Jason Victor Serinus

Chesky Raps It Home for the New Year

Jason Victor Serinus Dec 31, 2018

Many of us enter the New Year with a mixture of sorrow for our losses and hope for what lies ahead. While there's no right way to celebrate 2019's symbolic new start, one approach to creating space for the new is to pause long enough to acknowledge our lives and environment for exactly what they are at the present moment.

Cue David Chesky's Rap Symphony 2.0, a reworking of Chesky's original release currently available in download and video form.

Jason Victor Serinus

A Christmas Greeting from Bach Collegium Japan

Jason Victor Serinus Dec 22, 2018

Although I'm far more of a "Happy Holidays" audiophile than anything else, the prospect of a high-resolution Christmas-themed recording from Masaaki Suzuki and his superb Bach Collegium Japan led me to their new hybrid SACD issue from BIS, Verbum caro factum est: A Christmas Greeting (BIS-2291). Auditioned as a 24/96 stereo downloaddownloading or streaming are the only ways to access the recording immediately, and in format choices that include surroundMasaaki Suzuki's recording managed to bring smiles, warmth, and good cheer to this admittedly down-on-religion Grinch.

Recording of the Month

Recording of January 2019: Into the Fire

Jason Victor Serinus Dec 18, 2018

Joyce DiDonato: Into the Fire
Works by Heggie, Strauss, Debussy, Gruber, Lekeu
Joyce DiDonato, mezzo-soprano; Brentano String Quartet
Erato 573802 (24/96, CD). 2018. Jeremy Hayes, prod.; Steve Portnoi, balance, mastering. DDD. TT: 77:38
Performance ****½
Sonics ****½

On the 2017 Winter Solstice, the astounding Joyce DiDonatothe coloratura mezzo-soprano from Kansas who zips through impossible runs of Rossinian roulades faster than anyone can shuck corntook a break from opera to present a song recital in London's famed Wigmore Hall. With Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer's moving song cycle Into the Fire as its centerpiece, this live recording of DiDonato with the Brentano String Quartet confirms that she is a song interpreter of rare distinction.

Jason Victor Serinus

Jordi Savall and Le Concert des Nations Dance, Dance, Dance

Jason Victor Serinus Dec 15, 2018

Terpsichore, the Greek goddess of dance and chorus. How appropriate that her delight in dancing should be honored in Terpsichore: Apotheóse de la Danse baroque (Alia Vox), the latest beautifully produced and packaged Alia Vox SACD from Jordi Savall and his baroque orchestra, Le Concert des Nations. Filled with high energy orchestral music by Jean-Ferry Rebel (16661747) and the even longer-lived Georg Philipp Telemann (16811767), the recording exalts the exuberant French style of instrumental dance music that became popular during the rise of the baroque orchestra in the courts of Kings Henry IV and Louis XIII in the early 17th century.

Jason Victor Serinus

Aequa & H e (a) r

Jason Victor Serinus Dec 09, 2018

First came the press release, from San Francisco Symphony, announcing:

Esa-Pekka Salonen is the Music Director Designate of SFS, to replace Michael Tilson Thomas when he voluntarily steps down after the summer of 2020.

EPS will lead SFS in a program on January 1820 that includes the SFS premiere of Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir's Metacosmos, Richard Strauss's Also Sprach Zarathustra, and Sibelius's Four Legends from the Kalevala.

These led me to explore Thorvaldsdottir's music in two recent hi-rez releases from Sono Luminus: Aequa: International Contemporary Ensemble Performs Anna Thorvaldsdottir (DSL-92224), and Nordic Affect: H e (a) r (DSL-92227).

Jason Victor Serinus

Sacred Polyphony from Antoine de Févin

Jason Victor Serinus Dec 02, 2018

There I was, driving through the streets of Port Townsend, dodging the dashing deer, when out of the blue, strains of Palestrina came floating by. Giving thanks to CBC Radio, which we can receive in the Pacific Northwest, I noticed immediately how my internal space had become far more peaceful after just a few bars of Palestrina's polyphonic writing for multiple voices. It was at that minute that I realized that I missed listening to sacred vocal music of the Renaissance, and that it was high time that more of it made its way on to the Stereophile.com.

French composer Antoine de Févin (ca 14701511/12) was, according to conductor Stephen Rice, one of the most accomplished and widely circulated creators of sacred music in France and Europe around 1500. With very few entire recordings devoted to Févin's music, there is no better way to make his acquaintance than the latest offering from Rice and The Brabant Ensemble, Antoine de Févin: Missa Ave Maria & Salve sancta parens (Hyperion CDA68265).

Jason Victor Serinus

Currentzis Turns to Mahler's Sixth Symphony

Jason Victor Serinus Nov 26, 2018

The utter devastation and hopelessness conveyed by Teodor Currentzis' recent Sony Classics recording of Tchaikovsky's Symphony No.6, "Pathétique," was so shattering that I could not wait to hear what he and his MusicAererna orchestra of Perm, Russia would do with Mahler's Symphony No.6 in a, "Tragic." In fact, I was so eager to experience Currentzis' first recording of Mahler's music that I listened to the 24/96 download even before the physical CD becomes available on December 7.

Jason Victor Serinus

Sonatas as Mozart Might Have Heard Them

Jason Victor Serinus Nov 20, 2018

How to encompass the myriad delights in Mozart's multiple Sonatas for Violin and Fortepiano? Judging from the three chosen by baroque violinist Isabelle Faust and period instrument/modern music keyboard specialist Alexander Melnikov for their November 23 release, Mozart Sonatas for Violin and Fortepiano, Vol.1 (Harmonia Mundi 902360), we will be fortunate enough to struggle with that question for some time to come.

Jason Victor Serinus

Silent Voices

Jason Victor Serinus Nov 16, 2018

Silent Voices (New Amsterdam Records) comes from the Grammy Award-winning Brooklyn Youth Chorus. The recording, from young forces who have performed with everyone from the New Philharmonic and Mariinsky Orchestra to Barbara Streisand and Elton John, showcases works composed for their ongoing multimedia, multi-composer concert series, Silent Voices. Some of these works, which have already been heard at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, National Sawdust, and other prestigious venues, are sure to find their way into the songbooks of many a professional and student organization.

Jason Victor Serinus

A Modern Witches' Sabbath

Jason Victor Serinus Nov 09, 2018

This review and its companion that will follow next week spotlight two very different and equally recommendable recordings of contemporary music with a common theme: the quest for freedom and justice in perilous times. This week's special, Lament/Witches' Sabbath (New Focus Recordings), due out today (November 9), contains four works by Mathew Rosenblum, an East Coast composer who occasionally ventures into forbidden territory as he blends percussion, acoustic instruments, electronics, voice and microtonal elements in extremely visceral, moving, and sometimes gut-wrenching ways.