performed by Quintette Nielsen & Pierre Roullier, or below by The Philharmonic Five I feel a little bit bad that this is the first representation that Berio will be getting in our series here, but while he is a critically important name … Continue reading Luciano Berio: Opus Number Zoo, Children’s Play for Wind Quintet
performed by Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Maryvonne Le Dizes, Pierre Strauch & Alain Damiens or below by Pianist Matthew Schellhorn and Soloists of the Philharmonia Orchestra: James Clark (violin), Barnaby Robson (clarinet), David Cohen (cello) Never was I listened to with such rapt attention … Continue reading Messiaen: Quatuor pour la fin du temps
performed by the Fine Arts Quartet and Gil Sharon. People (rightly) think of Bruckner as a craftsman, a constructor of enormous, highly-developed, colossal symphonies, and there’s a reason for that. As we saw this week (with the exception of his study symphony, a … Continue reading Bruckner String Quintet in F major, WAB 112
Who doesn’t love chamber music? I’m not much for midweek concerts, because they usually involve first running home to care quickly for a dog, then rushing to a concert, then rushing home to get ready for work the next day, … Continue reading TSO’s Playful Music Adventure
I feel bad for being a bit lazy with writing a concert review, but to be honest, I’m being a bit concert-ed out. There’s another one tomorrow that I was debating whether to go to, since I have quite a … Continue reading Kun Woo Paik and Friends
performed by the Zurich string trio, or below in a much brisker rendition by the Grumiaux Trio So trios… We talked about Beethoven’s op. 1 piano trios starting here, the first of those also in E flat. That was last summer, … Continue reading Beethoven Trio for violin, viola & cello in E flat, Op. 3
performed below by the Playground Ensemble Of all the quartets discussed so far, I feel this one has the traditional(ish) ideas of Schoenberg, the dense intensity and purpose of Babbitt, and the deep impression and atmosphere of Dutilleux, although I … Continue reading Ruth Crawford Seeger: String Quartet 1931
performed by the people listed here, directed by the very friendly Erik Carlson “… entire twelve-tone compositions may be seen to be consequences of the structure of the original sets on which they are based, thus revealing “those attributes of … Continue reading Babbitt: Composition for Twelve Instruments
played by any of the people in the recordings listed here, or as below (more detail on the performers later, but they are listed in the YouTube video’s info “… the general lesson of Composition for Four Instruments is that … Continue reading Babbitt: Composition for Four Instruments
I have come to love string quartets. It seems this group of four instruments has the perfect balance of succinct compactness, clarity, cohesion, and range of expression. There are times when a quartet sounds perfectly like a quartet, with four … Continue reading Some 20th Century String Quartets: A small series
performed by Oistrakh/Knushevitsky/Oborin, or the Beaux Arts Trio, or anyone else So… for whatever reason, this piece just does not resonate with me. I’ve really tried. I’ve done my homework, I know it’s a common piece in the repertoire. I … Continue reading Chopin Piano Trio, op. 8
performed by Martha Argerich and Gautier Capuçon What was one of the happiest times in your life, a time when you really genuinely wished everything would freeze and your life would stagnate in that perfect period in time and never … Continue reading Chopin: Introduction and Polonaise brillante in C major, Op. 3
performed by Szeryng/Fournier/Kempff or below by Vegh/Casals/Horszowski Our third and final Beethoven trio for now is the opus 1 no. 3 trio, the most daring of them all. Haydn approved of the first two trios, but suggested with whatever degree … Continue reading Beethoven Piano Trio no. 3 in Cm, op. 1 no. 3
performed again by Szeryng/Fournier/Kempff, or as below Again, same opus number, same year, same performance dates as yesterday. What’s new is a quiet, serene, classical personality, the “quiet middle child” as expressed in this fantastic article that was an excellent … Continue reading Beethoven Piano Trio no. 2 in G, op. 1, no 2.
performed by Henryk Szeryng, violin; Pierre Fournier, cello; Wilhelm Kempff, piano; or below by the Istomin/Stern/Rose trio That’s a lot of ones. I have a confession to make. This is the first piano trio I’ve ever listened to in full, … Continue reading Beethoven Piano Trio no. 1 in Eb, op. 1. no.1
performed by the Kohon Quartet (Bernard Zaslav was violist, and is a former member of the Fine Arts quartet, whose wonderful performance [and sole recording] of Babbitt’s third string quartet I recently got my hands on) It’s always odd looking … Continue reading Berg String Quartet, op. 3
performed by two separate teams:the clarinet and piano duo here or a truly splendid performance by Capucon and Argerich (cello, not clarinet) Welcome to part two of our three (and a half?) part clarinet series. Today’s piece was originally written for clarinet and piano, but it seems that it is more often performed on cello. That isn’t against the composer’s wish, though, as he’d directed that the clarinet part could be played either on violin or cello as well.Schumann is a composer I’m not terribly familiar with, as evidenced by my poor attention to his symphonies I wrote about a … Continue reading Schumann’s Drei Fantasiestücke, op. 73, for clarinet and piano
performed by Sabine Meyer and the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields string quartet So… The first few listens of this piece were almost as boring as the first time I listened to Mozart’s clarinet concerto, which I am … Continue reading Mozart Clarinet Quintet in A, K. 581
performed by members of the Ensemble InterContemporain (Amazon) (and for a delightful video of a live performance, check this out) (I recently featured the string orchestra version of this piece in a concert program series over on my Substack. Go check … Continue reading Arnold Schoenberg: Verklärte Nacht (sextet version)