Kalevi Aho - Symphony No. 3 / Songs & Dances of Death (Mussorgsky)

 2003; 8 tracks
Osmo Vänskä / Lahti Symphony Orchestra
Jaakko Kausisto, violin
Matti Salminen, bass  Kalevi Aho is a Finnish composer who studied under the great Einojuhani Rautavaara and composed his Symphony No. 3 for violin and orchestra between 1971 and 1973. Songs & Dances of Death is a song cycle by Russian composer Modest Mussorgsky, but here Kalevi Aho has orchestrated it into 4 songs for voice and piano. I thank Cliff Skoog for bringing the work of this composer to my attention.

01 Symphony No. 3 (Sinfonia Concertante), I. Andante

02 Symphony No. 3 (Sinfonia Concertante), II. Prestissimo
03 Symphony No. 3 (Sinfonia Concertante), III. Lento
04 Symphony No. 3 (Sinfonia Concertante), IV. Presto
05 Songs & Dances of Death, I. Cradle Song
06 Songs & Dances of Death, II. Serenade
07 Songs & Dances of Death, III. Trepak
08 Songs & Dances of Death, IV. The Field Marshal


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Murray Gold - Doctor Who Series 1-5 Soundtracks

Series 1 & 2

2006; 31 tracks

My favorite Doctor Who track as of now, "Doomsday," is on this one. I think I like it so much because it reminds me of the episode "Doomsday," which is so very beautiful and emotional.

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Series 3

2007; 28 tracks
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Series 4

2008; 27 tracks
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Series 4: The Specials

2008-2009
Disc 1, 21 tracks
Disc 2, 26 tracks

Disc 1 is the first three specials, and Disc 2 contains the soundtrack to "The End of Time," including the heartwrenching final music of the Tenth Doctor.. :\

Disc 1
Disc 2


Series 5

2010
Disc 1, 26 tracks
Disc 2, 39 tracks

This was supposed to be split up into 28 and 37 tracks, but I messed up.

Disc 1
Disc 2

Philip Glass - Dracula

1999; 26 tracks
Kronos Quartet

Prolific modern classical composer Philip Glass has created a live accompaniment to Browning's 1931 film Dracula, starring Bela Lugosi. While the film is not a 'silent film,' there being dialogue and a few selections from Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake, Glass intended the score to accompany the film. Though I prefer the deathly silence of the film, its startingly bare landscape, devoid of gore, blood, and thrills, merges quite well with this minimalist score for strings.

undead, undead

Dmitri Shostakovich - The Nose

2009; 16 tracks, 2 discs
Valery Gergiev / Mariinsky Soloists, Orchestra, and Chorus

This satirical opera shows a young (22, in fact) Shostakovich at, perhaps, his most unhinged. The Nose was completed in 1928 and premiered in 1930. The opera is set in St. Petersburg. Based on a short story by Nikolai Gogol, its absurd plot revolves around the exploits of a pompous government official and his nose. After a visit to the barber, the nose absconds from the man's face and takes on a life of its own; the pretentious bureaucrat is reduced to desperation, frantically searching the city for his lost appendage. Although primarily a comic opera, The Nose touches on the struggle between the individual and society (here portrayed by a cast of over 80 characters), and is one of the most remarkable pieces Shostakovich ever wrote (at least to me).

Shostakovich began work on The Nose soon after the stupendous success of his First Symphony, which was written as his graduation piece at the Leningrad Conservatory and first heard in May 1926, before the composer turned 20 years old. His First Symphony, as we all know, is certainly one of the greatest looks into the composer's core personality, but The Nose broadens this perspective even further. The opera is full of alarming and incongruous but entirely convincing musical turns; virtually the only predictable thing about it is its lack of predictability. Shostakovich was undoubtedly drawn to Gogol's story for its satirical aspects, as many of Shostakovich's pieces could easily be viewed as satirial, mocking, and even subliminally rebellious.

This modern opera masterpiece is highly intense and passionate, a great listen for any fans of the more chaotic realms of music.

Part 1
Part 2

Alfred Schnittke - The Ten Symphonies

2009; 47 tracks
6 discs

There is so much to say about these mindblowing and hardly well known pieces by the Soviet composer Alfred Schnittke and frankly I am not the one to say any of it. If you want to learn more about each one, I've found a few nice reviews while looking at individual recordings.

