Stories for January 18, 2021
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Recording from her apartment in Brooklyn, Sofia Rei provides an opening night globalFEST concert for NPR: Tiny Desk@Home
Posted At : January 16, 2021 12:00 AM
NPR: Tiny Desk's Bob Boilen writes......Every January, I attend globalFEST at a New York City nightclub and see some of the most fantastic music I'll experience all year. Now, given the pandemic's challenges and the hardening of international borders, NPR Music and globalFEST moved the 2021 edition from the nightclub to your screen of choice and shared the festival with the world. We called it Tiny Desk Meets globalFEST. We presented 16 artists in intimate settings (often behind desks donning globes), all hosted by African superstar Angélique Kidjo. Recording from her apartment in Brooklyn, award-winning Argentine vocalist and songwriter Sofia Rei provides a concert that blends South American folk traditions with experimental pop and electronic music. That mix of tradition and modernity extends to her surroundings, which features traditional iconography, robotic 'saints,' exuberant plants and looping pedals. This performance took place during the opening night of our 2021 festival. --globalFEST SET LIST
"Un Mismo Cielo" (The Same Sky)
"Negro Sobre Blanco" (Black On White)
"Escarabajo Digital" (Digital Beetle) MUSICIANS
Sofia Rei: vocals, charango, electronics
JC Maillard: guitar, bass, programming, background vocals
Leo Genovese: keys
Jorge Glem: cuatro
Ana Carmela Rodriguez Contramaestre: background vocals, percussion SEE THE NPR PAGEGlobalfest Moves Online, Showcasing World Music Without Boundaries / The New York Times
Posted At : January 16, 2021 12:00 AM
The New York Times, Jon Pareles writes.... With 16 bands over four nights, the festival expanded its reach at a time when live music with audiences is in short supply. Minyo Crusaders set an old Japanese song, from a tradition called minyo, to a Nigerian Afrobeat groove. DakhaBrakha, from Ukraine, roved from Eastern European drones and yipping vocals to something like girl-group rock. Aditya Prakash, from Los Angeles, sang a joyful Hindu devotional over upbeat jazz from his ensemble, sharing its melody with a trombone. Rachele Andrioli, from southern Italy, sang a fierce tarantella accompanying herself with a tambourine and electronic loops of a jaw harp and her voice. Hit La Rosa, from Peru, topped the clip-clop beat of cumbia with surreal lyrics, surf-reverbed guitar solos and psychedelic swoops and echoes. They were all part of the 18th annual Globalfest, the world-music showcase that moved online this year as a partnership with NPR Music's Tiny Desk Concerts series, which will preserve the performances online. Previous Globalfests were one-night live showcases in New York City for a dozen bands on club stages. But for this pandemic year, musicians recorded themselves performing live at home: living rooms, studios, a record-company office, a backyard barbecue. Angélique Kidjo, the singer from Benin who appeared at the first Globalfest, played virtual host in eye-popping outfits; musicians made sure to have at least one globe on camera. The sets were short, just two or three songs each. But Globalfest's potential audience has been hugely multiplied. While necessity forced Globalfest online, networking has long been built into its music. Many musicians who cherish local and traditional styles have decided that the way to ensure their survival is through adaptation and hybridization, retaining the essence while modernizing the delivery system. For musicians, fusion is also fun: a chance to learn new skills, a way to discover creative connections. There are commonalities in the ways voices can croon or bite or break, in mechanisms like repetition or call-and-response, in wanting people to dance. Modernization doesn't have to mean homogenization. There were traditionalists at Globalfest. Dedicated Men of Zion, a multigenerational band of family members, sang hard-driving gospel standards like "Can't Turn Me Around," rasping and soaring into falsetto, from a backyard in North Carolina with a smoking barbecue grill. Edwin Perez led a 10-piece band - mostly Cuban musicians - updating a New York style that flourished in the 1970s and 1980s: salsa dura, propulsive and danceable with jabbing horns, insistent percussion and socially conscious lyrics. (One song was "No Puedo Respirar" - "I Can't Breathe.") But tradition often came with a twist. Nora Brown adeptly played and sang Appalachian banjo songs from Kentucky, passed down through personal contact with elder generations, even though she's a 15-year-old from Brooklyn, where she performed in a tunnel under Crown Heights with a train rumbling overhead. Rokia Traoré, from Mali, has an extensive