Four Centuries of Great Music April 14, 2024 New Classical Music Releases from 2024 Episode 2

New Releases Episode 2 April 14, 2024

Today on Four Centuries of Great Music we are continuing our series of new classical music  album releases - those released since the beginning of the year.  We are opening with Erich Wolfgang Korngold: String Sextet in D major, Op 10.

Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1897-1957) was born in the Moravian city of Brunn then part of the Austrian Habsburg Empire (today Brno in the Czech Republic).  He was one of music history’s greatest prodigies, along the lines of the young Mozart and Mendelssohn. When he was 10, Mahler declared him to be a genius, and by age 13 his music was performed at the Vienna Court Opera. His 1920 opera, Die tote Stadt (“The Dead City”), was performed extensively throughout the world, reaching more than 80 stages. Then, with the rise of the Nazis, Korngold was forced to leave his native Austria. Settling in Los Angeles, he became “the de-facto father of Hollywood Film Music,” with scores such as Captain Blood (1935), The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938), The Sea Hawk (1940), and Kings Row (1942).

The String Sextet in D Major, Op. 10 was completed by the 17-year-old Korngold in 1915 on the eve of the First World War. This is music which basks in the twilight of Romanticism. As with the works of late Strauss and early Schoenberg, it pushes the harmonic language to its chromatic limits, yet always falls back into the sensuous grandeur of tonality. At moments, melodic threads emerge that will remind you of the most beautiful and transcendent passages of Mahler. It feels youthful and vigorous, yet there is also a sense of autumnal nostalgia.

The first movement marked Moderato-Allegro begins with a triplet line in the second viola that later forms the subject of a fugue. This opens the door to a warm, expansive melody which develops over constantly shifting harmony. The quietly passionate second theme emerges over ghostly, atmospheric sul ponticello in the middle voices.

Haunting bi-tonality (two keys occurring, simultaneously)  can be heard in the second movement marked Adagio. This restless and lamenting music grew out of an unpublished song by the composer. It seems to anticipate some of the most dramatic moments from his operas.

The buoyant third movement, an Intermezzo marked Moderato, con grazia ,is filled with the sounds, atmosphere, and swing of prewar Vienna. The main theme contains a series of rising fourths that became Korngold’s musical “signature,” known as “the motif of the cheerful heart.” You can hear this motif in the opening of Korngold’s Sinfonietta Op.5, throughout the film score for The Adventures of Robin Hood, and in other works. The final bars drift off into wistful nostalgia.

The final movement marked Presto erupts with a vivacious, cheerful energy. It revisits themes from the previous movements before culminating in a final, euphoric flourish.

Here is a performance of Erich Wolfgang Korngold: String Sextet in D major, Op 10  by  The Nash Ensemble  from the album  Tchaikovsky, Korngold -  String Sextets    Hyperion Records    March 1st

Erich Wolfgang Korngold: String Sextet in D major, Op 10 - 1 Moderato – Allegro
Erich Wolfgang Korngold: String Sextet in D major, Op 10 - 2 Adagio
Erich Wolfgang Korngold: String Sextet in D major, Op 10 - 3 Intermezzo Moderato, con grazia
Erich Wolfgang Korngold: String Sextet in D major, Op 10 - 4 Finale Presto

The Nash Ensemble - Tchaikovsky, Korngold -  String Sextets    Hyperion Records    March 1st

George Enescu was a Romanian composer, violinist, conductor, and teacher and is regarded as one of the greatest musicians in Romanian history.  He is most known for his Romanian Rhapsodies of which today we will be listening to his Romanian Rhapsody No. 1 in A Major.  However in future episodes we will be listening to one of his symphonies from this recent release of his orchestral music.  Enescu’s Romanian Rhapsodies were written in 1901 when Enescu was still only 19, and first performed together in 1903. The Rhapsody No. 1 in A Major is  the better known of the two rhapsodies. The essence of this rhapsody is the dance with Enescu claiming that it was "just a few tunes thrown together without thinking about it", but his surviving sketches show that he carefully worked out the order in which the melodies should appear, and the best instrumental setting for each one.

Here is a performance of George Enescu’s Romanian Rhapsody No. 1 in A Major by Cristian Mǎcelaru conducting the Orchestre National de France from the album Enescu: Symphonies Nos. 1-3 & 2 Romanian Rhapsodies  Deutsche Grammophon

Orchestre National de France, Cristian Mǎcelaru -  Enescu: Symphonies Nos. 1-3 & 2 Romanian Rhapsodies (04-12-24)


Most of this second hour of this new releases episode of Four Centuries of Great Music will be devoted to Maurice Duruflé’s  Requiem. Maurice Duruflé was a French composer, organist, musicologist, and teacher. Born in 1902, he studies at the Conservatoire de Paris and became the assistant to Louis Vierne at Notre Dame and was there when Vierne died at the console of the Notre-Dame organ on 2 June 1937, even though Duruflé had become the organist of St-Étienne-du-Mont in Paris. He died in 1986.

Maurice Duruflé was commissioned in 1941 to write a tone poem by the Vichy collaborative French government  for 10,000 francs but considering the oppressive German occupation, he decided to write a Requiem - mass of the dead - instead.  He completed it after the war in 1947 and it was published in 1948 as the original version for full chorus, baritone and mezzo-soprano soloists  and organ as you will be hearing here.

It is in nine movements

Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 1 Introït - (Requiem aeternam)
Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 2 Kyrie
Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 3 Offertory-  Domine Jesu Christe
Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 4 Sanctus and Benedictus
Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 5 Pie Jesu
Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 6 Agnus Dei
Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 7 Lux aeterna
Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 8 Libera me
Maurice Durufle: Requiem, Op 9 - 9 In paradisum

The Choir of Trinity College Cambridge, Stephen Layton
Duruflé -  Requiem & Poulenc- Lenten Motets
Hyperion Records


We will be closing this episode of Four Centuries of Great Music with Bedřich Smetana: Má vlast

My Homeland speaks to the pride we take in the best of our heritage and the pain of having to live with and come to terms with its darker pages.   Smetana speaks for his Czech country: its longing for independence at a time when it was dominated and needed to assert its national character, its language, its way of thinking. Just like his nation, Smetana has to reconcile the influence of his peers, especially Wagner, with his own
Czech musical heritage. How strong one must be to absorb and integrate the work of others without losing one’s own identity.
How courageous one must be to continue creating while losing the ability to hear, which began soon after he had completed
the first two of the six tone poems that are Má vlast.


The entire work of 6 tone poems is over 80 minutes in length so today will will listen to just Vltava (The Moldau)

The work tells of the flow of the Vltava, beginning from its first two tiny sources —the cold and warm Vltava, the joining of the
two little streams into one, then the sweep of the Vltava through the groves and along the meadows, through the countryside where harvest festivals are being celebrated; in the light of the moon the dance of the water nymphs; on the nearby rocks proud castles rear up, wide mansions and ruins; the Vltava swirls in the St. John’s rapids, then flows in a broad sweeping current on to Prague, where the Vyšehrad, Prague’s historic fort comes into sight and finally disappears in the distance with its the rivers majestic sweep into the Elbe.

Here is a performance of Bedřich Smetana: Vltava (The Moldau)  from Má vlast by the Czech Philharmonic conducted by Semyon Bychkov from the album Smetana Má Vlast    Pentatone Records