New Releases

[André]

That Ichmouratov release calls me!

Intriguing indeed.

The Beauséjour recital too. What's the program?

[Roy Bland]

[Brian]

Intriguing indeed.

The Beauséjour recital too. What's the program?

Was not available yet but French music involving or invoking birdsong.

[André]

Was not available yet but French music involving or invoking birdsong.

Messiaen on the harpsichord ? 

[aukhawk]

Some more MAY stuff to help us survive...

That's her 4th different label in six releases ...

[Maestro267]

Man, Naxos' website is stupidly slow again! I wanna see their May releases but the page never loads for me. It's always "waiting for naxos.com".

[Brian]

Man, Naxos' website is stupidly slow again! I wanna see their May releases but the page never loads for me. It's always "waiting for naxos.com".

Most of their May releases are posted 1-2 pages ago here, but I'll admit I don't post all of them and try to kinda guess what would be most interesting to GMG...so there are a few more that you'll need to load their site to see...

[vers la flamme]

  I love waltzes (preferably dancing to them).

I don't think Richter's words are an indictment of waltzes per se, just the Diabelli waltz that begins that set of variations. I can't say I blame him; it's not the most interesting minute of music in the world.

[JBS]

Was not available yet but French music involving or invoking birdsong.

Rameau must not have been the only one to compose a hen. I admit I don't know enough to fill out the list.

Most of their May releases are posted 1-2 pages ago here, but I'll admit I don't post all of them and try to kinda guess what would be most interesting to GMG...so there are a few more that you'll need to load their site to see...

Almost all their Beethoven releases are already in their Complete Beethoven box.  A lot of them were probably recorded specifically for the box...that Folk Songs CD is a compilation of first versions and alternative versions of arrangements whose official published version shows up on other CDs.

[Mandryka]

  I love waltzes (preferably dancing to them).

Preferably a slinky sexy slow

https://www.youtube.com/v/2hjrSR6Q8VY

[André]

Old recordings, old friends, in a different and highly valuable coupling. Same performances as the original DG issues from 1965 (Gurre) and 1968 (Mass). Released later this month.

[Daverz]

Old recordings, old friends, in a different and highly valuable coupling. Same performances as the original DG issues from 1965 (Gurre) and 1968 (Mass). Released later this month.

I assume these would be LP rips by this Italian knockoff label.  I don't think the "official" releases are that hard to obtain.

[Mandryka]

Since then [his first recording] we have played the Rosary Sona- tas hundreds of times in concerts, yet only after 20 years did I get the feeling that I had finally understood the work in its religious, and thus in its full musical meaning. Com- ing back to listen to the old recording after a long time, I was amazed at how beautifully and full of inspiration we had played, but I
also had the feeling that at the time we had not yet understood the work from within, and were merely celebrating its outer beauty. Slowly a niggling desire grew to record the Mystery Sonatas a second time. Nevertheless, I was hesitant – it really had to make sense to make a second recording after such a good and successful first one. Then when Michael Sawall from Pan Classics asked me to think about a second recording of the Rosary Sona- tas, I began to prepare.
Countless recordings have been released since 1996. Having opened Pandora's box with our colourful continuo line-ups, other musicians gladly came on board. Today a performance with the standard nineties' line-up is without doubt the exception, however, playing with timbres seems to have mutated into an end in itself. It can happen that after the first sonata's toccata-like introduction a ,,continuo band" be- gins to improvise over the short ostinato bass for 2 or 3 minutes before the poor violinist is allowed to start his melody. Harp, lute and oth- er plucked instruments lay a veil of pop music over every musical event, contrasting counter- melodies are artistically composed along with numerous other confusing distractions. All this sounds great to me when I listen for the first time, but after a while my discomfort starts to grow, namely, when I can no longer recognize any musical meaning in the various skilfully performed interpretive activities.
The younger generation of baroque violinists has reached an extremely high level of techni- cal maturity, with virtuosity no longer being the exception. It is all too tempting to squeeze simple melodies into rococo costumes with all kinds of flourishing ornaments, but do cadential phrases really always need frantic improvisation?
I have often expressed my critical thoughts about the current sound of string instruments with a claim historical authenticity. In the Mystery Sonatas, questions about the sound of the continuo instruments and the violin are even more important, as the scordaturas open up additional levels of acoustic relevance.
At this point I'd like to move on to describing my concrete ideas for our new recording of the Rosary Sonatas.
SOUND
Without scordatura, the sound of my violin is like the voices of choirboys or the sound of baroque organ stops used for obbligato movements. Playing in the church, often uni- sono with boy sopranos, was the most noble and important of a violinist's jobs up to and including the time of Biber.
I assume that Biber's Rosary Sonatas were never performed as a cycle. His compositions probably formed part of the rosary prayers that were practised with great fervour by the
20
Confraternity of the Rosary in the newly built church of Maria Plain near Salzburg, with one sonata per Rosary devotion seeming most likely to me. This means Biber had ample time to prepare his instrument for the various scordaturas.
Such a scenario is impossible to recreate today. The sonatas are usually performed in groups or a cross section, adapted to the length of a concert. More rarely, we find com- plete performances with breaks in between. In all these cases, violinists are faced with the problem that under no circumstances would their instruments survive being so extremely re-tuned in the short time required. The usual solution is to perform using several instru- ments. Currently I play complete cycles of the Rosary Sonatas using just 3-4 violins. This is made possible by precisely organising the tuning process, many tricks and plenty of ex- perience gained in past concerts.
Different violins naturally have their own timbre. The changes in tone that result from the instruments being re-tuned in the various scordaturas are thus additionally falsified, the result not corresponding to that which one gets when retuning a single instrument.
A violin needs at least a day to get used to a different tension. In order for this to happen, the violinist has to be diligent, finding and ac- tivating an instrument's overtones. Only then will it be able to resonate at its best. . . 

