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About Arcana

My name is Ben Hogwood, editor of the Arcana music site (arcana.fm)

On Record – Rick Wakeman & The English Rock Ensemble: The Red Planet (Snapper)

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reviewed by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

The Red Planet marks a much-heralded return to progressive rock for Rick Wakeman. The prolific keyboard player and composer has been working on the album for a good while, having been captivated by the three missions currently in progress from Earth to Mars, not to mention some of the pictures received by NASA.

Wakeman, who has made three albums previously about the universe beyond Earth’s orbit, has enlisted the talents of three prodigious talents – guitarist Dave Colquhoun, bassist Lee Pomeroy and drummer Ash Soan. The English Rock Ensemble, as they are known, are given equal billing with the keyboard player.

What’s the music like?

Some of Wakeman’s strongest in years. There is a great deal of passion and imagination here, with Wakeman’s characteristically brilliant keyboard work more than matched by his protagonists and friends. It is important to recognise the connection of personalities, because as Rick told Arcana in an extensive interview, their creative spirit and comradeship were big elements of The Red Planet’s success.

The album works really well because of a really good balance between excess and restraint! The familiar strengths of progressive rock are exploited in prodigious drum fills, creative keyboard solos, twisted bass lines and epic guitar work, but each of the four musicians knows when to pull back and concentrate on evocative scene-setting. The latter quality means the likes of Arsia Mons and The North Plain, both portraits of their respective areas on Mars, are more descriptive and have the necessary light and shade.

As Wakeman admits, a lot of fun was had with the making of this album, and it comes through right from the off, and the imposing church organ of Ascraeus Mons. Meanwhile in the final and most extensive picture, Valles Marineris, the spirit of Holst is channeled through the oblique rhythms and stabbing counterpoint.

Between the two imposing outposts there is much good music. The descriptive Tharsis Tholus has attractive flute voicing, while Arsia Mons has one of the album’s most memorable riffs, not to mention superb drumming from Soan. Wakeman himself comes right to the fore on Olympus Mons, with some typically probing keyboard athletics near the end, while he leads with a soaring synthesizer on Pavonis Mons. Meanwhile a wonderfully gritty keyboard sound takes over on The North Plain, shaking off the mysterious, ghostly piano of its opening strains.

Does it all work?

Yes. Anyone with an interest in Wakeman or his on / off band Yes will recognise the keyboard style but will also applaud the attention to detail and relative restraint shown in the course of this hour-long triumph.

Is it recommended?

Yes, as a thoroughly enjoyable album. Anyone with an interest in progressive rock will want to hear it – but happily The Red Planet gives us the notion of getting away from our own habitat for a while, which I’m sure we’ve all fantasized about in the last few months!

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You can buy The Red Planet from Rick Wakeman’s website here

Listening to Beethoven #63 – O care selve WoO 119

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Peanuts comic strip, drawn by Charles M. Schulz (c)PNTS

O care selve WoO 119 for voice and piano (1795, Beethoven aged 24)

Dedication not known
Text Pietro Metastasio
Duration 1’30”

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Background and Critical Reception

This is Beethoven’s second song to be set in Italian, a possible side-product of his studies with Salieri. The Italian composer’s influence on his pupil extended to a more operatic approach.

Very little is known or written about this song, but it is part of a clutch of short works completed in Vienna in 1795. We are effectively peering into the engine room, beneath the bonnet of Beethoven’s large-scale works.

Thoughts

This is a short and tender song in a lilting triple time, with a winsome melody that is easy on the ear. O care selve (O beloved forests) is as dreamy as its words imply, quite a wistful number with a faraway mood.

In fact this is a surprisingly relaxed utterance from Beethoven, a lullaby in all but name.

Recordings used

Hermann Prey (baritone), Heinrich Schütz Kreis Berlin, Leonard Hokanson (piano) (Capriccio)
Peter Schreier (tenor), Walter Obertz (piano) (Brilliant Classics)

Two chaste accounts, especially from Hermann Prey by way of the Heinrich Schütz Kreis Berlin, dreaming of their escape.

Spotify links

Hermann Prey, Heinrich Schütz Kreis Berlin, Leonard Hokanson

Peter Schreier, Walter Obertz

Also written in 1795 Salieri Palmira

Next up 2 Triple Fugues

Switched On – Fhloston Paradigm: Right Where You Are (Cosmic Lounge Music)

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reviewed by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Floston Paradigm is one of the many aliases for King Britt, and has been active since 2012. The celebrated Philadelphia musician and producer describes it in his Bandcamp biography as ‘is a manifestation of afro-futurist ideals, based in an electronic music landscape. The purpose is to transmit the omni-versal message of divine abstractions into aural pleasing tones’.

The time would seem right for its revival, and this new four track album was released to coincide with Bandcamp’s day of sharing their royalties with artists. Dedicated to ‘a world of peace, love and equality for all’, the music is designed to think along the same lines as the blue sky and heady clouds of the cover.

Whether that can be achieved in real life, of course, is another matter – but it is a reminder of the hugely important part music continues to play as the Coronavirus pandemic shows no sign of letting up.

