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             


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

REVIEW


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

 

 

alternatively
CD: MDT AmazonUK AmazonUS

Fritz von BOSE (1865-1945)
Suite Nr. 2 op. 20 (pub. 1928) [18:17]
Drei Klavierstücke op. 10 (1913) [15:12]
Elegie op. 21/1 [4:59]
Thema und Variationen op. 17 (pub. 1922) [17:20]
Suite Nr. 1 op. 9 (pub. 1913) [21:35]
Alexandra Oehler (piano)
rec. MDR Leipzig, Springerstrasse 16-20 July, 12-14 November 2001
CPO 777 201-2 [78:20]

Experience Classicsonline


 
Fritz von Bose taught piano at the Leipzig Conservatory from 1838 to 1932, and the remarkable span of his meant he was old enough to have met Brahms and performed with Clara Schumann and Joseph Joachim. His teachers included Carl Reinecke, who apparently regarded him as his favourite student. It is hardly surprising then, to discover that von Bose’s work inhabits the world of conservative Romanticism rather than entering into any kind of avant-garde modernity, and he was known as the “Leipzig Brahms” for good reasons.
 
Thank heavens it isn’t a requirement of every composer working in the 20th century to be experimental or revolutionary, and this celebration of Fritz von Bose’s work show his voice to have been that of a gifted composer for his instrument. The Suite No.2 Op.20 is a middle period work, with trademark chromatic lines here and there, but with considerable melodic charm and what the booklet notes allude to as “Mendelssohnian lightness.” The Three Piano Pieces Op. 10 have plenty of that Brahmsian richness in the piano textures and harmonies, while the Elegy Op. 21/1 is a more introspective statement which has something of a whiff of romantic film music about it.
 
By far the most extended single movement here is the Theme and Variations Op.17, in which the composer flexes his creative and pianistic muscles furthest. A funereal theme with some nice scrunchy dissonances is followed by eleven variations which move inexorably through a variety of largely elegiac moods towards a darkly triumphal finale. The programme concludes with the Suite No.1 Op.9, whose individual movements are stylised dance forms sandwiched between an elegantly lyrical Prelude and a superbly dramatic closing Finale.
 
If you were wondering what happened to the legacy of Brahms in late 19th and early 20th century piano music then Fritz von Bose can supply some answers to your question. His pieces are relatively undemanding, but nonetheless enjoyable in a retrospective kind of way. The music is not effusively virtuosic or heavily Germanic in the “New German” Wagnerian sense, harking back as it does to the genial warmth of Mendelssohn and the pianistic palette of Brahms. If it seems strange and anachronistic to think of such music being created long after the musical world had been turned on its head by Schoenberg and Stravinsky, remember that von Bose inherited the conservative line of Carl Reinecke who inhabited similar early Romantic sensibilities at the same time that Mahler and Rachmaninov were flourishing. Alexandra Oehler’s performances of these works are very fine, and the MDR recording is highly serviceable if not particularly exciting.
 
Dominy Clements
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 


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






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.