![Dmitri Shostakovich - Cello Concerto No. 2 [With score] @DamonJHK](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/e92zMFbDSQ4/maxresdefault.jpg)
Uploaded February 2017 | Updated September 2026, 17 minutes ago
Composer: Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich (25 September 1906 -- 9 August 1975)
Orchestra: Boston Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Seiji Ozawa
Cello: Mstislav Rostropovich [Also the dedicatee]
Cello Concerto No. 2, op. 126, written in 1966
00:00 - I. Largo
13:59 - II. Allegretto
18:19 - III. Allegretto
Shostakovich's last major work before his first heart-attack -- his first intimation of his own mortality -- was the Second Cello Concerto. Composed in the early months of 1966, the Cello Concerto seems to have started life as what Shostakovich called his Fourteenth Symphony. In the event, however, the work evolved into the concerto, although the work's symphonic character was so pronounced that Shostakovich wrote to his friend Isaak Glikman "...that the Second Concerto could have been called the Fourteenth Symphony with a solo cello part" (Shostakovich, A Life, Laurel Fay, p. 247).
Although the work was conceived and composed prior to the deterioration of his health, the Second Cello Concerto is, for the most part, a dark and ominous work with a long and introspective opening Largo and a counter-balancing Allegretto finale, which is a sort of dusky barcarolle. Indeed, the work ends with the curious "clock-work" percussion which closed the Fourth Symphony of 1935 and which would close the Fifteenth and final symphony of 1971. Yet the work is not all gloomy: the central movement, also an Allegretto, is based in part on a popular song of the '20s, "Pretzels, Who'll Buy my Pretzels?" Apparently, Shostakovich and some of his close friends saw in the New Year of 1966 with a game of "Name that Tune" and Shostakovich played that tune which he said was one of his favorites. One of the party guests was the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, the dedicatee and first performer of the Second Concerto.
Scored for pairs of winds with double bassoon, a pair of horns and of harps, plus a large percussion section, Shostakovich's Second Concerto is a darkly lit work with flashes of light. The outer movements are rhapsodically composed around pivotal climaxes and the central movement is a sardonic scherzo of a type that Shostakovich had been writing since his E flat major Scherzo of 1923 - 1924. The lack of display for the soloist and the inward nature of the music has denied the Second Cello Concerto the popularity of the First Concerto of 1959; nevertheless, it is a great, if underappreciated, work.
[allmusic.com]
Original Audio: youtu.be/oEU5y_Qjvpw
Composer: Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich (25 September 1906 -- 9 August 1975)
Orchestra: Boston Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Seiji Ozawa
Cello: Mstislav Rostropovich [Also the dedicatee]
Cello Concerto No. 2, op. 126, written in 1966
00:00 - I. Largo
13:59 - II. Allegretto
18:19 - III. Allegretto
Shostakovich's last major work before his first heart-attack -- his first intimation of his own mortality -- was the Second Cello Concerto. Composed in the early months of 1966, the Cello Concerto seems to have started life as what Shostakovich called his Fourteenth Symphony. In the event, however, the work evolved into the concerto, although the work's symphonic character was so pronounced that Shostakovich wrote to his friend Isaak Glikman "...that the Second Concerto could have been called the Fourteenth Symphony with a solo cello part" (Shostakovich, A Life, Laurel Fay, p. 247).
Although the work was conceived and composed prior to the deterioration of his health, the Second Cello Concerto is, for the most part, a dark and ominous work with a long and introspective opening Largo and a counter-balancing Allegretto finale, which is a sort of dusky barcarolle. Indeed, the work ends with the curious "clock-work" percussion which closed the Fourth Symphony of 1935 and which would close the Fifteenth and final symphony of 1971. Yet the work is not all gloomy: the central movement, also an Allegretto, is based in part on a popular song of the '20s, "Pretzels, Who'll Buy my Pretzels?" Apparently, Shostakovich and some of his close friends saw in the New Year of 1966 with a game of "Name that Tune" and Shostakovich played that tune which he said was one of his favorites. One of the party guests was the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, the dedicatee and first performer of the Second Concerto.
