On Record – MahlerFest XXXII: Joshua DeVane sings Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, Kenneth Woods conducts Symphony no.1

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Joshua DeVane (baritone); Colorado MahlerFest Chamber Orchestra (Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen), Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra / Kenneth Woods

Mahler Symphony no.1 in D major (1887-8, rev, 1898)
Mahler arr. Schoenberg Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen (1884-5, arr. 1920)
Mahler Blumine (1884, rev. 1889)

Colorado MahlerFest 195269164287 [79’02”]
Live performances on 18 May 2019 (Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen), 19 May 2019, Macky Auditorium, Boulder, Colorado

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Recorded representation of the current MahlerFest era continues to grow with this release on CD (previously available as a download) of the First Symphony with related pieces, given at its 32nd edition and what was the fourth such event with Kenneth Woods as artistic director.

What’s the music like?

What was doubtless intended to inaugurate a chronological traversal began in 2019 with this performance of the First Symphony, the first to be heard in the critical edition published that year by Breitkopf & Härtel. Woods has written about this extensively at his website [Ken on the Great Mahler Debate of 2019 | Kenneth Woods – conductor]: suffice to add the numerous corrections and textural amendments enhance that fuller and more stratified orchestral sound such as Mahler favoured in 1899 when compared with earlier versions from 1889 and 1893.

Interpretatively, this performance is a satisfying one with few overt surprises but no obvious idiosyncrasies. Any lack of atmosphere during the first movement’s mesmeric introduction is offset by its easeful if never uneventful continuation – thus a subtly differentiated exposition repeat, then stealthy marshalling of expressive tension to a coda whose joyousness is rightly kept within limits. The scherzo is robust yet propulsive and the trio even finer in its unforced suavity, while the funeral march never over-inflects its Klezmer elements unfolding from the ominous and ironic, via gentle repose, to a closing fatalism. Woods succeeds better than most in holding together the unwieldy finale, allowing due emotional space for the recall of initial ideas that is its sure highlight, and the ensuing apotheosis lacks nothing in blazing affirmation.

Included as an encore is Blumine, the ‘romance’ salvaged from earlier incidental music which formed part of this symphony until being jettisoned in 1894 – here emerging with its elegance and pathos devoid of wanton sentiment. The actual concert continued with Korngold’s Violin Concerto then Beethoven’s Third Leonora Overture reorchestrated by Mahler, but the present release opens with a performance from the previous day’s concert of Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen. This is heard in a chamber arrangement as supervised by Schoenberg for the 1920 season of his Society for Private Musical Performances, its textural transparency underlining the soulfulness then buoyancy of its opening two songs. If the (over-wrought?) drama of the third song is under-projected, the wistful radiance of its successor comes across unimpeded.

Does it all work?

Indeed it does, overall. Mahler symphonies may have been performed and recorded by a host of international orchestras, but that of the Colorado MahlerFest lacks nothing in commitment or tenacity; any lack of atmosphere and finesse owes more to the clear if confined acoustic of Macky Auditorium than absence of quiet playing or overriding of dynamics. Joshua DeVane is a thoughtful exponent of the song-cycle, at his best in the restrained inwardness of its outer numbers, while the ensemble drawn from the CMO makes a persuasive case for this reduction.

Is it recommended?

It is. The orchestral playing may have grown in conviction with each new instalment, but this is a notable statement of intent for MahlerFest under Woods’s direction. That the 33rd edition had to be scaled down then presented online had little effect on the resolve of those involved.

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For further purchase options, visit the MahlerFest website – and for more information on the festival itself, click here. Click on the names for further information on conductor Kenneth Woods and soloist Joshua DeVane

Published post no.2,247 – Monday 22 July 2024

On Record – George Lloyd: The Works for Brass (Lyrita)

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George Lloyd
Royal Parks (1982/4)
Diversions on a Bass Theme (1986)
Evening Song (1989. arr. 1991)
H.M.S. Trinidad (1941, arr. 1991)
English Heritage (1987)
A Miniature Triptych (1981)

John Foster Black Dyke Mills Band / David King; Equale Brass [John Wallace and John Miller (trumpets), Michael Thompson (horn), Peter Bassano (trombone), John Jenkins (tuba) (A Miniature Triptych)]

Lyrita SRCD.425 [75’52”]
Producers Paul Hindmarsh with George Lloyd, Engineer Harold Barnes

Recorded 5 & 6 July 1991 at Town Hall, Dewsbury at Wyastone Leys, June 1987 at Monmouth (A Miniature Triptych)

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Lyrita continues its ‘Signature Edition’ devoted to the music of – while mostly conducted by –George Lloyd with this collection of almost all his output for brass instruments and a further reminder that, however belated his commitment to a specific medium, it was then in earnest.

