CLASSICAL

Latest releases reviewed.

TCHAIKOVSKY: PIANO CONCERTO NO 1; MUSSORGSKY: PICTURES AT AN EXHIBITION
Ayako Uehara, London Symphony Orchestra/Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos EMI Classics
***

In 2002 the 21-year-old Ayako Uehara became the first woman and the first Japanese pianist to take the top prize at the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. In the process she knocked Alexei Nabioulin, who had taken the top prize in Dublin in 2001, into second place. This coupling of the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto and Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition shows Uehara to be a thoughtful and technically able player. It's as if she's set out to show that she's no stereotypical, whizz-kid competition winner. Yet, although she manages to avoid many of the cliches of keyboard athleticism (while still revealing her very real athletic abilities) she also tends to ruminate in a way that can drain essential energy from her music-making. There's a viable middle-ground in this regard which she hasn't fully found her way around yet.  www.emiclassics.com Michael Dervan

GRIEG: NORWEGIAN DANCES
Estonian National Symphony Orchestra/Paavo Järvi Virgin Classics 344 7222
***

Paavo Järvi and the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra scored a great success with Grieg's Peer Gynt music last year. In this new Grieg collection - the Symphonic Dances, Op 64, the Norwegian Dances, Op 35, the Holberg Suite and the Elegiac Melodies, Op 34 - Järvi slightly underplays his hand. The intention is obviously to avoid anything overblown or unduly sentimental. But the music here is not as characterful as in Peer Gynt, and neither the straightness of the playing nor the reluctance to create too much light and shade are entirely to the music's advantage. On the other hand, of course, the playing never stresses the music out of shape or asks it to convey more than it can bear.  www.virginclassics.com  Michael Dervan

TAKEMITSU: A FLOCK DESCENDS INTO THE PENTAGONAL GARDEN & OTHER WORKS
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra/Marin Alsop Naxos 8.557760
****

French impressionism was alive and well in the Japan of the late 20th century through the music of Toru Takemitsu. Marin Alsop's new Naxos collection ranges from Solitude Sonore of 1958 to Spirit Garden, written in 1994, two years before the composer's death. The disc also includes two pieces associated with dreams, Dreamtime (1981) and A Flock Descends into the Pentagonal Garden (1977) plus workmanlike excerpts from three 1990s film scores. Alsop and her players breathe just the right perfumed air for this selection of time-stilling pieces by one of the 20th century's most alluring orchestrators. www.naxos.com Michael Dervan

A UNIVERSAL MUSICIAN
Karl Richter Deutsche Grammophon Original Masters 477 6210 (8 CDs)
***

For most music-lovers Karl Richter (1926-81) was first and last the founder of the Munich Bach Choir and Orchestra, who conducted his favourite repertoire with a powerful, reverential expressiveness that is poles apart from the lighter tread of today's period performances. This compilation shows a wider reach, starting from a pioneering 1953 performance of Schütz's Musikalische Exequien that packs all the power of his Bach. Haydn's Surprise and Clock Symphonies with the Berlin Philharmonic (rather smile-resistant), and four symphonies by CPE Bach (with the composer's characteristic surprises rather smoothed out). Richter is also shown as a gifted organist (very impressive in Mozart, Brahms and Liszt), as well as a man who was a more than proficient harpsichordist, though his performances here of Bach and Handel are quite out of kilter with today's tastes. The set also includes Alessandro Scarlatti's cantata Su le sponde del Tebro with soprano Maria Stader and a selection of baroque arias with both Stader and tenors Ernst Haefliger and Peter Schreier. www.deutschegrammophon.com Michael Dervan