Joachim Raff - Symphonies; Suites for Orchestra; Overtures (Hans Stadlmair)

Information

Composer: Joachim Raff

• CD1: Symphony No. 1 "An das Vaterland"
• CD2: Symphony No. 2; Suite "Aus Thüringen"
• CD3: Symphony No. 3 "Im Walde"; Italian Suite
• CD4: Symphony No. 4; 4 Opera Overtures; Concert-Overture
• CD5: Symphony No. 5 "Lenore"; Suite No. 1
• CD6: Symphony No. 6; Suite No. 2 "In ungarischer Weise"
• CD7: Symphony No. 7 "In den Alpen"; Bach's Chaconne; Abends Rhapsodie
• CD8: Symphony No. 8 "Frühlingsklänge" & No. 10 "Zur Herbstzeit"
• CD9: Symphony No. 9 "Im Sommer" & No. 11 "Der Winter"

Bamberg Symphony Orchestra
Hans Stadlmair, conductor

Date: 1999-2002
Compilation: 2009
Label: Tudor
http://tudor.ch/produktinfo.php?id=785&sid=32wAp13R88yirx@fwA00l00kx6

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Review

Many of Raff’s orchestral works have been recorded and both the Swiss company Tudor and a decade before that Marco Polo (now fitfully migrating to Naxos) have made major inroads into the Raff discography.

We may know Raff's name for a variety of one-off reasons. Some will recall his winsome piece for piano and orchestra La Fileuse. His Kavatina op. 85 no. 3 kept his name alive when it seemed that all his work would fall away to dust, pulping and landfill. Others may remember that Bernard Herrmann's taste for engaging rarities ran to recording Raff's Fifth Symphony Lenore - the Fuselli Gothic cover of the Unicorn LP will probably come to mind. Then again others, especially Lisztians, will remember that Liszt left the task of orchestrating his tone poems to Raff. Perhaps a few will know of the Candide Vox LP of the Third Symphony Der Wald.

Tudor, over a period of three years, recorded the eleven symphonies with a single orchestra and conductor and at a single venue. In this they were pioneers; the earlier project by Marco Polo used a mix of orchestras, conductors and venues. The financial support of Stiftung Dr Robert und Lina Thyll-Dürr was crucial to Tudor’s admirable and needful enterprise. Nor have Tudor stopped there. The Zürich-based company’s catalogue is laced with CDs of Raff’s concertos, other tone poems, violin sonatas and string quartets.

The present well designed and space-saving box has the nine discs each in a hard card sleeve designed to match the individual CDs and setting out full track contents on the reverse. As for the programme notes, these are in a 127 page booklet in German, English and French. No need to fiddle around with a CD-ROM.

...

There we have it: the delights of the Raff symphonies are now conveniently accessible in this Tudor set. The company’s catalogue has the right to claim to be the home of Raff. This box is an alternative to the only other symphony cycle on Marco Polo many of which may now be difficult to track down and will cost you more. In addition the couplings are more generous than those on Marco Polo. I would not say it was any better than the Marco Polo although it has the advantage of being a decade more recently recorded.

-- Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International

More reviews:
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/jul/29/raff-symphonies-suites
http://www.raff.org/records/reviews/symphony/16.htm
https://www.amazon.com/Symphonies-JOSEPH-JOACHIM-RAFF/dp/B002QV20VS

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

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

***

Hans Stadlmair (born 3 May 1929 in Neuhofen an der Krems) is an Austrian conductor and composer. Stadlmair studied at the Vienna Academy of Music with Clemens Krauss and Alfred Uhl, and in Stuttgart with Johann Nepomuk David. From 1956 to 1995 he was artistic director of the Münchener Kammerorchester, conducted the orchestra in more than 4000 concerts, included several premieres, as well as on international tours. He recorded all eleven symphonies of Joachim Raff with the Bamberger Symphoniker, along with Raff's four orchestral suites, overtures and smaller orchestral works.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Stadlmair

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

FLAC, tracks

Links in comment

Enjoy!