What’s the music like?

Despite (or perhaps because of) his experience as bandsman in the Royal Marines during the Second World War, Lloyd turned to this medium relatively late on and then obliquely via the brass quintet. Written for members of the Philharmonia Orchestra, A Miniature Triptych has a depth hinted at by the movement-titles – the plangency of its preludial Lost followed by the more emotionally varied Searching, then the mounting resolve of Found sees this sequence to a decisive but not wholly affirmative close. An intriguing addition to an appealing medium.

The brass band was at the forefront of Lloyd’s thinking over the next decade, starting with the suite Royal Parks composed for the European Brass Band Championships. Here the airborne evocation of Dawn Flight, and the genial animation of Holidays, frame an In Memoriam written for orchestra two years earlier to commemorate the bandsman murdered in a bombing at Regent’s Park by the Provisional IRA – making it one of the composer’s most personal and affecting statements. English Heritage was written for the Historic Buildings and Monuments Commission and later used as test-piece for the National Brass Band Championships of Great Britain – its technical virtuosity matched by formal dexterity, with the spontaneity of Fanfare allayed by the repose of Largo and Finale combining these motifs into a rousing peroration.

Composed just before the latter work, Diversions on a Bass Theme ranks among Lloyd’s most ingenious pieces in any medium – the range of ideas emerging in its earlier stages functioning as variations in search of a theme as duly emerges with not a little laconic humour toward the close. The remaining items are both arrangements – Evening Song being that of the two-piano work Eventide two years earlier, its luminous elaboration of a carol composed by the ten-year -old Lloyd sounding arguably even more idiomatic and atmospheric when rendered by brass. By contrast, the march HMS Trinidad was arranged half-a-century after being composed for orchestra – and it is a measure of Lloyd’s prowess that he throws the ‘march and trio’ format off-kilter by juxtaposing their varied reappearances to such unexpected and appealing effect.

Does it all work?

It does. As Paul Conway surmises in his informative notes, any reticence on Lloyd’s part in writing for brass band likely derives from his wartime traumas – which does not make those works he eventually wrote any less idiomatic or distinctive. Not least as David King gets so laudable a response from the then John Foster Black Dyke Mills Band; also, Equale Brass in a recording seemingly left ‘in the can’ the past four decades. As with composers such as John McCabe, Edward Gregson or John Pickard, one overlooks Lloyd’s band music at one’s peril.

Is it recommended?

It is. Note that the original release predates Lloyd’s last such work – 1993’s King’s Messenger given by Eikanger-Bjorsvik Musikklag on Doyen (DOYCD047), with 1987’s Forest of Arden for wind band recorded by City of London Wind Ensemble on LDR Records (LDRCD1001).

Listen & Buy

For further information visit the dedicated page for the George Lloyd Signature Series. For more on the composer himself, head to the George Lloyd website

Published post no.2,246 – Sunday 21 July 2024

Let’s Dance – Various Artists: Under One Roof (Poker Flat Recordings)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Under One Roof marks the kick off to a new series of releases dedicated to new artists from Poker Flat. Label head Steve Bug took part as a coach in the Mixmasters Retreat on Ibiza last year, alongside producers Huxley and Denney and singer-songwriter Jade PraiZe.

The retreat harvested a great crop of tracks, most of which were signed up for the Under One Roof initiative, bolstered by a remix each from the coaches themselves.

The first instalment is a bundle of the first five EPs.

What’s the music like?

There is some strong house music here, confidently delivered – and of consistently high quality.  Jade PraiZe’s smoky vocal on Thorsten Hammer’s World On Shoulders provides the ideal start, while the rolling beats of Maxima’s Get Into It – bolstered in remix form by Denney – are quick to impress.

