More wonderful piano music by women composers

The Future is Female, vol. 3: piano music by Montgeroult, Chaminade, Bacewicz, Yi, Ali-Zadeh, Oliveros, Kendall, Shirazi, Harris Baiocchi

Sarah Cahill has produced another winner, the third CD in her series The Future is Female. This disc is full of substantial works by mainly fairly obscure women composers who all deserve to be better known. Of the nine composers represented here, I only knew three: Cécile Chaminade, Grazyna Bacewicz and Pauline Oliveros. 

But from the beginning I was taken by a sonata by Hélène de Montgeroult, who was born about a decade after Mozart, and died about a decade after Beethoven. The Sonata in F sharp minor, op. 5 no. 3 was published in 1811, two years after Haydn's death, and it reminds me very much of the minor key sonatas that master wrote in the 1770s and 80s. But Montgeroult updates that Sturm und Drang feel, moving to the verge of Romanticism; her Études published in 1820 perhaps influenced Chopin. Sarah Cahill plays this sonata with more of a classical feel, while Nicholas Horvath, in his 2021 disc of Montgeroult's Complete Piano Sonatas, pushes harder on the incipient Romanticism, sounding more like Beethoven, if not Chopin. I prefer Cahill's approach; in this sonata she's a more effective advocate for this fascinating composer.

Franghiz Ali-Zadeh's Music for Piano uses a John Cage-style prepared piano technique to create a sound reminiscent of the tar, an Azerbaijani stringed instrument. I don't believe there's any connection to Todd Field's 2022 film Tár, though that is also a celebration (of sorts) of women in classical music. 

There are so many other exciting pieces included here; some are short, but all are worth a listen, and multiple listens as well.

The complex being of 'Woman'

Maria Mater Meretrix: music for voice and violin by Holst, Crumb, Dufay, Martin, Kurtag, Hildegarde von Bingen & more
 

"This is the theme of this album, Maria Mater Meretrix – a study of the three classical female phenomenologies into which, since time immemorial, the (un-female!) eye and ear have divided up the complex being of ‘Woman’: as Saint, Mother, and Whore."

Thematic albums like this new disc from soprano Anna Prohaska and violinist/conductor Patricia Kopatchinskaja, with the Camerata Bern, have recently become more popular in the classical music sphere. Back in 2016, Patricia Kopatchinskaja released a marvellous album around the theme of "Death and the Maiden"; in my review I called it an "illuminating, moving project." We have another such winner here.

The quote at the top of this review is from a fascinating essay by Christine Lemke-Matwey. She highlights the Virgin Mary - and Mary Magdalene - references in the huge range of music included here: from early works by Hildegard von Bingen, Walther von der Vogelweide and Tomas Luis de la Victoria to 20th century music by Frank Martin, Gyorgy Kurtag and Gustav Holst. Clever arrangements, by Michi Wiancko and Wolfgang Katschner, are included with original chamber and orchestral works. The resulting common sound-world allows one to truly appreciate the common themes in this incredibly diverse music. This album rewards close and careful - and repeat - listens. I feel like I learned more each time I sat down with this music.

I'm reading Adam Gopnik's new book The Real Work: On the Mystery of Meaning, and I feel this passage applies here:

"We find meaning in one thing by enlarging the area of reference, making it not more precise but less, by a horizontal leap relating it to something larger. Meanings expand as our contexts expand. Art only becomes articulate within a history..."

The wonderful cover photo of Prohaska and Kopatchinskaja is by Marco Borggreve. There are two equally fine shots of each of them inside the cover.

Remarkable music from Iceland

Atmospheriques: music by Thorvaldsdottir, Mazzoli, Bjarnason, Sigfusdottir, Gisladottir

I listened to these two discs one after another: the first is a normal CD, which I listened to to familiarize myself with this music. This is all definitely in my wheelhouse: Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s CATAMORPHOSIS, from 2020; Missy Mazzoli’s Sinfonia (for Orbiting Spheres), from 2014; Daníel Bjarnason’s From Space I Saw Earth, from 2019; Maria Sigfúsdóttir’s Clockworking for Orchestra, from 2020; and Bára Gísladóttir’s ÓS, written for the Iceland Centenary in 2018. It's beautifully played by the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, directed by Daniel Bjarnason.

Only a few months ago I reviewed Missy Mazzoli's latest album, Dark With Excessive Bright, which also includes her Sinfonia (for Orbiting Spheres), with Tim Weiss conducting the Arctic Philharmonic. It seems like high-latitude orchestras are best situated to play this piece about the Music of the Spheres, situated as they are far from the noise of the world's cities, and closer to the light show of the Aurora Borealis. I prefer the performance of the Iceland players by the narrowest of margins in this important work, helped as it is by the sound engineering of Sono Luminus.

And it's the audio that brings us to the second disc: a Pure Audio Blu-ray disc with the identical repertoire, totalling just under an hour, in remarkable Surround Sound. As I've mentioned a few times in my reviews, I don't spend a lot of time worrying about the audiophile component of recording, but listening to this Blu-ray knocked me for a loop. This will surely become a demonstration disc for high-end Surround Sound systems.

