Elgar / Orchestra Of St. Paul's / Palmer - String Quartets - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

In 1910, the Italian poet Gabriele D'Annunzio wrote a play about the martyrdom of St. Sebastian. He enlisted Claude Debussy as the composer and the InchMystere en cinq mansions compose en rhythme francaisInch already premiered in 1911. The text combines and overlaps Christian and pagan traditions, playing with both the flair of antiquity and the fascination of the exotic. The Catholic Church took offense concerning the portrayal of Sebastian, who was played by a female Russian Jew, the dancer Ida Rubinstein, and the audience also reacted hesitantly, so that neither D'Annunzio's play nor Debussy's music to it remained in the repertoire of the concert halls. Debussy himself was very fond of his work and soon put together an orchestral suite, the InchFragments symphoniquesInch, which adapts some of the central numbers of the incidental music for orchestra. Additionally, Desire-Emile Inghelbrecht created a kind of concert version that radically shortened the text and reduced it to around 15 minutes of recitation in addition to Debussy's music. The same applies to the present recording, which juxtaposes Debussy's original music with texts by the writer Martin Mosebach. These texts do not necessarily reflect the course of D'Annunzio's piece, but rather summarize central aspects of the Sebastian legend, sometimes more directly, sometimes more abstractly.The present version, a studio recording form 2005, is enriched with (German) text additions by the writer Martin Mosebach, making it thus unique among other recordings of Le Martyre.

Productions by the Munich Piano Trio delight us time and again one time they'll discover unknown works and draw an InchAh!Inch of astonishment, while the next time they'll focus on the great works of the repertoire and InchWow!Inch us with their marvelous interpretation. The eighth recording by the ensemble, now celebrating it's 33rd year, is inspired by Robert Schumann's guiding principle the artist's mission is to cast light into the depths of the human heart. And if speakers could not only emit sound, but were capable of shining, there is no doubt they would be doing so during what is perhaps Schumann's most well-known Piano Trio (No. 2) and his equally wonderful Piano Quartet... Bravo to the persistence of great artists!

Delius / Elgar / Villiers Quartet - Delius & Elgar String Quartet [COMPACT DISCS] date 05/12/2017