Compositions for Piano Trio

On this CD:

1. Bunte Blätter, for piano trio, Op. 83
Composed by Theodor Furchtegott Kirchner

2. Serenade for piano trio in E major
Composed by Theodor Furchtegott Kirchner

3. Ein Gedenkblatt, for piano trio, Op. 15
Composed by Theodor Furchtegott Kirchner

4. Terzette (2) for piano trio, Op. 97
Composed by Theodor Furchtegott Kirchner

5. Kleines Trio for piano trio
Composed by Theodor Furchtegott Kirchner

6. Pieces (6) in Canonic Form for piano trio (after Robert Schumann's Op. 56)
Composed by Theodor Furchtegott Kirchner

Tracks:

Caprice Viennois
Tambourin Chinois
Schon Rosmarin
La Gitana
Liebesleid
Liebesfreud
Polichinelle
Rondino
La Precieuse
Chanson Louis XIII & Pavane
Scherzo
Gavotte
The Londonderry Air
Ballet No.2
The Old Refrain
Poupee Valsante
Andante Cantabile
Humoresque
Serenade Espagnole
Larghetto
Midnight Bells
Chanson Hindoue
Lotus Land
Danza Espagnola

The Music of Elliott Carter, Volume Five - Nine Compositions (1994-2002)

Average customer rating:

Carter continues to impress
Fantastic from the first piece
Vive le Carter!

The Music of Elliott Carter, Volume Five - Nine Compositions (1994-2002)

Manufacturer: Bridge
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Duets | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

Quartets | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music

Classical | Indie Music | Stores | Music
Similar Items:

The Music of Elliott Carter, Volume Four
The Music of Elliott Carter, Vol. 6
The Music of Elliott Carter Vol. 7; Boston Concerto, Cello Concerto, ASKO Concerto, Dialogues
Elliott Carter: The Complete music for Piano
The Music of Elliott Carter, Vol. 1: Vocal Works (1975-1981)

ASIN: B00009OLTI
Release Date: 2002-06-01

Tracks:

Steep Steps
Two Diversions
Two Diversions
Oboe Quartet
Figment No. 2 (Remembering Mr. Ives)
Au Quai
Of Challenge and of Love
Of Challenge and of Love
Of Challenge and of Love
Of Challenge and of Love
Of Challenge and of Love
Figment No. 1
Retrouvailles
Hiyoku

Album Description

Steep Steps* (2001) Virgil Blackwell, bass clarinet; Two Diversions (1999) Charles Rosen, piano; Oboe Quartet* (2001) Speculum Musicae; Figment No. 2 "Remembering Mr. Ives"* (2001) Fred Sherry, cello; Au Quai* (2002) Maureen Gallagher, viola, Peter Kolkay, bassoon; Of Challenge and of Love (1994) Tony Arnold, soprano; Jacob Greenberg, piano; Figment No. 1 (1994) Fred Sherry, cello; Retrouvailles (2000) Charles Rosen, piano; Hiyoku* (2001) Charles Neidich and Ayako Oshima, clarinets

*Premiere recording

Volume Five of Bridge's ongoing Elliott Carter series contains five premiere recordings, including Carter's bracing Oboe Quartet of 2001. Performed by many of the leading Carter advocates of our time, this recording is a must for those interested in keeping up with the undimmed imagination and constant creative impulse of this American master, now well into his tenth decade. Also featured on this CD is a new recording of Carter's song cycle Of Challenge and of Love, performed by the brilliant young American soprano Tony Arnold, the recent first prize winner of the Gaudeamus International competition for interpreters of contemporary music. Rounding out this CD are a series of instrumental miniatures played by dedicatees Virgil Blackwell, Charles Neidich, Ayako Oshima and Fred Sherry. In addition, the pianist Charles Rosen adds on to his earlier (almost) "Complete Piano Music of Carter" CD (BRIDGE 9090) with the Two Diversions, and Retrouvailles.

Volume one: BRIDGE 9014
Volume two: BRIDGE 9044
Volume three: BRIDGE 9090 (Grammy nomination)
Volume four: BRIDGE 9111 (Grammy nomination)

Customer Reviews:

Carter continues to impress.......2006-06-27

This disc, containing seven short works and two longer ones dating from Carter's late eighties and early nineties, continues Bridge's invaluable series of recordings of works by this modern American master. As with all Bridge's recordings, the performers are almost always musicians with a long history of performing Carter's music (here including the group Speculum Musicae, the cellist Fred Sherry and the pianist Charles Rosen), and this certainly helps to give the performances an authoritative air.

