Tiefe Leidenschaften und düstere Klagen, Höllenqual und Paradieslicht sowie...

Franz Liszts Dante Symphonie dreht sich, wie so vieles bei diesem Komponisten, um das Göttliche und das Teuflische. Die Symphonie zu Dantes Divina Commedia hat zwei Teile, Inferno mit den Qualen der Hölle, und das zart klingende Purgatorio, wo die Seele für die Aufnahme in den Himmel gereinigt wird. Ein vom Chor gesungenes Magnificat bringt die Symphonie zu Ende.

1859 komponierte Liszt ein Werk zum hundertsten Jahrestag von Schillers Geburt. Das Stück betitelte er Künstlerfestzug, wohl wissend, dass ein solcher Festzug in Weimar nicht stattfinden würde. Seine Komposition wurde daher auch nicht aufgeführt, weswegen er sie 1860 für Klavier zu zwei und vier Händen transkribierte.

Kirill Karabits liefert von den drei Werken spannende, klangschön ausgefeilte Interpretationen; jene des Künstlerfestzugs ist eine Weltersteinspielung.

In der Dante-Symphonie verhindert er durch den feinen Klang, dass das Inferno grob und schwer klingt. Das Motiv ‘Gebt die Hoffnung auf, alle, die ihr hier eintretet’ wird orchestral feierlich und kraftvoll vorgetragen, das teuflische Rasen wird mit höchster Dramatik, aber auch mit federndem Spiel und viel Raffinement dargestellt. Im Purgatorio wirkt der Dirigent sehr inspiriert, und er trifft die Atmosphäre von diesem zweiten Satz wie auch vom abschließenden Magnificat sehr gut. Karabits gelingt eine gute Mischung von zärtlicher Versöhnung und Transzendenz. Im Magnificat entsteht eine leichte, kristalline Stimmung, und der himmlische Chor beendet das Werk mit viel Ruhe und Besinnung.

An der Interpretation der Tondichtung ‘Tasso’ ist nichts auszusetzen: die Färbungen im Orchester sind schön und stimmungsvoll, die Dramatik fehlt ebenfalls nicht, so dass wir diese zweite von Liszts dreizehn Tondichtungen in ihrer ganzen rhetorischen Kraft erleben können.

Franz Liszt’s Dante Symphony, like so many other works by this composer, revolves around the divine and the devilish. The symphony to Dante’s Divina Commedia has two parts, Inferno with the tortures of hell, and the delicately sounding Purgatorio, where the soul is purified for admission to heaven. A Magnificat sung by the choir brings the symphony to a close.
In 1859 Liszt composed a work for the centenary of Schiller’s birth. He entitled the piece Künstlerfestzug, knowing well that such a procession would not take place in Weimar. His composition was therefore not performed, which is why he transcribed it for piano two and four hands in 1860.
Kirill Karabits delivers exciting, beautifully polished interpretations of the three works; the one of the Künstlerfestzug is a world premiere recording.
With a refined sound he prevents the Dante Symphony’s Inferno from sounding coarse and heavy. The motif ‘Give up hope, all who enter here’ is solemnly and powerfully performed, the diabolical race is presented with the highest drama, but also with supple playing and much refinement. In the Purgatorio the conductor is very inspired, and his conducting of the final movement is suitably atmospheric. In the Magnificat, a light, crystalline mood is created, and the heavenly choir ends the work with much calm and reflection.
There is nothing wrong with the interpretation of the tone poem ‘Tasso’: the colours in the orchestra are beautiful and atmospheric, and the drama is not lacking either, so that we can experience this second of Liszt’s thirteen tone poems in all its rhetorical power.

The still rarely programmed Dante symphony and the tone poem Tasso: Lamento e Trionfo receive committed performances from an orchestra that is on the rise thanks to its charismatic maestro.

Die Staatskapelle Weimar musiziert unter Kirill Karabits wie aus einem Guss. [...] Die ganze Ausdrucksskala vom Schmerz bis zum Jubel kommt bei dieser Einspielung zum Vorschein.

[...] nobelstes Quartettspiel auch in Raritäten von Donizetti und Malipiero.

