Three Occasions [Import]

On this CD:

1. Piano Concerto
Composed by Elliott Carter
Performed by SWF Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden with Ursula Oppens
Conducted by Michael Gielen

2. Concerto for Orchestra
Composed by Elliott Carter
Performed by SWF Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden with Ursula Oppens
Conducted by Michael Gielen

3. Three Occasions for orchestra
Composed by Elliott Carter
Performed by SWF Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden with Ursula Oppens
Conducted by Michael Gielen

Elliott Carter: Piano Concerto / Concerto for Orchestra / Three Occasions, Music, Elliott Carter, Michael Gielen, SWF Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden, Ursula Oppens, 20th/21st Century Occasional Music, Classical, Classical Music, Concerto, Concerto for Orchestra, Orchestral, Orchestral & Symphonic, Piano Concerto

The Music of Elliott Carter Vol. 7; Boston Concerto, Cello Concerto, ASKO Concerto, Dialogues
Average customer rating:

Some of the Carter's best works flow from his pen at ninety-plus

The masterpieces just keep coming!

spectacular works from Elliott Carter!

Dialogues repeats the success of the much ealier Piano Conce

Late Carter at its best

The Music of Elliott Carter Vol. 7; Boston Concerto, Cello Concerto, ASKO Concerto, Dialogues

Manufacturer: Bridge Records; Inc.
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Elliott Carter: Piano Concerto; Concerto for Orchestra; Concerto for Orchestra; Three Occasions

ASIN: B000C6NO6E
Release Date: 2005-11-15

Tracks:

Dialogues
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Boston Concerto
Cello Concerto
Cello Concerto
Cello Concerto
Cello Concerto
Cello Concerto
Cello Concerto
Cello Concerto
ASKO Concerto

Product Description

This highly anticipated recording, a Bridge co-production with the BBC, presents first recordings of four major Elliott Carter compositions, all composed within the past six years. Conducted by the distinguished British conductor, Oliver Knussen, these recordings tell the amazing tale of an American composer, well into his nineties, composing at the peak of his powers. Malcolm McDonald writes that Â“Carter is not far short of his own centenary, and continuing to produce highly complex, sophisticated scores with an energy that would hardly be conceivable even in a much younger man.Â” The composer traveled to London and Amsterdam to oversee the performance and recording of these four works. Dialogues for piano and chamber orchestra was a BBC Radio 3 commission for the brilliant young British pianist Nicolas Hodges and is scored for piano solo and a chamber orchestra comprising 18 instruments. Carter writes that Â“Dialogues is a conversation between the soloist and the orchestra: responding to each other, sometimes interrupting one another or arguing.Â” Hodges, Knussen and the London Sinfonietta give a reading of electrifying intensity. Boston Concerto was commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and is based on a William Carlos Williams poem, Â“RainÂ”, a verse chosen to convey the composerÂ’s enduring love for his wife Helen, the dedicatee of Boston Concerto. Describing the diaphanous textures of this work, Bayan Northcott writes of Boston Concerto that Â“despite occasional deep sonorities, the whole work has a kind of distanced lightness, seeming to hover in mid air.Â” CarterÂ’s Cello Concerto is a twenty minute span introduced by the soloist alone, playing a cantilena that presents ideas later to be expanded into a series of linked movements. The concerto is played by long-time colleague and valued Carter interpreter Fred Sherry who, during the composition of the work, consulted with Carter about the finer details of the cello writing. Scored for a large orchestra that frequently plays with intimately drawn orchestral textures, the Cello Concerto was commissioned by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and was first performed by the CSO with Yo Yo Ma, cello soloist and Daniel Barenboim, conductor. Carter completed the concise 12 minute Asko Concerto in January 2000 to a commission from the Asko Ensemble of Amsterdam and the recording on this disc is of its first performance in the Concertgebouw on April 26 of that year. The composer writes: Â“Although the music is in light-hearted mood, each soloistic section approaches ensemble playing in a different spirit.Â” Bridge has also just issued Volume Six of this series which features Rolf SchulteÂ’s performance of CarterÂ’s Violin Concerto (BRIDGE 9177).

Customer Reviews:

Some of the Carter's best works flow from his pen at ninety-plus.......2007-07-05

It's amazing enough that Elliott Carter is still composing at nearly a hundred--the works here were all written after his ninetieth birthday--and to his usual standards to boot, but what is even more remarkable is that these recent works a great deal of artistic evolution. Carter has been consistently "mellowing" since his brash music of the 1960s, but these four pieces show a new interest in smaller proportions, where the instrumentalists generally chat instead of shout, though Carter's language with its sharp atonalities and interest in polymetric slitherings remains the same. Oliver Knussen leads various ensembles, and the soloists are the composer's choice musicians.