Scored for pairs of winds with double bassoon, a pair of horns and of harps, plus a large percussion section, Shostakovich's Second Concerto is a darkly lit work with flashes of light. The outer movements are rhapsodically composed around pivotal climaxes and the central movement is a sardonic scherzo of a type that Shostakovich had been writing since his E flat major Scherzo of 1923 - 1924. The lack of display for the soloist and the inward nature of the music has denied the Second Cello Concerto the popularity of the First Concerto of 1959; nevertheless, it is a great, if underappreciated, work.
[allmusic.com]
Original Audio: youtu.be/oEU5y_Qjvpw
![Dmitri Shostakovich - Cello Concerto No. 2 [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/e92zMFbDSQ4/mqdefault.jpg "Dmitri Shostakovich - Cello Concerto No. 2 [With score]
Composer: Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich (25 September 1906 9 August 1975)
Orchestra: Boston Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Seiji Ozawa
Cello: Mstislav Rostropovich [Also the dedicatee]
Cello Concerto No. 2, op. 126, written in 1966
00:00 - I. Largo
13:59 - II. Allegretto
18:19 - III. Allegretto
Shostakovichs last major work before his first heart-attack his first intimation of his own mortality was the Second Cello Concerto. Composed in the early months of 1966, the Cello Concerto seems to have started life as what Shostakovich called his Fourteenth Symphony. In the event, however, the work evolved into the concerto, although the works symphonic character was so pronounced that Shostakovich wrote to his friend Isaak Glikman ...that the Second Concerto could have been called the Fourteenth Symphony with a solo cello part (Shostakovich, A Life, Laurel Fay, p. 247).
Although the work was conceived and composed prior to the deterioration of his health, the Second Cello Concerto is, for the most part, a dark and ominous work with a long and introspective opening Largo and a counter-balancing Allegretto finale, which is a sort of dusky barcarolle. Indeed, the work ends with the curious clock-work percussion which closed the Fourth Symphony of 1935 and which would close the Fifteenth and final symphony of 1971. Yet the work is not all gloomy: the central movement, also an Allegretto, is based in part on a popular song of the 20s, Pretzels, Wholl Buy my Pretzels? Apparently, Shostakovich and some of his close friends saw in the New Year of 1966 with a game of Name that Tune and Shostakovich played that tune which he said was one of his favorites. One of the party guests was the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, the dedicatee and first performer of the Second Concerto.
Scored for pairs of winds with double bassoon, a pair of horns and of harps, plus a large percussion section, Shostakovichs Second Concerto is a darkly lit work with flashes of light. The outer movements are rhapsodically composed around pivotal climaxes and the central movement is a sardonic scherzo of a type that Shostakovich had been writing since his E flat major Scherzo of 1923 - 1924. The lack of display for the soloist and the inward nature of the music has denied the Second Cello Concerto the popularity of the First Concerto of 1959; nevertheless, it is a great, if underappreciated, work.
[allmusic.com]
Original Audio: https://youtu.be/oEU5y_Qjvpw")
![Francis Poulenc - Cello Sonata [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/eIla8wtCc7E/mqdefault.jpg "Francis Poulenc - Cello Sonata [With score]
Composer: Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc (7 January 1899 30 January 1963)
Performers: Pierre Fournier (cello), Jacques Février (piano)
Sonata for cello and piano [Sonate pour violoncelle et piano], FP 143, completed in 1948
00:00 - I. Allegro - Tempo di marcia
05:48 - II. Cavatine
13:06 - III. Ballabile
16:46 - IV. Finale
Woodwind pieces dominate Poulencs chamber music oeuvre, but the Cello Sonata, like the somewhat earlier Violin Sonata, is a substantial work finding the composer at the height of his powers, and his tongue planted less firmly in his cheek.
Despite a rather rude initial outburst from the piano, the sonata-form first movement, Allegro (tempo di marcia), leavens its fragmentary fanfare-like motifs with lyrical, good-humored material for the cello. One important theme is especially broad, romantic, and bittersweet, although much of the development section is given over to playful treatments of the melodies, with staccato piano accompaniment to cello pizzicato.
