Wie schon in den vorangegangenen drei Folgen seiner Einspielung sämtlicher Orchesterwerke Griegs macht Eivind Aadland auch diese Musik so stark wie irgend möglich, vor allem gönnt er ihrem poetischen Zauber die erforderliche Transparenz und die Vielfalt der Orchesterfarben. Auf vordergründige Effekte verzichtet zumal die Wiedergabe des Klavierkonzerts. Herbert Schuch musiziert ganz auf dieser Linie, indem er bei tadelloser Technik, niemals vordergründig den Virtuosen ausstellt, um stattdessen vielmehr die Schönheiten dieser Partitur lyrisch und sanglich zu entfalten. Eine Empfehlung!

'Must never be performed' is an obvious red rag to any musical bull and although Grieg's youthful C minor Symphony reveals numerous influences, some more obvious than others, it's confidently built, thematically appealing and mildly memorable in a way that recalls similarly derivative early symphonic works by Dvorak and Glazunov. Its first recording, by the Bergen Symphony Orchestra under Karsten Andersen, is now out on Decca Eloquence (appropriately coupled with Goldmark's equally engaging Rustic Wedding Symphony), and shares the market with worthy versions under Ari Rasilainen, Okko Kamu, Terje Mikkelsen and Neeme Järvi. Up until now I would probably have rated the latter as top contender but this newcomer from Eivind Aadland and the Cologne WDR Symphony Orchestra, which is captured in admirably natural sound and appears in the context of Grieg's 'Complete Symphonic Works, Vol 4', is a fresh, lightly sprung performance that avoids any inappropriate feelings of portentousness and highlights the mazurka-style third movement as the most characteristic in terms of its thematic material.

A good idea to couple Grieg's least familiar orchestral work with its totally familiar near contemporary, the A minor Piano Concerto, in a not insubstantial reading by the excellent Herbert Schuch, who sounds-as if he's worked over every semiquaver with infinite care. Not that the performance lacks spontaneity, more that inner voices, crisp rhythms and a sculpted brand of poetry suggest a truly 'settled' interpretation, one that happily compares with (but hardly replaces) the best available. Again Aadland and his Cologne players provide an excellent account of the orchestral score, supportive of Schuch and distinctive on its own terms, and the recorded balance is excellent.

The Mantovani-style fanned chords at the start of Arthur H Lilienthal's all-strings rewrite of the Cello Concerto does not augur well, though Raphael Wallfisch rises from his freshly retextured orchestral bed determined not to allow the missing wind lines with their absent acerbities to compromise the strength of Schumann's message. He offers a convincing performance, phrasing with warmth and agility, while at the transition into the slow movement (at the start of tr 2) he achieves an affecting level of poignancy. But compare the close of the movement with Oren Shevlin's recording of Schumann's original with the Cologne WDR Symphony under Heinz Holliger, where the sting of brass and rocketing winds intensify the drama, and you soon realise what's missing in Lilienthal's rewrite, even though the arrangement was prompted by Schumann's own unrealised plan to prepare a version for string quintet. Had he done so I rather suspect it would have involved a certain amount of re-composition, not the blanket softening that we have here. And good as Wallfisch is, Shevlin suggests more of the fragile resolve that underlies the piece, fighting the dying light in a way that only Schumann could. Shevlin's tone is more subtly variegated than Wallfisch's, while his attack in the finale is toughened and springy. Holliger too keeps things stripped to the bone, sweetening the line where necessary, though never to excess, and with a level of clarity that others aim for but achieve only at a price of compromised expressivity. As to rivals, among older recordings I would especially recommend Janos Starker's Cologne version under Rafael Kubelik, recently issued by Orfeo as part of a three-disc Kubelik collection (all first-release material), probably the best we've had from Starker, simultaneously tender-hearted and tough-grained.

Most of Wallfisch's Schumann extras with piano are nicely done, the Fünf Stücke im Volkston delivered in the main with a light touch both by Wallfisch and by his fine pianist John York, the Three Romances, Op 94, and the Op 73 Fantasy Pieces similarly eloquent in a relaxed, unassuming way (barring the fiery last movement of Op 73), the Adagio and Allegro, Op 70, in many respects the disc's highlight. I wasn't too keen on the two Lieder transcriptions (both taken from the Op 39 Liederkreis collection), certainly not the start of 'Mondnacht', where the cello's presence spoils the music's solitary atmosphere, and in 'Frühlingsnacht', where the soloist ideally needs to project with greater presence.

Holliger's account of the 1851 Fourth Symphony has all the qualities that make his accompaniment to the Cello Concerto so distinctive, namely flow, transparency, and character (note the subtle but dramatic diminuendo among the horns at 4'42"). The expressive Romanze follows close on the heels of the first movement, surely as it should, the Scherzo asserts a virile presence, while the fast-paced finale is breezy and exhilarating, with plenty of light and shade. Altogether a worthy continuation of Holliger's Schumann series, with excellent playing and well-balanced sound.

Kritiker loben ihre Stimme als nuancenreich, lyrisch, natürlich und unprätentiös. [...] Ina Siedlaczek hat viel Herzblut in die Auswahl der Musikstücke eingebracht [...] Nun ist die Sopranistin auch für die International Classical Music Awards 2015 (ICMA) in der Kategorie "Barock vokal" nominiert worden.

