The release of any new film score by John Williams is an event. Beginning with the grand Mahler-esque melodies of Indiana Jones and Superman, the American composer has created the most recognisable film music of all time. The Williams of Tintin, however, is less like Mahler and more like the dive bar on Tattoine from Star Wars – if it had been a French colony. The theme of Tintin the character is heavily swing-infused, with a walking double bass and a synthesised harpsichord (like something out of Mario Brothers) that may disappoint some listeners. The piano-driven Snowy’s theme is more fun, and sounds weirdly like one of Rachmaninov’s more chipper Paganini Variations.  There is a chromatic, circus-like quality to all the proceedings here, with a clarinet and accordion introducing bungling detectives Thomson and Thompson. A moment of grandeur is introduced by Renée Fleming (as Mme Castelfiore) singing Ah, jeux vivre, with the final high C autotuned up to an F (to the sound of breaking glass). Williams’s ensuing variations on the melody of the aria are a witty touch. The Adventures of Tintin is perhaps not a piece of the stature of, say, Saving Private Ryan – a soundtrack that…

Whatever you do when you listen to Nigel Kennedy’s The Four Elements, don’t expect anything like The Four Seasons… The British violinist is known, firstly, for his visceral performances of Vivaldi’s four most famous concertos and, secondly, for his rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle, symbolised by his very non-classical hairdo. Kennedy’s own take on “The Four Somethings” idea melds these two facets of his personality. Writing for instruments more commonly encountered in pop or rock, Kennedy has composed four pieces entitled Air, Earth, Fire, Water – plus an overture and a finale. It’s just like Vivaldi – but it rocks. At least, that’s the idea. In reality, The Four Elements is a rambling work not quite interesting enough for the classical genre, nor punchy enough to succeed as popular music. Vivaldi fans will be turned off as soon as the electric bass and drums thud into motion in the overture; while the veneer of classical nerdiness will turn off mainstream listeners (despite the trip-hop beats in Air and a rap solo from Kennedy in Earth). The playing is top-notch throughout, and the instrumental writing is quite accomplished – but the flaw of Kennedy’s work is… Continue reading Get unlimited digital access…

They played enemies in Alan Curtis’s recording of Ariodante, but French-Canadian Baroque specialists Karina Gauvin and Marie-Nicole Lemieux make a happier pair in this collaboration, a selection of arias and duets from Handel’s English oratorios.  Handel ceased composing opera in 1741 and turned his hand instead to sacred vocal music. There’s a transcendent quality to these later works, befitting their pious status, but Handel was a man of the theatre, and never lost his knack for drama. Gauvin and Lemieux are well placed to strike that balance, bringing ravishing beauty and drama to these excerpts.  In duet, Gauvin’s pearly soprano contrasts ecstatically with Lemieux’s billowing contralto: the voices blend gorgeously without being subsumed within one another. Welcome as the dawn of day, a sensual love duet between Solomon and his Queen, is an especial delight. Lemieux can stray towards bluster in a militant role, as in Cyrus’s Destructive war from Belshazzar, but to calmer music – As with rosy steps the morn, for instance – she brings a tremulous and earthy beauty.  Gauvin is even better, singing with luscious tone, silken phrasing and keen emotional instincts. Her solo arias are some of the disc’s finest moments: My father! Ah! Methinks I…

Schoenberg’s admiration for Mahler extended to founding an Association for Private Musical Performances to revive Viennese musical life after WWI. They could rarely afford a full orchestra so relied on chamber music reductions. In the case of The Song of the Earth, Schoenberg completed only most of the first song then delegated Webern to the task, by which time the Association was bankrupt. The real hero is Rainer Riehn, who completed the sketch in the 1980s based on Schoenberg’s orchestration. “Mahler arr Riehn” doesn’t have quite the cachet of “Mahler arr Schoenberg”, so you can imagine the push to overstate the latter’s involvement. Nonetheless, the arrangement is a credit to Riehn and this CD is also a credit to Douglas Boyd and his ensemble and singers. The Song of the Earth in any form represents Mahler’s art at its most distilled and offers a tantalising glimpse – as do the Ninth and Tenth symphonies – into how his music would have developed had he lived longer. Even the full orchestral version has many chamber-like textures and it’s anyone’s guess how these two singers would have fared in the more heavily scored passages (Christa Ludwig and Fritz Wunderlich in Klemperer’s reading…