The first piece on this disc, "Dialogues" for piano and chamber orchestra (2003) is a good example of this new style. Carter's Piano Concerto of 1965 was a monster of a piece where, in a nod to the dire situation in East Germany the composer heard about while writing the concerto in Berlin, the piano (the individual) is beaten down by the orchestra (the mob, or the state). In "Dialogues", on the other hand, the mood is conversational instead of confrontational. The piano part here is just as virtuosic as in the old concerto, and the dedicatee Nicholas Hodges gives a fine performance.

Two works here are for ensemble without soloists. In the "Boston Concerto" for full orchestra (2002), each portion of the orchestra performs in turn, rarely talking over each other. I find Carter's Concerto for Orchestra from the 1960s to be something of a failure, since it doesn't truly show off the sonorities of the ensemble in a virtuosic fashion, but the composer more than makes up for it here. A lush passage of woodwinds and pitched percussion is especially memorable, one of the most simply beautiful things he's ever written, but in no way compromising on his traditional line of writing.

The "ASKO Concerto" (2000), written for the small ensemble of that name, is also something of a concerto for orchestra, It's got a light and airy feel too, with downright humourous moments, but for most of its length a strong dramatic feel prevails. Portions of the orchestra clash, and it gets pretty close to the old aggressive Carter. This is the second recording, but the first where the ASKO Ensemble actually performs, as the world premiere recording on ECM has different players led by Peter Eotvos. I find both performances satisfactory, but as the ECM disc couples this concerto with Carter's controversial opera "What's Next?", this disc might be a more satisfactory purchase.

The Cello Concerto is also reminiscent of the Carter of yore, as the orchestra rains blows upon the solo line at times. However, for much of the piece the cello sounds alone, and it turns out to be some of the most straightforward music Carter has ever written, certainly the answer to critics who claim he's all about noise and brouhaha. The concerto was written for Yo-Yo Ma, but Fred Sherry performs here. Sherry played the drafts for Carter while the composer was writing the piece (see them at work on the Labyrinth of Time documentary DVD), and I find him an all-around more interesting performer of contemporary music than Yo-Yo Ma, so I welcome his presence here.

This disc would make a fine introduction to Carter's music, though those looking for a budget presentation could instead choose the Ars Nova disc with the Piano Concerto and Concerto for Orchestra (bad-boy 1960s Carter) or the Warner Apex disc with works starting from the late 1970s (the first mellower period). Still, fans of the composer should certainly pick this disc up sooner or later, along with the other discs in Bridge's Carter series. Bridge is doing fans a great series with this edition, and it's a pity that it doesn't get as much attention as the complete Ligeti edition or DG's Boulez discs.

The masterpieces just keep coming!.......2006-02-24

All of these works, written between 2000 and 2003, are superb additions to Carter's flawless string of masterpieces. In fact Carter's "late period" may be his most fertile and beautiful of all. Of course, as we know, Carter was something of a "late bloomer", as he did not begin to produce works in his "mature style" (beginning with his String Quartet No. 1) until he was in his mid-40's. From that point he produced his complex music slowly (by neccessity) but as he has aged he has produced more and more great music, including short incidental chamber and solo works. The works on this superb CD are among his best ever. It is great to see an icon of 20th-century modernism bring his distinctive style intact into the 21st century. Don't wait for Yo Yo Ma to record the Cello Concerto...Fred Sherry's reading is matchless, understandable considering his long-standing association with Carter. Knussen brings all his intellectual rigor and warmth of soul to these works, imbueing them with color and vigor. The recording by Bridge is perfectly crystal clear and perfectly balanced.

spectacular works from Elliott Carter!.......2006-02-13

Easily the record of the year 2005 in contemporary classical, this latest Bridge release presents four of Elliott Carter's latest compositions in superb performances and recordings. Another recording of the "ASKO Concerto" (2000 -- 10'38") was previously released on ECM along with the opera "What Next?" (see my review), but this is actually the first recording, a recording of the live premiere by the ASKO Ensemble on 4/26/00 at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. The other three works are also premiere recordings, but never before heard -- the piano concerto "Dialogues" (2003 -- 13'28"), the "Cello Concerto" (2001 -- 20'06"), and the "Boston Concerto" (2002 -- 16'54"). Nicolas Hodges plays piano, Fred Sherry plays cello, and Oliver Knussen conducts the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the London Sinfonietta and the ASKO Ensemble.

