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Duttons for October

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tapiola
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« on: July 25, 2013, 07:44:17 pm »

A third disc of John Foulds.
David Matthews Vespers & Symphony No. 7
Braunfels Concertos (world premieres)
Some French guy I mentioned earlier.
Worth the wait and very exciting.
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Dundonnell
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« Reply #1 on: July 26, 2013, 12:24:34 pm »

I actually find this list rather depressing :(

It appears to me that the glory days of Dutton are gone(for good ???).

I used to look forward with eager anticipation to the company's three-times-a year releases knowing that I would be buying at least four of their cds, containing exciting new recordings of major British works.

Now...what do we get ???

Yes, of course the David Matthews will be a splendid addition to the catalogue....but a third cd of John Foulds ??? Even Malcolm MacDonald(Foulds' greatest advocate) admits that what we are now getting is very much "light music" and-if not "dragging the bottom of the barrel"-appears an attempt to record everything Foulds wrote for orchestra.

The Braunfels works have "British connections" but so what ??? This is the sort of stuff CPO might have recorded.

Where is the cd of major orchestral pieces to celebrate Arthur Butterworth's 90th birthday ??? Why no more Stanley Bate ???

Even if Dutton has set its face against the "tougher" side of British music: Frederic d'Erlanger ??? ???

I am fully aware that this is a personal response and many will disagree totally with me but I am certainly intending to email Lewis Foreman with precisely these sentiments.

We owe Dutton SO MUCH.....but the company is now really beginning to disappoint at least one of its greatest admirers :(
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« Reply #2 on: July 26, 2013, 02:02:50 pm »

Certainly doesn't excite me. I used to rifle through the pages of Gramophone for their advert. This is starting to get like Chandos!! :( There will only be Cpo left at this rate,if you want surprises! Nice for David Mathews & his admirers though! (Nice website too!).
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patmos.beje
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« Reply #3 on: July 26, 2013, 02:14:00 pm »

Disappointing there is no Stanley Bate for the second successive year.  I had been hoping for one or more of the Violin Concertos.  Nonethelees, their Vaughan Williams' 'Early and Late Works' of last August with the Serenade and Bucolic Suite was, for me, the best classical CD of last year.
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Bosque Bill
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« Reply #4 on: July 26, 2013, 02:19:58 pm »

As a Yank, I'm very sorry that yet a second batch of Duttons will be arriving minus any Keith Lockhart forays into mostly untouched American repertoire -- unfortunate given that his Dutton recordings of rare Converse and Chadwick won praise and offered exciting yet sensitive performances. I mistakenly assumed we'd be getting at least one such Lockhart venture into Americana a year, but apparently not. Maybe next spring! And the list of things to come does offer some intriguing titles.

Don't mean to complain, but this seemed such an exciting branching out of this label!
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cilgwyn
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« Reply #5 on: July 26, 2013, 03:41:48 pm »

Indeed! I've been enjoying the Reference & Karl Krueger recordings on the Bridge label. What wonderful music! Also the Naxos cd of Henry Hadley. Therefore,I was a little surprised to see the reviews of the Converse & Chadwick cds in back copies of IRR Magazine. Muted enthusiasm at the most. And I certainly wouldn't call music like Chadwick's Symphonic Sketches or Tam O' Shanter 'second rate'! ??? ::) I remember thinking what a great Prom item they would make. Also,my delight that 'Tam O' Shanter was,in it's own way,every bit as entertaining & inventive as the celebrated Arnold (I think I actually like it better!! :o :) ).
Anyway,look outside IRR Mag & the reviews are all very enthusiastic,albeit,with a few minor reservations,here & there ie 'Adonais' being a little uneven in places (etc);but you could say the same for some Richard Strauss tone poems.......and give me Chadwick,any day (although I DO  like 'Also sprach Zarathustra! :)).
 The Dutton cd on the other hand receives a good deal of praise from various reviewers.
So,there to the IRR 'critic'!! >:( ;D

From what I've heard,Henry Hadley definately deserves more recordings. I really HAVE been impressed by what I have heard,so far!

Recordings of the FrederickConverse symphonies would be very welcome. Take no notice of that IRR critic Dutton!! ;D I want to hear them anyway!! ;D

I was also impressed by the rather wonderful & eerie 'The Gods of the Mountains-suite' by Arthur Farwell. That opening is genuinely memorable & the approach of the Gods is creepy. I wouldn't like to listen to it in bed,in the dark!! But why no other recordings of Arthur Farwell's orchestral output?! :( :( Surely he has some historical significance,and if this wonderfully evocative suite is anything to go by,some music that could be well worth hearing!

