Recent Releases No. 41 (CD Mini-reviews)

By Karl Nehring

Lucie Horsch: Origins. Charlie Parker: Ornithology; Piazzolla: Libertango; Maxwell Davies: Farewell to Stromness; Traditional: Simple Gifts; Piazzolla: Fuga y Misterio; Bartók: Romanian Folk Dances; Debussy: Syrinx; Stravinsky: 3 Pieces for Solo Clarinet, No. 1; Chanson Russe; 3 Pieces for Solo Clarinet, No. 3; Piazzolla: Café 1930; Traditional: Pašona Kolo; IsangYun: The Actor with the Monkey; Bartók: 3 Hungarian Folksongs from the Csìk, Sz. 35a; Traditional: She Moved Through the Fair; Londonderry Air (Danny Boy); Horsch, Sissoko: Tilibo; Nyami; Heraclio Fernandez: El diablo suelto (The Devil on the Loose); Zequinha de Abreu and Charlie Parker: Tico Tico. Lucie Hirsch, recorders; Fuse (Julia Philippens & Emma van der Schalie, violins; Adriaan Breunis, viola; Mascha van Nieuwkerk, cello; Tobias Nijboer, double bass; Daniel van Dalen, percussion); Carel Kraayenhof, bandoneon; LUDWIG Orchestra; Dani Luca, cimbalom; Sean Shibe, guitar; Bao Sissoko, kora. DECCA 485 3192

The young Dutch recorder player Lucie Horsch (b. 1999) started playing the instrument at the age of five, appeared on national television at age nine, and made her first recording in 2018 while still a teenager. The liner notes point out that “as a performer of Baroque music, Horsch feels at home with the folk melodies adapted by its composers to please their aristocratic masters.” Around the middle of the 19^th century, there had been something of a Great Divide in art between so-called “high” art” and “low” or “common” art, with folk music being cast into the latter category – despite the fact that many “high art” composers drew much of their inspiration from folk music. In any event, Horsch’s goal with this album was to bridge the Great Divide by showcasing music where classical musicians feel at ease with folk styles from various cultures and musical styles from around the globe. With music ranging from Parker to Pizzzolla to Stravinsky, Bartok, and Debussy, there really is quite an eclectic mix, but trust me, it is all quite enjoyable to hear. If you have been looking for something out of the mainstream but not “way out there,” this may be just what you were looking for but didn’t know it.

Christopher Tin: The Lost Birds: An Extinction Elegy. Flocks a Mile Wide; The Saddest Nosie; Bird Raptures; A Hundred Thousand Birds; Wild Swans; Intermezzo; Thus in the Winter; There Will Come Soft Rain; All That Could Never Be Said; I Shall Not See the Shadows; In the End; Hope Is the Thing with Feathers. Voces8; Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Christopher Tin and Barnaby Smith. DECCA B00836123-02

Having previously enjoyed a recording of a composition by the American composer Christopher Tin (b. 1976) titled “To Shiver the Sky” (reviewed here), I was excited to see that he had a new composition out featuring the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, this time with the vocals of Voces8, whose vocal stylings have been featured on numerous recordings reviewed previously on this site. The theme of the album brought to mind the composition Spectral Spirits by another American composer, Edie Hill (b. 1962), which was included on a recording by the Philadelphia-based choral group, The Crossing (reviewed here). The recording was largely funded by a Kickstarter campaign reported to have topped the record for the highest-funded classical music crowdfunding campaign ever. The lyrics (which are printed in the CD booklet) are adapted from poetry by Emily Dickinson, Christina Rossetti, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Sara Teasdale.

Although there is plenty to like about this release, the music has a film score quality to it that may not prove palatable to all listeners, and the prominence of Voces8 in the mix can make some of the soprano parts sound overpowering at times. All in all, this is a pleasant, well-intentioned album that will not make serious demands of listeners, but on the other hand might leave some listeners wishing for more musical substance.

Mahler: Symphony No. 5. Czech Philharmonic conducted by Semyon Bychkov. Pentatone PTC 5187 021

Conductor Semyon Bychkov was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1952 to Jewish parents. As a result of his family suffering from some official anti-Semitism, Bychkov fled to Vienna in 1974 and then emigrated to the United States in 1975, becoming an American citizen on July 4, 1983. He was music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic from 1985-89 and the Orchestre de Paris from 1989-98. Fast-forward to 2018, and Bychkov became music director of the Czech Philharmonic. Then early in 2022, he and the orchestra made their Pentatone recording debut with the release of Mahler’s Symphony No. 4, the first of what is projected to be a complete Mahler symphony cycle. That recording received generally favorable reviews, including from our own JJP, a review that can be found here.

 
Now we have the second release in the series, Symphony No. 5, and once again Bychkov and his Czech forces have produced an excellent recording. Although it does not quite have the sheer dramatic intensity of the Bernstein/Vienna Philharmonic version (as an aside, Bernstein was buried with a copy of the score of the Mahler 5th) on DG or the completely convincing combination of performance and engineering of the Haenchen/Netherlands Philharmonic version on Pentatone – a release from some time back, reviewed here. This is a very good recording; the problem is that there are just so many very good recordings of Mahler on the market today. Or maybe that’s not a problem – if you are a Mahler fan, this new recording would be a good one to add to your collection. The Czech Philharmonic, which did a previous Mahler cycle under the late Vaclav Neumann in the 1970s, is a natural fit for this music, and Bychkov certainly knows what he is doing. This will be a Mahler cycle to keep an eye – and ear – on.