catalog of her own songs, but her set reached back to a tradition of epic song: centuries-old historical praise of generals who built the West African Mande empire - "Tiramakan" and "Fakoly." She sang over mesmerizing vamps, plucked and plinked on ngoni (lute) and balafon (xylophone), progressing from delicacy to vehemence, from gently melodic phrases to rapid-fire declamation, putting her virtuosity in service to the lore she conveyed. Musicians securely grounded in their own cultures also felt free to experiment with others. Martha Redbone - born in Kentucky with Cherokee, Choctaw and African-American ancestors - punctuated bluesy, compassionate soul songs with Native American rattles and percussive syllables. Elisapie sang in her Native American language, Inuktitut, as she led her Canadian rock band in volatile songs that built from folky picking to full-scale stomps. Emel, a Tunisian singer influenced by the protest music of Joan Baez, sang two songs from a living room in Paris. They were introspective, brooding, keening crescendos: "Holm" ("A Dream"), which envisioned a "bitter reality that destroys everything we build," and, in English, "Everywhere We Looked Was Burning." Labess, a Canadian band led by an Algerian singer, had musicians performing remotely from France and Colombia; its set roved from Arabic-flavored songs to, for its finale, "La Vida Es Un Carnaval," a kind of flamenco-samba-chanson amalgam with French lyrics and a button-accordion solo. Natu Camara, a singer from Guinea now based in New York, gave her West African pop a tinge of American funk as she offered determinedly uplifting messages. And Sofia Rei, an Argentine singer now based in New York, conjured a wildly eclectic, near hallucinatory international mix from her living room with her band: Andean, Asian, jazz, funk, electronics. True to Globalfest's boundary-scrambling mission, she sang about living under "Un Mismo Cielo": "The Same Sky."Ofra Harnoy finds inspiration in Newfoundland / New Classical Tracks
Posted At : January 16, 2021 12:00 AM
New Classical Tracks, Julie Amacher writes....Ofra Harnoy returns to the stage with her new album - On The Rock (Analekta) "We came here for a vacation, and it was within days that we decided to start looking for a house here and we found the perfect house, which is on a lake. I can look out and see eagles flying across the lake. Every day the weather's so different that it's like watching an ever-changing painting." That beautiful scene in the province of Newfoundland is what inspired Ofra Harnoy's 44th recording, On the Rock. It's her second recording with her husband, multi-instrumentalist and arranger, Mike Herriott. "Well, 'The Rock' is kind of a slang or nickname for the province of Newfoundland. My husband and I actually moved here about two years ago and we came up with a list of music that we thought could be beautifully arranged to suit the cello. "Our hope with the album was to be true and respectful to the Newfoundland tradition but also share my love of this music through the voice of the cello. So, the music had to be suitable for that. I think we came up with a beautiful collection of songs that really tell a story. I think it's a universal story for any seaside or oceanside community. It has the love, the longing, the ballad, the pub culture, and the fun." READ THE Q&A AND LISTENDudamel, LAPhil, and DG deserve thanks for releasing these endlessly fascinating 'Ives' works / THE CLASSIC REVIEW
Posted At : January 15, 2021 12:00 AM
Deutsche Grammophon releases Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic's performances of the complete Charles Ives symphony cycle. Called "a revelation" by the Los Angeles Times, the rarely heard symphony cycle was recorded in early 2020 as part of the LA Phil's Dvořák and Ives festival. THE CLASSIC REVIEW's David A. McConnell writes.....Dudamel, the Los Angeles Philharmonic and DG deserve our warmest thanks for releasing new recordings of these endlessly fascinating works. The label "Complete Symphonies" is misleading however, since the "New England Holidays" Symphony is not included. Given the excellence of these performances, I hope Dudamel and Los Angeles turn their attention to that work in the future. Nevertheless, it is fantastic that one of America's finest orchestras has recorded this repertoire. SEE THE CLASSIC REVIEW PAGEFanfare gives Smaro Gregoriadou - A Healing Fire 5 out of 5 stars....says; 'A lovely, very musical and varied guitar recital'
Posted At : January 15, 2021 12:00 AM