The slow second movement, Cavatine, is one of Poulencs most tenderly songful creations. After a long introduction, the cello takes up a mournful, nostalgic theme, and with the piano subjects it to several elaborations, some intense, some hesitant, ending with a lullaby for lost souls.
Unusually for Poulenc, an extra movement separates the slow section from the finale. This Ballabile a word suggesting a dance-like nature is a playful intermezzo offering a nod to the music hall in its outer sections. A trace of wistfulness colors the still cheerful middle portion.
The Finale begins with a stern cello recitative over sour piano chords, pausing for an eerie passage of harmonics. The movements main matter scampers quickly through several episodes of short-breathed cello phrases and rippling piano passagework, with time out midway and again just before the end for more tender if occasionally dizzy music. The movement concludes with the recitative with which it began.
Original Audio: https://youtu.be/dzGlnvG53hU , https://youtu.be/m8K8kkPDvYs")
![Edvard Grieg - Lyric Pieces (Volume VIII), op. 65 [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/elK3NIPXAlA/mqdefault.jpg "Edvard Grieg - Lyric Pieces (Volume VIII), op. 65 [With score]
-Composer: Edvard Hagerup Grieg (15 June 1843 – 4 September 1907)
-Performer: Leif Ove Andsnes
6 Lyric Pieces, op. 65, written in 1896
00:00 - I. Fra Ungdomsdagene {From Early Years}
04:39 - II. Bondens Sang {Peasant’s Song}
07:02 - III. Tungsinn {Melancholy}
11:50 - IV. Salon
13:45 - V. I Balladetone {Ballad}
17:53 - VI. Bryllupsdag på Troldhaugen {Wedding Day at Troldhaugen}
Edvard Grieg has a longstanding place among Romantic musical miniaturists, standing in the direct lineage of Mendelssohn and Schumann. He was born in Bergen, Western Norway in 1843. By the time of his death there in 1907, his principal achievement was to have successfully engineered a fusion between nationalistic elements commonly found within indigenous Nordic song, and some of the most progressive innovations of mainstream Romanticism, notably the rapid advance of musical impressionism as applied to the keyboard miniature.
Taking the broad view of Griegs output, we can say that the impact of folkloristic idioms can be found to pervade most of his compositions for solo piano. The links are strongest, perhaps, in the Piano Sonata in E minor, Op. 7, of 1865, the Pictures from Country Life, Op. 19, and of course, the ten books devoted to Lyric Pieces, some sixty-six miniatures in all which were published in the years 1867-1901. It was, wrote Grieg, the celebrated Norwegian violin virtuoso Ole Borneman Bull who opened my eyes to the beauty and unspoilt nature of Norwegian music, although in these works, it would be hard to overlook the demonstrable impact that exerted upon Griegs creative processes by the seminal German Romantic miniaturists, and by the music of Chopin, whose expressive instincts are also closely mirrored. As Joachim Dorfmüller has written To this traditional aspect, however, Grieg added a novel element in the form of folk music, which, in a number of pieces may be regarded as a genuine source of inspiration.
Writing to his publisher, the head of Peters Edition Henri Hinrichsen in 1901, the composer remarked that his Lyric Pieces were an intimate slice of life, and indeed, it would be very hard to challenge such an assertion. Book 8, published as Griegs Op. 65, comprises of the following numbers: 1) From days of Youth, 2) Peasants Song, 3) Melancholy, 4) Salon, 5) In Ballad Vein, 6) Wedding Day at Troldhaugen. The final piece in the set has good claims to be the best-loved and most universally performed of all Griegs piano works, great or small. This is the piece known as Wedding Day at Troldhaugen, Op. 65 No. 6. As Dorfmüller explains, Trolls are quintessentially Norwegian creatures, and it was in their honour that Grieg and his wife Nina named the plot of land on which they built their house on the outskirts of Bergen in 1884-85; Troldhaugen or Troll Hill. In this delightful piece, the march-like outer sections, illustrating the guests greeting the happy couple, frame a more lyrically reflective central episode. Other pieces, notably Op. 65 No. 5 In Ballad Vein set a much more melancholic tone, in its broad chorale-like phrases. Finally, as Dorfmüller concludes, in his Lyric Pieces, and indeed in much of his remaining piano music, Grieg thrust aside tradition no doubt, in the final analysis, to his own astonishment as much as to that of his contemporaries and in his last great creative period he set out on a virtually impressionistic path.
