Classical Candor: Schumann: Cello Concerto (CD review)

Schumann: Cello Concerto (CD review)

Also, Adagio un Allegro; Fantasiestucke Opus 73; Funf Stucke im Volkston; Fantasiestucke Op. 88. Gautier Capucon, cello; Martha Argerich, piano; Renaud Capucon, violin; Bernard Haitink, Chamber Orchestra of Europe. Erato 0190295634216.

So, what's it to be first? The good news or the bad? Of course, the good.

On the plus side, the disc offers some great music in the Schumann Cello Concerto plus an assortment of other music by the composer. It's played by some of the world's great performers, including Gautier Capucon, cello; Renaud Capucon, violin; Martha Argerich, piano; Bernard Haitink, conductor; and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. It's hard to ask for better talent.

On the minus side for me (or still on the plus side for a lot of other folks), Erato chose to record the music live, in concert. So, no, I don't think it sounds as good as it could have sounded, but such are the demands of today's economics. Besides, it's some of the most natural live sound I've heard in years, so it's not much of a real minus.

Anyway, the program begins with the Cello Concerto in A minor, Op. 129 by German composer and critic Robert Schumann (1810-1856). He wrote it in 1850, zipping through its composition in a mere two weeks. However, he would never hear it performed in his lifetime, and it only found a première some four years after his death.

Why no public performance in his lifetime? Possibly because Schumann recognized it was too unusual a piece. The opening movement is rather fragmentary; the second intensely lyrical, with a conversation between the soloist and the principal cellist; and the finale is in a quick Vivace tempo. Further, possibly because Schumann didn't want there to be any chance for applause between movements, he indicated all three movements be played without pause.

Gautier Capucon

Capucon and Haitink appear to take things a bit more leisurely than we generally hear, yet the timings would indicate they're in the ballpark with other recordings. And there is certainly nothing lax in Capucon's presentation. Indeed, he seems right on the money in most regards, if perhaps emphasizing the poetic aspects of the score more so than the purely dramatic. The performers take the transitions between movements at so smooth a pace, one hardly notices the change. Capucon's forte in the piece is his lyrical playing, which works best in the second movement. Then, the whole team works up a good head of steam in the final part yet in a performance that still maintains the romantically melodious, yearning nature of the score, also making it sound less disjointed than it sometimes can sound.

Filling out the disc are four additional Schumann items: the Adagio un Allegro, Op. 70; the Fantasiestuckes Op. 73 and Op. 88; and the Funf Stucke im Volkston, Op. 102. They are ably performed by pianist Martha Argerich and violinist Renaud Capucon. I found these performances more animated, more spontaneous, even in the slower pieces, than those of the concerto. They are worth the price of the album in themselves.

Producer Michael Fine and engineer Erdo Groot recorded the concerto live in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Netherlands, in November 2015. Producer and engineer Ulrich Ruscher recorded the other pieces live at the Auditorio Stello Molo Luganao, Switzerland in June 2009 and 2010, and November 2012.

The engineers miked the concerto a little farther away than we usually hear in a live performance, thus making it sound a bit more realistic. It's also a little softer than usual but again not unrealistically so. The solo instrument, too, is a bit farther back but well integrated with the orchestra. Detailing, as I say, is not entirely transparent but more natural than is common for a live recording. Dynamics seem a little restrained as well, so you may have to turn up the volume to get it to sound at all impressive.

In the closing duets, the sound is also a bit softer and more distant than one often finds in live recordings, making them sound more like studio recordings. I'm not sure if this was the result of the mike placement or a bit engineering magic afterward, but they sound quite nice.

The engineers have also mercifully edited out any applause.

JJP

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click below:

John J. Puccio, Founder and Contributor

Understand, I'm just an everyday guy reacting to something I love. And I've been doing it for a very long time, my appreciation for classical music starting with the musical excerpts on the Big Jon and Sparkie radio show in the early Fifties and the purchase of my first recording, The 101 Strings Play the Classics, around 1956. In the late Sixties I began teaching high school English and Film Studies as well as becoming interested in hi-fi, my audio ambitions graduating me from a pair of AR-3 speakers to the Fulton J's recommended by The Stereophile's J. Gordon Holt. In the early Seventies, I began writing for a number of audio magazines, including Audio Excellence, Audio Forum, The Boston Audio Society Speaker, The American Record Guide, and from 1976 until 2008, The $ensible Sound, for which I served as Classical Music Editor.

Today, I'm retired from teaching and use a pair of bi-amped VMPS RM40s loudspeakers for my listening. In addition to writing for the Classical Candor blog, I served as the Movie Review Editor for the Web site Movie Metropolis (formerly DVDTown) from 1997-2013. Music and movies. Life couldn't be better.

Karl Nehring, Editor and Contributor

For more than 20 years I was the editor of The $ensible Sound magazine and a regular contributor to both its equipment and recordings review pages. I would not presume to present myself as some sort of expert on music, but I have a deep love for and appreciation of many types of music, "classical" especially, and have listened to thousands of recordings over the years, many of which still line the walls of my listening room (and occasionally spill onto the furniture and floor, much to the chagrin of my long-suffering wife). I have always taken the approach as a reviewer that what I am trying to do is simply to point out to readers that I have come across a recording that I have found of interest, a recording that I think they might appreciate my having pointed out to them. I suppose that sounds a bit simple-minded, but I know I appreciate reading reviews by others that do the same for me — point out recordings that they think I might enjoy.