The disc starts with a bang--Carter's bass clarinet solo Steep Steps (so titled because of the importance of leaps of a twelfth in the composition). This is a vigorous and highly enjoyable work that provides an ideal disc opener. More dry are the Two Diversions, two pieces for the advanced piano student. These two works complement each other well; the first simpler, the second rhythmically complex.

The Oboe Quartet is one of Carter's more important recent scores. Written in a single multi-section movement, it alternates between tutti passages and duets for pairs of instruments, and demonstrates (as does much of Carter's recent music) that a strictly atonal style need not reduce a composer's capacity for lyricism. If I'm not sure that Speculum Musicae's performance here quite matches the intensity of Holliger and friends on ECM, this is still a fine reading of a significant work.

The disc then returns to a couple of miniatures. Figment No 2 for solo cello is one of a series of works in which Carter pays homage to musical figures important to him when he was younger, and though there are no obvious stylistic references to Ives, the work does include fragmentary quotations and hints of hymnic writing. Au Quai, by contrast, is a tribute to a composer and conductor who has done so much for Carter's own music--Oliver Knussen, on his 50th birthday. Written for the unusual combination of viola and bassoon, this is a delightful, charming miniature with a wonderfully sense of timing.

Returning to major works, once again, Of Challenge and of Love is one of Carter's many recent song cycles (though the only mature work of his for voice and piano). A setting of five poems by John Hollander, this builds to an expressive climax in the lengthy fourth poem, Quatrains from Harp Lake, before the almost anticlimactic close, End of a Chapter. Having only heard this work though Lucy Shelton's premiere recording on Koch, I found much more warmth in it in this reading, with the fine Tony Arnold the soprano soloist, though I don't think it will ever rank amongst my favourite late Carter works.

The disc ends with three more miniatures. Figment No 1 for solo cello is one of Carter's finest short works, ranging over the whole expressive gamut despite being based entirely on one short idea. Retrouvailles is a brief and comparatively simple (for Carter, at least) study for piano, written for Pierre Boulez's 75th birthday, while Hiyoku, a duet for two clarinets, effectively explores the contrast between the two instruments playing similar and different material.

This is another impressive release in Bridge's Carter series. Lovers of the composer's music will not hesitate to snap it up.

Fantastic from the first piece.......2006-01-22

Carter lets the bass clarinet show off every bit of its range in Steep Steps, from soulful low bass lines, through a smoky lower-midrange area, to an almost sax-like upper register.

All the cellos pieces are great, and the oboe quartet? The other reviewer nailed it; it's like the oboe is playing the lead violin line.

Vive le Carter!.......2003-07-07

The fifth offering in Bridge's indispensible series of the music of Elliott Carter contains nine compositions written from 1994 to 2002, when the composer, incredibly, was between the ages of 85 and 93. There are the usual short gems for various instruments that Carter has made a specialty in recent years. The disk begins with the fascinating "Steep Steps" for solo bass clarinet, an instrument Carter has exploited to great effect in his Piano Concerto and Triple Duo. Fred Sherry delivers a haunting rendition of "Figment No. 2" for solo cello. Subtitled "Remembering Mr. Ives" (Carter first met Ives as a teenager), the piece conveys a nostalgia rare in Carter's work, with short phrases evoking, though not quoting, the kind of hymns Ives used in his music. The Two Diversions for Piano are more transparent than some of Carter's other piano pieces, and rightfully so, since they were written for the Millenium Piano Book for pianists of intermediate skills. Charles Rosen, a long-time Carter champion, provides tender and beautiful readings. Soprano Tony Arnold's rendition of the song cycle "Of Challenge and of Love" seems softer and less forced than Lucy Shelton's premiere recording, which is all to the good, but for me the highlight of the disk is the Oboe Quartet, a major 14-minute work that shows Carter at the top of his instrumental game. Despite its unrepentant modernist idiom, this composition has a classical elegance, a romantic sensuousness, and a Baroque richness of counterpoint that doesn't showcase the soloist as much as make him a first among equals. It is as though the composer had written a new string quartet with the oboe subbing for the first violin. I could not wish for a better performance.
More!

Average customer rating:

uncompromisingly incomprehensibly obtuse
Fabulous music by one of America's greatest composers
Fabulous music by one of America's greatest
Great collection by a genuinely colossal figure.
How refreshing such vehement dislike ...