[allmusic.com]")
![Francis Poulenc - Deux poèmes de Louis Aragon [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ensR1tipEf0/mqdefault.jpg "Francis Poulenc - Deux poèmes de Louis Aragon [With score]
-Composer: Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc (7 January 1899 – 30 January 1963)
-Performers: Felicity Lott (Voice), Pascal Rogé (Piano)
Deux poèmes de Louis Aragon for Voice and Piano, FP 122, written in 1943
00:00 - I. C
03:08 - II. Fêtes galantes
I. [...] The bridges of C, sometimes called Ce, are the four Caesar Bridges are near Angiers. In 51 B.C.E., the Gauls were defeated there by the Romans. In 1940, the Germans invaded at the same spot, and the French were again defeated.
Louis Aragon, the poet, speaks of the ancient defeat, and the tales of glory that followed. Then he speaks of the present time and the ill-concealed tears for his beloved, abandoned France.
Every line ends with a rhyme to the word Ce. The vocal line moves syllabically, and the piano part is equally unextravagant. In total, this is one of those heartrending moments in music that achieves its goals through simple means.
II. [...] While Aragon consciously evoked a period of Frances past in the C, here he ironically applies a title Watteau used in painting and Verlaine in poetry. But whereas these two creative artists of earlier times were celebrating grace and beauty, Aragon points out the ugliness and the absurdity of the ugliness of the period of Occupation. Every line except the last is a miniature portrait of yet another horror, always presented in the same way: You see [On voit] fops on bicycles, you see pimps in kilts...you see motor cars run on gasogene...you see guttersnipes you see perverts, you see drowned folk.... This entire litany, eerily comic in its piling-on of horrors, rattles out from a music-hall accompaniment as the baritone declaims the text with extreme rapidity. Poulenc applies the tempo marking Incroyablement vite (Unbelievably Fast), with a tempo marking not less than quarter note = 152. Like Shostakovich did so often, Poulenc here confronts the drab, valueless life under a dictatorship with the commonplace, with banality, with the sound of a low cabaret.
[allmusic.com]")
![Felix Mendelssohn - Sonata for Cello and Piano No. 2 [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fGaBqZRQmW4/mqdefault.jpg "Felix Mendelssohn - Sonata for Cello and Piano No. 2 [With score]
-Composer: Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy (3 February 1809 – 4 November 1847)
-Performers: Mischa Maisky (Cello), Sergio Tiempo (Piano)
Sonata for Cello and Piano No. 2 in D major, Op. 58, written in 1843
00:07 - I. Allegro assai vivace
07:33 - II. Allegretto scherzando
13:10 - III. Adagio
18:31 - IV. Molto allegro e vivace
Mendelssohn was briefly between jobs when he wrote the second of his two cello sonatas; he was making the transition from handling musical matters for the King of Prussia to assuming the directorship of the new Leipzig Conservatory. The attendant stress of this period is hardly reflected in this sonata, which the composer wrote for his brother Paul, a cellist. The first movement, Allegro assai vivace, begins with a surging, confident melody for the cello, underpinned by a pressing piano accompaniment. The keyboard then presents its own statement of the theme, the cello now relegated to the background. The piano remains dominant during the introduction of the more lyrical but still impulsive second subject, but the cello eventually gets its turn at an extension of the tune. Unwary listeners might gather that Mendelssohn is here launching a third subject, but the cello is clearly playing the flowing outline of the melody the piano has just broached. Indeed, the instruments will be treated as equals throughout most of this sonata, and often each is allowed a virtuoso flourish. Mendelssohn develops his themes sequentially and neatly, with an almost circumspect ardor that never subordinates one instrument to the other.