What’s the music like?

Not surprisingly, very relaxing indeed. King Britt has all the assurance of an experienced hand in this repertoire, and the four tracks between them make an extremely calming whole lasting just under an hour.

There is no rush to go anywhere, and as the 22-minute opening track Friday Sombers develops we fall slowly under the spell of its bubbling bass part and slow moving treble lines, which occasionally glint at the edges as though caught by a particularly intense ray of sun. There are little acidic synthesizer sounds that flicker around the picture, like the embers of a fire, while the harmony remains grounded to an omnipresent pitch centre of C. Gradually the track breaks up, like those embers on the fire, until we are left with fragments of indistinct melody.

Mercury’s Portal returns to the same pitch centre with pure tones, birdsong and what sounds like footsteps crunching leaves and / or snow. The pure tones soon give way to a probing piano line, but the textures remain full of light until broader and more jagged tones make themselves known. Now the shadows lengthen, but the music remains airy.

A Moment For Self is more propulsive, with broad strokes around the edges while a more probing synth line forces its way through in mid-range. Again the musical breaths are long, as they are in the final ReBalancing The Theory, which starts with rain and a watery, sustained loop. This is more mellow, the music sinking back to earth gradually, where it becomes more noise-based and fades to the distance.

Does it all work?

Yes – because all of it is just the one track, and with absolutely no hurry or pressure King Britt creates the safest of musical spaces. It is one the listener can completely give over to, or they can apply a more critical ear and appreciate the subtle movements and texture changes. Either way it works well.

Is it recommended?

Yes. From personal experience Right Where We Are achieves exactly what its maker wanted – bringing the listener to a ‘place of center’. If only it could do the same to all those causing friction on the planet at the moment!

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Listening to Beethoven #62 – Adelaide Op.46

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Friedrich von Matthisson (1794) Portrait by Ferdinand Hartmann

Adelaide Op.46 for voice and piano (1794-5, Beethoven aged 24)

Dedication Friedrich von Matthisson
Text Friedrich von Matthisson
Duration 5’30”

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Background and Critical Reception

This substantial setting of a text by Friedrich von Matthisson proved Beethoven’s most adventurous song to date. Commentators see Adelaide (pronounced A-del-eeder) as something of a watershed in his output, both in the prominence of the piano and its unusual, ‘through-composed’ structure.

By ‘through composed’ we mean a song that does not repeat itself in a recognisable way, though the four verses do each end with the beloved’s name. In this way the structure operates in the way a Baroque cantata might. Perhaps Beethoven was mindful of Handel’s vocal works when using this form.

Jan Swafford writes, ‘Beethoven obviously loved the sentimental verses of poet Friedrich von Matthisson. He labored on the setting of Adelaide for more than two years. Matthisson received the dedication and, in 1800, a copy of the song with an admiring and pleading letter from Beethoven: My most ardent wish will be fulfilled if my musical setting of your heavenly Adelaide does not altogether displease you and if, as a result, you should be prompted to write another similar poem…I will then strive to compose a setting of your beautiful poetry’.

Unfortunately the song confused some of his audience, including the poet himself, who found the song insensitive. Julian Haylock, writing in the Hyperion booklet for Stephan Ganz and Roger Vignoles’ recording, says ‘the solo-sonata style Beethoven adopts for the third verse in particular was perceived as overbalancing the text’, and that ‘the dramatic outpourings of the same verse, with its sudden changes of dynamic…were considered more suited to the opera house than the drawing room.’

Swafford speculates that ‘Adelaide might, in fact, have been written as part of Beethoven’s courting of Magdalena Willmann, a beautiful and talented contralto whom he had known in the Bonn Kapelle and who had come to Vienna to sing.’

The exact dates for the completion of the song are unknown, but it was published in 1797.

Thoughts

Something feels different and new about this song, right from the expansive piano introduction, which gives notice of a much bigger structure.

The song itself is a beauty, the most immediate we have yet heard from Beethoven as a songwriter. The dappled piano part flows in thrall to the vocal line, which is by turns lovelorn and optimistic.

For the third verse Beethoven shifts to a new key and outlook, reflecting the evening breezes through the piano and a slight shiver to the vocal line, which takes on a yearning quality as Adelaide’s name reappears.

The last of the four verses makes a decisive shift to the major key, a positive future on the cards as the singer declares Einst, o Wunder! entblüht auf meinem Grabe Eine Blume der Asche meines Herzens (One day, O miracle! there shall bloom on my grave A flower from the ashes of my heart).

Recordings used

Christian Gerhaher (baritone), Gerold Huber (piano) (Sony Classical)
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (baritone), Jörg Demus (piano) (Deutsche Grammophon)
Stephan Ganz (baritone), Roger Vignoles (piano) (Hyperion)
Matthias Goerne (baritone), Jan Lisiecki (piano) (Deutsche Grammophon)
Fritz Wunderlich (tenor), Hubert Giesen (piano) (Deutsche Grammophon)
Anne Sofie von Otter (mezzo-soprano), Melvyn Tan (fortepiano) (Archiv)

Gerold Huber’s introduction for Christian Gerhaher is of the sort that makes the listener stop and pay attention; it sets the scene of the ‘magical sweet light that shimmers through the swaying boughs’ perfectly. Gerhaher himself is ideal. Similar praise can be directed to Stephan Ganz and Roger Vignoles, beautifully balanced and poised.

