Danbi Um - Much Ado - Romantic Violin Masterpieces - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

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Themes of art song, poetry and spirituality run throughout Poème Mystique, the second solo album by Korean-American violinist Danbi Um. Following Danbi's acclaimed solo debut album Much Ado - a showcase for her virtuosity and gilded tone - Poème Mystique explores works of lyrical beauty and profound personal expression. Richard Strauss' Violin Sonata, written in the year he met his future wife, is imbued with romance and intimacy. Ernest Bloch's Second Violin Sonata, the title work of the album, is by turns ecstatic, spiritual and fantasy-like. Inspired by a dream, Bloch incorporates a vast range of spirituality, including motifs from his Jewish-themed works, the Gregorian Credo, Mass Kyrie and traditional Amen.Danbi weaves two shorter works amongst the sonatas. Gabriel Fauré's Après un rêve (InchAfter a dreamInch), originally a French art song, becomes an exquisite song without words in this transcription for violin. The album concludes with Franz Schubert's Ave Maria, likewise originally for voice and piano, presented here in an arrangement by August Wilhelm.Danbi's refined collaborator is Finnish pianist Juho Pohjonen. Together they deliver a performance that is at once technically virtuosic and emotionally nuanced.

Christmas is constant, says Ben Folds. InchAllowing you to take stock of what's different, to understand who you are and all the ways you've grown and changed.Inch That notion lies at the heart of Folds' brilliantly titled new holiday collection, Sleigher. Built on an eclectic mix of originals and reimagined classics, the album examines the passage of time through the lens of Christmas, reflecting on memory, loss, and longing as it explores the variety of ways the yuletide season marks the chapters of our lives. The songs are playful here, full of humor and cheer, but they're also laced with an inescapable sense of melancholy, a looming darkness that always seems to hover around the periphery of those late December nights. Folds' performances, meanwhile, flirt with the standards while stretching the boundaries of tradition, at times offering up flashes of Vince Guaraldi and Burt Bacharach while still remaining true to Folds' singularly virtuosic brand of off-kilter indie pop. The result is not so much a Ben Folds Christmas record as it is a Ben Folds record set at Christmas, a meditation on the inexorable turning of the calendar and our ever changing selves as observed at the most wonderful-and challenging-time of the year.