The second movement, Allegretto scherzando, opens with a whimsical tune in the piano that is quickly taken up pizzicato by the cello. The melody becomes a bit more lyrical when played arco, but Mendelssohn reserves real songfulness for the second theme, which the cello sings out over a palpitating piano accompaniment. The movement continues with a repeat of the first section that turns uncharacteristically gruff before a brief reprise of the second theme, again in the cello. The instruments quietly slip away, playing fragments of both melodies.
The Adagio begins with graceful piano arpeggios that follow the chord structure of the aria Es ist vollbracht from Bachs St. John Passion, reflecting Mendelssohns lifelong devotion to the music of the German Baroque master. The piano recedes into the background as the cello offers an aria of its own, which grows more ardent and recitative-like as it progresses. Before long, the cello is playing its aria over the pianos chorale-like arpeggios; at the very end, the piano offers its own treatment of the cellos theme. Cellist Coenraad Bloemendal has proposed reading this movement as a programmatic representation of the competing religious forces that coexisted in Mendelssohns mind the Lutheran piano part overlapping and ultimately embracing what Bloemendal describes as the cellos cantorial chant.
The extensive finale, Molto allegro e vivace, begins with hectic yet low-key material that recalls the composers famous Spinning Song. All of this sonata-form movements thematic elements are spun from the material of the first several measures. Mendelssohn does not vary or develop this material so much as use it to put the two instruments through accelerating, arduous runs, culminating in a final section that creates a dazzling effect without descending to vulgarity.
[allmusic.com]")
![Dmitri Shostakovich - Suite for Jazz Orchestra No. 1 [Jazz suite No. 1] [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fKXUby45s5k/mqdefault.jpg "Dmitri Shostakovich - Suite for Jazz Orchestra No. 1 [Jazz suite No. 1] [With score]
Composer: Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich (25 September 1906 9 August 1975)
Orchestra: Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
Conductor: Riccardo Chailly
Suite for Jazz orchestra No. 1 [Jazz suite No. 1], composed in 1934
00:04 - I. Waltz
02:42 - II. Polka
04:26 - III. Foxtrot
In the 1930s, jazz was highly popular in the Soviet Union. Shostakovich was particularly interested in this kind of music, especially as it was practised within the USSR by his colleagues and friends. So he was delighted when he was asked to write a piece for a small Leningrad dance-band. The result was this charming and tuneful Suite in a style combining echoes of Kurt Weill, klezmer and cabaret with more American influences, especially in the darkly hilarious final movement. There are three movements in all: a soupy and engaging Waltz, a lively Polka with a tricky xylophone solo, and a paradoxically entitled Foxtrot (Blues), which features a notable episode for that pioneering electric instrument, the Hawaiian guitar.
[Boosey&Hawkes]
Original Audio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79uN3YRxJFU")
![Robert Schumann - Romanzen und Balladen III, op. 53 [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fYB5yde9-j0/mqdefault.jpg "Robert Schumann - Romanzen und Balladen III, op. 53 [With score]
-Composer: Robert Schumann (8 June 1810 – 29 July 1856)
-Performers: Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (Bariton), Christoph Eschenbach (Piano)
Romanzen und Balladen III, 3 Songs for Voice and Piano, op. 53, written in 1840
00:00 - I. Blondels Lied {Blondels Song}
05:37 - II. Loreley
06:36 - III. Der arme Peter {Poor Peter} - I. Der Hans und die Grete tanzen herum {Hans and Grete dance about}
08:02 - III - II. In meiner Brust, da sitzt ein Weh {Within my breast lies a woe}
09:19 - III - III. Der arme Peter wankt vorbei {Poor Peter staggers by}
Schumanns third set of Romanzen und Balladen, Op. 53, was the last group of songs from his legendary year of song (1840) to be published. In the company of so many outstanding lieder, especially the song cycles Dichterliebe and Frauenliebe und -leben, the three (actually five) songs of Op. 53 have often been lost in the shuffle and are not especially familiar to listeners. But stylistically, poetically, and more importantly in their animating spirit, they are every bit as representative of Schumann the song composer. The best-known and most interesting song is the third, Der arme Peter (Poor Peter), which is actually three songs in one, and therefore a self-contained song cycle in miniature somewhat like Beethovens An die ferne Geliebte. It is often excerpted and performed on its own.