Disc 1:
Symphony No. 1; 4 tracks
Leif Segerstam / Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra

Disc 2:
Symphony No. 2, St. Florian; 8 tracks
Anders Aby / Mikaeli Chamber Choir
Leif Segerstam / Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra

Disc 3:
Symphony No. 3; 4 tracks
Eri Klas / Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra
Symphony No. 7; 3 tracks
Tadaaki Otaka / BBC National Orchestra of Wales

Disc 4:
Symphony No. 4; 7 tracks
Stefan Parkman / Academy Chamber Choir of Uppsala
Okka Kamu / Stockholm Sinfonietta
Symphony No. 5 (Concerto Grosso No. 4); 4 tracks
Neeme Järvi / Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra

Disc 5:
Symphony No. 6; 4 tracks
Tadaaki Otaka / BBC National Orchestra of Wales
Symphony No. 8; 5 tracks
Lü Jia / Norrköping Symphony Orchestra

Disc 6:
Symphony No. 0; 4 tracks
Symphony No. 9; 3 tracks
Owain Arwel Hughes / Cape Philharmonic Orchestra

Btw: The 9th Symphony, the composer's last work, is one of the most powerful and moving pieces of music I've heard in a long time. Schnittke’s ultimate symphony – actually his very last work – is a “Ninth” in a most unusual sense: Put down with a shaky left hand by an artist who had survived four strokes and was laterally debilitated, it is an impressive triumph of spiritual energy over physical constraints.


Disc 1
Disc 2
Disc 3
Disc 4
Disc 5
Disc 6

Dmitri Shostakovich - Symphony No. 8 in C Minor, Op. 65

2004
Mstislav Rostropovich / London Symphony Orchestra

Although it was written at a time of great optimism in the Soviet Union with the Nazis in retreat, Shostakovich's Eighth Symphony is imbued with a deep sense of sorrow and fear of the future. Whereas the authorities expected a victorius anthem, Shostakovich appeared too affected by the bloody cost of the war. Mstislav Rostropovich again proves that no other conductor is able to so intimately understand the feelings of his dear friend.

Shostakovich on Rostropovich:
"In general, Rostropovich is a real Russian; he knows everything and he can do anything. Anything at all. I'm not even talking about music here, I mean that Rostropovich can do almost any manual or physical work..."

So there you have it - this is most likely the ONLY accurate and real Russian recording of the symphony.

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Dmitri Shostakovich - Symphony No. 1 in F Minor, Op. 10

Leonard Bernstein / Chicago Symphony Orchestra
1989

This is my favorite Shostakovich score, ever, (especially the second movement). Dmitri Shostakovich wrote this fantastic symphony at the age of 19. He was going to graduate from the esteemed Leningrad Conservatory, leaving behind his long years of studying under the amazing Glazunov (and others), and composed this, his First Symphony, as a graduation piece. Indeed, it is a very youthful and vibrant piece that shows all the compositional spark of a rising genius - the true Modern Russian composer hero. But now that I think about it, it seems like this spark was quenched by the Soviet government and never again did Shostakovich create a piece so whimsical and truly of himself. Always the yurodivy, or "holy fool," Shostakovich must have realized that it was in his best interest to bow down to Stalin and compose pieces that were socially acceptable. This is why I love the First Symphony so much. It is what Shostakovich could have been if Stalin had not been in power... it is the true genius of the composer that struggled to find his way out for the rest of his life...

Don't get me wrong, I think everything Shostakovich ever wrote is, in it's own way, a masterpiece. I just percieve this "graduation piece" as one of his finest works, in terms of the man behind the music. He looked a lot like Harry Potter back then, didn't he?

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Arnold Schönberg - Piano Music

Maurizio Pollini is one of my favorite interpretors when it comes to solo piano music. He played Beethoven masterfully; Chopin, he played with a tender sentimentality; Rachmaninoff, Bach, Debussy - all with the deliberate and magnificent skill that comes natural to masters of the art.

Here, he plays Schönberg's complete solo piano music with amazing form. I love these pieces of Modern amazingness and you surely will too.

" The first great pianist to record all of Schoenberg's piano music was Glenn Gould, and if you grew up with Gould's interpretations, then you're in for a shock. In the first place, Pollini actually plays what Schoenberg wrote--Gould freely altered the text in ways that would have driven the composer insane. And then there's the humming--yes, believe it or not, Gould did manage to sing along as he played. Pollini's quieter, less vocal approach conveys much more of what Schoenberg actually wrote, with no sacrifice of expressiveness. And although most of the pieces on this disc are quite short, they are nonetheless important. It was in his piano works that Schoenberg worked out his theories of free atonality and 12-tone composition. So for anyone interested in these critical musical developments, this disc is essential listening. "

Oh yeah... As great of a pianist as he is, I don't recommmend Glenn Gould interpretations of music, he normally adds too much of his own flair to the music and rarely plays pieces as well as, say, Pollini does.

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Geirr Tveitt - Piano Concerto No. 4, "Aurora Borealis" / Variations on a Folksong from Hardanger

Gierr Tveitt was a Norwegian composer of modern classical music, inspired by composers such as Bartók, Debussy, Stravinsky, Ravel, Grieg, etc. Here is his one of his more popular works, the 4th Piano Concerto (nicknamed "Aurora Borealis", as well as Variations on a Folksong from Hardanger, for two pianos and orchestra.

Havard Gimse and Gunilla Süssmann are the pianists. Bjarte Engeset conducts the Royal Scottish National Orchestra.


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