Excellent liner notes by Bayan Northcott provide insight into the works' contents. The booklet includes a great painting for the cover by Pavel Tchelitchew, apparently from Elliott Carter's collection, and several photos, including two of the composer and his late wife Helen to whom the "Boston Concerto" is dedicated. These are magnificent pieces at the highest level of sustained imagination, wit, and craft. This music of Elliott Carter makes no concessions to popular sensibilities, but it has the elegance, balance, drive and sparkle of Mozart.

Viva la Carter! Happy 97th!

Dialogues repeats the success of the much ealier Piano Conce.......2006-01-16

Among the Carter blockbusters the Piano Concerto (1967)is one of the undoubted triumphs as was clearly evident in the recent retrospective held in London.Many decades on and it's once again the same form which shows Carter to best advantage.The compact 'Dialogues' (a mini piano concerto)is composed in the familiar rebarbative musical language but there's an urgency to the invention and even an joyfulness which immediately excites the senses. Nicholas Hodges is on brilliant form and Knussen exudes a tremendous sense of authority in Carter's music.

Late Carter at its best.......2006-01-01

Elliott Carter's compositional career has already lasted far beyond what anyone could have expected, with works still flowing from his pen at the age of 97. This disc confirms the composer's continued late success; all four works on it date from the composer's nineties and three of them are previously unrecorded.

Dialogues, for piano and small chamber orchestra, is one of those works whose titles does describe the musical content very effectively. Starting (and ending) with the soloist playing unaccompanied, the music moves through a series of contrasting moods and colors, sometimes piano alone, sometimes orchestra alone, sometimes both playing together (or against each other). What stays with this listener, though, is not the structure of the work, but its rhythmic and harmonic vibrancy and its range of color.

Both the Boston Concerto (for full orchestra) and the ASKO Concerto (for fifteen instruments) share an overall design which has become common in Carter's recent work--a kind of concerto grosso where ever-shortening tuttis alternate with contrasting passages for subsections of the ensemble. The ASKO Concerto is a playful piece indeed--particularly in the bassoon solo that precedes the final, brief tutti--but it is the Boston Concerto that is the major work of these two. Here, pitter-pattering tuttis that evoke the sounds of rain alternate with lyrical and dramatic episodes--and in the slower episodes some of Carter's most emotive and lyrical writing (in passages such as the Boston Concerto's string cantilenas I see a clear parallel between late Carter and the lyrical side of late Lutoslawski). Certainly, I'd have no hesitation in regarding the Boston Concerto as one of the two finest Carter works since Symphonia (and it shares a sense of weightlessness with the latter work's finale).

The other work I'd rank up with the Boston Concerto is the Cello Concerto, even if it is by some way the hardest piece to get into here. It shares some of the abrasive nature of the concertos of the 1960s, even if the scoring is much lighter and, as in most of Carter's recent concertos, the soloist plays almost continuously. Here, in complete contrast to Carter's 1960s concertos, the orchestral parts are often extremely simple (though sometimes explosive in nature), while the soloist winds its way through an impassioned monologue ranging from lyricism to ferocity through icy cold sonorities and almost jazzy rhythms, eventually reaching a ferocious climax before sputtering out in a whimsical passage for the soloist alone.

The performances here are excellent--Oliver Knussen has known Carter's music for decades and it shows, while the BBC Symphony, London Sinfonietta and ASKO Ensemble are all effortlessly adept in this repertoire. Nicolas Hodges and Fred Sherry are excellent soloists and where there is competition (in the ASKO Concerto) I would say Knussen's performance trumps the earlier reading.

This is a disc every Carter fan probably already owns, but those who don't will need no encouragement to snap it up. Meanwhile, those wondering what the fuss is about could do a lot worse than start here.

Elliott Carter: Piano Concerto; Concerto for Orchestra; Concerto for Orchestra; Three Occasions

Average customer rating:

Amazing performance of an extremely difficult piece
Two interesting but thoroughly ugly concertos, followed by a display of colour
Ugly Ugliness
A classic Carter recording reissued
worth having for the piano concerto-one of EC's best pieces

Elliott Carter: Piano Concerto; Concerto for Orchestra; Concerto for Orchestra; Three Occasions

Manufacturer: Arte Nova Classics
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music

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ASIN: B0009ML2N8
Release Date: 2005-06-14

Tracks:

I
II
Concerto For Orchestra
A Celebration Of 100 x 150 Notes
Remembrance
Anniversary

Customer Reviews:

Amazing performance of an extremely difficult piece.......2007-03-01

I cannot understate the difficulty of the Piano Concerto by Carter which by all measures is difficult. It sways back and forth like the tides of the ocean. The opening is rivetting with its intense rhythmicity.