Walton’s First is one of the most outstanding symphonies of the 20th century, the turbulent energies of which are apparently the result of the composer’s failing relationship with one Imma von Doernberg. The exultant final movement burst out after a fresh encounter with one Alice Wimborne. Whatever the inspiration, it stands with the Elgar symphonies at the peak of English orchestral composition. A pity such passion had not fired the Second Symphony; compare the ravishing slow movement of the First with that of the Second… The latter seems almost an afterthought.  Premiered in 1957, the Second Symphony fell afoul of the “toot, whistle, plunk and boom” school of music that held contemporary classical music to ransom for the following 40 years. We now know better and the symphony can be seen for what it is: an excellent if minor work. It is drier and less moving than the First, stylistically at one with many great 20th-century composers such as William Schuman, Sibelius and Roy Harris. Never at fault is Walton’s brilliant orchestration. These are excellent performances and good value for money. The finest Walton First is still the 1967 recording with the LSO under André Previn on RCA. (Sargent’s better-played…

David Garrett was a gifted young violinist who performed as soloist with the London Philharmonic at the age of ten. He “crossed over” a few years ago to record a series of song-based albums, and never has that act seemed more like crossing to the dark side. It began with the rather jejune Free (2007), a bouquet of tunes by Morricone, Bernstein and Bizet, but reaches an apotheosis of awful with Rock Symphonies – Garrett joined by an orchestra and heavy metal band.  The violinist wields his bow like a machete, castrating composers of talent from Beethoven (first mvt of Fifth Symphony) to Kurt Cobain (Smells Like Teen Spirit). What makes it especially heinous is that Garrett’s playing isn’t even that refined, despite the Juilliard training. He can “shred” all right, but he doesn’t have the variety of phrasing to make rock music sound natural on the violin; he’s out of tune in Guns and Roses’ November Rain; and his solos seem conscribed to the pentatonic scale. It’s almost like Garrett is the André Rieu of rock – the schmaltz king of metal. Bad taste release of the year.

Sarah Connolly spins 20th-century English songs into gold in this new recital, the latest in a string of excellent solo discs from the English mezzo. It’s hard to believe that just seven years ago, Connolly was obliged to self-fund her first solo album – she’s a natural in the recording studio, singing with irresistible warmth and unfailing elegance. On the operatic stage, where many of her signature roles put her in breeches, Connolly can swagger with the best of them; in the quieter and more intimate world of art song, she’s just as vivid but in a very different way. English art songs are prone, rightly or wrongly, to being viewed as twee or irretrievably stuffy. Not so in Connolly’s care. Even the most familiar folk tune – Britten’s arrangement of O Waly Waly for example – is sung with hushed intensity, and Connolly handles lyrics about flowers and fields with as much sincerity as she does darker fare, such as Gurney’s stark By a Bierside.  Her diction and phrasing are so exemplary that one ceases to notice them and is simply caught up in the finely wrought world of each song, be it a tale of lost love, a paean to nature…

A Handel opera from René Jacobs is always an event and this recording is a veritable cracker.

