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             


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 £12.49 postage paid.

Musicweb Purchase button

Vytautas BARKAUSKAS (b. 1931)
Sun for symphony orchestra op. 69 (1983, 1995) [8:41]
Concerto for viola and chamber orchestra Op. 63 (1981) [24:09]
Symphony No. 5 Op. 81 (1986) [34:50]
Konzertstück für Orchester No. 2 op. 103 (1994, 1996) [8:15]
Yuri Bashmet (viola)
Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra/Robertas Šervenikas; Juozas Domarkas
rec. Lithuanian National Philharmonic Hall, Vilnius, live (opp. 63, 103); 8 January 2007 (Sun); 6 April 2001 (concerto); 9 January 2007 (5); 16 November 1996 (Konzertstück). DDD 
AVIE AV 2163 [75:55]

Experience Classicsonline



Barkauskas website: www.mxl.lt/barkauskas
 This is the sequel to Avie AV2073.

These four Lithuanian works - which largely predate those on the earlier disc - date from the decade and a half in which the Soviet Union in part fell away from the Baltic states and in part was pushed.

Sun opens with the suggestion of a dynamo hum cut across with piano and brass chords. A harpsichord tinkles. Fluttering energetic instrumental lines erupt in slow motion supported by a ringing, glassy and percussive ostinato. The flutter returns at the close in a simulacrum of peace overarched by the chaotic dynamo of the sun that holds the earth and moon in check. We are told that this music relates to the Pagan and shamanic adoration of the Sun.

This recording of the Viola Concerto is remarkable for the resourceful and vivid playing of Yuri Bashmet, its dedicatee.  The viola wails and husks, while harpsichord  arpeggios provide a plangent backdrop or drip in singular specks of sound. The strings conspire in a barely heard silvery thread of trembling sound.

The Fifth Symphony is a product of the year of the Chernobyl disaster. It is one of Barkauskas's six symphonies. Across five movements we hear that raindrop intimations of the harpsichord, the pummelling side-drum and the insistent trumpet panic. It’s all increasingly atavistic and gripped by hysteria and tension. The middle movement makes sport with a Stravinskian oboe and percussive tintinnabulatory slashes and parries. The awed expectation suggested by insectile buzzing is set against sheets of sleety sound. Then at 2:11 Barkauskas delights us with a very commercial soft-shoe shuffle. This cannot last – neither does it. The brass growl and strings bustle in panic. The finale is  another of Barkauskas’s essays in the kingdom lying just this side of silence. The writing has a breathless Panufnik-like gleaming perfection. The work ends amid  the tinkle of bells and the melodic benediction of the solo viola.

The Konzertstück für Orchester No. 2 recalls Sun. It is a virtuoso piece in which rushing urgent insurgencies run forward full tilt then halt while less assertive characters appear and hold forth. The brassy desert-devils of Sun return in this work and once again birds of nightmare are set loose.

The notes for this disc are by Svetlana Barkauska.
 
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.