Jørgen Plaetner is best known as one of the pioneers of electronic music in Scandinavia. This new recording from Danish label Dacapo (8226520) features Plaetner’s acoustic works and includes Episoder og Kollisoner, Op. 82 (1996) for clarinet, cello and piano; Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, Op. 93 (2000-2001); Three Songs to Texts by Stig Dagerman (1988); and Four Danish Songs.

Born in Copenhagen in 1930, Plaetner played piano as a child and entered the Royal Danish Academy of music at the age of 19, where he studied with Vagn Holmboe, Niels Viggo Bentzon, and Bjørn Hjelmborg. Early on, he became aware of the experimentation going on abroad in the field of electronic music, and at 20 he became one of the first Danes to participate in courses for contemporary music at Darmstadt. He attended the first performances of Stockhausen’s Gesang der Jünglinge and Kontakte, which inspired him to set up his own electronic music studio. In addition, Plaetner was a music teacher and taught at the State School for the Blind for almost a decade before taking a position in the town of Holstebro as the country’s first “town composer.” While serving in Holstebro, he set up a council music school for children and wrote music for local ensembles. Unfortunately, a rift with the city council in 1977 precipitated his move to Sweden, where he lived for the rest of his life.

When Plaetner died in 2002, his computer music was almost entirely forgotten in Denmark until Dacapo released a CD with a selection of his electronic works from the 1960s and 1970s (8226511), giving these works a new lease on life. That said, his electronic works have largely overshadowed his acoustic music, which includes music for chamber ensembles, vocal and theater music, and eight piano sonatas.

Representing one of the larger chamber works from Plaetner’s later period is the trio Episodes and Collisions, which was written in 1996 for the LINensemble. Partly influenced by Eastern European folk music (filtered through Bartók and Holmboe), the piece consists of various episodes that collide, in the manner of a rhapsody.

Plaetner’s Sonata for Clarinet and Piano was one of his last works, and this performance marks its world premiere. In this three-movement work, the clarinet is torn between three different moods: frantic, touching, and wounded.

Plaetner’s settings of Swedish texts by Stig Dagerman show his interest in politics. Dagerman, from 1943 until his suicide in 1954, noted his daily observations in the form of “diary leaves,” which were printed in a left-wing Swedish newspaper. Plaetner came across the texts when they appeared in book form in 1983. They became “shrewd, ironic aphorisms on the meaninglessness of war.” The Four Danish Songs feature settings of poems by poets Halfdan Rasmussen, one of Denmark’s best-loved poets, symbolist poet Sophus Claussen, Arne Herløv Petersen and Pia Tafdrup.

Generally, I would never advocate posting press releases as blog entries. In this case, however, I will make an exception. The July 29 release of Martha Argerich: Evening Talks was reason for great personal celebration for me. Yes, I’ve loved her playing for decades. And I just spent the better part of an hour trying to dig up an old Playbill from her last solo recital at Carnegie Hall. Much to my horror, it, along with my Horowitz programs, has gone missing. I do, however, have a whole bunch of eminently forgettable Metropolitan Opera programs from the early 1980s through the early 2000s. Don’t ask.

I’ve told the following story many times about Argerich’s recital. I remember expecting a formal affair, where the pianist would strut onstage in a suitably beautiful gown, bow gracefully, and then treat us to her great artistry. I got the last bit, which of course is all that mattered in the end. If memory serves, Argerich almost waddled onto the stage in a black leotard, long black stretchy skirt, and those hideous Mao shoes that were once “fashionable” (God knows why). She didn’t quite bow, but I do remember her head seemed to slope downward. But for anyone who has ever heard the great Ms. Argerich play, it made absolutely no difference. Of course she brought the house down … and seemed almost surprised by her feat. It was as if she thought that what she was doing was very simple: she was merely speaking for the composers, pure and simple. They, in fact, were the Gods and she was just the messenger.

Below is my love letter to the film and to Ms. Argerich:

“First of all, there was this interview-which is not an interview at all, as I do not believe I asked her a single question. Let us, rather, call it a conversation that took place at dead of night, without a spotlight or makeup- a single ‘night-time conversation’ recorded as if by miracle on the magnetic tape of a comer that would then become the very heart of this film.” -Georges Gachot

It took the French film director Georges Gachot 20 years to convince the very private and elusive Martha Argerich to agree to appear on camera for this intimate portrait. The resulting film, Martha Argerich: Evening Talks (Medici Arts 3073428), pays tribute to this great pianist’s 40-year career with a blend of informal conversations and superb performance footage. It also contains rare archival material from across the globe, including footage from her 1957 First Prize win at the Geneva Competition when she was just 16.

