XIAYIN WANG — American Piano Concertos (2013) SACD | FLAC (tracks), lossless

Chinese pianist Xiayin Wang emerged as something of a specialist in American music with her spectacular recording of Earl Wild's Gershwin fantasias in 2010, and she continues to amass a strong track record with this Chandos release, nicely recorded at the Royal Concert Hall in Glasgow. It's interesting how novel the trio of piano concertos by Gershwin, Copland, and Barber are as a program, for they all have a great deal to say to each other, and each finds its way between jazz and modernistic influences. Given that you get here a Chinese pianist teaming with Scottish musicians, with not an American in sight, it's safe to say that the music is beginning to get the respect it deserves. Wang's performances of the Barber Piano Concerto, Op. 38, is wonderful. With clean, delicate passagework in the upper registers, she finds the composer's characteristic lyricism in this sometimes thorny score, and in the modernistic jazz of Copland's Piano Concerto, composed in 1926, is very nearly as good, tough and rhythmically brash. The weakest performance of the three, oddly enough in view of Wang's stellar work in Gershwin-related material previously, is the Gershwin Piano Concerto in F (not F major as the packaging and booklet have it here); there is nothing to object to, but the performance lacks the contained jazz energy that makes great readings of the piece work. The restraint may come from the Royal Scottish National Orchestra under Peter Oundjian, who are peppy throughout but are not confirmed Gershwin interpreters. This is, however, a revelatory program, very well performed. James Manheim
Tracklist :
1-3.      Concerto For Piano And Orchestra, Op. 38 (1962) (27:40)
Composed By – Samuel Barber
4-5.    Concerto For Piano And Orchestra (1926) (15:39)
Composed By – Aaron Copland
6-8.    Concerto In F Major (1925) (31:49)
Composed By – George Gershwin
Credits :
Conductor – Peter Oundjian
Leader – James Clark (tracks: 6 to 8), Maya Iwabuchi (tracks: 1 to 5)
Orchestra – Royal Scottish National Orchestra
Piano – Xiayin Wang

IAIN QEEN - Variations on America (American Organ Works) (2009) FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

These Variations on America consist not just of Charles Ives' famous piece of that title ("My Country, 'Tis of Thee" -- the same melody as the British and other national hymns, as well as "Heil dir im Siegenkranz," the German liner notes helpfully explain) but also of varieties of American organ music in general. British organist Iain Quinn even programs some pieces that have never been recorded in the U.S., to say nothing of Britain, and they include some very nice finds. Chief among these is the pair of fugues by Ives, written while he was a student at Yale University. They're basically academic exercises, but there are hints of a tweaking spirit in both of them. Another student exercise is the ambitious, uncharacteristically chromatic Prelude and Fugue of Samuel Barber, composed in 1927. Barber's nifty setting of The Sacred Harp tune Wondrous Love, Op. 34, alluding to the parallel harmonies of the American folk hymn style from which the melody comes, has been recorded before but not often, and the same is true of William Grant Still's Reverie (1962). Other premieres include works by Henry Cowell and Stephen Paulus, who are often-programmed composers, but not well known for their organ music. The more famous pieces on the program are given a fresh twist due partly to the environs of Coventry Cathedral, a space whose acoustic subtleties are matched by few in the U.S. This is, as Quinn points out in his concise and helpful notes (in English, French, and German), especially impressive in the case of Copland's Preamble (For a Solemn Occasion), written in 1949 to honor the first anniversary of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights. The Ives Variations on America themselves, first improvised by the composer as an obstreperous teenager, are presented here in their final version; Ives added ad libitum interludes in 1910, with bitonal elements, and continued to revise the piece even after he had given up composing. Quinn is not prevented by any British propriety from appreciating the piece's humorous aspects. More characteristic of Ives' mature idiom is the 1898 setting of Adeste Fidelis, S. 131, which Ives also later revised. The opening strains piece contains an early example of the cosmic, transcendental elements in his musical language, and they, too, come alive in mysterious, muted colors here, as if they came from Messiaen. An enjoyable program that fans of organ music and American composition will equally enjoy. by James Manheim  

Aaron Copland
Preamble (For A Solemn Occasion) (5:31)

