Challenge Classics reviews
Cieco Amor
JS Bach • Mozart • Schubert: Sonatas, etc
Fesch: Violin Concerto; Concerti Grossi
Willem Jeths: Ritratto
Schubert: Symphony No. 9 (Hague/Vriend)
R Schumann: Einsam (Piano Works)
JS Bach: The Art of Fugue, BWV1080
Mozart: Piano Concertos Nos 17 & 23
Prokofiev/Górecki/Ysaÿe
Brahms: Piano Quartet No. 1/Academic Festival Overture
Prokofiev: Violin Concerto No. 1; Walton: Viola Concerto; Vaughan Williams: The Lark Ascending
The Great War Centenary: Works by Debussy, Janáček, Hesketh & Respighi
Auf Flügeln Des Gesanges: Romantic Songs and Transcriptions
Schubert: Symphonies Nos. 2 & 4
A performance of Korngold's Violin Concerto and Bernstein's Serenade after Plato's 'Symposium'
Written around nine years apart in mid-20th- century USA, these concertos complement one another surprisingly well. Both composers of Jewish immigrant heritage – though very contrasting ones – each had a strongly individual voice and refused to compromise amid changing fashions.
Cyril Scott: Visions, etc
Brownridge performs Debussy
Mozart's Piano Concertos Nos 11-13 performed by Marie Kuijken & Veronica Kuijken
The Kuijkens – daughters Marie and Veronica as fortepiano soloists, father Sigiswald as first violin – offer here the three keyboard concertos completed by the 26-year-old Mozart towards the end of 1782. Since he expressly designed them to allow his soloist to be accompanied by either full orchestra or ‘a quattro’, ie only a string quartet, these small-scale versions are not only authentic but, as Kuijken père argues in his booklet essay, especially rewarding in the way they highlight the extreme finesse and responsiveness of Mozart’s string writing.