MIECZYSLAW WEINBERG - Kremerata Baltica, Gidon Kremer (2014) 2CD / FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Latvian violinist Gidon Kremer has proven a near-infallible guide to the neglected music of the former Soviet bloc. In the case of Polish-born Soviet Jewish composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg, the revival was well underway even before Kremer came along, but this beautifully recorded two-disc set makes for a tasty sampler. Weinberg's career roughly paralleled that of Shostakovich, and he suffered the slings of history to an even greater degree than Shostakovich did. The influence went both ways: Shostakovich's embrace of Jewish themes was probably due to Weinberg's example. The Symphony No. 10 on disc two gives a good indication of why Weinberg's symphonies are showing up so often on orchestral programs. The tonal language, flirting with dodecaphony, is not simple, but the five compact movements, rooted in Baroque dances, are arresting, especially with a crack string section such as the one Kremer has at his disposal (check out the cello acrobatics). The work is similar tonally but of a different flavor from Shostakovich's more atonal works of the 1960s. Even more intense is the late Sonata No. 3 for solo violin, Op. 126, played by Kremer himself. The other three works all date from the late 1940s and early 1950s. These are pleasing pieces in the Soviet vein of enforced simplicity. They're probably better than Shostakovich's works of the same period, but with an album that seems to aim to be a survey of Weinberg's music, one will wonder why the full range of the composer's music wasn't exploited. But this is really the only possible complaint in this fine collection. by James Manheim  

Sonata No. 3 Op. 126    22:14
Trio Op. 48
Sonatina Op. 46

Concertino Op. 42
Symphony No. 10 Op. 98
All Credits

WEINBERG : Chamber Symphonies • Piano Quintet (Kremerata Baltica, Gidon Kremer) 2CD (2017) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Gidon Kremer and his Kremerata Baltica ensemble may be best known for Piazzolla, but they have also specialized in the rediscovery of neglected East Bloc composers. The Polish-born Mieczyslaw Weinberg, a follower of Shostakovich who was much championed by his mentor, doesn't quite qualify as neglected, but much of his music, including the late chamber symphonies recorded here, has awaited persuasive performances. The chamber symphonies aren't quite a genre in themselves, the first three are arranged from earlier Weinberg string quartets, while the 1992 Chamber Symphony No. 4, Weinberg's last completed work, is original. It's a fascinating piece, with a triangle sounding the strokes of approaching death at the end. The Piano Quintet, Op. 18, of 1944, is presented in an arrangement for string orchestra and, notably, percussion; the word "arrangement" doesn't seem strong enough for what's happening. This is the place to start sampling, for there are all kinds of junctures where the music sounds like Shostakovich, but veers off into something decisively different. The work is, like Shostakovich's roughly contemporaneous piano quintet, in five movements, but they are not Shostakovich's five. Sample one of the two scherzo-like movements for the superficially Shostakovich-like effect. The substantial 14-plus-minute "Largo" does not have Shostakovich's bitter grimness, but an altogether nonpareil, very subdued lyricism. The performances, conducted by Kremer except for the final chamber symphony, are wonderfully sensitive, and the engineering, from Vienna's venerable Musikverein, is, as you expect from ECM, superb. If you were thinking of passing this up because it consists mostly of arrangements of obscure repertory, well, the arrangements make sense (and have precedent in the realm of Shostakovich), and the repertory isn't going to be obscure for much longer. by James Manheim  

Chamber Symphony No. 3 Op. 151    
Chamber Symphony No. 2 Op. 147
Chamber Symphony No. 1 Op. 145
Piano Quintet Op. 18
Arranged By – Andrei Pushkarev, Gidon Kremer
Percussion – Andrei Pushkarev
Piano – Yulianna Avdeeva
Viola – Santa Vižine
Violin – Dainius Puodžiukas, Džeraldas Bidva
Violoncello – Giedrė Dirvanauskaitė
Chamber Symphony No. 4 Op. 153
Clarinet – Mate Bekavac
Conductor – Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla
Triangle – Andrei Pushkarev

Bass – Iurii Gavryliuk, Kristaps Pētersons
Music Director [Artistic Director], Violin [Principal Violin] – Gidon Kremer
Orchestra – Kremerata Baltica
Percussion – Andrei Pushkarev
Viola – Ingars Ģirnis, Vidas Vekerotas, Zita Zemoviča
Viola, Leader [Group Leader (Viola)] – Santa Vižine
Violin – Agata Laima Daraškaitė, Aliona Rachitchi, Anna Maria Korczyńska, Dainius Peseckas, Lina Marija Domarkaitė, Madara Pētersone, Marie-Helen Aavakivi, Miglė Marija Serapinaitė, Sanita Zariņa, Semen Gurevich
Violin, Concertmaster [Violin] – Džeraldas Bidva
Violin, Leader [Group Leader (Violin)] – Andrei Valigura, Dainius Puodžiukas
Violoncello – Maruša Bogotaj, Pēteris Sokolovskis, Pēteris Čirkšis
Violoncello, Leader [Group Leader (Violoncello)] – Giedrė Dirvanauskaitė