Although composed separately and to poems of three different authors, the Op. 53 songs are unified by the theme of devotion. The first song, Blondels Lied, is by the poet Johann Gabriel Seidl, and is the tale of a medieval minstrel keeping a vigil in song for his king. At times reminiscent of Auf einer Berg from the Op. 39 Liederkreis, and even Talismane from Myrthen, it is constructed around a repeated refrain of the text Suche treu, so findest du! (Seek in faith and you shall find!). Loreley is among Schumanns shortest songs and usually takes less than one minute to perform. But in that brief span it manages to capture the very spirit of Romantic poetry and song writing in its evocation of a ghostly moment the disembodied refrain, Remember me, mingling with the sounds of the sea. Finally, Heinrich Heines Der arme Peter is the unfortunate tale of a young man driven to suicide by the loss of his love. He first sees her dancing with her new groom; then avoids her for fear of saddening her with his grief; and finally determines that the grave is where he most belongs. As is typical of both Schumann and Heine, Peters sad tale is infused with enough irony to be both sad and humorous, but never sentimental.
[allmusic.com]")
![Igor Stravinsky - Le roi des étoiles [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fbP89tlo_FI/mqdefault.jpg "Igor Stravinsky - Le roi des étoiles [With score]
Composer: Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (17 June 1882 6 April 1971)
Orchestra: [Radio-Symphonie-Orchester Berlin] Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin
Choir: Berlin Radio Choir [Rundfunkchor Berlin]
Conductor: Riccardo Chailly
[Cantata] Le roi des étoiles [The king of the stars] for Orchestra and male chorus, written in 1911-12
The Russian title of Stravinskys cantata King of the Stars (1911-1912) is Zvezdoliki, literally Starface. The work is scored for male chorus and full orchestra (including celesta and two harps). The text, by symbolist poet Konstantin Balmont, is in Russian; Stravinsky, as was often the case, was more interested in the text on a purely sonic level than for its content or semantic sense. Its words are good, Stravinsky noted, and words were what I needed, not meanings.
King of the Stars was composed at roughly the same time that Stravinsky worked on the score of his ballet masterpiece The Rite of Spring (1911-1913). The choral writing, predominantly in four parts, is characterized by close spacing and triad-based harmonies with the addition of sevenths, ninths, elevenths, and thirteenths. At times, Stravinsky sets phrases in unison to accentuate certain parts of the text.
As with many of Stravinskys early Russian works, King of the Stars has a fundamentally bitonal harmonic structure, often employing the choral and instrumental bodies as distinct harmonic entities superimposed upon one another; the final sonority, for example, consists of two distinct chords, a C major dominant ninth chord in the orchestra and a G major seventh chord in the chorus. Debussy, to whom the work is dedicated, was among the many who deemed the work essentially unperformable, targeting its bitonality as a likely cause of serious intonation problems in performance. The work was first performed in 1939, more than a quarter century after its composition.
