All recordingsPrices shown exclude VAT. (UK tax is not payable for deliveries to United States.)
See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Messiaen - Quatuor pour la fin du temps
Messiaen: | Quatuor pour la fin du temps Erich Gruenberg (violin), Gervase de Peyer (clarinet), William Pleeth (cello) & Michel Béroff (piano) Chronochromie for large orchestra BBC Symphony Orchestra, Antal Dorati |
If for many British music students in the early 1960s, modern music ended with Bartók and the neo-classical Stravinsky, the two recordings on this CD disc helped to change all that. Roger Nichols’s note goes on to relate: ‘The story behind the quartet has often been told: its composition in a wash-house in a prisoner-of-war camp in Silesia in 1940, its first performance on 15 January 1941 before an audience of 400 fellow prisoners with a piano whose keys kept sticking, and the audience’s response to the work’s life-affirming properties – “I was never listened to”, the composer said later, “with such attention and understanding”.’ The work treats of ‘the abolition of time itself, something infinitely mysterious and incomprehensible to most philosophers of time, from Plato to Bergson’. In this great recording from 1968, Nichols singles out Gervase de Peyer as supremely equal to his starring role: ‘surely no clarinettist has yet matched his “désolé” tone and phrasing at the start of the third movement solo’. The substantial coupling is the far less accessible Chronochromie, recorded in 1964 and written just four years earlier. This came about through a subvention from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and had the further benefit that Antal Dorati had conducted the work’s stormy Paris première in 1962. Here the BBC SO respond to the considerable challenges with playing of remarkable accuracy, energy and colour: as Nichols says, with repeated listening, the work’s difficulties become beauties. Again, both works are newly transferred and remastered to ART standard at Abbey Road Studios. | 
| | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Messiaen - Quatuor pour la fin du temps
The Flemish ensemble Het Collectief received much praise and many awards for their first recordings with Fuga Libera. Now they're back with a fascinating programme: Messiaen's Quatuor pour la Fin du Temps, in time for the celebration of the composer's 100th anniversary, incidentally one of their recurring concert programmes and a recent work by the foremost contemporary Malaysian composer, Kee-Yong Chong. |
| | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Messiaen - Quatuor pour la fin du temps
For its latest recording, France's acclaimed Trio Wanderer turn to the visionary music of countryman, Olivier Messiaen. For his ethereal Quartet for the End of
Time, the Trio is joined by the accomplished French clarinetist Pascal Moraguès.
Created in exceptionally difficult conditions while he was held as a German prisoner of war, the Quartet
sums up the composer's innovations in harmony and rhythm. “The spiritual dimension [in Quatuor Pour le Fin du Temps] is well projected, especially in the long string lines of the two "Louange" movements, but there could be more freedom and risk-taking in the more energetic music.
Clarinettist Pascal Moraguès's tone is rather rough, though the player shows impressive control in the solo "Abîme des oiseaux". Violinist Jean-Marc Phillips-Varjabédian and pianist Vincent Coq make a convincing case for the early Theme and Variations.” The Telegraph, 19th July 2008 |
| | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Messiaen - Chamber Works
James Clark (violin), Philippe Honoré (violin), Rachel Roberts (viola), David Cohen (cello), Kenneth Smith (flute) & Barnaby Robson (clarinet) British pianist Matthew Schellhorn is joined by the Soloists of the
Philharmonia Orchestra in this recording of Olivier Messiaen's
chamber works, including the eight-movement masterpiece Quatuor pour la fin du Temps and the world première
of Morceau de lecture à vue. Matthew will be performing at St Georges, Bristol in July with The Soloists
of the Philharmonia. "An excellent pianist and an excellent exponent. … Accuracy, rhythm, sonority, technique, emotion … everything is played as Messiaen wished it." Yvonne Loriod-Messiaen |
| | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Messiaen - Chamber Works
