Archive for Classical Candor
Classical Candor Review for Stylus Phantasticus
John J. Puccio reviews Tekla Cunningham and Pacific MusicWorks’ Stylus Phantasticus recording on Classical Candor: “the compositions follow a pattern of earliest to later music, with the earlier ones a bit less ornate. The Carlo Farina sonata, for instance, is almost sedate in its execution. Its subtitle, “detta la Desperata,” translates as “called the despairing,” an emotional piece if rather despondent in tone. MusicWorks provide it with an appropriately passionate melancholy. The harp and harpsichord…
Classical Candor Review for One Movement Symphonies
John J. Puccio comes away impressed by Michael Stern and the Kansas City Symphony’s One Movement Symphonies recording in his Classical Candor review: “Maestro Michael Stern and the Kansas City Symphony play the [Barber] in a fairly straightforward manner, without undue flourish yet with delicate nuance. They handle the mood swings in the music with subtlety and grace, producing if not the most striking account of the piece ever recorded certainly one of the most…
Classical Candor Reviews Last Tango Before Sunrise
John J. Puccio reviews José Serebrier’s Last Tango Before Sunrise on his Classical Candor blog: “Most classical music fans know Jose Serebrier as a world-class conductor, but not everyone may know that he is also a composer. The present disc hopes to rectify that situation by showcasing nine of his compositions, several of them world-premiere recordings. … The first two items on the program are among the longest, starting with the Symphony for Percussion, written in…
Classical Candor Reviews Kansas City’s Holst: The Planets SACD
Classical Candor‘s John J. Puccio reviews The Kansas City Symphony and Michael Stern’s new Holst: The Planets; The Perfect Fool on SACD: “You can be sure with Keith Johnson’s Reference Recordings, for example, that an orchestra sounds the way a real orchestra would sound in a real concert hall. That’s certainly the case with this recording of the Kansas City Symphony, under the direction of its longtime Music Director Michael Stern, and made in Helzberg…
Classical Candor Review for A QSF Journey
John J. Puccio calls Quartet San Francisco’s A QSF Journey recording one of his favorite albums of 2018 in a new review on his Classical Candor blog: “It’s always good news when Reference Recordings releases a new album. It’s doubly good news when their chief engineer, Keith O. Johnson, does the recording. It’s triply good news when they make it a studio production. And it’s quadruply good news when the studio they make it in…
Classical Candor on Pittsburgh’s “Dynamic” Beethoven Symphony No. 3
“Dynamic. That’s the best word to describe Manfred Honeck’s performance of the Beethoven Third. It’s dynamic in terms of Honeck’s interpretation and in terms of Soundmirror/Reference Recordings’ sonics. Of course, if “dynamic” is not the first thing you want from a Beethoven symphony, you might not appreciate Honeck’s way with it. But there is no questioning the excitement the recording generates. … The first movement Allegro con brio contains the usual complement of rhythms and harmonies we expect of…
Classical Candor Rave for ¡Viva Segovia!
Order Now “As I said about Mr. Perez in an earlier review, he does justice to each composer. Perez plays with flair but also with nuance and subtlety. His guitar opens up each work and expands it seemingly beyond the limits of a single instrument. Although you won’t find any (or if you are a dedicated classical guitar fan, many) familiar pieces here, if you are like me you will find each work entertaining, touching,…
Classical Candor Reviews Moszkowski: From Foreign Lands
“Most of this material is lightweight, to be sure, yet it’s also most delightful in the capable hands of West and his players. The opening “Torch Dance” has a rousing spirit. The six movements of “From Foreign Lands” are colorful and characterful, each exemplifying a different country. They reminded me of things by maybe Glazunov, Gounod, or Rimsky-Korsakov. In their time (the late nineteenth century), the “Foreign Lands” suite was apparently quite famous, although today…
Classical Candor Reviews Utah Symphony’s Mahler Symphony No. 1
John J. Puccio reviews the new Mahler Symphony No. 1 “Titan” recording from the Utah Symphony and Thierry Fischer on his Classical Candor blog: “The sound is good…here [the miking] is not so close as it is in many other live recordings. The result is a fairly natural perspective… the sonics are round, warm, detailed, and natural, as though heard from a moderate distance instead of so close up.” Full Review Order & Listen Now:…
Classical Candor Reviews Joel Fan: Dances For Piano and Orchestra
The new Joel Fan and Northwest Sinfonietta release, Dances for Piano and Orchestra, gets a rave from Classical Candor critic John J. Puccio: “The soloist captures [Fantaisie-Ballet‘s] light, elegant moments nicely and then fills it out with a grand and exciting virtuosity… Fan again demonstrates his dexterity in playing with seemingly ten fingers on each hand. Yet [Vals Capricho] is also a surprisingly delicate piece of music, with a wonderfully lilting rhythm that Fan and…
Classical Candor Reviews Organ Polychrome
A grand John J. Puccio review for the premiere solo recording for the new Julia Irene Kauffman Casavant Organ performed by Jan Kraybill: “Can you really think of anyone you’d rather have make an organ record than Reference Recordings? Well, anyone you’d rather have making any recording than Reference Recordings. For over thirty years they’ve been producing some of the best audiophile recordings around, and their current release, Organ Polychrome: The French School, with organist…
Classical Candor Reviews Dvořák and Janáček
Classical Candor‘s John J. Puccio has a new review for the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra’s new Dvořák & Janáček SACD: “This new rendering of [Dvořák] No. 8 by Manfred Honeck and his Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra on a live Reference Recordings Fresh! hybrid SACD stacks up pretty well. … There is great exuberance in the conductor’s handling of the various themes, while the sounds of nature, like the birdsong of the flute, create a truly sweet atmosphere.…
Classical Candor Praises the latest Andrés Segovia Archive Installment
John J. Puccio’s Classical Candor blog praises the performances of Roberto Moronn Pérez in the French Composers edition of the Andrés Segovia Archive: “Perez does each man and his work fair justice. He plays with flair but also with nuance and subtlety. His guitar opens up each work and expands it seemingly beyond the limits of a single instrument. …if you are like me you will find each work entertaining, touching, or enlivening as the…
Classical Candor Reviews Miraculous Metamorphoses
Classical Candor‘s John J. Puccio gives a thorough look through the new Kansas City Symphony Miraculous Metamorphoses recording: “It’s always a pleasure listening to an album made by the Reference Recordings team of producer David Frost, recording wizard Keith Johnson, and executive producers Tam Henderson and Marcia Martin. They never attempt to attain the kind of absolute transparency so beloved of the audiophile community but instead capture something closer to the actual sound of a…
Classical Candor Reviews Strauss
Classical Candor (which recently named our Elgar/Vaughan Williams recording a 2013 favorite) has a new review for the Pittsburgh Symphony’s Strauss recording: “…what Maestro Honeck and his team offer are vigorous performances and excellent, live, hybrid multichannel SACD sound. … With Honeck it’s all about the excitement. … Death and Transfiguration, Op. 24 … [is] both dreadful and peaceful, ominous and tranquil, dramatic and serene, at least in Honeck’s hands, and he builds a commendably…