Voilà un programme d’une grande cohérence tant au niveau de la chronologie de l’écriture que des ambiances qui l’entourent. [...] Il se [Karabits] révèle un interprète à la fois racé et passionné, emmenant la Staatskapelle de Weimar vers des élans de puissance ou de transparence construits avec netteté et équilibre, sans appuyer les traits. Il faut désormais considérer ce CD comme une référence moderne pour ces pages inspirées de Liszt.

Voilà la grande force de Grieg, au piano ou à l’orchestre : parvenir en quelques secondes, à créer une atmosphère particulière… à planter un décor, à peindre un paysage, à décrire une émotion. Ce génie de la miniature arrive à nous émouvoir et à nous passionner. tout comme le chef de cette intégrale et son orchestre symphonique du WDR de Cologne.

Eivind Aadland is a perfect conductor for this repertory. The WDR Orchestra is in top form, and the engineers have provided a superb multi-channel sonic picture. [...] This is an important collection. Don't miss it!

Prince Johann Ernst of Sachsen-Weimar was a good composer. And his achievements are all the more impressive when one considers he composed all of his music by 1715, the year he died at age 18. No wonder he attracted the attention of luminaries like Telemann and Bach. Bach worked in Weimar and even arranged several of the Prince’s violin concertos for keyboard.

8 of the 10 concertos on this program are for violin; one is for two violins, and there is another for trumpet. All of them reflect the vogue for Vivaldi’s concertos. In the wake of L’estro Armonico, published in Amsterdam in 1711, Bach, Johann Ernst, and numerous other composers would imitate Vivaldi’s busy sequential episodes and virtuosic flights into the high range. Gernot Süssmuth handles these technical challenges with ease, breathing life into this delightful repertory.

The three composers here lived on the eastern side of the Iron Curtain, as did two members of Trio Lirico, violinist Franziska Pietsch and violist Sophia Reuter. As Pietsch writes in the liner notes, “As children, we both lived in East Berlin and were close friends already then. We therefore share a personal history, a similar style of playing, and a similar non-verbal way of communicating about this music. We just feel it.” Indeed they do! Nor could they have a better partner than cellist Johannes Krebs. They converse with their magnificent instruments, giving the music perfect terraced balance. Pietsch uses bow pressure to create everything from brusk intensity in fortissimo passages to just enough vibrato to produce a comforting pianissimo. Because Trio Lirico’s grasp of the form of each work is so integral, its use of retards and rubato never interferes with the flow. The peerless engineering in Berlin’s Jesus Christus Church lets you “set it and forget it” so you can concentrate fully on the music.

This is especially true of the Trio (1950) by Vainberg, a soul brother of Shostakovich. Even the way Lirico links the extremely soulful I to II with just an inhale of a pause, and then does the same thing between the movements of all the works here, conveys the wholeness with which they conceive each work. Even Shostakovich himself would weep over the gorgeous sounds and musicianship in II, a lament “sung” over a fugue. In III the viola takes the lead with the cello supplying the bass line and the violin the pulse. What pacing the Lirico offer—persistent yet flexible, with tension created by their careful attention to note values that “speed up” from whole note to half to quarter to eighth notes, etc.

Krzysztof Penderecki’s Trio (1991) is, needless to say, sui generis. It opens with three sets of shouting chords after which each instrument has a cadenza. All the basic, seemingly independent materials are thus laid out, then brought together over the course of two movements, the first more recitative, the second Vivace, as the Trio ends as it began. The work is brilliantly constructed; emotional as the players make it, I hear it more as intellectual construct.

Pietsch comments on Alfred Schnittke’s Trio (1985): “This music, magnificent as it is, also has a certain coldness to it, something frightening. The trio begins with a variant of ‘Happy Birthday’, though what follow is no happy serenade but music without mercy. For me, this clearly is an analysis of death.” If there are bits of ‘Happy Birthday’ in it, I sure didn’t hear it. It strikes me as a really angry work—the first time I’ve ever used that word to describe a piece of music. I hear grimness drawn out of chorale-like chords, interrupted with momentary folk-like relief (like snippets Charles Ives might have dropped in) before returning to the torment. After 25 minutes, I could detect no organization to this seemingly repetitive work. It reminds me of how Woody Allen movies too often make me respond: “Enough of your neuroses! Go tell them to your shrink.” Nonetheless, the powerful Trio Lirico holds its grip on the work from start to finish.

In brief, these are peerless performances of music from troubled times, a lesson in how to make ugliness beautiful. That sounds like a task for our increasingly war-like times.