Iceland is a small country, but its music, both classical and popular, has the huge scope and universal appeal of the Sagas. This is a distinguished addition to a long and distinguished artistic tradition.

The cover painting is "Water and Mist I", by Kristin Morthens, from 2022.
 

Sunny and dark music for string trio

String Trios by Dohnányi, Enescu, Françaix, Sibelius & Bach

The string trio is one of my favourite formats; it doesn't have the baggage of the string quartet: that daunting mass of masterworks from Haydn to the present day. The String Trio has, on the one hand, the light serenade side, and on the other the intensity of great string trios by Schoenberg, Villa-Lobos and Schnittke. In the middle is the perfection of Mozart's great string trio from 1788, the Divertimento, K. 563.

The first two works chosen by the exceptional group Leipziger Streichtrio - violinist Adrian Iliescu, violist Atilla Aldemir and cellist Rodin Moldovan - try for that Goldilocks medium attained by Mozart. This is joyful music, but not completely ignoring dark undercurrents. Ernö Dohnányi's Serenade for String Trio, Op 10, is a relatively early work, written in 1902. It takes as its formal model not Mozart's Divertimento, but rather Beethoven's Serenade for String Trio, op. 8, from 1796-97. Jean Françaix's String Trio, from 1933, is a neo-classical gem, which exemplifies the modus operandi of Les Six: slightly sad nostalgia, slightly ironic romps, slightly erudite fugal passages, always having fun with serious matters. 

Jean Sibelius's String Trio, which dates from 1894 is a more serious beast. This is an almost altogether stern work, and though it's only 8 minutes long, it has a symphonic feel to it. When have you ever seen Sibelius smiling in a portrait? *

There are two additional pieces in this interesting program, which one might consider encores. George Enescu's Aubade, from 1899, is a bit of fun, a rustic folkloric piece full of swoops and pizzicati. Andras von Toszeghi's arrangement of J. S. Bach's great Chaconne from the 2nd Partita for Solo Violin is substantial, and interesting. Mozart himself transcribed six Bach Preludes & Fugues for string trio in 1788, K. 404a. I love listening to the Chaconne in any guise - I especially enjoy Brahms' version for piano, and Leopold Stokowski's for full orchestra. But this isn't quite a complete success as an arrangement - the violin gets to keep most of the good bits, and the viola and cello have the leftovers that make the soloist sweat while double-stopping in the original. It's neither fish nor fowl, but tasty anyway! Altogether this makes an exceptional hour of music.

* Here's your answer: Werner Bischof very nearly got a full smile out of Jean Sibelius in this 1948 portrait.

 

Splendid, authentic, joyful chamber music

Septets by Beethoven and Berwald

In the world of Charles Schulz's Peanuts, it's not Schroeder who's most like Beethoven, but the fussbudget Lucy. Beethoven had a lot to moan about in his difficult life, but even when things went well, there was always something to complain about. 

His Septet of 1799, scored for clarinet, horn, bassoon, violin, viola, cello and double bass, was a big hit, a very big hit. This irked the composer, since he felt that the serenade-like work was far eclipsed by his more important works, which at the time included his First Symphony, his first two Piano Concertos, his op. 18 String Quartets and a fair number of Piano Sonatas, including the Pathétique. I think what upset him most about the success of the Septet, a work of great charm and considerable ingenuity, was that it represented what he considered an obsolete role for the composer. Even today we connect the serenade with musicians playing on demand, often in the open air, for aristocrats. In this ancien regime scenario the be-wigged composer beating time is little more than a servant providing entertainment for courtiers.

In a controversial essay in the New York Times, Martin Scorsese posited that "cinema is an art form that brings you the unexpected. In superhero movies, nothing is at risk." Beethoven's Septet was a kind of Marvel Movie for the musical consumer of the turn of the 19th century, a safe source of entertainment that didn't tax the brain or emotions too much. Everything that Beethoven truly valued in his own music, as well as the music of others, was based on a much more radical and unsafe point of view. 

I know the Wigmore Soloists from their very fine 2021 recording of an undisputed masterpiece, Schubert's Octet. Here they navigate the tricky line between popular and erudite music, and come up with the perfect compromise. Their Septet is, quite properly, not treated as the Eroica, but neither is it tossed off with little regard for its true merits. The result is, I think, as fine a Beethoven Septet as I've heard.

Franz Berwald's Septet seems like the perfect pairing for Beethoven's Septet, since it was written in 1828, the year after Beethoven's death. But this is, I believe, only the second time the two works have appeared together on one disc; the other was in a 2017 CD from the Uppsala Chamber Soloists. That was a well-played recording, especially the Berwald, but it's completely outmatched by the new Wigmore Soloists disc. Everything about this new BIS recording is perfectly judged, from the splendid, authentic, joyful performance to the always impeccable BIS engineering, and the fine liner notes by  Philip Borg-Wheeler. Very highly recommended.

