Ottorino Respighi - Chamber Works (The Ambache)

Information

Composer: Ottorino Respighi

• (01-03) Piano Quintet in F minor
• (04-07) String Quartet in D minor
• (08-13) Six Pieces for violin and piano

The Ambache
Diana Ambache, piano
Marcia Crayford, violin
Ruth Ehrlich, violin
Martin Outram, viola
Judith Herbert, cello

Date: 2001
Label: Chandos
https://www.chandos.net/products/catalogue/CHAN%209962

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Review

Charming music charmingly performed‚ albeit with an incomplete Quintet

An agreeable collection‚ and further proof that Respighi was writing fine music long before Fontane di Roma arrived in 1916: all these pieces were written long before then. Proof‚ too‚ that his varied musical experiences as a young man (training in Italy‚ Russia and Germany; publicly performing as violinist‚ violist and pianist) had given him a wider expressive range than he is generally given credit for. The Six Pieces for violin and piano‚ from his early twenties‚ are fairly characteristic of this. They are all charmingly tuneful‚ and four of them could be classified as salon music‚ but the strikingly bolder and darker third (‘Leggenda’) and the sixth (a neo­Bachian ‘Aria’) already suggest areas that he would explore later. The Piano Quintet from the same period is obviously Brahmsian in inspiration but already very accomplished‚ for example in the way that ‘subsidiary’ piano figuration in the first movement soon takes on a life of its own‚ alongside the broadly lyrical main ideas‚ one of which eventually takes on a distinctly Italian cast. The second movement‚ in effect an introduction to the third‚ has an especially sonorous cantabile theme‚ which its successor takes up in several variants. This is the form in which the work was first heard (Respighi himself as first violinist) in 1902. The fourth movement‚ added later‚ is alas not included here.

The Quartet of seven years later is much more Italian‚ though with hints of Mendelssohn and of Russia in the scherzo. It is predominantly lyrical‚ but there is real variety to Respighi’s lyricism: closely twining motivic counterpoint in the first movement‚ for example‚ but a striking juxtaposition of long‚ melancholy line with abrupt chordal ostinato in the second. In that movement the contrast is better pointed by the Venice Quartet’s faster tempo and more restrained emotion (on the Dynamic label); otherwise I found these performances most enjoyable‚ and the recordings are excellent. But I would like to hear the Quintet’s finale one day.

-- Gramophone

More reviews:
BBC Music Magazine  PERFORMANCE: ***** / SOUND: *****
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2002/Jan02/Respighi_quartet.htm
http://www.classicalsource.com/db_control/db_cd_review.php?id=459

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Ottorino Respighi (9 July 1879 – 18 April 1936) was an Italian composer and musicologist. He is best known for his orchestral music, particularly the three Roman tone poems: Fountains of Rome (Fontane di Roma), Pines of Rome (I pini di Roma), and Roman Festivals (Feste romane). His musicological interest in 16th-, 17th- and 18th-century music led him to compose pieces based on the music of these periods. Although Respighi was known primarily as composers of instrumental and orchestral music, he also wrote a number of operas, the most famous of which is La fiamma.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottorino_Respighi

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The Ambache or Ambache Chamber Ensemble is an English group that can consist of anywhere from three to 30 musicians. It was founded in 1984 by pianist Diana Ambache specifically to accompany her in Mozart piano concertos, and the music of Mozart continues to make up a large part of the repertory. The other primary focus of the Ambache Ensemble is the interpretation of music composed by women. The Ambache Ensemble does not use a conductor; however, that has not prevented the group from recording extensively, as it has appeared on the Meridian, Naxos, Virgin Classics, Chandos, and Signum Classics labels.
http://www.allmusic.com/artist/ambache-chamber-ensemble-mn0002164538

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