Two interesting but thoroughly ugly concertos, followed by a display of colour.......2006-10-25

I discovered the ever-controversial composer Elliott Carter through his recent works like the "Symphonia" and the Cello Concerto. "What's the big deal," I thought, "he's no more out there than Lutoslawski or Lindberg, so why the public rage against him?" Well, on this Arte Nova release, a reissue of a 1992 disc, I got an answer. Michael Gielen leads the SWF Symphony Orchestra, with Ursula Oppens as piano soloist.

The two-movement "Piano Concerto" (1964-1965) is notable for its overt dramatic arc. The piano is a lone individual against the orchestral mob, and their interaction is violent. The piano is surrounded by a small ensemble of seven players who seem to support the piano, but are ultimately false comforters to the piano's Job, as Carter puts it. This form has been used successfully in Lutoslawski's cello concerto and Schnittke's viola concerto, and here it holds interest. And as ever, there are delightful experiments with varying rhythms. But there's a major problem with Carter here: his music is totally void of colour. I listen exclusively to modern repertoire, so I've no fear of the atonal, but you'd think an orchestra has more sonorities to offer then the same drab thumps that characterize this piece.

The same problem plagues the single-movement "Concerto for Orchestra" (1969). Still, one can admire the virtuosity present in the writing of all orchestral parts, and the way in which the spotlight is passed from each of the four instrumental groups to another is somewhat elegant. But in addition to Carter's monochromatic palette, the recording of these first two pieces is not ideal, it sounds as if the entire orchestra were playing inside a clown car.

With the "Three Occasions for Orchestra" (1986-1989), Carter has mellowed, and colour is definitely present. These three pieces were composed at different times and merely collected together for convenience. The first, "A Celebration of 100 x 150 Notes" was writen for the Houston Symphony to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Republic of Texas. It's a fanfare lasting exactly 150 bars that, for has its uncomprising modernism, has some downright charming writing for brass. "Remembrace" was written as a memorial for Paul Fromm, its sad expanses foretell the middle movement of his "Symphonia". "Anniversary" was written on the occasion of his fiftieth wedding anniversary to his wife Helen Carter, it's an airy piece, though feels somewhat fluffy and insubstantial after a few listens.

The disc comes with liner notes amounting to two pages. These lack any analysis of the pieces, giving instead mere context on when they were written. For more in-depth coverage of the music, I'd recommend David Schiff's THE MUSIC OF ELLIOTT CARTER (Cornell University Press, 1998).

For listening for mere idle pleasure, the recent Carter serves much better. These pieces here have some fascinating rhythmic and programmatic features, which does provide a reason to buy the disc for Carter fans, but the two concertos are pretty ugly music.

Ugly Ugliness.......2006-06-23

and dull....there are pieces that are Beautiful Ugly like Beethoven's Grosse Fugue or Varese's Arcana - but the music on this CD is just Ugly Ugly - Carter knows instruments, but his palette is soooooooooooooooo dull - this is the Concerto for Orchestra - to describe the work as busy music would be an understatement - only the beginning and end of a Carter work is mildly ear-catching - in between you have an unsustainable music - this is no exception - and with a lot of music after WW2, the more organized a work is on paper, the more chaotic it seems when heard - no exception there, either - the Concerto for Orchestra is a work which a dedicated conductor and orchestra should perform without anyone actually hearing it -

Some have mentioned how Carter differentiates musics by using specific instruments and intervals - so what? and what about the resulting music? The Piano Concerto uses the soloist and a chamber group to distinguish itself from the rest of the orchestra - ah yes, if they were in two different cities, perhaps - The most interesting thing about the Piano Concerto for me, aside from its two-movement form (borrowing from Berg's fiddle concerto), is the ugliest bass clarinet solo ever conceived this side of a mouthpiece - a more hideous creation could not be immagined -

The Three Occasions is good if you drop the last two, which leaves you One - at just over three minutes, it has somes nice fifths, which would be appropriate for a fanfare (except for the blips at the end) - Less is more -

A classic Carter recording reissued.......2006-03-04

This budget-price recording, featuring two Elliott Carter specialists, the pianist Ursula Oppens and the conductor Michael Gielen, has long been a highlight of the composer's discography. Now reissued in rather more attractive packaging, it remains an essential disc for those who know and love Carter's highly complex, densely atonal music.

