Sushananskaya & Locrian Ensemble of London - Piano Concerto 5 Emperor - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Alfonso Romero Asenjo's distinguished career has resulted in numerous awards and distinctions, highlighting an unmistakable and very particular musical language whose appetite for spirituality and selective use of the avant-garde is now an established aspect of the so-called 'Generacion del 51.' The String Symphony has a cinematic restlessness that conjures hauntingly unsettling images, while the Cello Concerto pits the luminous and extended melodic phrases of the soloist against dense darkness from the orchestra. The Concerto for Two Violins is in part a tribute to J.S. Bach's work in the same setting, endowing Baroque resources with a mysterious and attractive modernity. Album Tracks 1. Sinfonia Para Cuerda ('String Symphony') 2. Divertimento 3. Concierto Para Violonchelo y Orcquesta de Cuerda ('Concerto for Cello and String Orchestra') 4. Concierto Para Dos Violines y Orquesta de Cuerda ('Concerto for Two Violins and String Orchestra')

On the 1st of February, Chasing The Dragon had the opportunity of recording a live Beethoven concert performed at St. Martin-in-the-Fields. From this event, they have been able to 2 new recordings featuring the Locrian Ensemble of London, conducted by Rimma Sushanskaya. They were rewarded with a programme of outstanding quality from the finely played Egmont Overture, to the 5th Symphony, by way of the Emperor Piano Concerto, notably well conducted throughout by Rimma Sushanskaya, most able partnering the very fine John Lenehan who gave an outstanding account of the solo part, supported to the hilt by this very gifted conductor and orchestra. Dr. Sushanskaya's performance of the 5th Symphony was in the memorable class, a reading of deep musicianship and interpretive character. Part of The Live Beethoven Series On 180g 33RPM Vinyl LP!

Spring Fire, the newest from SOMM Recordings, highlights the complete music for cello and piano by Arnold Bax (1883-1953), with Alexander Baillie, recognized as one of the finest cellists of his generation, and pianist John Thwaites, his long-time musical partner. The Baillie-Thwaites Duo has capitalized on concert performances of the greatest twentieth-century British music over the last decade, and, with this recording, continues it's enduring partnership with SOMM. The takes it's title from an early masterpiece by Bax, Spring Fire, a Symphony for Orchestra from 1913. Coming from a particularly fruitful period when Bax wrote a series of symphonic poems of consistently high quality, it may well have been inspired by his love for the beautiful young pianist Harriet Cohen. Theirs was a passionate love affair and a fertile artistic partnership that lasted forty years. Through force of circumstance, not least of which was World War I, Spring Fire was never performed during Bax's lifetime; but he repurposed the haunting melody from it's opening movement, In the forest before dawn, for the slow movement of the Cello Sonata in E flat minor. Performances of this three-movement Cello Sonata are vanishingly rare, which makes the present all the more important. The recording opens with a little-known gem, the Folk-Tale for cello and piano. It is a gorgeous work dedicated to the English cellist, Felix Salmond, who gave the first performance at Wigmore Hall on 27 April 1918 with Bax at the piano.The first two works on this disc are linked to a fantasy world, while the last two are written with formal clarity and concision. In 1933, Bax dedicated his Sonatina for Cello to the legendary cellist, Pablo Casals, and it fulfils it's slight brief with barely a repeated note. The Legend-Sonata was commissioned by and dedicated to the English cellist Florence Hooton. She gave the pr