[allmusic.com]
Original Audio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6v3b2KiBw7k")
![Edvard Grieg - Romancer og Ballader {Romances and Ballads}, op. 9 [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/gnDIdKq5dSc/mqdefault.jpg "Edvard Grieg - Romancer og Ballader {Romances and Ballads}, op. 9 [With score]
-Composer: Edvard Hagerup Grieg (15 June 1843 – 4 September 1907)
-Performers (Song 1): Monica Groop (voice), Ilmo Ranta (Piano)
-Performers (Songs 2, 3, 4): Knut Skram (voice), Rudolf Jansen (Piano)
Romancer og Ballader {Romances and Ballads} for Voice and Piano, op. 9, written in 1863-66
00:03 - I. Harpen {The harp}
03:25 - II. Vuggesang {Cradle song}
07:37 - III. Solnedgang {Sunset}
10:46 - IV. Udfarten {Departure}")
![Edvard Grieg - Scenes of country life, op. 19 [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/hMo2W-lzOtU/mqdefault.jpg "Edvard Grieg - Scenes of country life, op. 19 [With score]
-Composer: Edvard Hagerup Grieg (15 June 1843 – 4 September 1907)
-Performer: Gerhard Oppitz
Folkelivsbilleder {Scenes of country life} for Piano, op. 19, written in 1869-71
00:00 - I. Fjeldslåt (In the mountains)
05:32 - II. Brudefølget drar forbi (The bridal procession passes by)
09:19 - III. Fra Karnevalet (From the Carnival)
His very famous Piano Concerto in A minor aside, Edvard Grieg was known during his lifetime and is today remembered more or less exclusively for his proficiency at the musical miniature. Even the celebrated and very worthy Peer Gynt incidental music is, when you get right down to it, a collection of miniatures/ Grieg certainly composed longer, more substantial works, but it was his piano bonbons that really engraved his name in the public consciousness. The ten volumes of Lyric Pieces for piano and the four Album Leaves of Op. 28 in these works are pieces that every young pianist of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, whether of serious ambition or of the variety that played the instrument only because it was expected of a young lad or lady of manners and class, had in their fingers. Reigning as the most popular of all Grieg piano miniatures is the second of the three Pictures from Life in the Country, Op. 19, of 1870 and 1871. The collections title is variously translated as Pictures from Peasant Life, Pictures from Everyday Life, and so on; Griegs original title is Folkelivsbilleder, and he described them as humoresques.
The first of the Op. 19 Pictures is called In the Mountains or Mountain Tune; No. 2 is the Bridal Procession (reused by Grieg in the Peer Gynt music); and the third piece is From the Carnival or Carnival Scene. In the Mountains opens with a quietly rumbling A minor melody in octaves that gradually grows in strength as a full harmonic accompaniment builds around it; a second melody, flitting gracefully atop a twitch-like neighbor-note idea in an inner voice, takes over in A major. The opening rumble starts again to round out a basic three-part form. The Bridal Procession music is merry rather than solemn, with a twinkling, ornamented melody that bounces along from start to finish. While they still must be considered musical individuals, the three pieces of Op. 19 are actually somewhat connected to one another, topically and musically; for as the third reaches its culmination, Grieg quotes snippets from the first and second as if the happy carnival-goers are recalling or perhaps witnessing the mountain and wedding scenes.
[allmusic.com]")
![Albert Roussel - Trio for Flute, Viola and Cello, op. 40 [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/hNaWj-xSh6k/mqdefault.jpg "Albert Roussel - Trio for Flute, Viola and Cello, op. 40 [With score]
-Composer: Albert Charles Paul Marie Roussel (5 April 1869 – 23 August 1937)
-Performers: Paul Verhey (flute), Henk Guittart (viola), Herre-Jan Stegenga (cello)
Trio pour flûte, alto et violoncelle, op. 40, written in 1929
00:00 - I. Allegro grazioso
04:46 - II. Andante
10:04 - III. Allegro non troppo
Commissioned by Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge that intrepid patroness whose generosity called forth works from the most distinctive composers of her era (e.g., Stravinsky, Bartók, Dallapiccola, Pizzetti, Prokofiev, et al.) Roussels Trio for Flute, Violin, and Cello was composed in a mere 15 days in September 1929. Given the prominence of the flute, it bears a similar relation to the Sérénade for Flute, Violin, Viola, Cello, and Harp (1925) that his Third Symphony (1929-1930) bears to the Fourth (1934); in both pairs Roussels final manner enables him to return to a mood or vision whose exuberance has been pared, chastened, and, perhaps, wizened. For so fastidious a composer it would not do to repeat himself, and there is a palpable gain in refinement and concentration in both the Fourth Symphony and the Flute Trio, rippled by an airy grace and leaping vitality that look back to the earlier works, but with an autumnal