Harmonious Families Vol. 3 - Asger & Ebbe Hamerik (Moshe Atzmon)

Information

Composer: Asger Hamerik; Ebbe Hamerik

• (01) Asger Hamerik - Jewish Trilogy, Op. 19
• (04) Asger Hamerik - Concert Romance for cello and orchestra, Op. 27
• (05) Ebbe Hamerik - Cantus firmus V, Sinfonia breve
• (10) Ebbe Hamerik - Concerto molto breve for oboe and orchestra

Henrik Steensgaard, cello
Jørgen Frederiksen, oboe

Danish Philharmonic Orchestra, South Jutland
Moshe Atzmon, conductor

Date: 1999
Label: Danacord
https://www.danacord.dk/frmsets/records/526-r.html

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Review

This is Volume 3 in Danacord's original and auspicious series of Harmonious families, this time the focus is on the Hamerik team. Ebbe Hamerik is more famous as a conductor and his early death robbed Denmark out of one of its finest and most sensitive masters of the rostrum. Apparently he was also a gifted creative artist as the short Oboe Concerto shows. Employing modernist and traditionalist tendencies Nielsen's more famously controversial work is occasionally recalled but is very much its own master. It receives a spirited performance from Jorgen Frederiksen and the Danish Orchestra with Moshe Atzmon a believable accompanist. The cantus Firmus is even more enterprising although it is conspicuously harder to understand especially in the frenetic concluding Presto that makes up the final part of the work which, in its savagery, reminds one of a Northern landscape

Asger Hamerik's music is altogether more accessible. I was particularly taken with the expansive breadth and beauty of the Jewish Trilogy with a substantial Overture and a rhetorically bombastic 'Sinfonia Trionfale'. The short Concert Romance is a mere exercise in virtuosity but is charming just the same. As I mooted earlier, all works receive committed and freshly invigorating performances by the South Jutland Orchestra under the wistful hand of Moshe Atzmon. For those who have bought the previous volumes, this will be an essential addition but others new to the delights of neglected Danish music should do well to investigate forthwith! Danacord's sound and presentation are, as usual, first-rate throughout!

-- Gerald Fenech, MusicWeb International

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Asger Hamerik (Hammerich) (April 8, 1843 – July 13, 1923), was a Danish composer of classical music. Hamerik studied music with J.P.E. Hartmann and Niels Gade in Denmark, then with Hans von Bülow in Berlin and Hector Berlioz in Paris. In 1871 he was offered the post of director of the Peabody Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, USA, a position he held until 1898. Hamerik composed 41 opus numbers, including 7 symphonies, chamber music, 4 operas, 5 orchestral suites and popular orchestral music, much of it based on Scandinavian folk tunes. During his lifetime he was considered the best-known Danish composer after Gade.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asger_Hamerik

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Ebbe Hamerik (5 September 1898 – 12 August 1951) was a Danish composer. Born in Frederiksberg, he was the son of composer Asger Hamerik. He died at the age of 52 in Kattegat when his sailboat sank and he drowned. Notable operas include Stepan (1922), Leonardo da Vinci: 4 Scener af hans Liv (1930), Marie Grubbe, inspired by the life of Marie Grubbe, (1940), Rejsekammeraten (eventyropera 1943) and Drømmerne (1949).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ebbe_Hamerik

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Moshe Atzmon (born 30 July 1931) is an Israeli conductor. He was born in Budapest, and at the age of thirteen he emigrated with his family to Tel Aviv, Israel. Atzmon started his musical career on the horn before going to London for further studies in conducting. He has won several conducting prizes and held many positions with major orchestras. Atzmon was chief conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra from 1967 to 1971, and the Basel Symphony Orchestra from 1972 to 1986. He was also chief conductor of orchestras in Tokyo, Nagoya, and Rennes and of the Dortmunder Philharmoniker.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moshe_Atzmon

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