Joachim Raff - Suite for Piano & Orchestra; Overtures & Preludes (Tra Nguyen; Roland Kluttig)

Information

Composer: Joachim Raff

• (01-05) Suite for piano & orchestra, Op. 200
• (06) Die Eifersüchtigen, comic opera, WoO 54: Overture
• (07) König Alfred, opera, WoO 14: Overture
• (08-09) Dornröschen, fairy tale, WoO 19: Vorspiel und Die Dornhecke
• (10) Samson, musical tragedy, WoO 20: Vorspiel dritter Akt

Tra Nguyen, piano (1-5)
Norrlands Opera Symphony Orchestra
Roland Kluttig, conductor

Date: 2009
Label: Sterling
http://www.sterlingcd.com/catalogue/cds1085.html

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Review

A welcome exploration of the music of a master melodist and orchestrator

Joachim Raff (1822-82) deserves considerably more attention than he currently receives, so full marks to this ever-enterprising Swedish indie for the resurrection of the Swiss composer’s five-movement Suite and affording us glimpses of Raff the opera composer. He had a fine melodic gift (as anyone who knows his C minor Piano Concerto and Cello Concerto will know) and was one of the master orchestrators of the day (he acted as Liszt’s guide in instrumentation for a short while). His Op 200, lasting over 36 minutes, shows not only these gifts but a clever and witty eclectic. The fugue subject of the first movement’s Introduction and Fugue, for instance, after its academic exposition, is treated in an unexpectedly humorous way, then played against itself in inversion as well as being used in a high-spirited transformation for part of the finale. The nimble-fingered soloist, the young British-Vietnamese pianist Tra Nguyen, despatches the Mendelssohnian filigree writing with stylish aplomb. Altogether an engaging and attractive discovery.

The two overtures from his 1882 comic opera Die Eifersüchtigen (“The Jealous Ones”) and King Alfred (1850), Liszt-influenced and solidly crafted, would make effective curtain-raisers though lacking that last spark of individuality that will forever confine Raff to the second division. The last three pieces underline this, especially the Intermezzo from Raff’s Dornröschen (“Briar-Rose”) for vocal soloists, chorus and orchestra, a straight lift from Mendelssohn’s fairy world. The orchestral playing is fine with the occasional untidy string ensemble, the recording is excellent and comes with an extensive (16-page) booklet in English.

-- Jeremy Nicholas, Gramophone

More reviews:
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2010/June10/raff_suite_sterlingCDS10852.htm
http://www.allmusic.com/album/joachin-raff-suite-for-piano-and-orchestra-op-200-overtures-preludes-mw0001962536
http://www.raff.org/records/reviews/orch/08a.htm
http://www.raff.org/records/reviews/orch/08b.htm
http://www.raff.org/records/reviews/orch/08c.htm
http://www.raff.org/records/reviews/orch/08d.htm

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Joachim Raff (May 27, 1822 – June 24 or June 25, 1882) was a German-Swiss composer, teacher and pianist. He worked as Liszt's assistant at Weimar from 1850 to 1853, helping in the orchestration of several of Liszt's works. From 1878 he was the first Director of, and a teacher at, the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt, where he employed Clara Schumann and a number of other eminent musicians as teachers. His pupils there included Edward MacDowell and Alexander Ritter. Raff was very prolific, and by the end of his life was one of the best known German composers, though his work is largely forgotten today.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joachim_Raff

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Tra Nguyen is a British-Vietnamese pianist. Tra made her first solo performance at the Hanoi Grand Opera House when she was ten and has continued to engage audiences in other prestigious venues worldwide. Tra Nguyen studied with Lev Naumov in Moscow Conservatory and with Christopher Elton at the Royal Academy of Music, London, where she received the academy’s highest award for her final recital. Her imaginative programming balances core repertoire and lesser-known music, winning critical praise. Her discography introduces many world première recordings of neglected music.

http://www.tranguyen.org/

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Roland Kluttig (born 1968 in Radeberg) is a German conductor. He he studied conducting at the Hochschule für Musik "Carl Maria von Weber" in Dresden, and attended master classes with Sylvain Cambreling, Peter Eötvös and John Eliot Gardiner. From 1992 to 1999 he was conductor of the Kammerensemble Neue Musik Berlin. From 2000 to 2004 he served as music director and assistant to Lothar Zagrosek at the Stuttgart State Opera. Since 2010 he has been music director at the Landestheater Coburg. He has worked with composers such as Chin Un-suk and Helmut Lachenmann.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_Kluttig
https://www.rolandkluttig.de

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