[Mandryka]

Johannes de Clèves (?1529-1582).

[Mandryka]

As already mentioned, Cutting was probably an amateur, not a professional lutenist. Still, his works show the hand of a skillful musician and composer. His music is characterized by a preference for a 'learned' polyphonic fabric, although he also wrote light pieces using simple homophony. In the pavans and galliards we often see a complex interplay between chordal and imitative writing. Harmonically, Cutting's music is sometimes forward-looking, with its extensive use of sequences and occasional flashes of harmonic daring. In his oeuvre, especially in his pavans, a development of his musical style may be discerned, from pieces with an essentially two-part structure with long chains of semiquavers in the divisions, via three-part works characterized by imitative counterpoint in short motifs, to even fuller four-part pieces with longer polyphonic lines. In the latter, a lute with an added seventh course is required.
Francis Cutting's compositions surely rank among the best of the Elizabethan 'Golden Age'. The serious mood of his pavans, the vitality of his galliards, the
gaiety of his almains and toys, together with his personal harmonic idiom and his inventiveness in using counterpoint, imitation and sequences, are all sure signs of a gifted and often inspired composer. It is only right that finally a complete recording is dedicated to his music.
© Jan W.J. Burgers

(After listening for 10 minutes I can't say I'm convinced by what Mr Bergers says!)

[Mandryka]

. . . his trattado de Glosas, along with the treatises of sylvestro Ganassi (la Fontegara, 1535; regola rubertina, 1542-3) had a pioneering, seminal influence on a whole future line of italian masters of the renaissance who followed ortiz's technique of diminution – the subdivision of melodic notes and their ornamentation – as well as the art of improvisation, and the virtuosic variation of simple, often well-known melodies. this became a musical language of its own, quite separate from other sources and developments of western art music. . . the interpretative research les Basses réunies have devoted to this repertoire goes hand in hand with the reconstruction of instruments long since vanished, but recreated for this occasion. Five viols (three bass and two treble) have been specially made by the string instrument craftsman Charles riché . . .

[Mandryka]

Composers

Firenze, Andrea da (d. 1415)
Firenze, Don Paolo da (1390-1425)
Firenze, Donato da (late 14th century)
Firenze, Giovanni da (c.1270-c.1350)
Firenze, Lorenzo da
Landini, Francesco (c.1325-1397)
Padova, Bartolino da (fl.c.1365-1405)
Rimini, Vincenzo da
Works

anon.: Benedicamus domino
anon.: Poi che veder non poso
Firenze, A: Non piu doglia ebbe Dido
Firenze, D P: Benedicamus domino
Firenze, D P: Godi Firenze
Firenze, D: Come 'l potes' tu far
Firenze, Giovanni: Per larghi prati, caccia
Firenze, Giovanni: Quand'amor
Firenze, Giovanni: Quando la stella
Firenze, L: A poste messe veltri e gran mastini
Landini, F: Adiou adiou
Landini, F: Che Chosa è quest'Amor
Landini, F: Conviens' a fede
Landini, F: Creata fusti o vergine Maria
Padova: Quel sole che nutrical gentil fiore
Rimini: Ay, sconsolato ed amoroso

[Mandryka]

5 minutes test suggests it's not without interest.

[Mandryka]

In the period around 1500, love songs in many shades were created at Maximilian I's court. Whether devoted loyalty insurance, the price of the beloved, mocking verses at weather-wise companions, complaints about unfavorable competitors: the composers of the court chapel transformed the poems into high-quality polyphonic miniatures with great tonal appeal. Vocally and instrumentally they unfold a varied listening landscape. In Augsburg, the court book printer Erhard Öglin, born in Reutlingen, united them in 1512 for the first ever German song book ever printed.

[Mandryka]

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8718373--two-lutes-with-grace-plectrum-lute-duos-of-the-late-15th-century

I saw Grace Newcombe sing with Marc Lewon and his friends in a concert, it may have even been the programme on this CD, and I liked her approach, so this is essential for me. (Memories there of the world pre-COVID, how depressing!)