A belated thank you for your support, Antonio.

Saturday, June 15, 2019

Mieczysław Weinberg - Music for Solo Cello Vol. 1 (Josef Feigelson)


Information

Composer: Mieczysław Weinberg
  • (01) Twenty-Four Preludes, Op. 100
  • (25) Sonata for Solo Cello No. 1, Op. 72

Josef Feigelson, cello
Date: 1997/2010
Label: Naxos (previously released on Olympia)
https://www.naxos.com/catalogue/item.asp?item_code=8.572280

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

Review

The music of Soviet Russian composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg (also known as Moises Weinberg) has enjoyed a modest revival as the issues surrounding who left for the West and who stayed and made the best of a bad situation begin to recede. The music on this fascinating album reflects that schism in several ways, and the notes by Latvian-born cellist Josef Feigelson (in English only) will be worth the price for students of Soviet music. Feigelson is, for now, the champion of the 24 Preludes for solo cello, Op. 100, and the story of how he came to perform and record them is illustrative in itself. After finding them in a small-town music store, he prepared to leave the Soviet Union himself. As he scheduled his final recitals in the country, pianists regarded him as a defector (although his emigration followed legal channels) and refused to perform with him, so he turned to Weinberg, whom he had previously disdained as an "official" Soviet composer. Later he learned that Weinberg had written the preludes (and the shorter Sonata for solo cello No. 1, Op. 72, that rounds out the program) for Mstislav Rostropovich, who refused to perform them after he left for America. In response to Feigelson's question, Rostropovich angrily called the non-dissident Weinberg a coward. But the next generation often can see past the individual choices to the music, and Feigelson is unlikely to be the last cellist to perform the preludes. For players, they have the attractive feature of being susceptible to slicing and dicing in several different ways. They might be thought of as a mixture of the Bach and Chopin prelude-set concepts, using a variety of 20th century techniques (none, of course, too adventurous, but this isn't socialist realism, either). That is, they ascend through the keys, or at least tonal centers, beginning with C, but each prelude is also a study in a certain texture or motive and its possible implications. A sensitive and committed cellist is a necessity, and Feigelson definitely qualifies as one, but these are not showpiece works. Originally recorded in 1996 with decent sound from a New York college recital hall and released on the Olympia label, this was a fine choice for reissue on Naxos, with its focus on neglected national styles.

-- James Manheim, AllMusic

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

Mieczysław Weinberg (8 December 1919 in Warsaw – 26 February 1996 in Moscow) was a Soviet composer of Polish-Jewish origin. From 1939 he lived in the Soviet Union and Russia and lost most of his family in the Holocaust. He left a large body of work that included twenty-two symphonies and seventeen string quartets. Weinberg's works frequently have a strong programmatic element. Throughout his life, he continually referred back to his formative years in Warsaw and to the war. Although he never formally studied with Shostakovich, the older composer had an obvious influence on Weinberg's music.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mieczys%C5%82aw_Weinberg

***

Josef (or Yosif) Feigelson (born 1954 in Latvia) is a concert cellist living in the United States. Feigelson is a former student of Mstislav Rostropovich and Natalia Gutman, and the winner of the Tchaikovsky International Competition and International Bach Competition. Since making his New York orchestral debut in 1988, Feigelson he has performed at virtually every major hall in New York City, as well as Orchestra Hall in Chicago and the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. In Europe, Feigelson has taken numerous tours of France, Germany and other Central and Eastern European countries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yosif_Feigelson
http://www.yfeigelson.com/

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

FLAC, tracks
Links in comment
Enjoy!

3 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The download is no longer available. Would you please upload it again? Thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Choose one link, copy and paste it to your browser's address bar, wait a few seconds (you may need to click 'Continue' first), then click 'Skip Ad' (or 'Get link').
    If you are asked to download or install anything, IGNORE, only download from file hosting site (mega.nz).
    If MEGA shows 'Bandwidth Limit Exceeded' message, try to create a free account.

    http://beteshis.com/A2n
    or
    http://uii.io/xqnWSq
    or
    http://exe.io/MPAYvkwd

    ReplyDelete