Cellist Yuli Turovsky founded I musici de Montreal in
1983. Since that time he has turned the fifteen member chamber
orchestra
into the Canadian version of Britain’s Academy of St. Martin
in the Fields, racking up more than forty recordings and presenting
more than one hundred concerts each season throughout the world.
In this collection of sedate slow movements, the orchestra has
compiled more than three hours of down-tempo excerpts sure to
be a hit in doctors’ offices all over the globe.
There is a great deal in these discs to enjoy. In particular,
Turovsky’s amber-toned cello playing, featured in a number
of concerto movements is worth the price of admission. There
is quite a lot of Baroque music, some of it adapted for modern
forces by various skilled arrangers. I musici de Montreal is
a modern instrument band, and although they perform with great
sensitivity and taste, there is a good deal more vibrato in the
string playing than is allowed by the period folk. Frankly, this
richness of sound is rather refreshing to these ears and I am
reminded of the great body of recordings made by Sir Neville
Marriner and the ASMF, Jean-François Paillard and his
chamber orchestra, and the Italian ensemble, also known as I
musici.
Other fine solos are delivered by Timothy Hutchins, particularly
in the gorgeous Largo from Vivaldi’s Concerto in C for
Sopranino recorder. Theodore Baskin also turns in some luscious
playing in another Vivaldi work, this one an Oboe concerto, also
in C. We get a goodly chunk of van Wassenaer’s Concerti
armonico, works that for years were attributed to Italian
boy genius Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, whose brilliant reputation
led to all kinds of misleading publications after his tragic
death at the tender age of twenty-six. These are lovely concertos,
brimming with melody and rich harmonic suspensions, and the slow
movements presented here are lovingly phrased.
Disc two is an interesting hodgepodge of old and new(er) music
with items from the baroque sharing the stage with classical
period, romantic and even a piece or two by more or less contemporary
composers. Each selection, however is geared toward the theme
of tranquillity, and after a couple of hours of straight listening,
I found myself going a bit numb from all the pretty slowness.
With many of the excerpts coming in at under two minutes, I found
that I barely had time to enjoy the music before it was over.
Perhaps fewer works of somewhat more substantial length would
have been a bit more engaging, but then again, that is a rather
minor quibble.
Other highlights include a beautiful rendition of the Andante
from Josef Suk’s E-flat serenade for strings. Suk is a
composer that deserves to be heard more often in the concert
hall, and this lovely excerpt is proof of that assertion. Borodin’s
gorgeous Notturno from his second string quartet, here arranged
by Lucas Drew for string orchestra receives a fine reading as
does Samuel Barber’s ubiquitous Adagio, in a performance
that spares us the gushy hyper-emotionalism of Leonard Bernstein’s
lugubrious old recording.
Serious music buffs will likely thumb their noses at this compilation
as it’s obviously designed to appeal to the “pretty
music” set. But, for a long evening of peace and quiet,
an elegant dinner party or a romantic encounter with one’s
significant other, this attractively packaged set contains a
lifetime’s worth of mood music, performed by a superb ensemble
in top form. One can hope, however that the buyer will be inspired
to explore the complete works from which these excerpts are taken.
Slow and pretty is all fine and good, but the composers put forth
complete sets of ideas in the works represented, and they are
deserving of a full hearing.