FanFare's Henry Fogel writes.....Gregoriadou is a Greek guitarist who draws a remarkably wide range of color from her guitar. The calm beauty of the third movement of the Bach violin sonata, simply marked Andante, is followed by a brilliantly executed final Allegro that manages to wed crisp articulation with lyrical flow. Britten's Nocturnal after John Dowland, written for Julian Bream, is given a superb reading. The music is a set of variations that appear before the Dowland theme itself emerges at the end. Britten said that the music contained "disturbing images," though he never specified what they were. This is unsettled music that seems to stop and start, building tension in its halting, quiet way. Release, at least to a degree, is found at the end with Dowland's original theme. Gregoriadou's performance emphasizes the work's underlying tension without overplaying it. Sofia Gubaidulina's Serenade was composed in 1960 when the composer was 29, and is a gentler and more introspective work than we are used to from her. At three minutes, it is also very brief. Not unlike the Britten, the music is tonally ambiguous until resolving in what Gregoriadou, in her excellent notes, calls "a therapeutic G major chord." Jacques Hétu was a Canadian composer (1938–2010) who wrote his Suite pour guitare in 1986. It is predominantly a lyrical work, much of it at soft dynamics. The third movement, "Ballade," is marked by an underlying darkness that is relieved in the following "Rêverie." After these two quiet movements the work ends with a brilliant finale, in the style of a moto perpetuo. What is special about this recording is Gregoriadou's focus on timbre. Her technique is exceptional, but it is always at the service of creating a sound world with a wide spectrum. Her dynamic shading in the last movement of the Hétu is astonishing, and it is so effortlessly achieved that you don't think about technique as you listen. I don't think of Gregoriadou as a guitarist. I think of her as a musician who happens to play the guitar. This is a very beautiful guitar recital, with recorded sound that makes it seem as if you are in the room with Gregoriadou, and at just the right distance for the best perspective.Gustavo Santaolalla - The Last of Us Part II makes 'HAPPY: The 10 best video game soundtracks of 2020'
Posted At : January 14, 2021 12:00 AM
HAPPY's Rian Howlett writes.....2020 was an incredible year for gaming for a few reasons. A lot of free time went around the place, imminent next-gen releases pushed everyone into a gaming frenzy, and Keanu Reeves called another man, and all of us, breathtaking. And just like the titles they represent, the video game soundtracks released in 2020 were top notch. We trawled back through the year that was to single out who we thought brought true heat to the musical table. For the most part, these OSTs are albums you can listen to in their own right, some of them however just complemented the game so perfectly that now it's hard to think of one without the other. From electrically charged thrash metal to spine-tingling orchestral scores, HAPPY picks the 10 best video game soundtracks of 2020. On the list is Gustavo Santaolalla - The Last Of Us Part 2. Gustavo Santaolalla has stood as the invisible third piece of the Joel and Ellie puzzle for as long as we've known them. The guitar in the original TLOU was a sparse, exquisite affair. Barely noticeable builds, and almost entirely acoustic. It was haunting and instantly recognisable. With all of the weapons of the contemporary music producer at his arsenal, he brought a much bigger world for our ears to play in. While absolutely different to the original, there wasn't anything lost through the shift in the music from part one to two. The Last Of Us Part 2's soundtrack is a gorgeous, expansive experience that complemented the jump from adolescence to adulthood that Ellie makes between the games. SEE THE FULL HAPPY PAGEThe Kanneh-Mason family, a modern musical dynasty performs Saint-Saens, Bob Marley on new recording / 98.7WFMT
Posted At : January 14, 2021 12:00 AM
98.7WFMT: Chicago, Lisa Flynn writes.....There have been many musical dynasties throughout history – think of the Bach and Strauss families. Today, we have a new dynasty in the making with the extraordinary talents of England's Kanneh-Masons – seven brothers and sisters, all of whom play either violin, piano, or cello. The COVID-19 pandemic has provided the siblings with the opportunity to join together at home for the first time in over five years, as they've performed and shared their music with the world via livestreams. In 2020, the Kanneh-Masons also released their first-ever family album, Carnival, joined by several instrumentalist friends for Saint-Saëns' Carnival of the Animals. Michael Morpurgo wrote delightful new poems for the beloved work, read by the author and actress Olivia Colman. (Photo: Stuart McIntyre) READ THE FULL ARTICLETop 10 for Jan
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Laila Biali :
A Case of You - LIVE
