Release Date: 01 October 2005
Label: Naxos / Naxos Classics
Packaging Type: Jewel Case
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 747313249428
Genres: Classical
Composer/Series: MARTINU
Description
Bohuslav Martin?ø (1890-1959)SongsAlthough known for a number of significant choralworks, not least his summative 1954 oratorio The Epicof Gilgamesh [Naxos 8.555138], attention is rarelygiven to the vocal music of Bohuslav Martin?ø.Nevertheless songs with piano actually comprise a fairproportion of his output until 1930, with many of themstill unpublished, or only recently made available inprint, and covering the range of styles and genres inwhich Martin?ø worked during that time. The presentdisc, however, features a selection of his songs that werewritten during the 1930s and early 1940s, a period inwhich he moved away from an idiom heavily pervadedby French influences towards one in which the folkloreof both his native Bohemia and further afield in CentralEurope played a significant r??le. Several of theselections derive from two of his most importantstageworks from this period, and all of the songs eitheranticipate or reflect the larger-scale pieces, whethervocal or instrumental, on which Martin?ø was usuallyengaged in what was one of the most productive phasesof his industrious composing career.The Two Songs (1932) make a well-complementedpairing: Peach Blossom treats Chan Yo Sun's poemconcerning the claustrophobic heaviness of summer,encapsulated in the lengthy piano prelude, to anelaborate setting which persuasively mingleslanguidness with anxiety; Automne malade finds inGuillaume Apollinaire's poetic yet equivocal evocationof season's end a tender melancholy which touches on adeeper pathos such as might have been inspired byRavel's celebrated Mallarme settings. Apollinaire,specifically, his Alcools collection published in 1913, isalso the source of the song Saltimbanques from theThree Melodies (1930), his picturesque evocation ofacrobats inspiring Martin?ø to a characterful setting inlightly syncopated accents. Although it has a directprecedent in Stravinsky's early Pastorale, Vocalise-Etude, also written in 1930, is a fully characteristicvocal piece, replete with the jazzy harmonies andrhythmic gestures found in the music of Martin?ø'sParisian years.Very different are the Two Ballads (1932), whichdraw on German folk sources. The Minstrels werewondering is a variation on the archetypal tale of ahuman spirit concealed within an inanimate object -here, a maple tree - which tells of its sorrow to passingmusicians: Martin?ø's setting is thus thoughtful andsearching in expression, with an imposing piano part.The Orphan is a typically 'grim' fairy-tale of loss andbrutality, to which the composer brings a plaintiverealism often redolent of Jana?çek, not least the subtlyattenuated piano writing, which fades away poignantlyat the close. Closely related in subject-matter, the FourSongs to Folk Texts (1940) draw on an anthology byKarel Erben, the nineteenth-century author and editorwhose writings inspired the sequence of symphonicpoems which Dvofiak wrote near the end of his career.Of the texts selected by Martin?ø, Ponies on the FallowField is a gen
Tracklisting
Dariia Lytvishko
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra; Marin Alsop
Alice Di Piazza; Basel Sinfonietta; NDR Bigband; Titus Engel
Anna Alas i Jove; Miquel Villalba
David Childs; Black Dyke Band; Nicholas Childs
Yaqi Yang; Margarita Parsamyan; Robynne Redmon; Minghao Liu; Frank Ragsdale; Kim Josephson; Kevin S
Vilmos Csikos; Olivier Lechardeur; Manon Lamaison
Tomas Cotik; Martingale Ensemble; Ken Selden
