Bach / Gabrieli / Clamor - Winds & Pipes - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Pavel Pabst - Paraphrases [COMPACT DISCS] date 01/18/2006

As a composer, conductor, accompanist and conservatory director, Hermann Zilcher (1881-1948) heavily influenced the musical life of the German city of Wurzburg. His oeuvre, stage and orchestral works as well as chamber, piano and choral music are being treated to a second look. With this album, his entire choral work is for the first time available on CD. Alfred Einstein characterized Zilcher as one of the most outstanding of German composers. His music is an ardent, robust and convincing German late-Romanticism, well within the tradition of his North German compatriot Johannes Brahms.

Avant garde. Eccentric. A maniac. Wild and adventurous. Off the wall. Extraordinary. No marketing hyperbole - this is how the player of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment describe Carl Philip Emmanuel Bach and his music. One of the many children of JS Bach, CPE Bach always lived in his father's shadow, and now is an almost unknown figure at least beyond the classical cognoscenti. How can such an unknown be considered a game changer? a listen to his music reveals just why - it constantly shifts, wrong footing the listener when they least expect it with wild changes of direction and color - it is bright, effervescent, and is a fascinating link between the music of his father (and the Baroque era) and Joseph Haydn (and the Classical era).