The Illuminators

Oboe Concertos by Kerzelli, von Schacht and Pla

This new disc of Oboe Concertos from the Court of Thurn und Taxis has some of the most obscure repertoire I've ever come across. I had never heard of any of these three composers: Franz Xaver Kerzelli (c1730-c.1794), Theodor von Schacht (1748-1823) or Joan Baptista Pla (c1720-c1773). And I only knew two things about Thurn und Taxis: firstly, the Post Service for the Holy Roman Empire was run by the Princely House of Thurn und Taxis, beginning in 1450.   

Thurn-und-Taxis Post's 1859 15 Kreuzer stamp

And secondly, Rainer Maria Rilke lived as a guest of the Princes Thurn & Taxis at Duino Castle near Trieste. It was there that he wrote his Duino Elegies, between 1912 and 1922.

At an earlier version of a Thurn und Taxis castle, in the 18th century, a huge library of music was built up. We're indebted to the work of music librarians and scholars that have allowed some of this obscure music to make its way, slowly, onto recordings like this one.

I happened to be reading John Russell's 1968 book on Henry Moore when I first listened to this album. He speaks about Moore going to Paris for the first time in the great year of Modernism, 1922. Russell talks about how, in the midst of the great works of that time, by artists like Picasso, Braque, Brancusi, Kandinsky, T. S. Eliot and James Joyce, there was an "ever-widening gap between the work of living art which came off and the work of living art which didn't."

"There was a topmost level of achievement, as there had always been: below that level there was only chaos and confusion. The minor master or acceptable epigone, so common in earlier epochs, had been swept off the board altogether since the beginnings of analytical cubism.... Attempts at resuscitation have proved again and again that there just is not, any longer, a level of acceptable minor achievement, some way below but within hailing distance of the giants. These giants have kicked down the ladder, once and for all, and it has to be set up somewhere else."

I'm not sure how well Russell's analysis of High Modernism holds up today; it seems a bit like an "End of (Art) History" argument that has been overcome by subsequent events in art historical fashions. But if we look back at music in the period of this album, we're perhaps in a perfect epoch of "acceptable minor achievement", the era of the Galant schemas that instantly slots music within an International Style that spans all of Europe during the 18th Century. With these devices in their musical toolboxes, a huge cohort of composers could stay within hailing distance of the Giants of their time, from Bach and Handel to Haydn, Gluck and Mozart. And they were guided by the Enlightenment-consensus concepts of beauty, loftiness, ease, sprezzatura, lightness, spirit and inventiveness, and that vital special sauce of the time: taste.

On the evidence of the oboe concertos in this historically informed and expertly played disc, we have another trio to add to the crowded ecosystem of second- and third-raters of 18th century music. This is pleasant music, and even, at times, more than pleasant. There's enough variety that one never tires of the oboe and strings sound; it helps that the von Schacht piece is for three oboes. Certainly this is not especially original music; the shadow of Mozart, and especially Haydn, is always there. 

When Elaine de Kooning was asked if she was in her husband Bill's shadow, she replied, "I was working in his light, & a great many others were working in the same light. I found him an illuminator, hardly a caster of shadows." Haydn and Mozart were both illuminators in this sense, and their light helps Kerzelli, Pla and von Schacht shine as well.

One of the prime marketing strategies in the crowded Classical Music marketplace is to unearth unknown masterpieces. Occasionally a great gem is found - the recent discovery of the orchestral music of Florence Price is perhaps the best recent example. But even if not every discovery is precious, there can be great pleasure to be gained from semi-precious gems, and even rhinestones can be fun if you have a couple of glasses of wine. Enjoy!

 

Bird With Strings

Phil Woods: Bird With Strings... And More!

On November 30, 1949, Charlie Parker recorded a 10" Mercury LP for producer Norman Granz, with Stan Freeman on piano, Ray Brown on bass and Buddy Rich on drums. Jimmy Carroll arranged six standards for Parker and his trio, with five strings and a harp, plus an oboe, played by future A&R man and conductor Mitch Miller. The album, which featured an iconic David Stone Martin cover, was so successful that a second 10" LP was recording the following summer, with 8 standards, arranged this time by Joe Lipman.

On June 12, 2005, Phil Woods presented his new arrangements of Parker's famous standards in Zurich, with a much larger string section: 24-30 strings rather than the original 5. This fine 2-disc set from Storyville Records also includes new standards with similar arrangements. 

Parker's albums were always controversial: the jazz cognoscenti thought he was selling out, both for the lush arrangements and the fact that he was playing standards exclusively. But the jazz-with-strings genre that began with this project has always been a popular one. I've always enjoyed the Charlie Parker albums; I played this music a lot during my CD-player days! So there's certainly a bit of nostalgia mixed in when I listen to Phil Woods' album, but I appreciate this project on its own merits: for Woods' playing as well as that of his sidemen, and for the gorgeous sound of the full complement of the Zurich Chamber Orchestra's strings. This is very highly recommended!

Here is a video of Woods playing "I'll Remember April" with the Zurich Chamber Orchestra, from 2005. 

And this is the original: "I'll Remember April", from Charlie Parker with Strings, July 1950:

This album will be released on March 3, 2023.