T. Nguyen’s Prophetic Love has strong hints of Kerri Chandler – in a good way – while Al Leahy’s Shadow Rush proves the pick of the punch, a superb bassy number that delivers a wonderful, full-bodied bass line.

The remixes are an ideal complement to the main course, putting the seal on a desirable package – especially Steve Bug’s upbeat take on Prophetic Love.

Does it all work?

Pretty much! One or two tracks on the list feel a little bit formulaic – and while she generally delivers excellent vocals, PraiZe’s slot on Fast To Slow might be too nasal for some – but that’s splitting hairs in a fine collection, up to Poker Flat’s typically high standards.

Is it recommended?

It is. A collection of house music on the deeper side that connoisseurs of the genre will warm to straight away.

For fans of… Kerri Chandler, Miguel Migs, Andy Caldwell, Larry Heard

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Published post no.2,245 – Saturday 20 July 2024

On Record – MahlerFest XXXVI: Kenneth Woods conducts ‘Resurrection’ Symphony & Musgrave’s Phoenix Rising

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April Fredrick (soprano), Stacey Rishoi (mezzo-soprano), Boulder Concert Chorale, Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra / Kenneth Woods

Musgrave Phoenix Rising (1997)
Mahler Symphony no.2 in C minor ‘Resurrection’ (1888-94)

Colorado MahlerFest 195269301194 [two discs, 104’02”]
Live performances on 21 May 2023, Macky Auditorium, Boulder, Colorado

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

Last year’s edition of MahlerFest continued its latest, not-quite-chronological traversal of the symphonies with the Second – appropriately coupled on this release (as in the concert) with a work such as considers ‘resurrection’ from a very different while no less relevant perspective.

What’s the music like?

Six years in the writing, Mahler’s Second Symphony fairly laid the basis for his reputation as a composer at its Berlin premiere in 1895. It is a measure of this performance that it captures something of the shock or excitement no doubt in evidence back then, not least in an opening movement with Kenneth Woods notably more interventionist tempo-wise as compared to that of the Third Symphony a year before. What emerges is imposing but never diffuse, at its most gripping in that baleful lead-in to a development whose terseness duly accentuates its impact, with the pathos of the second subject on its reprise making the coda’s sardonic recessional the more acute. After which, the second movement feels the more enticing through its alternation of warm sentiment with capering animation while heading to a conclusion of beatific repose.

There is no lack of incident in a scherzo whose glancing irony is leavened yet not lessened by its trios, the first as soulful with its lilting trumpets as the second is ominous in its import; but not before Stacey Rishoi has characterized the Urlicht setting with rapt inwardness. What to say about the finale other than, while this may not be the most overwhelming take on its vast fresco, it is matched by relatively few as regards an organic unfolding that sees the movement whole. Its contrasting elements here fuse with unforced cohesion to a fervent rendering of the chorale episode then on to a surging Toten-marsch – the kinetic momentum carried through to a methodical reprise of earlier ideas, then a rendering of Klopstock’s text (much altered by the composer) as only grows in intensity before the majestic affirmation of its closing pages.

As the ‘first half’, Thea Musgrave’s Phoenix Rising provides an ideal complement. The much esteemed (latterly more in the US than the UK) nonagenarian has written often for orchestra, but seldom with such immediacy than in a piece whose formal and expressive trajectory feels nothing if not symphonic in its progress. Comparison with the 2016 studio recording by BBC National Orchestra of Wales and William Boughton (Lyrita SRCD372) confirms that, passing tentativeness in ensemble excepted, Woods’s reading demonstrably makes more of this aspect.

Does it all work?

Yes, pretty much always. As on previous releases in this ongoing Mahler cycle, the Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra punches appreciably above its weight in music which should never fall prey to wanton virtuosity. The unyielding acoustic of Macky Auditorium is less an issue than before, with the finale’s offstage brass adeptly managed. April Fredrick brings her customary eloquence to bear on this movement, and the Boulder Concert Chorale – as prepared by Vicki Burrichter – rises to the occasion with notable fervency as this work reaches an ecstatic close.

