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
Plain text for smartphones & printers


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

 

Support us financially by purchasing this disc from
Felix WOYRSCH (1860-1944)
Ouvertüre zu Shakespeares Hamlet, op.56 (1912) [13:29]
Symphony no.2 in C, op.60 (c.1912-13) [48:00]
Oldenburgisches Staatsorchester/Thomas Dorsch
rec. Grosser Sendesaal, Norddeutscher Rundfunk, Hannover, 19-20 December 2011.
CPO 777 744-2 [61:33]
In the photo on the back of the front cover, German conductor Thomas Dorsch smiles cheerfully, and so he might - this recording with the excellent Oldenburg State Orchestra of Felix Woyrsch's Second Symphony and Hamlet Overture is not far off superb. 

The quality begins with the German-English booklet notes which, as is normal for CPO - are expansive and informative. Co-written by Dorsch and Andreas Dreibrodt, they give a detailed biography of the once much-admired Woyrsch and his music, including the two highly impressive works heard here. Not quite as common for the label is an excellent rendition of the notes into English - but here, though no translator is credited, CPO do themselves more credit. 

Dorsch and Dreibrodt's essay astutely recognises the leading role played by musicologists and critics in the lack of public interest in composers who were not "fixated on compositional innovation", a practice which unfortunately still goes on, despite the heroic efforts of labels like CPO, Naxos, Toccata, Chandos and others to redress the balance with bold - some would say foolhardy! - recording projects like this. 

In a more enlightened world, Woyrsch's music would be a safe bet. The Second Symphony is imaginatively orchestrated, tunefully dramatic, vivid and emotive. At various points it recalls Sibelius, Bruckner, Prokofiev, flashes of Brahms and one or two other - without ever really sounding like anyone other than Woyrsch. The audaciously atmospheric Overture is even better in some regards - the Symphony is four times as long and not easily assimilated in one or two listen-throughs. 

Despite this potentially wide appeal, this is only the second monograph of the composer's music, following an MDG recording (3290588) of the First Symphony, paired likewise with a concert overture, released nearly twenty years ago - and now deleted! Dorsch and the Oldenburg State Orchestra have that little bit extra brilliance and imagination, however, and it can only be hoped that they will eventually - soon, indeed - record all of Woyrsch's symphonies, including the First. 

Recordings of orchestral music on CPO are often less than ideal, with a sound that tends towards the thin lossy, but here all is well - arguably one of the label's most impressive symphonic realisations. With luck they will either always enlist this engineering team, or at least someone will remember these particular settings!  

Byzantion

Collected reviews and contact at artmusicreviews.co.uk