Charles Ives
With Bold And Noble Expressivity Throughout - Allargando    
Variations On 'America', S 140 (8:51)
Adeste Fidelis, S 131 (4:11)
Fugue, S 136 - 5:04
Fugue, S 135 - 3:31
Score Editor – Charles Krigbaum, John Kirkpatrick

Henry Cowell
Hymn And Fuguing Tune No. 14 - 7:16

William Grant Still
Reverie (4:38)

Samuel Barber
Slow
Prelude And Fugue (8:23)
Wondrous Love, Op. 34 (8:23)

Stephen Paulus
In Moderate Tempo - Slightly Faster - Same Tempo - With Grace - Very Much Slower    
Triptych (14:40)

Organ – Iain Quinn

THE KNIGHTS (Eric Jacobsen, Jan Vogler) - New Worlds (2009) FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

The Knights are an orchestra not affiliated with a city or an institution of learning such as a university, and they are committed to taking orchestral music out of the concert hall and directly to the people through playing non-traditional venues such as New York City's landmark restaurant Le Poisson Rouge. Sony's disc New Worlds was inspired by a program prepared by the Knights for the annual Dresden Music Festival, which chose as its theme the concept of "New Worlds" for its 2009 edition. These recordings, however, were made in Sony's Legacy Studios in New York and not at the festival itself, and for the better, as they have a great sense of presence while maintaining orchestral depth. This works very well for the splendid version of Charles Ives' The Unanswered Question included; for once, listeners are not straining to hear the string chorus and having the foreground elements smack them in the face, but all is well-balanced. Gabriela Lena Frank's Leyendas is a spicy and effervescently rhythmic confection that utilizes "new music" techniques in a wry and humorous fashion, whereas Dvorák's Silent Woods is indeed woody, wide, and fully achieved in a standard romantic idiom, perhaps the ultimate test of the mettle of a new century orchestra; how well can than they do standard, 19th century fare? If you're the Knights and cello soloist Jan Vogler, about as well as the Czech Philharmonic does Dvorák.

The Golijov is both bristling with energy and tension and played with precision; well done, especially when one considers the rather complex rhythmic profile of the piece. Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring closes out the show, and the Knights' -- and conductor Eric Jacobsen's -- attentiveness to detail pays off in the Copland, which for some established orchestras can sound like a tired old warhorse. That said, it doesn't quite crackle with the electricity encountered in older recordings by Antal Dorati or Copland himself, but the Knights' reading is fresher than many to most interpretations of this very commonly recorded piece. Listen up, orchestras of the classical establishment: here is your competition. In order to keep pace with what the Knights can offer in lithe limberness and immediacy, the big concert orchestras might need to put in some time at the gymnasium; suffice it is to say that New Worlds is a refreshing change over usual orchestral fare. by Uncle Dave Lewis  
Tracklist :
The Unanswered Question (II)
Composed By – Charles Ives
Leyendas - An Andean Walkabout
Composed By – Gabriela Lena Frank
Silent Woods (Klid)
Composed By – Antonín Dvořák
Last Round
Composed By – Osvaldo Golijov
Appalachian Spring
Composed By – Aaron Copland

Cello – Jan Vogler
Conductor – Eric Jacobsen
Orchestra – The Knights

IVES/BRANT : A Concord Symphony; COPLAND : Organ Symphony (San Francisco Symphony, Michael Tilson Thomas) (2011) FLAC (tracks), lossless

The first item on the program here is, as the potential buyer may have guessed, an orchestral transcrption of Charles Ives' Piano Sonata No. 2, known as the Concord Sonata. But it requires a little more explanation. Orchestrator Henry Brant was a Canadian-American composer of an experimental bent who became, one learns from the booklet, "obsesssed" with the Concord Sonata and worked on an orchestral version in his spare time for the startlingly long period of 36 years, from 1958 to 1994. Further, he did not try to turn it into another Ives symphony, as the title might imply, "but rather to create a symphonic idiom which would ride in the orchestra with athletic surefootedness and present Ives' astounding music in clear, vivid, and intense sonorities." The result is quite unusual: not exactly Ivesian, but wholly absorbing in this reading by the eternally fresh Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony. Brant's version is something like a guided tour through the work, with the swirling flow of musical existence pared away from the sonata's special features. The recurring references to Beethoven's Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67, are pointed up in this version, and the evocations of vernacular American music (hear the brass band passages) that are part of the torrent in the piano version are here restored to something like their original sounds. Again, it's not exactly Ives, but the Concord Sonata has a way of bursting over its pianistic confines anyhow; there is an optional flute part for the finale that is too rarely performed. The second piece on the program is likewise underperformed, Copland's short three-movement Organ Symphony of 1925 is perhaps the one that most clearly reflects his own personality among his early works. Written in an idiom that clearly owes much to Copland's recent studies in Paris, it nevertheless works in big lyrical tunes and rollicking fun. Tilson Thomas and organist Paul Jacobs give the work its due and are sensitive to the clever ways of balancing the organ with orchestral textures. A highly enjoyable album of unusual Americana. by James Manheim

