MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


CD REVIEW

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger


Buy through MusicWeb for£11 postage paid World-wide.
Sale or return - if you don't like it send it back

Musicweb Purchase button

 

Alexander GOEHR (b. 1932)
Little Symphony op. 15 (1963) [28:04]
String Quartet No. 2 op. 23 (1967) [23:01]
Piano Trio op. 20 (1966) [19:49]
London Symphony Orchestra/Norman Del Mar; Allegri Quartet; Orion Trio.
rec. 15 August 1964 (Little Symphony); no details for other items. ADD
First issued on LP: Philips SAL 3497 (Little Symphony); Argo ZRG 748.
original recordings made in association with British Council.
LYRITA SRCD.264 [71:03]

Experience Classicsonline

 

Goehr’s so-called "Little" Symphony of 1963 was written in memory of his father, the German-born conductor and composer Walter Goehr. The title refers to the instrumental forces used, not to the length or emotional scope of the work, which is otherwise on a large scale. First performed in York Minster, it was recorded the following year by the same forces when it was originally coupled with Tippett’s Concerto for Orchestra. This pairing was singularly appropriate in one aspect; both composers make use of contrasting instrumental groupings as a means of articulating the structure. Unlike his older colleague, however Alexander Goehr uses a modified form of serial technique in the work - perhaps as a tribute to his father’s interest in the music of Schoenberg and his contemporaries. Walter Goehr had made an extensive study of Mussorgsky’s Catacombs movement (in Pictures at an Exhibition) and his son uses a modified version of the chord sequence of that movement as a means of launching the work. Thus, having stated the sequence in the tiny opening movement, the second movement comprises a set of variations on it. The third movement is a brief, delicate scherzo and the finale an elegiac summing-up of what has gone before, including a brief quotation from Schoenberg’s First Chamber Symphony. A finely crafted work, although perhaps lacking the last degree of individuality to make it truly memorable.

Both the Second Quartet and the Piano Trio display the composer’s assurance in articulating his musical material within the overall structure. The Allegri Quartet gave the first performance of the Quartet, while that of the Trio was the result of a commission from Yehudi Menuhin; here it is played by the Orion Trio. In the Quartet Goehr casts his opening movement as an extended set of variations, contrasting serene and agitated passages. Originally this constituted the whole of the work, but feeling this would benefit from two extra movements Goehr went on to compose a brief scherzo and a lento conclusion, described by Goehr as "continuous melody". The opening Con anima of the Piano Trio also uses variation form; this is followed by a long, slow concluding movement.

Writing in The Musical Times of February 1974, Stephen Walsh speaks highly of these works, linking them to the chamber music tradition of Beethoven and Bartók in their combination of originality and tradition. He felt, however, that, while Goehr effectively held the listener’s interest in the opening movements of each work, later in the piece the musical argument lost impetus, so that the listener’s concentration lapses; this is particularly evident in some of the slower sections which the composer recognised are also challenging for the performers themselves.

Excellent analogue sound for all works and informative booklet notes by Paul Conway.

Ewan McCormick

see also review by Rob Barnett

 

 

 

 

 


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools




Return to Review Index

Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.