Richard Strauss - Eine Alpensinfonie (Frank Shipway)

Information

Composer: Richard Strauss

• (01-22) Eine Alpensinfonie, Op. 64
• (23) Symphonische Fantasie aus "Die Frau ohne Schatten"

Sao Paulo Symphony Orchestra
Frank Shipway, conductor

Date: 2012
Label: BIS
http://bis.se/conductors/shipway-frank/strauss-eine-alpensinfonie

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Review

Brit Shipway takes players from São Paulo to the Alps

A dramatic case of fire and ice if ever there was one. The São Paulo SO, sagely conducted by Frank Shipway, bring their South American heat to Strauss’s Alpine expedition. Icy peaks melt away just a little in the face of their panache. You might argue that nobility has to some extent been sacrificed to the brazenness of the playing but you cannot deny the fervour of what they bring. I don’t know of a more exciting account on disc. BIS’s engineers lay it all out in cinemascopic splendour.

First comes dawn and a sunburst of burnished horns. The offstage posse could have been a little more distanced for optimum effect but horn lovers will not be disappointed. There are plenty of thrills to come. The scenic ‘special effects’ are suitably ear-popping and each of the ‘points sublime’ do not spare the decibels. The summit again brings over-reaching horns, a couple of trumpet bullseyes and huge sighing glissandos in the violins. The storm is torrential, the mighty quadruple forte pretty sensational, though you could argue that the orchestra has already ‘peaked’ once too often. No question, though, that the final ‘Ausklang’ – the philosophical ‘summation’ of the piece – is beautifully done, with Shipway coaxing a convincingly Straussian glow from his players.

Strauss’s own ‘Symphonic Fantasy’ on his opera of questionable taste Die Frau ohne Schatten is far less of an indigestible potpourri than that of his friend Ernst Roth (or indeed the incoherent concoction that Vladimir Jurowski recently laid out in London) and the trick would seem to be that he focuses almost entirely on the music associated with Barak, the dyer, and his wife. He is nobly voiced by the São Paulo’s first trombone at the heart of the piece and the final paragraph is that of the opera – from the climactic quartet and spiritual ‘purification’ of the two couples.

I’m never entirely sure what I feel about Eine Alpensinfonie but if the thrill factor is what you seek above all from it, then I don’t think you’ll be disappointed by Shipway and his intrepid Paulistanos.

-- Edward Seckerson, Gramophone

More reviews:
BBC Music Magazine  PERFORMANCE: ***** / SOUND: *****
http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2013/Mar13/Strauss_Alpensinfonie_BISSACD1950.htm
http://www.classicalcdreview.com/MC414.html
http://www.classicstoday.com/review/shipways-bad-day-in-the-alps/
https://www.amazon.com/Eine-Alpensinfonie-Op-Symphonische-Fantasie/dp/B008S87SYW
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Strauss-Alpensinfonie-Symphony-Shipway-BIS1950/dp/B008S87SYW

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Richard Strauss (11 June 1864 – 8 September 1949) was a leading German composer of the late Romantic and early modern eras. He is known for his operas, lieder, tone poems and other orchestral works. Strauss was also a prominent conductor throughout Germany and Austria, enjoying quasi-celebrity status as his compositions became standards of orchestral and operatic repertoire. Strauss made a large number of recordings, both of his own music as well as music by German and Austrian composers. Along with Gustav Mahler, Strauss represents the late flowering of German Romanticism after Richard Wagner.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Strauss

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Frank Shipway (9 July 1935 – 6 August 2014) was a British conductor. Shipway was born in Birmingham, and earned a scholarship to The Royal College of Music to study piano and later switched to conducting. He was further trained in conducting by John Barbirolli and helped by Herbert von Karajan, modelling his style after Karajan's own. Shipway contributed to several classical music compilations. He also conducted some significant recorded performances that are highly regarded in the classical music community: Mahler's 5th, Shostakovich's 10th, and Strauss' Alpine Symphony.

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

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