Robert Plane (clarinet) Gould Piano Trio Described by The Independent as ‘master musicians’ The Gould Piano Trio, one of the most exciting ensembles to emerge in recent years, is joined by clarinettist Robert Plane for this recording to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of one of France’s greatest composers – Olivier Messiaen. Messiaen’s wartime masterpiece the outstanding Quartet for the End of Time was composed during the darkest days when he was a prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp. The particular instrumentation – piano, violin, cello and clarinet was determined by these circumstances. The result is an uplifting and spiritual work and Messiaen’s most significant contribution to chamber music. Its premiere is one of the legendary premieres of the twentieth century for it took place in the camp theatre before 5000 fellow-prisoners. ‘Never have I been listened to with such attention and such understanding’, Messiaen later recalled. The works also received a review in the camp newsletter, which recorded that: ‘The last note was followed by a moment of silence which established the sovereign mastery of the work.’ Quartet for the End of Time is coupled with the shorter work, Theme and Variations for Violin and Piano and the premiere recording of Piano Transcription of Les Offrandes oubliées. Theme and Variations was composed as a wedding gift from Messiaen to his wife whom he married in 1932. Like her husband, Claire was a devout Catholic and a composer as well as an accomplished violinist. The violin writing testifies to Claire’s passionate musicality and her technical skill, and as so often with Messiaen’s shorter works, has a power and presence that seems to belie its modest proportions. Les Offrandes oubliées, subtitled ‘méditation symphonique’ was composed in the summer of 1930, shortly after Messiaen completed his studies at the Paris Conservatoire. The work forms a stepping stone between the miniature world of the piano Préludes and the tumultuous virtuosity of his later piano music. “Who would want to listen to anything after the Quartet for the end of Time? …while they lack the freedom of Messiaen's recording, the Gould Trio and Robert Plane are among the best modern accounts.” BBC Music Magazine, Proms 2008 **** “The augmented Gould Trio… turns in an admirably well judged, scrupulously expressive performance, very well recorded. The Gould team offer a rarity in the form of Messiaen's piano arrangement of his early orchestral piece Les offrandes oubliées, and Benjamin Frith's fine performance underlines just how pianistic the turbulent central episode actually is.” Gramophone Magazine, October 2008 |
| | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Messiaen - Turangalîla Symphony
Michel Beroff, Jeanne Loriod, Yvonne Loriod, Wolfgang Meyer, Christoph Poppen & Manuel Fischer-Dieskau London Symphony Orchestra, André Previn “Newly reissued, Previn's 1977 account dragged Turangalîla to mainstream attention. Previn excels at combing through Messiaen's thick layers, and the LSO are on fine form - am exhilarating souvenir from a golden period in British orchestral life.” Gramophone Magazine, 2008 Awards Issue |
| | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Olivier Messiaen - Chamber Works
Hebrides Ensemble, William Conway Includes the first recording of Fantaisie, a work for violin and piano, thought to be lost until it was re-discovered
by Yvonne Loriod-Messiaen and then published in 2007. “The novelty on this disc of five items, including the group’s stirring account of Quatuor pour la fin du temps, is the Fantasie for violin and piano, which Messiaen wrote in 1933 to play with his first wife, the violinist Claire Delbos, and which was thought lost until it turned up among the composer’s papers last year. An eight-minute movement, beginning with a defiant, distinctive melody for the piano in octaves, it is in Messiaen’s liveliest, ripest, if early, style. His three-minute Pièce pour piano et quatuor à cordes is a marvellously incisive, birdsong-inflected tribute to the publisher Alfred Schlee. The flute-and-piano bird piece Le Merle noir is bristlingly despatched.” Sunday Times, 8th June 2008 *** “In celebration of Messiaen's centenary, the Hebrides Ensemble gives a quite dark performance of the Quartet for the End of Time. William Conway's cello burns with weighty intensity. In fact, a little spring and lightness would not have gone amiss, especially in the Danse de la Fureur, where the syncopated rhythm lacks bounce. Also included is Le Merle Noir, the black thrush, the first birdsong that Messiaen turned into music. The solo flute burrs authentically.” The Times, 31st May 2008 **** “All [the] pieces get vivid, beautifully judged performances from the Hebrides Ensemble, and the account of the much more frequently recorded Quartet stands up well to the competition, too.” The Guardian, 23rd May 2008 **** | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Messiaen: Quatuor pour la fin du temps
Gil Shaham (violin), Paul Meyer (clarinet), Jian Wang (cello), Mynug-Whun Chung (piano) | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
|
|
| |  | Messiaen: Quatuor pour la fin du tempsQuartet for the end of time
| | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
|
|
| |  | Messiaen: Quatuor pour la fin du temps
| | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
|
|
| |
|
