Tracklist & Credits :
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CD1 - Violin Concertos 1 and 2 - [69:00]
CD2 - Violin Concertos 3 and 4 - [72:08]
CD3 - Violin Concerto 5, Primavera - [72:25]
CD4 - Violin Concerto 6, Sonata, etc - [71:44]
CD5 - 24 Caprices - [74:36]
CD6 - Sonata Napoleone, I palpiti, etc - [47:11]
Salvatore Accardo - Violin
London Philharmonic Orchestra - Charles Dutoit
Emmanuel Pahud is an award-winning classical flutist who's also Principal Flute for the Berlin Philharmonic. Jacky Terrasson is an award-winning jazz pianist who's a Principal Original on the scene; uniquely playful and inventive, it's always interesting to see what he comes up with next. This time he rearranges 14 classical melodies in a jazz context. More than half are short tracks, colorful samples from jazz's favorite French Impressionists (Ravel, Faure, and Debussy)to Vivaldi's "Four Seasons" (all four) and pieces by Schumann, Mozart, Paganini, Rimsky-Korsakov "Flight of the Bumblebee," Saint-Saëns, and jazz pianist Claude Bolling, who in the 70s teamed up with legendary flutist Jean-Pierre Rampal to record their own crossover tracks. Although he also respects the basic character of the music, Terrasson is more adventurous. For example, the much-beloved "Pavane" (Ravel) is still serene, but with interludes of communal passion and trio jazz, as fine bassist Sean Smith and drummer Ali Jackson provide subtle, quickly reactive support. "Bolero" is an exciting journey which obliterates all memory of the plodding and repetitious original; it features a happy Latin groove that dances under the melody, then segues seamlessly into funk and Fender Rhodes. If Pahud's improvisations are rather basic, his tone is beautiful and he swings, as does the bass/drum section, after which the whole thing goes Jamaican -- before returning to Latin. It sounds like a mishmosh in print, but it works. So does the beautiful "Apres un Reve," which conjures the countryside of southern France where the CD was recorded, and "Jimbo's Lullaby," which originally described a lumbering elephant, but is meditative and nearly Oriental here. On "Marche Turque," Mozart meets reggae and humor. In fact, there's wit throughout this CD, as well as imagination and top-level playing. Both classical and jazz fans will find much to enjoy. Judith Schlesinger Tracklist & Credits :
The 24 Caprices, Op. 1, of Paganini are usually recorded as a set, and with the single opus number, it makes sense to approach them that way. Yet Paganini composed them not in a single stretch of creative activity but rather over many years, and when published, they were divided into groups of six, six, and 12. Certainly, they are among the most purely virtuosic violin pieces ever written, a compendium of violin techniques of which some say their first use in these works, and the famous Caprice No. 24 in A minor is in the nature of a finale, summing up the devices that appear in the earlier pieces. One way to approach the Caprices is as individuals, and that's what Alina Ibragimova does here. Given the fiery adventures of some of this violinist's other releases, one might expect a flamboyant Paganini set. Ibragimova does draw attention to her presence at some points where she evokes Paganini's presence in concert (check out the end of the Caprice No. 18, where she seems, as it were, to step to the back of the stage). For the most part, though, it is the personality of the individual Caprices, some of them programmatic, that emerges as the main attraction. Ibragimova's recording was made at an empty Henry Wood Hall during London's coronavirus lockdown in the spring of 2020; Ibragimova said that the solitude gave her the chance to "do some serious work" on the Caprices, and for all the fireworks, it is this inward quality with which the listener comes away. The engineering in this ideal space catches the balance between outward and inward, and the result is an entirely distinctive performance of these famed showpieces. by James Manheim
All Tracks & Credits
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