cast and, in the Flute Trio, a mellowed sweetness eschewing their coruscations and sophisticated primitivism. Classical is the term applied by most commentators to this shrinkage, and it is, indeed, a classic case, so to speak, in which for the connoisseur, at least less is more, though one may prefer the striking audacities of the earlier works. Still, there is no denying the Trios concise elegance. Of the first movement, Allegro grazioso, Norman Demuth noted, The writing is a model of terseness in its contrapuntal moments and is an excellent model. The resources of each instrument are fully exploited and the flute is taken as a perfectly serious entity in the ensemble. The flute is, indeed, primus inter pares, though in the second movement Andante, after a long-breathed melody neither grave nor gay but prolix and eldritch it allows the viola and cello to come into their own in a slowly coiling utterance that can seem mere note-spinning in a slack performance, but given with requisite tautness looks with chaste eyes into a demesne purged of passion. In the chirpy third movement Allegro non troppo, the flute regains its prominence in a motoric, cheerfully mocking, spritely utterance whose scintillance seems almost too polite, or, as Demuth said, There is not the thought in this movement which is characteristic of the other two.... Dedicated to Mrs. Coolidge, the Trios premiere was given by Georges Barrère, flute; Lionel Tertis, viola; and Hans Kindler, cello, on October 30, 1929, in Paris at a Concert Coolidge chez Institute international de cooperation intellectual.
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![Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - String Quartet No. 22, K. 589 [With score]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/hW6YZ_AZX80/mqdefault.jpg "Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - String Quartet No. 22, K. 589 [With score]
-Composer: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 1756 – 5 December 1791)
-Performers: Alban Berg Quartet
String Quartet No. 22 in B-flat major, K. 589, written in 1790 [Prussian Quartet II]
00:00 – I. Allegro
06:20 – II. Larghetto
12:29 – III. Menuetto. Moderato
18:46 – IV. Allegro assai
Mozarts greatest contribution to the string quartet repertoire dates from 1782 and 1785, the period during which he composed the six quartets dedicated to his friend Joseph Haydn. Only four quartets follow them, the lone K. 499 in D major, composed in 1786 and known as the Hoffmeister quartet, and the three quartets known as the Prussian quartets. They owe their name and genesis to what has generally assumed to have been a commission for six quartets from King Frederick William II of Prussia. The king, a keen amateur cellist, had received Mozart at Potsdam during the visit of the latter in the spring of 1789. After Mozart returned to Vienna he quickly completed the first of the quartets, K. 575 in D, but thereafter made no further attempt to add to Frederick Williams quartets for another year. Mozarts dilatory attitude to proceeding with the set may be in part accounted for by the commission he and his librettist Lorenzo da Ponte received for Così fan tutte, which probably arrived late in the summer of 1789. However, it also casts doubts on the so-called commission from the Prussian king, particularly since he referred in a letter to dedicating the quartets to the king, a very different matter to a commission, for which he would have received an agreed sum. There is in fact no evidence that Frederick William ever set eyes on the three quartets which were completed, and they were eventually published posthumously by Artaria in January 1792, just weeks after the composers death.
The B flat Quartet, the second to be completed, was entered in Mozarts own thematic catalog in May 1790. Mozart had obviously returned to the quartets after the first performances of Così in January 1790, since the third, K. 590 in B flat followed a month later. With the notable exception of the great String Quintet in D, K. 593, the two quartets represent the only major works composed by Mozart during the whole of 1790, a year in which increasing financial worries resulted in the bleakest compositional year of his adult life. In the three completed quartets, Mozart concentrated on giving the cello-playing king a dominant role, often pushing the second violin and viola into the background to enable the cello to present thematic material or engage in dialogue with the first violin. The second quartet is in the customary four movements, an opening Allegro, followed by a relatively brief Larghetto, a Minuet of almost symphonic proportions and a finale marked Allegro assai. While the quartet (like its companions) fails to attain the elevated status of the six Haydn quartets, it is nevertheless a work of enigmatic beauty typical of Mozarts late works.
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