Composer: Leoš Janáček
Performer: James Ehnes, Melina Mandozzi, Susanna Andersson
Orchestra: Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra
Conductor: Edward Gardner
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Chandos
Catalogue: CHSA5156
Release: 2015
Size: 1.25 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
01. Zarlivost (Jealousy), JW VI / 10
02. Violin Concerto ‘Pilgrimage of the Soul’
03. The Ballad of Blaník
The Fiddler’s Child
04. Con moto – Vivo – Adagio – Allegro – Tempo Vivo – Tempo I – Meno mosso – Allegro
05. Larghetto – Poco mosso – Tempo I – Con moto – Con moto – Meno mosso – Con moto
06. Allegro – Maestoso
Dunaj (The Danube), JW IX / 7 (completed by M. Stedron and L. Faltus)
07. I. Andante – Un poco piu mosso – Con moto
08. II. Un poco piu mosso – Meno mosso – Presto – Adagio
09. III. Allegro – Meno – Piu mosso
10. IV. [Allegretto] – [Waltz] – Piu mosso
Taras Bulba
11. I. Smrt Andrijova (Death of Andrij)
12. II. Smrt Ostapova (The Death of Ostap)
13. III. Proroctvi a smrt Tarase Bulby (The Prophecy and Death of Taras Bulba)
This is the second volume in our series devoted to the orchestral works of Janáček, with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra and Edward Gardner.
The repertoire on this disc includes some of the greatest programmatic pieces by the composer. Unsurprisingly, the first piece featured here is Jealousy – his first declared piece of programme music, originally written to preface the opera Jenůfa but never included in any production of it during his lifetime. Both The Ballad of Blaník and The Fiddler’s Child (also known as a ‘ballad for orchestra’) are characterised by the use of musicals symbols, reflecting the Czech poems on which the pieces are based and also some of the composer’s personal reflections and responses.
The one-movement Violin Concerto The Wandering of a Little Soul is a more mysterious piece, with uncertainties surrounding the title, the date of creation, and the goals of its composition. Like the unfinished Danube symphony, the version recorded here has been reconstructed by Miloš Štědroň and Leoš Faltus from Janáček’s sketches.
An interpretation of the famous tale by Gogol, Taras Bulba was completed in 1915 and was Janáček’s most substantial orchestral work to date. It is inflected with folk dances, battle and horse-riding music, suffering and love, and brought to a grandiloquent apotheosis, in orchestration of almost cinematic vividness.