Elliott Carter: Eight Compositions

Manufacturer: Bridge
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Trios | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Classical | Styles | Music

Classical | Indie Music | Stores | Music
Similar Items:

Elliott Carter: The Complete music for Piano
The Music of Elliott Carter, Volume Five - Nine Compositions (1994-2002)
The Music of Elliott Carter, Vol. 1: Vocal Works (1975-1981)
The Music of Elliott Carter, Volume Four
The Music of Elliott Carter Vol. 7; Boston Concerto, Cello Concerto, ASKO Concerto, Dialogues

ASIN: B000003GJ2
Release Date: 1994-06-28

Tracks:

Gra - Charles Neidich
Enchanted Prlds - Harvey Sollberger/Fred Sherry
Duo - Rolf Schulte/Martin Goldray
Scrivo In Vento - Harvey Sollberger
Changes - David Starobin
Con Leggerezza Pensosa (Omaggio A Italo Calvino) - Charles Neidich/Rolf Schulte/Fred Sherry
Riconoscenza Per Goffredo Petrassi - Rolf Schulte
Son: Moderato - Fred Sherry/Charles Wuorinen
Son: Vivace, Molto Leggiero - Fred Sherry/Charles Wuorinen
Son: Adagio - Fred Sherry/Charles Wuorinen
Son: Allegro - Fred Sherry/Charles Wuorinen

Amazon.com essential recording

With a full orchestra, Elliott Carter can spread his wings with clangorous grandness. When he goes with a smaller unit, as he does here, he can also do wonderful things--expanding on his tonal and timbral studies with telescoped intensity. This generous 78-minute collection begins in 1993 with Charles Neidich unfurling Gra for the solo clarinet, a piece that rivals anything on the extraordinary Giacinto Scelsi's Complete Works for the Clarinet for breadth and investigative power. Carter, an octogenarian when he wrote Gra, has, this collection shows, been on similar paths since at least 1948, when the CD's closer, Sonata for Violoncello and Piano, came to be. It shows off Carter's proclivity for middle-register grounding and fast outward motion, always tracking toward the unfamiliar and creating electric excitement. As a compendium of one of the greatest American composer's solo and chamber works, Eight Compositions can't be beat. --Andrew Bartlett

Customer Reviews:

uncompromisingly incomprehensibly obtuse.......2004-03-31

If only Carter would write electronic(ELEKTROACOUSMATIK, ELECTROINSTRUKTIVIST) music, instead of torturing those poor violins and violoncellos!(WHICH WERE DESIGNED TO PLAY TONAL MUSIC)....so much of this post-schoenbergian stuff just sounds "NAUGHTY" and "WRONGNOTE-EEE(K !)"...WHEREAS...my ear, at any rate, has a far greater tolerance for the conjunct/disjunct a-melodic spasms of so much current music(s) if elektronik sound generation is used..... unexpected AND UNLIMITED timbres carry no previous associations....so we can accept (AND WELCOME!)48-notes-to-the-octave-scales....as well as toilets flushing in counterpoint with wind chimes, buzzsaws, shakuhachis.......THE PERFORMANCES HERE ARE FULL-OF-FRIGHTENING-FABULOSITY!......AND, MAYBE IF I TAKE THE TIME TO LISTEN TO THIS CD 10 GAZILLION MORE TIMES, I'LL BEGIN TO ACTUALLY GET PLEASURE FROM IT(ALTHOUGH MUSIK/AS/PLEASURE IZ PROBABLY ANATHEMA TO CARTER AND HIS DISCIPLES....WHO PREFER "SERIOUS AND UNCOMPROMISING" STUFF!)...RANT RANT RANT..... yes I'm a composer too and write my share of self-referential elitist effusions.....but STRIVE TO juxtapose complexity with simplicity......without such contrasts, music becomes dry and lifeless.....look what happened to UNCLE IGOR......FIREBIRD/SACRE/PETTROUCHKA/LES NOCES/PULCINELLA/FAIRYS KISS/CAPRICCIO.....all masterpieces....AND THEN HE HAD TO GO INTERNATIONAL AND DILUTE HIS POWER BY WRITING FAKE-BACH AND PANDERING TO THE LIKES OF ROBERT CRAFT....WHO CONVINCED HIM TO BECOME AN ARNOLDWORSHIPPER.....BABBITT HAD THE RIGHT IDEA IN HIS SETTING OF JAMES JOYCES"WING AND A
PRAYER" FOR SOPRANO AND TAPE....A TRUE MEISTERPIECE.....THE ELEKTRONIK BLIP/BLEEPS PERFECTLY COMPLEMENT THE TEXT.....

