Jonathan Blumhofer

Classical Album Review: Rautavaara & Martinů Piano Concertos

July 30, 2023
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Move over, Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, and Bartók: the pantheon of great Third Piano Concertos is growing.

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Classical Album Review: Charles Villiers Stanford’s “Requiem”

July 29, 2023
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This new recording of Charles Villiers Stanford’s”Requiem” by Martyn Brabbins, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO), and the University of Birmingham Voices, is beautiful and often memorable.

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Classical Music Album Review: John Corigliano’s Piano Music

July 28, 2023
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An album that does admirable justice to one of the most prolific, significant, and increasingly long-lived composers of a remarkable generation.

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Classical Music Album Review: Violinist Randall Goosby Plays Concertos by Max Bruch and Florence Price

July 27, 2023
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Randall Goosby’s sophomore album proves that the violinist is the real deal.

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Classical Album Review: Karina Canellakis conducts Bartók — Pretty Much as Good as They Come

May 29, 2023
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This is an album of top-notch orchestral playing. Yet the real star is Karina Canellakis.

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Book Review: “Beethoven in the Bunker” — A Welcome, But Scattered, Point of Departure

May 28, 2023
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In place of coherent, in-depth analysis, the author has provided us with a series of short profiles on various individuals, some of them familiar, others less so. The tack presents problems that can’t be overcome.

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Classical Album Review: Martin Fröst’s “Ecstasy and Abyss” — A Mixed Bag of Mozart

May 27, 2023
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The best items in this all-Mozart album are the concertos.

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Classical Album Review: Violinist Maria Ioudenitch’s “Songbird” Soars

May 26, 2023
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Violinist Maria Ioudenitch seems to know how to get directly at the expressive core of this fare without devolving into showboating or histrionics.

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Classical CD and Livestream Reviews: Mahler 2, Two Ways

May 9, 2023
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In both performances tempos are fleet but not rushed. The big moments – from the hellish apex of the first movement’s development to the screaming climax of the Scherzo and the cathartic resolution of the finale – pack heavy punches.

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Music Documentary Review: “Music Under the Swastika” — Uncomfortably Timely

April 23, 2023
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The road to ultimate destruction is lined by spiritual apathy, intellectual carelessness, and moral equivalency.

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