Mikhail Pletnev once recorded a sensational piano transcription of the Nutcracker suite. His traversal of the entire ballet isn’t quite in that class. Tchaikovsky’s score has more glamour, charm and sheer magic than almost any other music, ballet or otherwise. I suppose its nearest rival would be his own Sleeping Beauty. I’ve never really heard a bad Nutcracker but I doubt this reading surpasses the two wonderful Doratis or my own favourite: André Previn with the LSO (EMI). It’s unfortunate Ondine couldn’t have filled the first CD and found something else to fill the second, as both have less than 50 minutes of playing time.  Sometimes the orchestra sounds rather flatly recorded, especially the brass. The traditional highlights, such as the Waltz of the Flowers and the dancing snowflakes, remain somewhat earthbound. The pistol shot at the start of the mouse battle sounds like a popgun and the castanets in the Spanish dance are poorly captured: they’re barely there. I always judge the performance by the Arabian dance – if the sinuous sensuality is there, the rest will usually take care of itself. Well, it’s not… Look, there’s nothing catastrophically wrong with this version, but you can do better with…

It seems hard to countenance today but in 1941 it was possible for a man to pass into legend who was not only a composer and the highest-paid musician of his day but also the Prime Minister of his country. The country in question was Poland; the man: Ignacy Jan Paderewski. As a tribute to his charismatic genius, boosey and Hawkes commissioned an anthology from 17 of the leading contemporary composers, which forms the starting point for this fascinating CD. The line-up of the great and the good forms a curious state-of-the-nation snapshot of music in the midst of WWII, for all of the composers were resident in North America at the time – some unable to return to their homelands. Represented here with distinction we find Bartók (cheating with the rehashed Three Hungarian Folk-Tunes), Milhaud, Castelnuovo-Tedesco (a charming mazurka), Goossens (a clever Homage based on Chopin’s C-minor Prelude), Martinu (another tangy mazurka) and even Britten, although the latter misunderstood the commission and composed a melancholy piece for two pianos. It’s good to see Australian-born Arthur Benjamin contributing an impressive, wistful Elegiac Mazurka. My personal favourite among many unknown gems was Stojowski’s delicate Cradle Song. The excellent british pianist Jonathan…

The six Bach Cello Suites are the cornerstone of the cello repertory. They make for ultimate judgement, able to intimidate and awe player and listener alike. Pablo Casals discovered them for the modern world and made them his own. Now Michael Goldschlager has put his own stamp on them. There’s no sign of intimidation here. From the first moment, Goldschlager gives us a committed and profoundly thoughtful interpretation of the Suites. The warm acoustic, though fine, does not quite match the deep glow of my favourite recording by Heinrich Schiff, but this is a different reading, with Goldschlager seeming to imbue the music with deep, intense personal emotion. In his thoughtful notes to this 2-CD set, Goldschlager explains that he finds the Suites almost skeletal in outline, believing that if Bach had revisited them they might have been fleshed out with far more embellishment. But it is this very austerity in which he seems to rejoice in performance, an austerity which is, at the same time, the essence of beauty. This is a wonderful reading which can find a place alongside the best and most famous in the catalogue. The performance is notable for its cohesion and commitment; the Bach…

This is no daddy-daughter vanity project; 24-year-old Lily Maisky is an impressive pianist in her own right with a felicitous musical rapport with her famous cellist father. He might count Martha Argerich as a long-standing duo partner, but in this selection of popular Spanish songs and dances – recorded live in concert – it’s hard to imagine a more fresh or sympathetic union. Lily’s buoyant accompaniment perfectly matches Mischa’s bright, crisp pizzicatos in the third movement of Falla’s Suite populaire espagnole; both bring searing intensity to the sixth’s rapidly repeated notes. A gift for expressive cantabile must be in the Maisky blood, as heard in the phrasing of Granados’s Intermezzo and in his lilting Andaluza from the 12 Danzas españolas (the cellist’s own arrangement). There is plenty of mystery in their fragrantly ornamented reading of Ravel’s Habanera, and it’s lovely to hear the full range of Mischa’s cello, especially the rich, resplendent nether end, in the stately Playera by Sarasate. What I long for on this album though, after all that Mediterranean lyricism, is a lively, virtuosic contrast. Falla’s Danse espagnole No 1 from La Vida Breve is a good effort but the cellist’s uncharacteristically graceless intonation on fast trills…