The film allows Argerich to express her feelings about music, composers, and musicians and to discuss her background and early career and how they shaped her as an artist. Argerich reminisces about her early studies with Austrian pianist Frederich Gulda, whom she credits with “[teaching] her how to listen.” She also recounts her yearlong stint with Michelangeli, during which time she received only four lessons. Moreover, she recalls the crisis she experienced in her early 20s, which spurred fellow Argentinean pianist (and conductor) Daniel Barenboim to once say, “Martha, you are like a very beautiful painting without the frame.” It becomes clear that her abandonment of solo performance so early in her career grew partly out of the intense loneliness she felt during this period.

However, through her commitment to concerto and chamber music repertoire, Martha Argerich developed into a deeply generous artist, never satisfied with herself and always looking for new meanings and approaches to her repertoire. “I find something new all the time,” she explains. “I hope I always will; I always doubt and I’m always groping.” She finds her deepest satisfaction in communicating with other musicians and communing with composers, whose music is inarguably part of her DNA. Gulda once told her “It’s not your fault that Schumann was not Argentinean.” As she plays Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A minor (effortlessly, it would seem), the listener notes that the music appears to be a natural extension of her being. “I hope I’m not bad for him,” Argerich remarks. “Schumann is very intimate for me, but I hope he likes me.” It is not surprising to hear this unique artist make such a humble comment about her work. Argerich appears utterly possessed by the composer’s essence each time she performs his music.

In a 2001 article about Martha Argerich for The New Yorker, critic Alex Ross wrote “Argerich brings to bear qualities that are seldom contained in one person: she is a pianist of brainteasing technical agility; she is a charismatic woman with an enigmatic reputation; she is an unaffected interpreter whose native language is music. This last may be the quality that sets her apart. A lot of pianists play huge double octaves; a lot of pianists photograph well. But few have the unerring naturalness of phrasing that allows them to embody the music rather than interpret it.” One listen to the Scarlatti encore from her performance in Zurich and the viewer will know exactly what Ross means.

FEATURED MUSIC INCLUDES:

Beethoven: Piano Concerto No.4, Op.58; Claudio Arrau, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Bernard Haitink (audio only).

Piazzolla/Hubert: Libertango; Martha Argerich & Eduardo Hubert, pianos, Ricardo Rossi, percussion.
Pescara, 2000

Liszt: Piano Concerto No.1; Martha Argerich, New Philharmonia Orchestra, Erich Leinsdorf. Paris, 1973

Chopin: Piano Concerto No.1, Op.11; Martha Argerich, Orchestre philharmonique de l’ORTF, Franco Mannino. Paris, 1969

Beethoven: “Moonlight” Sonata, Op. 27 No. 2 - Friedrich Gulda, piano. Vienna, 1968

Beethoven: Piano Concerto No.2, Op.19 - Martha Argerich, piano & conductor, London Sinfonietta. Milan, 1980

Ravel: Piano Concerto in G; Martha Argerich, Orchestre philharmonique de Radio France, Charles Dutoit. Paris, 1991

Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No. 3, Op. 26; Martha Argerich, London Symphony Orchestra, André Previn. Croydon, 1977

Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsody No.6 - Martha Argerich, piano (aged 15). 1957 (audio only)

Chopin: Scherzo, Op. 39 No. 3 - Martha Argerich, piano. Warsaw, 1965

Bach: Partita No. 2, BWV 826: Capriccio - Martha Argerich, piano. Zurich, 2001

Schumann: Piano Concerto, Op. 54; Martha Argerich, Württembergisches Kammerorchester, Jörg Faerber. Heilbronn, 2001

Saint-Saens: Introduction & Rondo capriccioso, Op. 28 (arr. for violin and piano); Martha Argerich, piano, Géza Hosszu-Legocky, violin. Geneva, 2000

Dvorak: Slavonic Dance, Op.72 No. 2, Martha Argerich, piano, Géza Hosszu-Legocky, violin. Pescara, 2000 (arr. for violin and piano)

