Post by Anders October 5, 2009 (1 of 26)
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I just want to second Polly Nomial´s review on Szymanowski, Dvorak by Steinbacher. This is a very good performance by a mature artist, not a "teenage wonder" (I heard her a couple of years ago in Malmö, Sweden and she is very godd live too), of lovely music in a superb recording. The engineer Geijsen has truly excelled himself lately (the recording of Sa Chen in Mussorgsky is a most excellent piano recording and all the recordings of Helmchen in Mozart and Schubert). This bodes well for the future.
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Post by Claude October 5, 2009 (2 of 26)
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This looks like a great release, also because of the less popular repertoire.
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I am really looking forward to this (October 27th is our date of release). I have heard Steinbacher in concert three times now and each was quite a treat.
I look somewhat askance at Poly's characterization: "The queen is dead, long live the queen" and I really don't think the evidence of "steely" sound stems so much from Julia Fischer's vibrato so much as the Guadagnini itself. Fischer is an artist of unusual potential, that is potential for giving at any point in time, an astonishingly inspired and superbly executed performance of music ranging from Bach and Vivaldi to Shostakovitch. I remain pained that she saw fit to leave PentaTone.
Arabella Steinbacher however is a VERY fine artist in her own right without comparisons to Fischer. We are extremely lucky to have her.
I sincerely hope PentaTone will proactively work to convince her and Herr Martin Helmchen as well, that remaining with the label is a commitment to the service of music. In other words, adding well balanced effective MCH SACD to these artists home audio systems should be considered as a cost of doing business. Maybe, if they leave, they return the equipment!
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Post by Peter October 6, 2009 (4 of 26)
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Windsurfer said:
I am really looking forward to this (October 27th is our date of release). I have heard Steinbacher in concert three times now and each was quite a treat.
I look somewhat askance at Poly's characterization: "The queen is dead, long live the queen" and I really don't think the evidence of "steely" sound stems so much from Julia Fischer's vibrato so much as the Guadagnini itself. Fischer is an artist of unusual potential, that is potential for giving at any point in time, an astonishingly inspired and superbly executed performance of music ranging from Bach and Vivaldi to Shostakovitch. I remain pained that she saw fit to leave PentaTone.
Arabella Steinbacher however is a VERY fine artist in her own right without comparisons to Fischer. We are extremely lucky to have her.
I sincerely hope PentaTone will proactively work to convince her and Herr Martin Helmchen as well, that remaining with the label is a commitment to the service of music. In other words, adding well balanced effective MCH SACD to these artists home audio systems should be considered as a cost of doing business. Maybe if they leave, they return the equipment!
There's an interesting mini-review with AS in the Awards issue of Gramophone.
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Windsurfer said:
I look somewhat askance at Poly's characterization: "The queen is dead, long live the queen"
That was meant somewhat tongue-in-cheek!
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Post by Peter October 6, 2009 (6 of 26)
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Polly Nomial said:
That was meant somewhat tongue-in-cheek!
Now, where did I read that AS and JF had the same teacher? Not that I'm insinuating that means their playing is identical - I have taught and did not produce identical students - I'm thinking, lucky teacher.
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Polly Nomial said:
That was meant somewhat tongue-in-cheek!
John,
Ha!
I hoped so, but still rubbed me wrong because as I said, I deeply, deeply regret Julia's decision to go with Decca. A couple years ago, a guy joined a discussion primarily between Julian and myself, saying that her performances of the Beethoven in Baltimore and Katchaturian in Washington DC were "the stuff of legends". I heard her give another performance that could only be described as "the stuff of legends" back in July in Weilburg Castle with the Luxembourg Philharmonic conducted by Emmanuel Krivine. It was of the Bruch #1. Two days earlier they had played the Mendelssohn and frankly I was a little disappointed that it did not live up to my expectations derived from a CD-R of a performance in Monte Carlo conducted by Kreizburg.
The Weilburg Mendelssohn lacked a playfulness in the last movement that was pervasive in the CD. I was looking forward to the Sunday performance hoping it would be different. When I discovered that she intended to do the Bruch instead, I was a little disappointed! But then WOW - the way she played that Bruch, at times, literally took my breath away. Talk about passionate! - and the sweet lyrical passages were played with a hushed tenderness that left me open mouthed with wonder. What an incredible artist she is!
Bruce
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Peter said:
Now, where did I read that AS and JF had the same teacher? Not that I'm insinuating that means their playing is identical - I have taught and did not produce identical students - I'm thinking, lucky teacher.
Tis true! Chumachenko it seems is very fond of both young women.
Not only did both share Ana Chumchenko, but each started with Helga Thelen, a Suzuki method teacher, at age Three. Arabella stayed with him until age 9 when she was admitted to the Munich College for Music and the Arts to study under Chumachenko - the youngest pupil ever admitted (at that time) Three years later Fischer who had left Thelen to study under Lydia Dubrowskaya also applied at age 9 and was admitted as another of Chumachenko's pupils.
They share the distinction of being the youngest pupils ever to study under Chumachenko. In Verbier this summer, Chumachenko was giving master classes which were open to the public. As we left the last one I spoke to a young woman asking her if she played the violin. "No" she replied, I am a violist. I asked her where she had come from, "Germany", she replied. I asked her if she had ever heard Julia Fischer in concert. Ooooooh Ya! was her smiling response. But she only knew of Steinbacher from recordings. The master class had been doing Beethoven's Sonata #8 in G major. I mentioned that in March I had heard Arabella in recital at Middlebury College VT playing that sonata and that I heard Julia play it 5 weeks later at Union College in Schenectady NY. The young woman became VERY interested in that and wanted to know if I could tell that they had the same teacher.
Well, I truthfully responded, they are two individuals and they have quite different sounds. But they seem to share an approach to music making that gets into the heart of what the composer was trying to accomplish. No casual run-throughs from either of them. If I had to choose between attending a recital on a given day and would thereby be excluded from attending the recital of the other, I would be terribly torn about which to attend!
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Post by Claude October 28, 2009 (9 of 26)
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I just bought this disc at the Ludwig Beck store in Munich. All the copies on display at that store come with an extra, autographed booklet.
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Claude said:
I just bought this disc at the Ludwig Beck store in Munich. All the copies on display at that store come with an extra, autographed booklet.
You are lucky to have a brick and mortar retailer that sells PentaTone discs. I pre-ordered my copy from CD Universe and found a message in my email this morning that the disc which was supposed to release yesterday, is back-ordered!
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