Stravinsky / Saraste / Wundsam - Le Rossignol - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Wolfgang Rubsam - Organ Works Vol 1 [COMPACT DISCS] date 04/11/2000

The preceding years have been extraordinary for Ryley Walker. In March, his second album, Primrose Green, emerged to critical hosannas from the likes of NPR, Village Voice, Uncut, and Mojo - in the process, earning admiration of musicians who had chalked up no shortage of turntable miles in Walker's life. Robert Plant declared himself a fan - as did double-bass legend Danny Thompson, with whom Ryley would later embark on a British tour. A sprawling tour of the USA around Primrose Green presented a perfect chance to workshop ideas for what would eventually become his third studio album, Golden Sings That Have Been Sung. On the album, InchThe RoundaboutInch represents a symbolic return to Chicago, while other songs are directly wedded to Ryley's actual return there. Perhaps more than any other song on the record, the somnambulant sun-dappled intimacies of opening track InchThe Halfwit In MeInch most audibly bear the imprint of Ryley's improvisational sessions with Wilco multi-instrumentalist, Chicagoan and producer Leroy Bach, while InchFunny Thing She SaidInch is an unflinching study of separation set to a shimmeringly supple ensemble performance.

Before the First World War, especially for the famous ballet ensemble InchLes Ballets RussesInch, one of the most important dance companies of the 20th century, and it's impresario Sergei Diaghilev, Igor Stravinsky composed the first three of his great ballet music works for large orchestra, indeed, the most important of his ballets in general InchL'oiseau de feuInch (The Firebird) in 1910, InchPetrushkaInch in 1911, and InchLe sacre du printempsInch (The Rite of Spring) in 1913. The first of these ranks as a pioneering work of the early 20th century - and the third, regarded as a key work of 20th-century music due to it's extraordinary rhythmic and tonal structures, can both be experienced on this new from BR-KLASSIK - in live recordings with the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks under it's chief conductor Mariss Jansons, and in masterly interpretations. Diaghilev, a formative figure in 20th-century ballet, had founded the Ballets Russes ensemble in 1909 in Paris, where it first performed before moving to Monte Carlo in 1911. The first performance of Stravinsky's InchFirebirdInch took place on June 25, 1910 at the Paris Opera House, and InchLe sacre du printempsInch premiered on May 29, 1913 in the newly-built Théâtre des Champs-Élysées - a day that went down in history as one of the great artistic scandals of the 20th century. The furious protests from the Parisian public combined with the highly negative critical reviews all ended up making Stravinsky famous. His truly futuristic music has now established itself internationally and is an integral part of concert programs, and one can still hear why it so enraged audiences over 100 years ago. (InchThe FirebirdInch can be heard in Stravinsky's ballet version of 1945.)