SOCAN Music and JUNO Award winner Laila Biali shares an intimate acoustic cover of Joni Mitchell's classic love song, A Case of You, captured live off the floor at Revolution Recording Studios. -
Ilan Eshkeri :
A Perfect Planet
Sony Music today announces the January 8, 2021 release of A PERFECT PLANET (SOUNDTRACK FROM THE BBC SERIES) with music by composer ILAN ESHKERI (Stardust, The Young Victoria). -
Jane Ira Bloom, Mark Helias :
Some Kind of Tomorrow
Soprano saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom and bassist Mark Helias come together to create duets discovered in the moment in a way that is rarely heard today with Some Kind of Tomorrow. -
Yo-Yo Ma | Kathryn Stott :
Comfort and Hope
Cellist Yo-Yo Ma and pianist Kathryn Stott come together again, this time for Songs of Comfort and Hope, set for release on December 11, 2020 on Sony Classical. -
Chad Lawson :
When the Party's Over
Pianist and composer Chad Lawson shares his cover of Billie Eilish's song "When the Party's Over" today; listen/watch HERE. -
Ezinma :
Drummer Bae
Violin sensation, Ezinma, releases "Drummer Bae," (Decca Records) an imaginative medley of cherished Christmas melodies. -
The Comet Is Coming :
Imminent
"The London-based trio The Comet Is Coming-made up of the saxophonist King Shabaka, the percussionist Betamax, and the keyboardist Danalogue-thrusts empyrean jazz into an apocalyptic future, where raucous psych rock and danceable electro-grooves ride lush tenor lines to outer space. -
Nick Cave - Nicholas Lens :
L.I.T.A.N.I.E.S
Belgian composer Nicholas Lens & Australian singer and songwriter Nick Cave present their lockdown album L. -
Cast Albums :
THE PROM - MUSIC FROM THE NETFLIX FILM
Sony Music Masterworks today announces the release of THE PROM (MUSIC FROM THE NETFLIX FILM), an album of music from the forthcoming Netflix film directed by Ryan Murphy and based on the hit Broadway musical from Bob Martin, Chad Beguelin, and Matthew Sklar. -
Max Richter :
Beethoven - Opus 2020
Max Richter and Deutsche Grammophon are set to release a brand-new orchestral composition to mark the 250th anniversary of Beethoven's birthday.
Igor Levit's 'Bach | Beethoven | Rzewski' Makes Iowa Public Radio's 2015 Mega-Meta-List
Posted: January 15, 2016 12:00 AM | By: AdminToday's output of classical albums is (pardon me while I scribble on the back of an envelope) something like triple what it was a generation ago. I won't vouch for that exact ratio, but I will for Anne Midgette's description of how it feels: "Keeping up with the stream of new releases is like trying to drink from a fire hose." Now imagine trying to capture a hose's jet-spray in a bucket, and you'll see why making a classical "best-of-year" list in 2015 struck many writers as a thankless task, even a hopeless one. Yet that didn't stop more of us than ever from trying - perhaps enough of us to be called a crowd. Could that crowd, taken together, have some kind of collective wisdom?
That was more or less the premise behind my "Classical Mega-Meta-List" last year (inspired by economist /blogger Tyler Cowen). I tallied every "best of year" list I could find - a total of 36, comprising about 100 writers. This year I found far more: 64 lists, with at least 160 contributors, which makes this year's meta-list 60-77% more mega. It's not surprising that almost twice as many releases made the final cut, defined by being chosen for more than three best-of-year lists. Last year, 28 albums reached that threshold; this year, 50 albums did. That's a 78% increase.
Igor Levit's 'Bach | Beethoven | Rzewski' received more than 12 votes in this pole.
Two of the top five albums feature twenty-something Russian-born pianists playing variation sets - yet they could hardly be more different. Igor Levit, whose family moved to Germany when he was eight, focuses on leviathan variation sets by the greatest German composers, Bach and Beethoven - and adds an equally mammoth set by Frederick Rzewski based on a Chilean protest song, The People United Will Never be Defeated. Levit fell in love with it when he combed the music library as a student in Hannover, and he has recently commissioned a new work from the American composer. (Footnote: the pianist who recorded the premiere of the Rzewski in 1976, Ursula Oppens, issued a remake in 2015 which also made the mega-meta-list Bronze category - the only contemporary classic to make the list twice.)
READ THE FULL IOWA PUBLIC RADIO PAGE
Crossover Media Projects with Igor Levit
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Igor Levit
Encounter
A very personal double album marked by a desire for encounter and togetherness. The program includes rarely played arrangements of Bach and Brahms by Ferruccio Busoni and Max Reger, as well as Palais de Mari – Morton Feldman's final work for piano.