Lutosławski: Variations on a Theme by Paganini - Martha Argerich, Mauricio Vallina, pianos. Pescara,
2000

Ravel: Ma Mère l’oye: Laideronette, Impératrice des Pagodes; Martha Argerich & Nelson Freire, piano 4 hands. Buenos Aires, 1999

Schumann: Von fremden Ländern und Menschen, Op.15 No.1 - Martha Argerich, piano. Warsaw, 1980
Prokofiev: Toccata, Op.11 - Martha Argerich, piano (audio only)

EXTRAS (duration: 38 min.):

Witold Lutosławski, Variations on a Theme by Paganini; Martha Argerich & Mauricio Vallina, pianos. Recorded in Pescara, Italy, 2000

Robert Schumann, Piano Concerto in A minor, Op.54; Director’s cut of the rehearsals. Martha Argerich, Württembergisches Kammerorchester, conducted by Jörg Faerber. Recorded at Heilbronn, Germany, 2001

Astor Piazzolla, arr. Eduardo Hubert; Martha Argerich & Eduardo Hubert, pianos, Ricardo Rossi, percussion.
Recorded in Pescara, Italy, 2000.
Libertango
Tres minutos con la realidad

Encores by Martha Argerich
Recorded in Zurich, Switzerland, 2001.
Domenico Scarlatti, Sonata in D minor, K141
Frederic Chopin, Mazurka in F minor, Op.63 No.2
Johann Sebastian Bach, Partita No. 2 in C minor, BWV826: Capriccio

Composed 11 years apart, Michael Nyman’s Six Celan Songs and The Ballad of Kastriort Rexhepi feature Sarah Leonard and Hilary Summers, singers the composer cites as key interpreters of his vocal music.
The Six Celan Songs were composed in 1990 for acclaimed German singer Ute Lemper. For this cycle, Nyman selected six of Paul Celan’s less hermetic texts, which represented the poet’s attempt to come to terms with the impossibility-according to German philosopher and social critic Theodor Adorno-of writing poetry after the Holocaust. The songs individually and collectively express the horror and emptiness experienced by the writer in exile. Nyman uses music to reinvent an imaginary emotional world related to the Romanian background in 1920s Bukovina, where Celan was born.

The Ballad of Kastriot Rexhepi, unlike the Six Celan Songs, deals directly with a war situation: an 18-month-old Kosovan boy, left for dead during the Balkan Wars, is found and re-named by the Serbs and reunites with his parents six months later. It is the most recent in Nyman’s series of collaborations with visual artists-in this case, the American feminist/conceptualist Mary Kelly. Kelly provided the composer with a complex text in simple ballad form, which he brilliantly subverts in his 18-minute piece. The work was written for Sarah Leonard and the Nyman Quartet and received its first performance in 2001 at the Santa Monica Museum of Art, surrounded by Kelly’s visual representation of the text.

Nyman Brass marks the first time an entire album of the composer’s music has been entrusted to an ensemble other than the musicians who regularly work with him. For this recording, Nyman’s works have been expertly arranged by John Parkinson and Andrew Berryman for the British brass band Wingates Band.

The two main sequences on the album are from the scores to Volker Schlöndorff’s 1996 film The Ogre and Laurence Dunmore’s The Libertine (2005). Rounding out the album are two Michael Nyman Band classics, In Re Don Giovanni and Chasing sheep is best left to shepherds from The Draughtman’s Contract (Peter Greenaway, 1982). Here the music sounds significantly different from the original performances. The composer remarks that “the whole sound-world was transformed. Things like repeated rhythms which I originally gave to piano are punchier, edgier, more dangerous on cornets and trombones.”

Wingates Band was formed in 1873 by the members of the Bible Class of Wingates Independent Methodist Church in Westhoughton, Bolton, in response to a challenge from members of Westhoughton Old Band, founded in 1858. By the turn of the century, led by legendary ‘giant’ of the British brass band movement Willaim Rimmer, Wingates had become one of the top bands in the country. In 1906, the Band achieved national fame by winning the “double”: the British Open and the British National Championships. The following year, Wingates astounded the brass band world by completing the “double” again. For more information, visit www.wingatesband.org.

