CD Reviews (The Straits Times, July 2016)

ENCORES

DENIS MATSUEV, Piano

Sony Music  88875189262 / *****

Everybody loves encores, those tasty little morsels of music performed at the end of a formal programme in concert, or recital in the case of soloists. Often spontaneous and unannounced, these come as delightful surprises, which sweeten the deal and sends everyone home happy. Russian virtuoso Denis Matsuev has more than several up his sleeve, and his anthology has a decidedly Slavic slant.

Those who attended his concert with the London Symphony Orchestra at Esplanade in 2014 will remember Anatol Liadov's delicate Musical Snuffbox, contrasted with the Grigory Ginzburg's manically charged transcription of Grieg's In the Hall of the Mountain King from Peer Gynt.

Those were the “easier” ones, compared with Vladimir Horowitz's Carmen Variations or Rossini's Largo al factotum from The Barber of Seville (Ginzburg again). Of a less frenzied variety are a selection from Tchaikovsky's The Seasons (the popular Barcarolle and Autumn Song among these) Rachmaninov's Préludes and Études-Tableaux. A true rarity is Rachmaninov's extroverted Fugue in D minor, written as a teenager. 

In Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No.2, Matsuev elects to play his own cadenza, a jazz improvisation in the truest sense, after which one will leap from the seat and shout “Bravo!”   

TANGO IN BLUE

Barcelona and Catalonia Symphony / Jose Serebrier

BIS 1175 / *****

Whoever would have thought that the sultry tango, once the dance of bordellos, would some day be elevated to that of a concert hall classic? It took several decades and the efforts of one Argentine Astor Piazzolla to bring that kind of respectability. 

He gets pride of place with the popular Oblivion and Tangazo, this anthology's longest piece, which builds from Bachian slow boil to toe-tapping rhythmic climax. Uruguay-born conductor Jose Serebrier, also a composer of repute, adds his own Tango in Blue and Casi un Tango with cor anglais solo, both receiving World Premiere recordings.

Serebrier's wife soprano Carole Farley joins in with Kurt Weill's Matrosen-Tango (Sailor's Song) from Happy End and the tango-habanera Youkali, which ooze sensual appeal on every turn. There are also contributions to the form by Igor Stravinsky, Samuel Barber, Erik Satie and Morton Gould, all of which are very different in many ways. 

Danish composer Jacob Gade's Tango Jalousie is an acknowledged classic and the album closes with Gerardo Matos Rodriguez's La Cumparsita. The Symphony Orchestra of Barcelona and Catalonia have this elusive idiom in their blood, and the flavour is infectious.

CD Reviews (The Straits Times, September 2014)

ZHOU LONG / CHEN YI

Wild Grass

Beijing New Music Ensemble

Naxos 8.570604 / *****

Here is an hour of chamber music by two of the world’s greatest living Chinese composers, Zhou Long and Chen Yi (both born in 1953), who happen to be husband and wife. While contemporary musical techniques are employed, the essence of being Chinese strongly permeates their music. The best known work here is Chen’s Romance Of Hsiao And Ch’in, where the violin and piano relive the combo of xiao (vertical flute) and guqin, with the distinct voice of ancient musical theatre. The revolutionary Chinese writer Lu Xun (1881-1936) figures prominently in this collection. Chen’s Monologue for solo clarinet is a 5-minute long meditation on the fate of Ah Q, Lu’s most famous literary anti-hero. Was he executed, or was it just our vivid imagination?

Zhou’s Wild Grass just includes the introduction to Lu’s collection of prose poetry Yecao (1924-26), with Zhou as the reader-narrator accompanied by solo clarinet. Zhou gets more air time with his Su (Tracing Back) for flute and guqin, a work that achieved cult status in China even before the advent of the internet. His Pianogongs for piano and opera gongs may be heard as the prototype of his Postures for piano and orchestra, recently premiered by the SSO. The intoxicating world of drumming dominates in Taiping Drum and Taigu Rhythm, the latter a vigorous work for clarinet, violin, cello and percussion that unites the dagu and taiko of Chinese and Japanese cultures. These performances by the Beijing New Music Ensemble, formed by both locals and expats, are unlikely to be surpassed.

GLAZUNOV Symphonies & Concertos

Royal Scottish National Orchestra

Russian National Orchestra

JOSE SEREBRIER

Warner Classics 2564 66467-4 (8 CDs) 

****1/2

Alexander Glazunov (1865-1936) was arguably the greatest Russian composer of symphonies between Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov. That is scant consolation as his eight and a half symphonies (the ninth was incomplete) are hardly ever heard in concert. He was a superb craftsman whose symphonies are a joy to behold especially in performances as good as these. The early symphonies from the early 1880s contain strong Russian folk influences, and are reminiscent of Borodin and Rimsky-Korsakov. The best are Nos.4, 5 and 6 where he finds his own voice, the same muse that distinguished his most popular music – the Violin Concerto, ballets The Seasons and Raymonda, also included in this budget-priced box-set.

By the time of his sprawling Eighth Symphony (1906), some 40 minutes long, he had withdrawn into the world of pedagogy (Shostakovich became his most famous student). This masterpiece has Wagnerian overtones and looks forward to the worlds of Elgar and early Stravinsky. All his concertos – for violin (with Rachel Barton Pine), piano (Alexander Romanovsky), cello (Wen Sinn Yang) and saxophone (Marc Chisson) – all highly engaging works also find a place here. The magisterial Uruguay-born conductor Jose Serebrier makes the best cases possible of each of these lesser-known works. The absence of programme notes (even the downloadable file from Warner Classics is non-functional) is a sore point, regrettable penny-pinching behaviour from a major label.