Fabulous music by one of America's greatest composers.......2004-02-04

This disc is full of some of the most interesting and beautiful compositions by one of American's greatest composers. Every piece is both delightful and challenging, and each rewards repeat listening. Some of these pieces needed some time for me to grow into them, but I very fond of all them now. Others I found to be terrific right away. You mileage may vary!

By the way, the performances are spectacular. It is difficult to imagine the possibility of performances with greater charm and commitment. The players believe in every note, and play it all with superb confidence and musicianship.

Fabulous music by one of America's greatest.......2004-02-04

Great collection by a genuinely colossal figure........2003-07-01

Elliott Carter (b. 1908) is a composer whose music seems to inspire either love or hatred, with little in between. Carter started out studying with Nadia Boulanger in the 1930s, then wrote several years' worth of neo-Copland music before finally finding his own voice in the mid-1940s. Beginning with his Piano Sonata, Carter began writing in an exclusively atonal idiom, constructing works that are breathtaking in their complexity and integrity.

This is not music for the dilettantes who like to play Schubert like muzak when they are cleaning their house or chatting with friends. This is uncompromising, "serious" (often playfully so) music intended for listeners who approach it with the respect it deserves and with the willingness to spend the time required (however long that may be) to appreciate it. If you're looking for instant comprehension, look into [stuff] like "The World's Most Soothing Classical Album" and other corporate delights.

This is a truly invaluable collection, with important works culled from 45 years of Carter's creative development. The earliest work here was written when the composer was 40 and the latest when he was 85, but evident throughout is his daring, originality, extraordinary technique and adherence to his own creative vision. This is beautiful music by virtually any measure. The performances, mostly by the Group for Contemporary Music, are superb. This collection speaks for itself.

Milton Babbitt once asked, "Who cares if you listen?" The point of that notorious essay was that there is now more to music than Tchaikovsky, and that composers have an obligation to themselves and their art and not to close-minded, musically unlettered philistines. Though he wrote that essay in 1958, Babbitt's thesis is unfortunately still valid, as evidenced by the negative, dismissive reviews of Carter's music featured here. If you don't like it, don't listen to it; but don't attack the composer for being a fraud if you won't take the time to familiarize yourself with his music beyond a cursory listen.

How refreshing such vehement dislike ..........2002-02-08

Lloyd Schwartz, in his liner notes to Speculum Musicae's essential recordings of Carter's vocal works (Bridge 9014) writes of his early Frost settings that they are "like the early realistic drawings of a great abstract painter". It would be difficult to come up with a better analogy, not only for Carter's post-1950 compositions but for all works that have willfully surrendered any notion of conventional tonal centers. Tonality in this equation is the equivalent of the figurative in painting. Non tonal works are correspondingly abstract, like the paintings of Pollock or Motherwell: all figurative elements in such works are either accidental or part of a designated encounter of tonal and non tonal aspects (as in Maxwell Davies or the de Koonig of the 'women' series). Now, it is quite clear that, in music as in painting or even dance, there will a number of quite intelligent persons who will never accept the value of abstraction, who think abstract expressionism for instance so much tosh, a Greenbergian legerdemain concocted to brutally anchor american art in the history books as new, valid in its own right, not sub- par europeanism. And it is in fact unfortunate that such progressive art has too often been brandished as an ideological jackhammer, out to bring down the venerable Penn stations of the prevalent taste: this is what happens when true creativity gets ossified in academia. But for those who do not find abstraction anathema, who are as they say adventurous, it should be made clear that all the hyperbolic smoke surrounding Carter is not without fire. He may not be the greatest american composer just like Pollock is hardly the greatest american painter but there are brilliant things to discover here.
This however is not the disc to start with: it's well performed no doubt and the pieces are always interesting if not the best of Carter (except for the cello sonata). Just as it is not really possible to grasp Pollock's 'advance' without a knowledge of what preceded him (as in Kandinsky or the German expressionists: ie, how the figure gets progressively disintegrated and for what reasons) so with Carter (or Schoenberg for that matter) it is best to start with an earlier transitional work like his piano sonato of 1946. It's an astounding piece: Rosen does it well, Jacobs was great, but I favour Watson on Virgin because he choses to program it together with Copland's own monumental sonata and Barber's fighting romanticism. (all these were written in the 40s, an amazing decade for keyboard works: in addition to the above it is also when Dutilleux publishes his luminous and equally transitional sonata). After this, I would move to the cello sonata of '48 on Nonesuch (the better rendering) before taking a deep breath for the plunge into the mind boggling first quartet. (The Composers are the best on Nonesuch; they convey the excitement of discovery. The great Arditti is next and best all round. I find the later Juilliard plodding and too closely recorded for comfort: listen to the crisp page turning throughout). Then, you could turn to the superb Night Fantasies (by Rosen or Oppens) which echo Copland Night thoughts. From there, you're on your own but down forget the vocal pieces: Carter is the premiere reader of American poetry: in addition to Frost and Dickinson, he sets Bishop, Lowell, Ashbery, etc.