Als kleines Mädchen hat sie in der St. Antoniuskirche im Kinderchor gesungen,...

This is as fine a performance of the Tchaikovsky Trio that you’ll ever find with these players putting their hearts and souls into the music. The engineers provide a fine recording in the acoustic of the Jesus-Christus-Kirche, Berlin-Dahlem, Germany the venue for so many fine recordings. There are informative notes.

Diese Archivaufnahmen haben in sorgfältiger Aufbereitung heute nichts von ihrem einstigen Glanz verloren, zeigen den Chor in der abgerundeten Schönheit, Sicherheit und Souveränität seines legendären Klangcharakters.

Getragen wird dies alles vom schönen, geschmeidigen Gesang des hervorragenden Chores.

Haydn, the “father of the string quartet”, never wrote a quintet for strings; nor did many classical composers (but Mozart did). As stated in the notes for this release, it was felt that the four instruments could achieve perfect harmony, and a “fifth person” did not add to the conversation. In the romantic era, adding richness to the inner parts was sometimes desired. The greatest quintet, Schubert’s in C, uses two cellos, but the two-viola format, as in Beethoven, Brahms, and Dvorak, is somewhat more common. Mendelssohn’s use two violas.
Quintet 1 bears the opus number 18, though it was in fact composed after Mendelssohn’s great Octet, Op. 20. This quintet is rarely performed, possibly because it is eclipsed by the monumental Octet, but I would not call it a minor work. It is mature, yet youthful in its exuberance. As the notes tell us, Mendelssohn here is “paying tribute to Mozart in tone-color, but thinking harmonically in romantic directions”. Quintet 2 was composed almost 20 years later, and it is full-blown romanticism. It opens with a heroic theme over tremolos, and almost never loses steam. Even III, Adagio, takes full advantage of the five instruments to produce a full-bodied, broad sound. IV sounds almost orchestral. The Pieces for Quartet, Op. 81 are charming minor works discovered and published after the composer’s death.
This is Volume IV in Mandelring’s cycle of Mendelssohn’s complete chamber music for strings. I had the pleasure of reviewing Volume III (Octet, Quartet 5, and Pieces 1+2—May/June 2014), and this volume is also a delight. The Mandelring Quartet has a reputation for a homogeneous tone, and this quality is maintained when the ensemble is augmented (or doubled!). Perfect engineering, good notes. A must-have for lovers of chamber music for strings.

This is the third and final volume in Hans-Eberhard Ross’s recording of the six organ symphonies of Louis Vierne (1870–1937). One of the chief guiding principles of the project is to bring audible clarity to the compositional details of these monumental works. It was no secret that Vierne conceived these works with the instrument and acoustic of Paris’s Notre Dame Cathedral in mind. Ross counters that dense organ tone and an ultra-reverberant acoustic defeat the clarity of detail that he wishes to convey. He has a point, but I am far from certain that the present recording or its two previous volumes furnish a satisfactory resolution of the dilemma. The instrument here is the four-manual Goll organ (1998) at St Martin’s Church, Memmingen (Bavaria). The tone does not have quite the passionate quality of Cavaillé-Coll at his finest, but it is not worlds removed from that. The church’s foursecond reverberation contributes some warmth but still allows contrapuntal lines and other details to be audible.

Donald Metz reviewed the first volume in the series (Audite 92.674; March/April 2013), and I reviewed the second (92.675; March/April 2014). Our assessments were similar. Metz refers to Ross’s “more clinical approach” in comparison with other performers of this music. In my review of the second volume I thought his judgement perhaps too severe, though I am now inclined to reconsider. In addition to the instrument and the space, Ross sometimes allows a more open articulation than the continuous legato that was standard in the time of the French romantic and postromantic repertory. He also makes some alterations to the composer’s registrations, but I do not find those drastic. The general categories of tone color are observed, but the details always need to be adapted to the particular organ, as no two of them are the same.

The more fully registered passages here seem to me the more persuasive, as they effectively engage the reverberation of the room. The quieter and more lightly registered movements and sections are the ones that sound clinical to me. A good example is the opening movement of Symphony 5. This is a gloomy opening and should sound as if coming to the listener from out of the shadows. Here it is just too matter-of-fact. The clarity turns out to be counterproductive. Much the same could be said of the second movement of Symphony 6 with its troubled, jagged melodies and anguished chromatic harmonies.

I would not describe Ross’s performances in general as mechanical or dispassionate, but they sound as if he is more concerned about getting the notes to flow smoothly—no small feat in these formidably difficult works—than in projecting the expressive qualities of the music. It sounds as if he is so preoccupied with the surface of the music that he never really gets inside so as to convey to the listener what makes it tick. These are very unromantic performances.

Of the Vierne recordings I have encountered recently, the one that has most impressed me is François Lombard’s of Symphony 6 on the three-manual Cavaillé-Coll (1870) at St Peter’s Church, Calais, where he is organist (Motette 13811; Jan/Feb 2014). Not only is his performance wonderfully moving, but the recording proves that it is possible to capture the sound of a romantic organ in a reverberant room without losing most of the musical detail.