Zagreb Festival Orchestra - Symphonic Suite 3 - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

It is tempting to compare Matej Meštrovic's compositional style to his great predecessors in the late-Romantic tradition. After all, much of the Croatian composer's style and techniques would be right at home in Rachmaninoff's concertos, Tchaikovsky's works, or Prokofiev's neoclassicism; and the name of the album's first work, Danube Rhapsody, naturally evokes associations with Smetana's similarly river-themed Vltava. Add to all of this that Meštrovic, like most of his great musical ancestors, is a talented virtuoso pianist, and it's easy to see why 3 Rhapsodies is bound to meet with enthusiasm. Of course, a skillful composer like Meštrovic doesn't confine himself to mere epigonism. And indeed, there is an original voice which constantly rises out from tradition. This is partially achieved through Meštrovic's clever instrumentation the Danube Rhapsody's scoring includes, among others, a cimbalom and a tamburitza (the Croatian long-necked lute), which immediately tells the listener that he or she is hearing the Balkans, not Russia or Czechia. Similarly, the Chinese Rhapsody employs traditional Chinese instruments such as the pipa, erhu, and zheng, gorgeously contrasting them against the tremolo strings of the Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra. American East Coast natives will find themselves swept back home in Meštrovic's New England Rhapsody, a composition initially as comforting and sentimentally heart-warming as the Transatlantic accent in a 1940's film. It's a deceptive respite, however the final movement, interspersed with jazzy rhythmic elements and Meštrovic's resurfacing Croatian voice, takes the listener right back to the exalting ardor of the album's beginning. Instead of fizzling out like lesser compositions might, it finishes with a bang. There is no way around it 3 Rhapsodies is a triumph. It is not at all unlikely that future generations, when asked to nam

Vinci / Ipata / Bellini - Didone Abbandonata [COMPACT DISCS] 3 Pack date 09/08/2017

Navona Records proudly presents PRISMA VOL. 2, an epic journey into the world of the large ensemble with five of today's top contemporary composers. PRISMA 2 opens with two debuts James Lentini's stunning first with PARMA Recordings, and the Zagreb Festival Orchestra's first project on the Navona tag. Lentini's Concerto for Guitar and Strings, performed with the string orchestra by virtuoso guitar soloist Iliana Matos, begins with a fresh and buoyant motive that serves as a foundation for the entire movement. Orchestra and guitar converse back and forth as the piece moves through a melancholic, reflective second movement, and then rises back to full energy with the brisk final movement. This is followed by Rain Worthington's Full Circle, a somewhat dissonant, striking piece with the Moravian Philharmonic Orchestra that follows the emergence and recession of emotions through a lifetime, as soloists emerge and recede from the orchestra. Jan Järvlepp's Camerata Music, is a bright, tonal piece in a style that the composer calls Inchpost-academic.Inch Inspired by the vallenato styles of folk music that Järvlepp heard while visiting Colombia, Camerata Music uses percussion to capture the joyous, rhythmic energy of that musical tradition. Peter Castine's Aperture takes the album in a more somber direction with unsettled dissonance and fragmented feeling, filled with the horror following the 2001 World Trade Center attacks. The composer sets the solo flute and concertino string quartet at odds with one another, clashing even as the orchestra sometimes intervenes to help. PRISMA 2 is brought to a close with composer Beth Mehocic's Left of Winter, written as a prelude to Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. It has the same primal rhythms as Stravinsky's ballet, but with the addition of cymbals, trumpets, and winds that paint the image of young men going off to war.