Michael Nyman comments that it was “a privilege” to work with Wingates. Although his music is very different from what the players were used to, Nyman says they “picked up the style, especially the formality of the music, and it soon sounded second nature to them …I loved the spirit of the playing, the instant dedication and the energy in what is a very new sound world for me.”

Found this in the Naxos circular and I thought I share with everyone.

NAXOS Opens its new logistics centre in July

Effective July 1st, Naxos will open its new logistics centre NGL (Naxos Global Logistics) in Kirchheim, near Munich. With the launch of NGL, Naxos will have an operations centre in a centralized location for its distribution activities throughout Germany and worldwide markets. 

Mr. Chris Voll, Managing Director of NAXOS Germany, announced the appointment of Mr. Mohamed El Wakil, former Chief Financial Officer of NAXOS Germany, to the post of Managing Director of NGL. “I’m very pleased that we could staff this important position with a veteran member of the NAXOS family, “ said Voll. “Through his experience and know - how, Mr. El Wakil has the skills and experience for this task.”

Voll spoke of the benefits of the new logistics centre, “With NGL we can accommodate the still unbowed demand for Classical Music physical product and also optimize our service to our German and international distribution partners.” 

“Our customer service will be even better,” said El Wakil. “Apart from new telephone and fax numbers, there will be little change in how we do business with our German partners, I am looking forward to this new step in our business.” NGL benefits from a good central location. “The new logistics centre in Munich/Kirchheim is seamlessly connected to the local infrastructure,” said El Wakil. “The nearby Munich airport and motorway provide an ideal transit route which optimizes the distribution process. Due to its size and location, NGL will provide an ideal base for the worldwide expansion of NAXOS distribution activities.”

So if you’re in the area please help welcome them to the neighbourhood. 

Zum ersten Juli eröffnet Naxos ein neues Logistikzentrum für den nationalen und internationalen Versand und bündelt damit den Vertriebsbereich wieder unter einem Firmendach. Damit wird Naxos Global Logistics (NGL) in Kirchheim vor den Toren Münchens zum Dreh- und Angelpunkt der deutschen und globalen Vertriebsaktivitäten des weltweit agierenden Unternehmens.

Ab Juli sollen von Kirchheim aus alle Tonträger von NGL distribuiert werden. Als Geschäftsführer gab Naxos-Deutschland-Chef Chris Vol Mohamed El Waki bekannt, der bislang als kaufmännischer Direktor für die Naxos Deutschland Musik & Video Vertriebs-GmbH tätig war: “Ich freue mich, dass mit Herrn El Wakil ein langjähriges Mitglied der Naxos-Familie für diese verantwortungsvolle Position gefunden werden konnte. Herr El Wakil bringt durch seine Erfahrung und sein Know-how alle Voraussetzungen für diese Leitungsfunktion mit.”

Zudem betonte Voll die Vorteile des neuen Logistikzentrums: “Damit tragen wir der nach wie vor ungebrochenen Nachfrage nach dem physischen Tonträger im Bereich Klassik Rechnung und können die Abwicklung und den Service sowohl für den deutschen Handel als auch für unsere internationalen Vertriebspartner optimieren.” Für den Handel in Deutschland ändere sich außer den Telefonnummern, Faxnummern und einem “noch besseren Service” nichts, so Voll. Mohamed El Wakil lobt die günstige Lage des Vertriebsstützpunkts. “Das neue Logistikzentrum in München-Kirchheim ist perfekt an die Infrastruktur wie Autobahn und Flughafen angebunden und bietet somit auch hinsichtlich der örtlichen Gegebenheiten optimale Bedingungen für einen reibungslosen logistischen Ablauf. Ich freue mich sehr auf diese neue Aufgabe.”

Außerdem sei das neue Vertriebszentrum so dimensioniert, dass auch für weitere Vertriebe und Labels sowohl die deutsche Logistik als auch der weltweite Export abgewickelt werden könne, und biete daher eine optimale Grundlage für die Expansion der Aktivitäten im nationalen und internationalen Bereich.

An interview with Michael Nyman who has worked as a composer, pianist, harpsichordist, musicologist, music editor, writer, photographer and videographer.

He has provided the scores for most of Peter Greenaway’s movies, as well as Jane Campion’s movie The Piano.

Album details…
Catalogue No.: MNRCD113