The 1965 Piano Concerto is one of the composer's most difficult--yet most rewarding--pieces. It's written in two movements, and to add to the complexity of the music, there's a small sub-orchestra that acts as an intermediary between the soloist and the full orchestra. (No wonder that Carter now says he could never again write works like the Piano Concerto--they'd just take up too much time.) It's a highly dramatic work, with the piano constantly at odds with the orchestra, and the sub-orchestra attempting to bring about some kind of rapprochement between the soloist and orchestra. In the end, this fails, and in a truly terrifying climax the pounding drums finally silence the soloist--only for her to start up again in a slow, quiet coda.

Of the three recordings--all very good--that I've heard of this concerto, this is the strongest. Mark Wait's on Naxos lacks the truly apocalyptic resonances of the climax, and Oppens' earlier New World recording, to my mind, operates on a slightly lower level of tension than the present reading.

The Concerto for Orchestra was written soon after the Piano Concerto, and is a similarly dramatic work, if slightly less fierce. It has an openly literary program, being inspired by St John Perse's poem "Vents," which depicts the destruction and renewal of America through violent windstorms. After an opening tutti, the work evokes the winds of the four seasons by focusing on a different section of the orchestra for each season, before reaching a violent climax and fading away.

Of the easily available rivals to this recording, Oliver Knussen's recording with the London Sinfonietta is the most competitive. It features somewhat better playing and clearer detail, though it doesn't quite have the dramatic sweep of the present recording. Leonard Bernstein's Sony recording, while dramatic, disqualifies itself as a first choice through the many inaccuracies in the playing.

The disc closes with a less ambitious, more recent piece, the Three Occasions for Orchestra. Compared to the two earlier works, this one shows the slimming down of style that has been prominent in Carter's work over the last 20 years, to my mind, with mixed results--though the textures are clearer, more joyous, something of the dramatic sweep and intensity has been lost. The work begins with a complex fanfare, continues with a bleak elegy and concludes with a celebratory last movement. While not major Carter, it can perhaps be considered significant as it forms a sort of miniature prototype of his key 1990s work, Symphonia.

Knussen's London Sinfonietta recording is, again, the competitor here. It is technically superior, but I find Gielen has a warmth that Knussen doesn't quite match.

Overall, this is an essential disc for any Carter enthusiast, though, due to the highly complex nature of the two concertos, it may not be the ideal place for a newcomer to start (I'd still direct such people to the Elektra Nonesuch disc of the Double Concerto, the Cello Sonata and the Sonata for Flute, Oboe, Cello and Harpsichord).

worth having for the piano concerto-one of EC's best pieces.......2005-09-26

The Piano concerto is one of Carter's finest achievements.
Initially, seeming like the hermetic norm one assosciates with this composer it slowly emerges as a piece with a real sense of passion and fantasy.On this rare occasion unleashed from his Nadia Boulanger heritage,there's something very likeable about the way the piano weaves it's way through an unwieldy orchestral mass.The melodic writing(most notably a bass clarinet solo)is also surprisingly engaging.A bleak piece-composed in Berlin amidst the height Cold War tensions-but strangely compelling.

Concerto for Orchestra remains a tough nut to crack.Maybe i need to hear the Knussen recording but it's hard to fathom the continuity and allure of this piece.It seems to have been composed by the page,without the fierce sense of urgency which are the hallmarks of equally dense orchestral works of Xenakis and Stockhausen.
Still,there are interesting features.Most notably,the way in which the orchestral piano almost takes on a heroic,soloistic role.

The three occasions might veer slightly in the direction of dryness but atleast no.1 has a splendidly visceral climax 1.5 minutes in! Rather dreary trombone line in no.2,but things improve in no.3 where Lulu-like string lines are accompanied by spasmodic yet urgent ticking motifs.

Rückblick Moderne: 20th Century Orchestral Music

Average customer rating:

BUT WHY?
Great Recordings
A must for lovers of modern music

Rückblick Moderne: 20th Century Orchestral Music

Manufacturer: Col Legno
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: B000038IDI
Release Date: 1999-11-15

Amazon.com

It starts, appropriately enough, with Charles Ives's The Unanswered Question, which seems to hold its breath, and occasionally exhale in brief bursts of panic, as the new century unfolds. It ends with Dmitri Shostakovich's Chamber Symphony Op. 110a (based on his String Quartet No. 8), whose alternating sequences of anguish, alarm, and derision come as close as possible for absolute music to indicting its bloody history--eight CDs and over 30 works later.

