Pianist Orion Weiss assembled this program around a theme – the composer responding to a specific source of inspiration with a virtuoso composition. It’s an interesting idea, and it yielded an album that virtually spans the Romantic Period. The earliest work is Variations on “Là ci darem la mano” by Frederic Chopin. And the inspiration […]
Leon Botstein
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“Buried Alive” unearths Roaring 20s classics
This release presents three works from the late 1920s. It was a time of reinvention. The First World War swept away the conventions of the Edwardian Age. Composers (and other artists) developed new forms of expression, that incorporated various elements of prewar aesthetics. Arthur Honegger, Othmar Schoeck, and Dmitri Mtropoulous were among them — each […]
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Paul Hindemith – The Long Christmas Dinner
In an ideal world, Hindemith’s 1961 on-act opera “The Long Christmas Dinner” would be be a perennial holiday favorite, alongside Menotti’s 1951 “Amahl and the Night Visitors.” Both operas use a deceptively simple tonal language, making the music sound accessible without being cliche or trite. And both offer fresh takes on traditional holiday narratives. “Amahl” […]