There is a recording from tenor Martyn Hill and Christopher Hogwood on the fortepiano that is unfortunately only available as part of a massive L’Oiseau-Lyre box set; happily the fortepiano of Melvyn Tan can be heard prompting Anne Sofie von Otter’s relatively urgent account.

Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau is an ardent singer of this particular song, as is Fritz Wunderlich, moving up a few tones to sing in the tenor range.

Spotify links

The following playlist brings together six different versions of Adelaide, from Fritz Wunderlich to Matthias Goerne:

Meanwhile you can listen to a clip from the Stephan Genz & Roger Vignoles version at the Hyperion website

You can chart the Arcana Beethoven playlist as it grows, with one recommended version of each piece we listen to. Catch up here!

Also written in 1795 Reicha –  Concerto Concertant Op.3

Next up O care selve (first version)

On record: Bruch: Symphonies & Overtures – Bamberger Symphoniker / Robert Trevino (CPO)

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Max Bruch
Symphony no.1 in E flat major Op.28 (1868)
Symphony no.2 in F minor Op.36 (1870)
Symphony no.3 in E major Op.51 (1882)
Lorely Op.16 – Overture (1863)
Hermione Op.40 – Prelude (ed. Jacob); Funeral March; Entr’acte (1871)
Odysseus, Op. 41 – Prelude (1872)

Bamberger Symphoniker / Robert Trevino

Producers Torsten Schreier, Michaela Wiesbeck
Engineers Christian Jaeger, Markus Spatz
Recorded 2-5 January & 8-12 July 2019, Joseph-Keilberth-Saal, Konzerthalle, Bamberg

CPO 555252-2 [two discs, 149’04”]

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

CPO continues its coverage of Max Bruch with his complete symphonies, finely rendered by the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra and conducted by Robert Trevino with the same insight and perception he brought to his recent Malmö traversal of Beethoven symphonies (Ondine).

What’s the music like?

Seldom encountered in the concert hall, Bruch’s symphonies have been recorded frequently these past three decades – with cycles from such conductors as Kurt Masur (Philips/Decca), James Conlon (EMI/Warner) or Richard Hickox (Chandos) and at least three others. Trevino is at least the equal of any, not least because the playing from his Bamberg forces has all the warmth and eloquence this taciturn music requires; with the acoustic of the Joseph Keilberth Room affording clarity and definition in Bruch’s often densely layered orchestral textures.

This recording of the First Symphony is the first to restore the Intermezzo that Bruch placed second in what was originally a five-movement structure. Here its wistful charm offers subtle contrast between the slow-burning momentum of the opening Allegro and Mendelssohnian impetus of the Scherzo. The sombre grandeur of the Quasi Fantasia functions as extended introduction to the Finale – its vaunting energy featuring what must be the nearest in any of these works to a ‘catchy tune’, on the way to a coda whose affirmation is equally uninhibited.

It may be much less approachable, but the Second Symphony is undoubtedly the finest of this cycle. Formally innovative, too, in that its three movements – each of them moderately paced and gradually cumulative – builds from salient motifs all derived from a ‘motto’ idea stated at the outset and which duly returns to crown the finale. Coolly received at its premiere and then accorded only grudging respect, this remains a highpoint of Bruch’s output as also of German mid-Romanticism, and Trevino does full justice to its deep-seated logic and cumulative power.

Bruch evidently conceived his symphonies as a triptych, but he laboured over completing his Third Symphony – by which time, the first two of Brahms’s cycle had shifted the symphonic goalposts irrevocably. That said, the restrained initial movement has a delightful insouciance, while the Adagio evinces a ruminative poise worthy of Dvořák. The bustling Scherzo (better placed second) feels a little too generic, however, while the short-winded Finale hardly rises above the routine. Bruch thereafter essayed concertos and suites, but no further symphonies.

Does it all work?

Yes, allowing Bruch was very much a product of that century between the Napoleonic and First World wars when cultural, as opposed to societal change was incremental rather than radical. Excerpts from his operas Loreley and Hermione (the latter’s Prelude disfigured by Wolfgang Jacob’s crude ‘concert ending’) and his oratorio Odysseus fill-out the picture of a composer who, if his innate conservatism may have been wielded increasingly out of spite rather than conviction, wrote appealing music which did not lack for integrity of purpose.

Is it recommended?

Indeed. Those who have heard Ray Chen’s engaging account of the First Violin Concerto (Decca) will be aware of Trevino’s identity with this music and so it proves here, in what is a welcome addition to Bruch’s discography as the centenary of his death fast approaches.

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For further information, audio clips and purchase information visit the Presto website