Rückblick Moderne: 20th Century Orchestral Music represents as fine a look back at musical modernism as you're likely to get. And in what a lavish package! A tall box holding two multi-CD jewel boxes and a beautifully printed booklet with photographs of modern and postmodern architecture and extensive liner notes (in German). Even the CDs themselves look handsome. All the more amazing when you realize that the entire set was digitally recorded live--with coughs, turning pages, chair creaks, and vivid sound--during one week in 1998 in Stuttgart (where, it seems, you have to travel nowadays even to hear about this kind of music), by such groups as the RSO Saarbrücken and the Bamberger Symphoniker, led by Dennis Russell Davies, Michael Gielen, Heinz Holliger, and other risk takers. Each CD has been programmed around a theme; for example, "Explosion/Implosion" (featuring Varèse and Mahler's tone poem Totenfeier, later becoming the first movement of his Second Symphony) and "Minimal Postludien," which includes (heads up, completists) Philip Glass's Echorus for two solo violins and string orchestra and Ligeti's Ramifications. Stravinsky, who, like Schoenberg and Cage, appears to cast a long shadow over this imposing collection, remains one of the highlights: a sharp, fiercely erotic performance of Le Sacre by Lothar Zagrosek and the Stattsorchester Stuttgart that helps remind us how much modern music has done, in the face of controversy and disaster, to ground us in our humanity. --Robert Burns Neveldine

Customer Reviews:

BUT WHY?.......2002-05-15

At eight cds, this could have been a hefty set of 20th century orchestral music. But somewhere along the line, around the beginning of planning the festival I'm guessing, something went horribly wrong. There were eight concerts, each with a theme. The pieces chosen have often only a tenuous connection with the theme, if any. There are no women composers. There are no composers from Romania. There are no composers from the Czech Republic. There are no composers from Poland. That means no Gubuidulina, no Ana-Marie Avram, no Joan Tower. That means no Dumitrescu or Janacek or Lutoslawski. Can you believe it? A collection of twentieth century orchestral music with no Lutoslawski? Verily it boggleth the mind.

But so what? Are the pieces they did play well played? Well, sometimes. Gielen and Zender get predictably excellent results. But much of the rest sounds for all the world like first reads. Extremely sensitive and polished first reads to be sure, but no sense of piece qua piece, a thing with a shape from start to finish. (This is most apparent in the eccentric phrasing.) These are not the newer pieces, either, but Ives and Ravel and Bartok and Stravinsky. You know these people have played these pieces dozens of times. No excuse.

It's hard to fault a company (Col legno) that puts out so many fine performances of the likes of Helmut Lachenmann, but in this venture I really think they dropped the ball.

Great Recordings.......2000-12-30

I wish I could read in German! This is the only "flaw" of this edition, in my opinion: it seems to have a great booklet, but I can't read it. Otherwise, it is a great collection: excelent recordings, good choice of works. I find it an excelent intro to modern music.

A must for lovers of modern music.......2000-06-26

This 8 CD collection contains a wonderfully diverse selection of works that trace the development of music through the century. This set contains music form the pivotal artists from the beginning of the century; Schoenberg, Webern, Berg, Stravinsky, Debussy, Bartok, Ives and Varese. Master from later in the century include; Messiaen, Carter, Boulez, Cage, Feldman, Kurtag, Schnittke, Glass, and Ligeti. From the late romanticism of Mahler, to the impressionism of Ravel and Debussy, the atonality of the Second Viennese, the neo-styles of Stravinsky, Kurtag, Schostakovich, and Schnittke, to the minimalism of Glass, this collection has it all. Also within this collection are some classic compositions by lesser known masters such as; Maderna, Nono, Kagel. Rihm, Zimmerman, Furrer, and Lachenmann to name a few. Dennis Russell Davies, Michael Gielen, Heinze Holliger, and Hans Zender conduct superb performances of most of these classics. There is much to cherich in this collection, and are many treasures to be discovered.

Elliott Carter: Piano Concerto / Concerto for Orchestra / Three Occasions

Average customer rating:

Two interesting but thoroughly ugly concertos, followed by a display of colour
strong 1992 performances -- look for the reissue
Great stuff, but not for Carter newbies
Piano Concerto goes well, the others don't
Gielen and Oppens make good Carter synergy

Elliott Carter: Piano Concerto / Concerto for Orchestra / Three Occasions

Manufacturer: Arte Nova Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Elliott Carter: Symphonia: Sum Fluxae Pretium Spei (1993-96) / Clarinet Concerto (1996) (20/21 series) - Oliver Knussen
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ASIN: B000005I5T
Release Date: 1998-01-01

Tracks:

Concerto For Piano And Orchestra: I
Concerto For Piano And Orchestra: II
Concerto For Orchestra
Three Occasions For Orchestra: A Celebration Of 100 X 150 Notes
Three Occasions For Orchestra: Remembrance
Three Occasions For Orchestra: Anniversary

Customer Reviews:

Two interesting but thoroughly ugly concertos, followed by a display of colour.......2006-10-25

I discovered the ever-controversial composer Elliott Carter through his recent works like the "Symphonia" and the Cello Concerto. "What's the big deal," I thought, "he's no more out there than Lutoslawski or Lindberg, so why the public rage against him?" Well, on this Arte Nova release (recently reissued at budget price), I got an answer. Michael Gielen leads the SWF Symphony Orchestra, with Ursula Oppens as piano soloist.