Kevin Sutton
Details
CD 1
Johann Christian BACH (1735-1782) Concerto in c minor
for cello and orchestra (Adagio molto espressivo) [7:04]
Count Unico Wilhelm van WASSENAER (1692-1766) (formerly
attributed to Pergolesi) Concerto armonico No. 3 in A (Largo,
andante) [3:55]; Concerto armonico No. 4 in f (Largo) [4:19];
Concerto armonico No. 1 in G (Grave, staccato) [4:57]; Concerto
armonico No. 5 in B flat (Largo, andante) [4:25]; Concerto armonico
No. 4 in f (Adagio) [2:50]; Concerto armonico No. 2 in G (Largo
affetuoso) [4:35]
Antonio VIVALDI (1678-1741) Concerto in C for Recorder
and Orchestra, RV444 (Largo) [4:14]; Concerto in C for Oboe and
Orchestra, RV449 (Largo) [2:44]; Concerto in A for Strings, RV158
(Largo) [3:24]; Concerto in g for Two Cellos and Orchestra RV531
(Largo) [3:31]; Concerto in F for Flute and Orchestra RV433 (Largo)
[2:14]
Igor STRAVINSKY (1882-1971) Concerto in D for strings
(Arioso) [2:35]
Dmitri SHOSTAKOVICH (1906-1975) Concerto No. 2
in F for Piano and Orchestra, Op. 102 (Andante) [6:01]
Luigi BOCCHERINI (1743-1805) Concerto in B-flat
for Cello and Orchestra, G482 (Adagio non troppo) [6:34]
CD 2
Giuseppi TARTINI (1692-1770) Concerto in D for
Cello and Strings (arr. Louis Delune) (Grave espressivo) [6:17]
Antonio VIVALDI (1678-1741) Concerto in F for Violin,
Organ and Strings RV542 (Adagio) [3:39]; Concerto in D for Two
Violins, Cello and Strings, RV565 (Largo e spiccato) [4:11];
Concerto in G for Two Violins, Two Cellos and Strings, RV575
(Largo) [2:56]
Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791) Divertimento
in B flat, KV 137 (Andante) [4:09]; Church Sonata in F, KV224
[4:24]; Divertimento in F, KV 138 (Andante) [5:56]
Franz SCHUBERT (1797-1828) Minuet No. 3 in d, D89
[5:40]
Benjamin BRITTEN (1913-1976) Variations on a Theme
of Frank Bridge, Op. 10 (Romance) [1:37]
Georg Frideric HANDEL (1685-1759) Concerto grosso
in a, Op. 6, No. 3 (Larghetto affetuoso) [2:33]; Concerto grosso
in e, Op. 6, No. 3 (Larghetto) [1:31]; Concerto grosso in B flat,
Op. 6, No. 7 (Largo e piano) [2:43]; Concerto grosso in c, Op.
6, No. 8 (Adagio) [1:27]; Concerto grosso in b, Op. 6, No. 12
(Largo) [1:12]
Rodion Konstantinovich SHCHEDRIN (b. 1932) Carmen
Suite (Second Intermezzo) [1:59]
Josef SUK (1874-1935) Serenade in E-flat for Strings,
Op. 6 (Andante con moto) [6:10]
Camille SAINT- SAËNS (1835-1921) Carnival
of the Animals (The Swan) [3:31]
Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893) Album for
the Young (The Old Nanny’s Tale) [2:54]
Franz Josef HAYDN (1732-1809) Divertimento in D
for Cello and Strings (arr. Gregor Piatigorski) (Adagio) [5:23]
CD 3
Antonin DVORAK (1841-1904) Serenade in E for Strings,
Op. 22 (Moderato) [4:54]; Waltz No. 1 in A, Op. 54 [4:46]
Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791) Serenade in
G for Strings RV525 (Eine kleine Nachtmusik) (Romanze, Andante)
[5:44]
Marc-Olivier DUPIN (b. 1954) Fantasia on Arias
from La Traviata (Allegretto, Andantino, Allegro Brillante) [11:22]
Franz Josef HAYDN (1732-1809) Twelve German Dances,
H. IX: 12 [8:32]
Johannes BRAHMS (1833-1897) Liebeslieder Waltzer,
Op. 52 (Arranged for strings by Friedrich Hermann) (No. 6, No.
1 and No. 9) [4:43]
Alexander Porfir’yevich BORODIN (1833-1887) String
Quartet No. 2 in D (Notturno, Andante) (arranged for String Orchestra
by Lucas Drew) [9:09]
Samuel BARBER (1910-1981) Adagio for Strings [10:17]
Yuli Turovsky (cello); Timothy Hutchins (sopranino recorder,
flute); Theodore Baskin (oboe); Alain Aubut (cello); Dmitri
Shostakovich, Jr. (piano); Elenora
Turovsky (violin); Geneviève Soly (organ); Edvard Skerjanc (violin); Christian
Prèvost (violin); Lucia Hall (violin); Benoit Hurtuboise (cello); David
Owen Norris (piano); Gregory Shaverdian (piano); Alexander Trostiansky (violin);
Ensemble Repercussion; I musici de Montreal; Yuli Turovsky/Maxim Shostakovich
rec. locations and dates not given.
I musici
de Montreal/Yuli Turovsky