 Charles Ives (1874-1954)
A Concord Symphony (50:05)
Orchestrated By – Henry Brant

Aaron Copland (1900-1990)
Organ Symphony (27:02)
Organ – Paul Jacobs

Orchestra – San Francisco Symphony
Conductor – Michael Tilson Thomas

COPLAND • IVES • CARTER • BARBER • GRIFFES • SESSIONS : American Piano Sonatas (Peter Lawson) 2xCD (1992) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Pianist Peter Lawson cultivates a full and resonant sonority and wide dynamic range that suits the rugged registral valleys mapped by Carter and Copland in their respective sonatas. He lavishes similar care over the delicate harmonic twists throughout Griffes' Sonata and lovingly tends the spacious, transcendent lyricism Charles Ives spins when he's not bashing out good dissonances like a man. Listen, for instance, to Lawson's sustained calm and delicately placed "celesta" notes midway through Ives' Three Page Sonata, or to his twinkling dispatch of the Copland Sonata's zesty middle movement. Lawson sustains the slow movement of Roger Sessions' gnarly Second Sonata as eloquently as Robert Helps' more texturally differentiated live recording (CRI), and offers a cogent, somewhat reserved foil to Charles Rosen's more amply engineered and dramatically colored Elliott Carter Sonata (Bridge).  by Jed Distler
1.  Sonata for Piano in E flat minor, Op. 26 by Samuel Barber 
 Length: 19 Minutes 46 Secs. 
Performer:  Peter Lawson (Piano) 
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1949; USA 
  Date of Recording: 1989 
Venue:  EMI Abbey Road Studio no 1, London, UK 

2.  Sonata for Piano "Three Page" by Charles Ives 
Performer:  Peter Lawson (Piano) 
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1905; USA 
Date of Recording: 1989 
Venue:  EMI Abbey Road Studio no 1, London, UK 
Length: 7 Minutes 16 Secs. 

3.  Sonata for Piano no 2 by Roger Sessions 
Performer:  Peter Lawson (Piano) 
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1946; USA 
 Date of Recording: 1991 
Venue:  EMI Abbey Road Studio no 1, London, UK 
Length: 15 Minutes 15 Secs. 

4.  Sonata for Piano no 1 by Charles Ives 
Performer:  Peter Lawson (Piano) 
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1901-1909; USA 
  Date of Recording: 1991 
Venue:  EMI Abbey Road Studio no 1, London, UK 
Length: 39 Minutes 18 Secs. 

5.  Sonata for Piano in G major by Aaron Copland 
Performer:  Peter Lawson (Piano) 
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1920-1921; USA 
  Date of Recording: 1989 
Venue:  EMI Abbey Road Studio no 1, London, UK 
Length: 23 Minutes 43 Secs. 

 6.  Sonata for Piano by Elliott Carter 
Performer:  Peter Lawson (Piano) 
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1945-1946; USA 
  Date of Recording: 1989 
Venue:  EMI Abbey Road Studio no 1, London, UK 
Length: 24 Minutes 11 Secs. 

