MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2023
Approaching 60,000 reviews
and more.. 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
RECORDING OF THE MONTH


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos 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
Sound Samples & Downloads

Franco ALFANO (1875-1954)
Violin Sonata in D (1923) [31:31]
Piano Quintet in A flat major (1945) [27:58]
Nenia and Scherzino for violin and piano (arr. Enrico Pierangeli) (1936) [4:24+2:23]
Elmira Darvarova (violin), Scott Dunn (piano), Mary Ann Mumm (violin), Craig Mumm (viola), Samuel Magill (cello)
rec. Edith Memorial Chapel, The Lawrenceville School, Lawrenceville, NJ, 22-23 February 2011. DDD
NAXOS 8.572753 [66:16]

Experience Classicsonline


For a while it seemed that Alfano was to be remembered simply as the composer who completed Puccini's Turandot. That's no bad thing. At least it kept his name somewhere near public awareness and intermittent curiosity. Others have suffered far worse. He also benefited because his operas, written during the verismo ascendancy, received wide-spaced occasional revivals and then recordings. Beyond his dozen operas there are four ballets, a Hymn to Bolivar (premiered in Caracas in December 1930 to mark the Bolivar centenary), a Suite Romantica for orchestra, Three Tagore Songs for voice and chamber orchestra, a Divertimento for piano and chamber orchestra and three string quartets, a cello sonata and a violin sonata. There are two ambitious symphonies and a third dating from 1934 for 32 instruments.

His concert works have emerged only slowly from the long and suffocating shadow cast by Respighi and have done so alongside those of Casella, Ghedini and Pizzetti. His Cello Sonata and Triple Concerto can be heard on Naxos 8.570928. His first two symphonies are on CPO 777 080. There is also a CD of his opera Cyrano de Bergerac on CPO and a DVD/Blu-ray on Naxos 2.110270 or Blu-ray NBD0005.

Here the 1923 original version of the Violin Sonata is caught in full passionate radiance. The music sings and sings and sings. If you enjoy the Delius sonatas and the Walton violin concerto then seek this out without delay. The ideas are intrinsically good and the flow and dramatic schema make an ineluctable case. The music speaks without a tremor with its face looking into the light. The Piano Quintet was his last chamber work. It continues the style of the Sonata with exultantly cantabile magnificently weighted and paced. One might well think while hearing this glorious work of the romantic chamber music of Chausson, early Fauré, Joseph Marx and Korngold. The performance feels utterly committed - no half measures.

The CD ends with a bipartite piece also in a world premiere recording. There's the elfin delight of the chuckling and light-suffused Nenia contrasted with the skippingly pregnant tension and sweetly liquid triumphal progress of the Scherzino.

Dr Konrad Dryden is to be congratulated on his outstanding liner-note. He clearly knows his subject having written the monograph Franco Alfano - Transcending Turandot. Now that Alfano monograph I would like to read. The composer's life would make a fine television documentary and Dryden would be key to such a project. More to the point, he avoids the often futile attempts to describe works in words. Instead he delivers an attentive, well-structured and detailed account of the music and its context. For now though let's hope for more of the concert music.

Rob Barnett

 

 

 

 

 


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.