WEINBERG : Symphonies Nos. 2 & 21 (Gražinytė-Tyla, Kremer) 2CD (2019) FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg has received renewed attention, especially as the centenary year of his birth in 2019 approached. He has hardly received better advocacy than he gets here from the sensational young conductor Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla in her first recording for Deutsche Grammophon, and first as conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. Weinberg lost most of his family in the Holocaust; he himself fled to the Soviet Union, where he wasn't exactly well treated, but survived and became closely acquainted with Shostakovich. The two mutually influenced each other, but it is surprising how individual Weinberg's style remained. The Symphony No. 21, Op. 152 ("Kaddish") was worked at by Weinberg for some time and was completed in 1991, a few years before his death. The work is dedicated to the victims of the Warsaw Ghetto in World War II and has the feeling of a personal memorial. It is almost unrelievedly grim, although it has an episodic quality deriving partly from its association with a film about the ghetto. You would not pick the youthful Gražinytė-Tyla as an interpreter, but this is an extraordinary reading. The finale has a kind of wordless keening for soprano, which Gražinytė-Tyla takes herself. There is no way to know what Weinberg had in mind for the work, but the effect of her chorister's voice is extraordinary here. A factor adding a personal quality to the performance is the presence of violinist Gidon Kremer, who has championed Weinberg's music, and who here appears not only as the leader of his Kremerata Baltica in Weinberg's Symphony No. 2 for string orchestra, Op. 30, but also takes the violin solo part in the Symphony No. 21. It is as though the Weinberg baton was being handed on to the next generation. The Symphony No. 2 itself is an elegant string serenade that draws more on interwar Czech and Polish music than it does on Shostakovich. The work of Kremerata Baltica and the CBSO here seems almost to mesh, and this is an extraordinary debut overall. How is Gražinytė-Tyla going to follow it up? by James Manheim

Symphony No. 2 (Opus 30, 1946) (34:21)
Conductor – Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla
Orchestra [String] – Kremerata Baltica

Symphony No. 21 (“Kaddish”, Opus 152, 1991) (54:38)
Clarinet – Oliver Janes
Conductor, Soprano Vocals – Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla
Double Bass – Iurii Gavryliuk
Orchestra – City Of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra
Orchestra [String] – Kremerata Baltica
Piano – Georgijs Osokins
Violin – Gidon Kremer

SOFIA GUBAIDULINA : Canticle of the Sun (Gidon Kremer · Kremerata Baltica) (2012) FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Sofia Gubaidulina doesn't designate either of the pieces on this recording as concertos even though they feature a solo and ensemble, and that logic is evident in the sound of the music itself, which integrates the soloists organically into its texture and structure. Gubaidulina is unquestionably a modernist and employs a wide spectrum of contemporary techniques, but she is also a mystic, so her music tends to convey a striving for transcendence that's expressed in luminous warmth. She wrote The Lyre of Orpheus for violin, percussion, and string orchestra for Gidon Kremer and Kremerata Baltica, who deliver a radiant, shimmering performance. In her notes on the piece, Gubaidulina deals only with her somewhat arcane strategies for deriving pitches and chords, but the music itself glows with timbral ingenuity and sweetness, and almost inevitably invites the listener to call to mind the poignancy of the myth of Orpheus. She does not mention it in the notes, but she wrote the piece as a memorial to her daughter, which certainly accounts for the music's intense depth of feeling. The Canticle of the Sun for cello, chamber choir, percussion, and celesta was dedicated to Mstislav Rostropovich, who gave its premiere in 1998. The unique orchestration gives it an atmosphere of luminous, ethereal mystery. She wanted to pay tribute to the cellist's famously sunny disposition, and it has sections that make one of her most exuberant works; the cello sends major chords rocketing through the first movement and there is a furiously powerful roar of ecstasy at the end of the second movement. The piece ends in the major, in an exquisitely delicate filigree of interwoven lines. Nicolas Altstaedt gives a distinguished, deeply committed performance, and the Riga Chamber Choir "Kamer…" sings with lustrous tone. ECM's sound is perfectly clean, realistic, and beautifully balanced. Stephen Eddins
Tracklist :
1     The Lyre of Orpheus 23:41
Sofia Gubaidulina
Orchestra – Kremerata Baltica
Violin – Gidon Kremer
Violoncello – Marta Sudraba
The Canticle of the Sun
Celesta – Rostislav Krimer
Choir – Riga Chamber Choir "Kamēr..."
Conductor – Māris Sirmais
Lyrics By – St. Francis Of Assisi
Percussion – Andrei Pushkarev
Violoncello – Nicolas Altstaedt
Vocal Percussion – Rihards Zaļupe    
2     Glorification of the Creator, and His Creations: the Sun and the Moon 10:13
Sofia Gubaidulina
3     Glorification of the Creator, the Maker of the Four Elements: Air, Water, Fire and Earth 13:20
Sofia Gubaidulina
4     Glorification of Life 14:29
Sofia Gubaidulina
5     Glorification of Death 7:23
Sofia Gubaidulina

GEORGE ENESCU : Octet, Op. 7; Quintet, Op. 29 (2002) FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

Featuring the first recording of two works by George Enescu -- the String Octet, Op. 7, and the Piano Quintet, Op. 29 -- this album introduces the listener to the fascinating, multifaceted, and intriguing world of the Romanian master's chamber music. Enescu's music is expertly performed by members of the extraordinary KREMERata BALTICA under the direction of Gidon Kremer, who plays first violin in both pieces. Kremer wisely chose the music, for the two works in many ways exemplify the salient features of the Enescu's musical language and reflect his development from an eclectic, post-Romantic style to a richer, more complex and personal idiom. Composed in 1900, the lush, colorful, and dynamic octet is played with remarkable subtlety, balance, and sense of nuance. The string players find the exact tonal color to perfectly conjure up Enescu's polychromous musical imagery, also impeccably expressing a wide range of moods from lyrically intimate to ardently symphonic. In the piano quintet, which Enescu composed in 1940, the players rise to the challenge of interpreting a work presenting many technical and artistic problems, many stemming from the composer's austerely sophisticated idiom. Indeed, the KREMERata, completely mastering the many complexities of Enescu's style, rewards listeners with the shared experience of highly significant, albeit lesser-known, works of twentieth century chamber music. by Zoran Minderovic