Is it recommended?

It is. There have been too many superfluous Mahler cycles, but this traversal is shaping up as one of the most worthwhile and more than the memento of a memorable occasion. Hopefully such standards will be maintained by the Sixth Symphony as part of next year’s 37th edition.

Buy

For further purchase options, visit the MahlerFest website – and for more information on the festival itself, click here. Click on the names for further information on conductor Kenneth Woods, soloists April Fredrick, Stacey Rishoi and composer Thea Musgrave

Published post no.2,244 – Friday 19 July 2024

In concert – Mary Bevan, CBSO / Edward Gardner: Schubert – Symphony no.9 & Songs

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Mary Bevan (soprano), City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra / Edward Gardner

Schubert
Rosamunde D797 – No. 3b, Romanze (1823)
Der Erlkönig D328 (1815, orch. Berlioz 1860)
Die Forelle D550 (1816, orch. Britten 1942)
Im Abendrot D799 (1825, orch. Reger 1914)
Geheimes D719 (1821, orch. Brahms, 1862)
Symphony no.9 in C major D944 ‘Great’ (1825-6, rev. 1828)

Symphony Hall, Birmingham
Wednesday 17 May 2024

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse Pictures by Benjamin Ealovega (Ed Gardner), Victoria Cadisch (Mary Bevan)

July concerts no longer a consistent fixture in the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra’s schedule, it made sense to end the current season with the intended programme for the fourth and final volume of this orchestra’s Schubert cycle with former chief guest conductor Edward Gardner.

If not his final such project, the ‘Great’ was the final symphony that Schubert finished and the culminating orchestral work of his last decade. Now, as almost two centuries ago, it is not an easy work to being off – but this account hit the ground running with a flowing yet purposeful introduction that elided seamlessly with the initial Allegro. Gardner kept momentum on a sure yet flexible rein over those impetuous and capricious themes of its exposition; underlining the subtly eddying tension of its development and a propulsive coda whose link-up with the tempo of that introduction was marred only by the too emphatic final gesture. Respectively plaintive or consoling, the Andante’s alternate episodes were brought into eloquent accord – the fanfare -riven anguish at its climax then the stark fatalism towards its close being especial highlights.

The essential link between the scherzos of Beethoven and Bruckner, the third movement had the right buoyancy but also a suavity in keeping with the Viennese character of its dance-like themes, and complemented by those of its trio whose lilting elegance were tinged by wistful regret. Launched with a commanding call-to-attention, the Finale did not lack for vigour but, unlike so many performances, Gardner was mindful not to rush either here or in the capering second theme whose relentless string accompaniment was vividly rendered. The development more than fulfilled its purpose as an extended transition into the reprise, then the coda opened with a frisson of anticipation such as underpinned the closing pages as they powered towards the decisive but never headlong close to what was a convincing and engrossing performance.

Regarding repeats, Gardner observed that of the first movement’s exposition but not those in the second half during either scherzo or trio, and that of the finale’s exposition. This at least made matters easier for the players, and left options open for their inclusion in the recording.

That forthcoming release on Chandos will hopefully find room for the five songs that formed the first half of this concert, with each of them arranged by a different composer. The pensive Romanze from Schubert’s incidental music to Rosamunde was heard in the composer’s own orchestration, with the compact psychodrama of Der Erlkōnig in a resourceful and nowadays overlooked orchestration by Berlioz. The looping but not always ingratiating playfulness of Die Forelle was expertly attended to by Britten, while the pensive soulfulness of Im Abendrot summoned an appropriate response from Reger; the sombre resignation of Geheimnis making for a welcome encore in its orchestration by Brahms. Throughout the selection, Mary Bevan’s veracity of emotional response and her clarity of enunciation were qualities worth savouring.

This programme may have concluded the Schubert cycle by Gardner and the CBSO, though hopefully it will not see of this partnership in recorded terms – the symphonies of Schumann, and maybe Brahms, being well worth considering as additions to the orchestra’s discography.

For details on the 2024-25 season A Season of Joy, head to the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra website. Click on the names to read more about soprano Mary Bevan and conductor Edward Gardner

Published post no.2,243 – Thursday 18 July 2024