 7.  Sonata for Piano by Charles T. Griffes 
Length: 17 Minutes 25 Secs. 
Performer:  Peter Lawson (Piano) 
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1917-1918; USA 
  Date of Recording: 1991 
Venue:  EMI Abbey Road Studio no 1, London, UK 

THE KOHON QUARTET - American String Quartets 1900-1950 (1993) 2CD | FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

CD1
William Schuman
Quartet No. 3 (23:47)

Howard Hanson        
Quartet In One Movement, Op. 23 17:47

Virgil Thomson
Quartet No. 2 (22:16)

George Gershwin
Lullaby For String Quartet 11:24

CD2
Roger Sessions
Quartet No. 2 (32:19)

Charles Ives
Scherzo For 2 Violins, Viola And Cello – 1:45

Peter Mennin
Quartet No. 2 (17:29)

Walter Piston
Quartet No. 5 (16:55)

Aaron Copland
Two Pieces For String Quartet (8:50)

Ensemble [String Quartet] – The Kohon Quartet
Cello – W. Ted Hoyle
Viola – Eugenie Dengel
Violin – Harold Kohon, Isadora Kohon

BERNSTEIN • SCHUMAN • IVES • RUGGERI • COPLAND • BARBER • COWELL : American Festival (Lukas Foss · Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra ) (1984) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Leonard Bernstein
Overture To "Candide" – 4:27

William Schuman
Newsreel    (7:06)

Charles Ives
The Unanswered Question – 5:39

Roger Ruggeri
If... Then – 3:30

Aaron Copland
Fanfare For The Common Man - 3:52
Variations On A Shaker Melody From The Ballet Appalachian Spring –  3:30

Samuel Barber
Adagio For Strings 9:44

Henry Cowell
Saturday Night At The Firehouse – 5:03

Charles Ives
The Circus Band March - 2:05

Orchestra – Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra
Conductor – Lukas Foss

JEANNE BAXTRESSER : Chamber Music for Flute by Devienne, Dring, Copland, Gaubert & Barber (2006) FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

 

COPLAND : Early Orchestral Works, 1922-1935 (1991) 2xCD / APE (image+.cue), lossless

Track listing: Disc 1

Dance Symphony (1922-1925)
1. I. Introduction: Lento; Molto allegro; Adagio molto 7:02
2. II. Andante moderato 6:03
3. III. Allegro vivo 4:56

London Symphony Orchestra Conducted by Aaron Copland
Recorded at Walthamstow Town Hall, London UK on October 2&3, 1967

Two Pieces For String Orchestra (1923, 1928)
4. Lento molto 5:42
5. Rondino 4:23

London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Aaron Copland
Recorded at Walthamstow Town Hall, London UK on November 6, 1965

Symphony For Organ & Orchestra (1924)
6.: I. Prelude: Andante 6/8 5:54
7. II. Scherzo: Allegro molto 3/4; Moderato 4- 7:30
8. III. Finale: Lento; Allegro moderato 4/4 11:00

New York Philharmonic conducted by Leonard Bernstein
E. Power Biggs, organ
Recorded at Philharmonic Hall (Avery Fisher Hall), New York City, NY USA on January 3, 1967

Music For The Theatre (1925)
9.: I. Prologue 5:46
10. II. Dance 3:13
11. III. Interlude 5:19
12. IV. Burlesque 3:13
13. V. Epilogue 3:51

New York Philharmonic conducted by Leonard Bernstein
Recorded at the St. George Hotel, Brooklyn, New York USA on December 15, 1958

Time: 74:35 mins

Disc 2

Concerto For Piano & Orchestra (1926)
1. I. Andante sostenuto 6:50
2. II. Molto moderato (molto rubato) 9:18

New York Philharmonic conducted by Leonard Bernstein
Aaron Copland, piano
Recorded at Philharmonic Hall (Avery Fisher Hall), New York City, NY USA on January 13, 1964

Symphonic Ode (1927-1929)
3. Symphonic Ode 19:47

London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Aaron Copland
Recorded at Walthamstow Town Hall, London UK on October 2&3, 1967

Short Symphony (Symphony No. 2) (1931-1933)
4. Short Symphony (Symphony No. 2) 15:30

Statements (1934-1935)
5 I. Militant 2:44
6. II. Cryptic 3:21
7. III. Dogmatic 1:47
8. IV. Subjective 3:31
9. V. Jingo 2:33
10. VI. Prophetic 3:34

London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Aaron Copland
Recorded at Walthamstow Town Hall, London UK on November 5, 1965

Time: 69:31 mins 

SHARON KAM - American Classics : Music for Clarinet (2002) APE (image+.cue), lossless