom of what is now decades of HIP scholarship and practice.

All that said, this new offering from the Akademie fűr Alte Musik Berlin under its concertmasters Georg Kallweit and Bernhard Forck, feels different. For starters it’s different to the ensemble’s earlier Brandenburgs recording, which now is almost twenty-five years old. Partly this is down to tools, when a quarter of a century ago the instrument-making world hadn’t quite caught up with period performance no longer being a niche enterprise, meaning fewer high-class period copies to be found, and thus more mediocre instruments sitting in the world’s baroque bands. Then it’s also partly due to a change in the continuo department, because this time there’s no double bass – a reflection of the belief that, at time of composition, the “violone grosso” was yet to arrive in Köthen.

Yet it’s not just a matter of lighter continuo textures or an orchestra of top-drawer instruments. Or even of the range of light and shade the orchestra are bringing to their colouring. More, it’s the sense of joyous intimacy and excitement radiating from absolutely everyone, combined with the sheer effortless of the virtuosity you’re hearing at every fresh turn. No doubt this is due in no small part to the presence of the ensemble’s longtime collaborator, violinist Isabelle Faust, and its recent new collaborator violist Antoine Tamestit; because while theirs are hardly “prima donna” star turns (after all, these are democratic, multi-instrument concertos, and Faust and Tamestit have correspondingly submerged themselves into the ensemble), it’s also true that Faust’s solo pyrotechnics in No. 4, and her lovely interplay with the recorders, had me wanting to rewind; and that No. 6 for two violas, two gambas and obligato cello is especially ringing with tonal beauty and sprightly vim. What’s more, the aforementioned lack of double bass has yielded a concluding Allegro for No. 6 that stands as one of the set’s absolute highlights: notably warmly climactic and uplifting, but equally notably light of tread and transparent of texture in a way that’s strikingly, surprisingly successful.

Worth emphasising also is that the sense of occasion is by no means limited to where Faust and Tamestit have their solo turns. For instance, I can’t remember having ever been so captivated by the tonal beauty and shaping of the harpsichord’s virtuosities in No. 5’s opening Allegro as I am here by Raphael Alpermann’s glittering figures.

In short, don’t hesitate. This is superb from start to finish. © Charlotte Gardner/Qobuz

Via the Grimm -> Mola Mola Tambaqui -> Hegel -> Vivid Audio G2s, this album leads me into higher spheres! This is (like) pure ecstacy!
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AV: Hegel C-53, Marantz AV8802A, Oppo BDP-203EU, Pioneer Kuro 60", Vivid Audio C1 & V1w's, Wireworld Platinum Eclipse, SE & E
Second system (veranda): Halgorythme preamp and monoblocks, Burmester 061, Avalon Avatar, Sharkwire & Wireworld cables
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