For readers who might be wondering about what kind of system I am using to do my listening, I should probably point out that I do a LOT of music listening and employ a variety of means to do so in a variety of environments, as I would imagine many music lovers also do. Starting at the more grandiose end of the scale, the system in which I do my most serious listening comprises Marantz CD 6007 and Onkyo CD 7030 CD players, NAD C 658 streaming preamp/DAC, Legacy Audio PowerBloc2 amplifier, and a pair of Legacy Audio Focus SE loudspeakers. I occasionally do some listening through pair of Sennheiser 560S headphones. I miss the excellent ELS Studio sound system in our 2016 Acura RDX (now my wife's daily driver) on which I had ripped more than a hundred favorite CDs to the hard drive, so now when driving my 2022 Accord EX-L Hybrid I stream music from my phone through its adequate but not outstanding factory system. For more casual listening at home when I am not in my listening room, I often stream music through the phone into a Vizio soundbar system that has tolerably nice sound for such a diminutive physical presence. And finally, at the least grandiose end of the scale, I have an Ultimate Ears Wonderboom II Bluetooth speaker for those occasions where I am somewhere by myself without a sound system but in desperate need of a musical fix. I just can’t imagine life without music and I am humbly grateful for the technology that enables us to enjoy it in so many wonderful ways.

William (Bill) Heck, Webmaster and Contributor

Among my early childhood memories are those of listening to my mother playing records (some even 78 rpm ones!) of both classical music and jazz tunes. I suppose that her love of music was transmitted genetically, and my interest was sustained by years of playing in rock bands – until I realized that this was no way to make a living. The interest in classical music was rekindled in grad school when the university FM station serving as background music for studying happened to play the Brahms First Symphony. As the work came to an end, it struck me forcibly that this was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard, and from that point on, I never looked back. This revelation was to the detriment of my studies, as I subsequently spent way too much time simply listening, but music has remained a significant part of my life. These days, although I still can tell a trumpet from a bassoon and a quarter note from a treble clef, I have to admit that I remain a nonexpert. But I do love music in general and classical music in particular, and I enjoy sharing both information and opinions about it.

The audiophile bug bit about the same time that I returned to classical music. I’ve gone through plenty of equipment, brands from Audio Research to Yamaha, and the best of it has opened new audio insights. Along the way, I reviewed components, and occasionally recordings, for The $ensible Sound magazine. Most recently I’ve moved to my “ultimate system” consisting of a BlueSound Node streamer, an ancient Toshiba multi-format disk player serving as a CD transport, Legacy Wavelet II DAC/preamp/crossover, dual Legacy PowerBloc2 amps, and Legacy Signature SE speakers (biamped), all connected with decently made, no-frills cables. With the arrival of CD and higher resolution streaming, that is now the source for most of my listening.

Ryan Ross, Contributor

I started listening to and studying classical music in earnest nearly three decades ago. This interest grew naturally out of my training as a pianist. I am now a musicologist by profession, specializing in British and other symphonic music of the 19th and 20th centuries. My scholarly work has been published in major music journals, as well as in other outlets. Current research focuses include twentieth-century symphonic historiography, and the music of Jean Sibelius, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Malcolm Arnold.

I am honored to contribute writings to Classical Candor. In an age where the classical recording industry is being subjected to such profound pressures and changes, it is more important than ever for those of us steeped in this cultural tradition to continue to foster its love and exposure. I hope that my readers can find value, no matter how modest, in what I offer here.

Bryan Geyer, Technical Analyst

I initially embraced classical music in 1954 when I mistuned my car radio and heard the Heifetz recording of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto. That inspired me to board the new "hi-fi" DIY bandwagon. In 1957 I joined one of the pioneer semiconductor makers and spent the next 32 years marketing transistors and microcircuits to military contractors. Home audio DIY projects remained a personal passion until 1989 when we created our own new photography equipment company. I later (2012) revived my interest in two channel audio when we "downsized" our life and determined that mini-monitors + paired subwoofers were a great way to mate fine music with the space constraints of condo living.

Visitors that view my technical papers on this site may wonder why they appear here, rather than on a site that features audio equipment reviews. My reason is that I tried the latter, and prefer to publish for people who actually want to listen to music; not to equipment. My focus is in describing what's technically beneficial to assure that the sound of the system will accurately replicate the source input signal (i. e. exhibit high accuracy) without inordinate cost and complexity. Conversely, most of the audiophiles of today strive to achieve sound that's euphonic, i.e. be personally satisfying. In essence, audiophiles seek sound that's consistent with their desire; the music is simply a test signal.

Mission Statement

It is the goal of Classical Candor to promote the enjoyment of classical music. Other forms of music come and go--minuets, waltzes, ragtime, blues, jazz, bebop, country-western, rock-'n'-roll, heavy metal, rap, and the rest--but classical music has been around for hundreds of years and will continue to be around for hundreds more. It's no accident that every major city in the world has one or more symphony orchestras.

When I was young, I heard it said that only intellectuals could appreciate classical music, that it required dedicated concentration to appreciate. Nonsense. I'm no intellectual, and I've always loved classical music. Anyone who's ever seen and enjoyed Disney's Fantasia or a Looney Tunes cartoon playing Rossini's William Tell Overture or Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 can attest to the power and joy of classical music, and that's just about everybody.

So, if Classical Candor can expand one's awareness of classical music and bring more joy to one's life, more power to it. It's done its job. --John J. Puccio

Schumann: Cello Concerto (CD review)

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"Their Master's Voice" by Michael Sowa