The two-movement "Piano Concerto" (1964-1965) is notable for its overt dramatic arc. The piano is a lone individual against the orchestral mob, and their interaction is violent. The piano is surrounded by a small ensemble of seven players who seem to support the piano, but are ultimately false comforters to the piano's Job, as Carter puts it. This form has been used successfully in Lutoslawski's cello concerto and Schnittke's viola concerto, and here it holds interest. And as ever, there are delightful experiments with varying rhythms. But there's a major problem with Carter here: his music is totally void of colour. I listen exclusively to modern repertoire, so I've no fear of the atonal, but you'd think an orchestra has more sonorities to offer then the same drab thumps that characterize this piece.

The same problem plagues the single-movement "Concerto for Orchestra" (1969). Still, one can admire the virtuosity present in the writing of all orchestral parts, and the way in which the spotlight is passed from each of the four instrumental groups to another is somewhat elegant. But in addition to Carter's monochromatic palette, the recording of these first two pieces is not ideal, it sounds as if the entire orchestra were playing inside a clown car.

With the "Three Occasions for Orchestra" (1986-1989), Carter has mellowed, and colour is definitely present. These three pieces were composed at different times and merely collected together for convenience. The first, "A Celebration of 100 x 150 Notes" was writen for the Houston Symphony to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Republic of Texas. It's a fanfare lasting exactly 150 bars that, for has its uncomprising modernism, has some downright charming writing for brass. "Remembrace" was written as a memorial for Paul Fromm, its sad expanses foretell the middle movement of his "Symphonia". "Anniversary" was written on the occasion of his fiftieth wedding anniversary to his wife Helen Carter, it's an airy piece, though feels somewhat fluffy and insubstantial after a few listens.

The disc comes with liner notes amounting to two pages. These lack any analysis of the pieces, giving instead mere context on when they were written. For more in-depth coverage of the music, I'd recommend David Schiff's THE MUSIC OF ELLIOTT CARTER (Cornell University Press, 1998).

For listening for mere idle pleasure, the recent Carter serves much better. These pieces here have some fascinating rhythmic and programmatic features, which does provide a reason to buy the disc for Carter fans, but the two concertos are pretty ugly music.

strong 1992 performances -- look for the reissue.......2005-08-06

This Arte Nova disc has now been reissued with a new cover, an aerial cityscape much more appropriate to the dynamic music than this still-life flower vase.

This is the second recording of the "Piano Concerto (1964-5 -- 22'31) by conductor Michael Gielen and pianist Ursula Oppens, following their 1984 recording with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra on New World. This recording from eight years later with the SWF Symphony Orchestra of Baden-Baden is much, much better. The "Piano Concerto" is not one of Carter's best works, but this is its best performance and recording. It was written in Berlin near an American target range not long after the Wall went up, and the sound of machine guns is echoed in the eruptions of the orchestra in the second movement. Metaphysically, the "Piano Concerto" seems to have been inspired by the global "Cold War" conflict to address the tragedy of intractable human conflict.

The highlight of the disc is a performance of one of Carter's masterpieces, the "Concerto for Orchestra" (1969 -- 22'23). Commissioned by Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic, their original recording failed to do justice to this fantastically complex composition. The "Concerto" features four groups of instruments, each proceeding at a different tempo through the work, one of the best examples of this core Carter innovation in his oeuvre. Gielen's recording follows by only a year the recording by Oliver Knussen and the London Sinfonietta, a performance supervised by the composer. I believe that 1991 Virgin recording is the best available (see my review), but it is harder to find. If you cannot locate a copy (try amazon.co.uk), this is a strong alternative. Gielen leads the SWFSO to more powerful tutti passages than Knussen, but Knussen's reading is more transparent, more like Boulez in laying bare the intricacies of the score. Another advantage of the Virgin disc is that the "Concerto" is separated into six tracks, which makes it easier to hear the logic of the movements by listening to them one at a time.

The "Three Occasions for Orchestra" (1968-9 -- 17') is also found on the 1991 Virgin disc. This live recording does not compare to the crisper studio recording, but this Arte Nova disc affords an opportunity to hear an excellent Carter work at a bargain price.