Average customer rating:

Table for Three
Phil DeGreg
Manufacturer: Prevenient Music
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Jazz | Styles | Music
ASIN: B000CAFH92
Release Date: 2003-05-20

Tracks:

Come Rain or Come Shine
It Might As Well Be Spring
Anthropology
Sail Away
Carol's Waltz
Broadway
Hallucinations
Elizete
Lush Life
Cupbearers
We Kiss In a Shadow

Average customer rating:

Song of Joy

Manufacturer: Shepherd's Trio
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Classical | Styles | Music
ASIN: B000CAECSY
Release Date: 2005-01-18

Theodor Kirchner: Compositions for Piano Trio, Vol. 3

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Theodor Kirchner: Compositions for Piano Trio, Vol. 3

Manufacturer: Antes
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music
ASIN: B00005RYGH
Release Date: 2001-10-30

Tracks:

Bunte Blatter, Op.83: I Zwiegesang
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: II Humoreske
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: III Romanze
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: IV Scherzino
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: V Novellette
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: VI Lied Ohne Worte
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: VII Barcarola
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: VIII Serenata
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: IX Erzahlung
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: X Madchenlied
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: XI Capriccio
Bunte Blatter, Op.83: XII Abendmusik
Ser
Ein Gedenkblatt, Op.15
Zwei Terzetter, Op.97: I Andante
II Allegretto, Poco Vivace
Kleines Trio: Poco Lento
Sechs Stucke In Kanonischer Form, Op.56: I Nicht Zu Schnell
Sechs Stucke In Kanonischer Form, Op.56: II Mit Innigem Ausdruck
Sechs Stucke In Kanonischer Form, Op.56: III Andantino - Etwas Schneller
Sechs Stucke In Kanonischer Form, Op.56: IV Innig - Etwas Bewegter
Sechs Stucke In Kanonischer Form, Op.56: V Nicht Zu Schnell
Sechs Stucke In Kanonischer Form, Op.56: VI Adagio

Average customer rating:

Transition

Manufacturer: Elliot Steger
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Jazz | Styles | Music
ASIN: B000CAE874
Release Date: 2001-01-02

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Victoria Bond: Compositions

Manufacturer: Gega
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Quartets | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

Trios | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Classical | Styles | Music

Wedding Music | Miscellaneous | Styles | Music
ASIN: B0000044MR
Release Date: 2006-10-24

Tracks:

Dreams Of Flying: Resisting Gravity/Floating/The Caged Bird Dreams Of The Jungle/Flight - Georgy Valtchev/Nikolai Gagov/Valentin Gerov/Christo Tanev
Rage - Anna Stoytcheva
Weddings & Bar Mitzvahs - Georgy Valtchev
Other Selves: Intro/Country Fiddle/Passacaglia/Mechanical Dolls/Rag/Monologue/Finale - Gerogy Valtchev/Christo Tanev/Anna Stoytcheva
Batucada - Anna Stoytcheva
Shenblu - Kremena Acheva
Son - Christo Tanve/Anna Stoytcheva

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Epiphany
Andy Laverne
Manufacturer: Clavebop
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Bebop General | Bebop | Jazz | Styles | Music

General | Jazz | Styles | Music

Modern Postbebop | Jazz | Styles | Music

General | New Age | Styles | Music

Jazz | New Age | Indie Music | Stores | Music
ASIN: B0002LSZQI
Release Date: 2004-07-01

Tracks:

Epiphany
Antipathy
Creature Comforts
This Just In
The Day After Tomorrow
Deja New
Big Time
Resolve
Omnipotent
Tear Drop

Album Description

With this collection of original jazz compositions written for piano, organ and drums trio, Andy LaVerne creates a new and exciting, yet natural and intuitive medium for keyboards unlike any you've heard before.