Jonathan Blumhofer
Any number of threads that tie these three pieces (and composers) together. But in this instance, such busywork is superfluous: the musical results – blazingly played and flawlessly recorded – speak for themselves.
This disc stands comfortably in the company of Beethoven and Bartók performances by the Emerson, Tákacs, Alban Berg, and Juilliard Quartets.
Bottom line: these are excellent performances and a valuable documentation of Elliott Carter’s early work.
A welcome addition to Scottish percussionist Colin Currie’s endlessly fascinating discography – as well as to Austrian maverick HK Gruber’s.
If this is your first Bluebeard’s Castle, Susanna Mälkki’s recording makes for a fine, occasionally inspired, introduction.
Throughout these Études, Driver’s playing marries tonal warmth with textural precision.
One might risk hyperbole by saying so, but in this instance such recklessness is worth it: this album sounds like Brahms as he ought to be played and sung.
For Alex Ross, Wagnerism is as profound and far-reaching an aesthetic ideology – for good, ill, and all degrees in between – as any.
Fiddler Daniel Hope’s new all-Schnittke disc with pianist Alexey Botvinov brings with it a level of authority that demands respect.
Arts Commentary: In Memoriam, James Levine (1943-2021)
Do any of his accomplishments – including James Levine’s raising the level of an orchestra’s playing to new heights – really excuse sexual predation?I’d argue in the negative.
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