Great stuff, but not for Carter newbies.......2003-12-04

This disc, conducted by Michael Gielen, a long-time Carter veteran, contains two of his thorniest scores and a rather more accessible--though less important--work. Hence this disc, while an essential for Carter fans, is not ideal for those coming to the composer for the first time (which is a shame, as it is very cheap).

The Piano Concerto (written in the mid-1960s) is a phenomenally complex score, with ferocious, virtuoso atonal writing in the solo instrument against stabbing interjections in the orchestra, frequent changes of perspective, and a brutal climax where pounding drums silence the soloist, only for her to re-emerge, a small, hopeful voice at the end of the work. This is Ursula Oppens' second recording, and her playing is outstanding, as is the support from Michael Gielen and the SWF Symphony Orchestra.

The Concerto for Orchestra, completed in 1969, is still very complex, though perhaps less so than the Piano Concerto. Like many of Carter's work, this one takes a poetic inspiration, in this case from St John Perse's poem Vents, which depicts America swept by great winds of change, destruction and eventually renewal. Accordingly, after a brief introduction, the opening music is appropriately autumnal, dominated by the cellos, wooden percussion, lower piano notes and harp. This music gets more and more frantic until it triggers off a scherzando section focused on violins, flutes and metal percussion. This scherzando music becomes gradually slower until the music sags down into the deep bass (double basses, tubas, trombones, timpani, bass drum) before a restoration of energy (violas, trumpets, oboes, clarinets, snare drums) brings it to a vigorous close.

In contrast, the Three Occasions for Orchestra are much lighter works, ones that to my mind sound like studies for Carter's 1990s masterpiece, Symphonia. The first is a playfully complex fanfare; the is second a bleak elegy with a prominent solo trombone part; the finale brings relief in a warm-hearted celebratory music.

This is an outstanding disc, and could be recommended at full price, let alone the $5.98 it's currently listed at. The performances of all three works can be regarded as the finest available. If you're a Carter fan, don't hesitate--if not, this probably isn't the best place to start (the two concerti are very tough listening, though in my opinion amongst the best orchestral works of the 20th century). Newcomers to Carter would probably do better with the Nonesuch disc containing the Cello Sonata and Double Concerto, or maybe the DG disc of Symphonia.

Piano Concerto goes well, the others don't.......2001-07-13

I'm not going to argue the merits of the music - if you're not already familiar with Carter's style, this disk is *not* the place to start - so let's get right to the performances.

In the Piano Concerto, Oppens does a fine job, actually a bit better than on her previous recording (on New World). The same goes for the orchestra. But they're in way over their head in the Concerto for Orchestra. The strings in particular are consistently either inaudible or else a smudged mess, grabbing frantically at whatever notes they can.

This is, of course, very common with pieces of this difficulty. The attempted premiere of the Concerto for Orchestra (NY Phil/Bernstein) was instead declared an 'open rehearsal', and the recording which followed was an embarrassment. The premiere of the Piano Concerto (Lateiner/Leinsdorf/BSO) was almost as bad.

'Three Occasions' goes better; unfortunately, the audience noises in the quiet and sombre second movement pretty much ruin it.

Fortunately, there are terrific performances of both the Concerto for Orchestra and Three Occasions with Knussen and the London Sinfonietta (on Virgin). They really get it sounding like *music*, not just notes; at least except for the last few minutes of the Concerto, when the strings get all flustered, just like these other performances. Sounds like they ran out of rehearsal time.

Recommended for the Piano Concerto, which, at the super-budget price, is probably enough.

Gielen and Oppens make good Carter synergy.......2000-04-09

It's absolutely incredible the amount of reviews Carter gets, time was no one knew who he was, and if they did, they'd run for the exit doors, some still do. Carter if anything else gets people tied up in his structural constructs, pitch sets, harmonic schemes and metric modulations and conceptual facility. But answer me who can hear all that complexity, not even Carter I dare say, who has a memory to recall when a pitch permutation has occurred from the strings to the winds, no one. What remains, is incredibly expressionistic music with thory strident textures. The darkly brooding Piano Concerto to me recalls the anxiety, the hidden violence that is Americana, they below the surface tension of the problems that exist in this country. The Concerto for Orchestra was written during the Anti-War Vietnam times, and is Carter's contribution to that. In that context he is a great creator, in that his music becomes a document of history, reflecting a specific time where people lived and died. The fact that Carter does both attenuates the structural with a wider social perspective is a sign of genius in this age, of homogenized art. Oppens and Gielen bring the violence and coldness here, as well as opaque feel and violence this music harbors.

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