Longing and its fulfilment at the same time: Igor Levit's new double album "Encounter" is the pianist's sixth disc released on the Sony Classical label and conveys the urgent desire for encounter and human togetherness – at a time when isolation is the order of the day. The result is a very personal recital. While speaking touchingly of the hardships and unexpected feelings of liberty resulting from social distancing, musically the recital stands out for the objective spirit of its carefully crafted form.
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Igor Levit
Beethoven Complete Piano Sonatas
Igor Levit's work on the 32 Beethoven Piano Sonatas has been the most important endeavour of the past 15 years of his life. This autumn will see his new studio recording of the complete sonata cycle released on Sony Classical on September 13 and represents the recorded testament to almost half his life spent in the study and performance of these sonatas. The release of this momentous 9-album cycle is one of the most eagerly awaited recordings for the 250-year Beethoven anniversary.
No other composer has had such an important influence on Igor Levit's life as that of Ludwig van Beethoven. He admits that this composer's music is around him practically every day and in almost everything he does. The profound impact of Beethoven's music- since his first emotional point-of-no-return with the Missa solemnis at age 13, followed by his first dedicated work on Sonata op. 2/2–has subsequently shaped Levit's approach to almost all music, whether he is playing Liszt, Shostakovich or Rzewski.
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Igor Levit
Life
Sparked by the tragic death of a close friend in an accident, Igor Levit's piano playing reflects upon an experience of loss encompassing grief, despair, resignation and solace. He concentrates on works whose gloomy grandeur and melancholy beauty have occupied him for years. Each of them pays tribute to the virtuoso possibilities of the piano. Poetic moments of contemplative silence blend with life-affirming and extremely sensual music with a direct physical fascination. ...
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Igor Levit
Bach | Beethoven | Rzewski
Sony Classical announces the release of Pianist Igor Levit's third album - Bach, Beethoven, Rzewski. Available October 30, the album includes Bach's Goldberg Variations and Beethoven's Diabelli Variations, long considered acid tests of the performer's art, plus Frederic Rzewski's gigantic cycle on the Chilean revolutionary song ¡El pueblo unido, jamás será vencido!, which has the reputation of being nearly unplayable. Not content with canonized masterpieces, Levit is equally drawn to the physical challenge of Rzewski's virtuosic tightrope walks.
38 NEW 43 Total
SYND: C24, CBC
Direct: SiriusXM, Music Choice, MOOD
Markets include: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, Philadelphia, Wash DC, Dallas, Atlanta, Seattle, Cleveland, Minneapolis, Portland, Cincinnati, Detroit, Baltimore, Denver, Pittsburgh, Austin, New Orleans, Indianapolis, Louisville, Buffalo, Columbus OH, Honolulu, Canada
Online: theartsdesk -
Igor Levit
Bach - Partitas: BWV 825-830
Igor Levit has recorded the Partitas by this incommensurable Bach, BWV 825-830: it's the second release by the 27-year-old pianist, whom many regard as the greatest talent of his time. With his debut album, featuring the late Beethoven sonatas, Levit already enjoyed great success and international critical acclaim: the album rose to no. 46 in Germany's Top 100 album charts.
45 Total
SYND: PRI/Classical 24, CBC
Direct: SiriusXM, Music Choice
Markets include: New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Wash DC, Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Seattle, Minneapolis, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Denver, Portland, Austin, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Albuquerque, San Antonio, Memphis, Madison, Canada
Online: Taintradio -
Igor Levit
Beethoven: The Late Piano Sonatas
"Unlike those technically brilliant young pianists who dazzle briefly and disappear, Levit is pre-eminently a real musician who seems built to last." – The Guardian
For the last three years, Igor Levit's name has been the first to be mentioned whenever there has been talk of the most exciting of the younger generation of pianists. What is so surprising about Levit is not only the maturity of his interpretations, but his boundless appetite for new repertoire of works as difficult and demanding as possible. For his long awaited debut album, the twenty-six-year-old Levit has chosen some of the most challenging repertoire ever written for piano: Beethoven's last five piano sonatas. On his two-CD debut set, Levit is not just another young aspiring pianist releasing his debut album, but rather an outstanding artist who meets the exceptionally high demands of this extraordinary music. Levit's technical and artististic command in the difficult "Hammerklaviersonate" op. 106 is sure to be recognized as one of the most astounding accomplishments in recent history of Beethoven recordings.