Also very impressive,John Alden Carpenter's 'Sea Drift'.A  particularly lovely piece with some quite magical orchestration. Wonderful!
 I could go on a bit about some of the other pieces,on the Bridge/Krueger cds too (Louis Coerne,Burlingame Hill,etc)......but fortunately for everyone here,I won't! ;D

There is some real buried treasure amongst these composers!! :)

 
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Bosque Bill
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« Reply #6 on: July 26, 2013, 04:44:11 pm »

Yes, cilgwyn, and the classical music review publication Fanfare gave a very positive review of the Dutton/Lockhart collaboration (but then again, it's an American magazine) and even profiled the conductor, who talked about future recordings that might include music by the long-neglected but substantial American composer Louis Gruenberg. And you're absolutely right about Chadwick's "Tam O' Shanter," which is a real barn-burner of a piece, and the wonderfully mysterious "Gods of the Mountains" suite by Arthur Farwell. My own suggestions for the Dutton/Lockhart collaboration would be a disc of orchestral music devoted entirely to Henry F. Gilbert, a spirited sort of Mark Twain of American music who busily assimilated African-American and Indian influences in his utterly charming compositions of the early 20th century, and the rambunctious Anthony Philip Heinrich, whose brash, jocular, downright fun music neatly captures the untamed spirit of Manifest Destiny of the 19th century. (One 50-minute symphony, "Mastodon," includes the composer's reaction to being rebuffed by President John Tyler!) In the old days, Naxos might have undertaken these, but the label's American Series seems to have gone off in different directions as of late. Hope Dutton isn't doing the same. They probably just have a lot on their plate right now.
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« Reply #7 on: July 26, 2013, 05:34:24 pm »

I have absolutely nothing against any record company recording any of the American composers mentioned..........although(yes, there has to be an "although" ;D), very attractive though the music of these composers undoubtedly is, there are-in my opinion-a large number of mid-20th century American composers of greater substance whose music is sorely in need of restitution(we need more Walter Piston and David Diamond, to name but two).

What I cannot understand is why Dutton made the decision to branch out/diversify into first romantic Americana, then late 19th/early 20th century French music and now Braunfels.

Obviously Dutton no longer wishes to be identified as a "British Music only" company. Fair enough, I suppose.....but for those (yes, like myself...hands up ;D) who were relying on them to record so much neglected British music those hopes are now being steadily, if not "dashed", at least very considerably "diminished".
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Bosque Bill
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« Reply #8 on: July 26, 2013, 06:16:40 pm »

I suppose one reason many of us were first attracted to Dutton was its attention to offbeat and neglected British repertoire, which is why its brief foray into American music was so promising. With all due respect to Piston (whose slow movements in the symphonies I absolutely cherish) and Diamond (his Second Symphony is a real masterwork), we now have excellent and stunningly well-recorded performances of most of their major works. That's why the interest in absurdly neglected composers such as Converse, Chadwick, Gilbert and Heinrich ranks as pivotal -- nobody has really tackled them and they, too, offer important music for the truly discerning listener. My opinion, of course!
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tapiola
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« Reply #9 on: July 26, 2013, 08:27:45 pm »

I am told the Braunfels disc is a "stunner".  Braunfels is without doubt a master of 20th Century music. Far and away a greater composer than Hindemith. Any release of his music is a good thing.
He was blacklisted by the Nazis and then by the Boulez-Stockhausen serial killers.
His time has finally come.
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« Reply #10 on: July 26, 2013, 09:40:27 pm »

I too was hoping for a Butterworth symphony or two for his 90th!
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kyjo
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« Reply #11 on: July 26, 2013, 10:18:26 pm »

I suppose one reason many of us were first attracted to Dutton was its attention to offbeat and neglected British repertoire, which is why its brief foray into American music was so promising. With all due respect to Piston (whose slow movements in the symphonies I absolutely cherish) and Diamond (his Second Symphony is a real masterwork), we now have excellent and stunningly well-recorded performances of most of their major works. That's why the interest in absurdly neglected composers such as Converse, Chadwick, Gilbert and Heinrich ranks as pivotal -- nobody has really tackled them and they, too, offer important music for the truly discerning listener. My opinion, of course!

I agree with you, Bill. There are still quite a few major Diamond works that haven't made it to CD yet, e.g. the Violin Concertos 1 and 3, Cello Concerto, Piano Concerto, Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra, Secular Cantata for chorus and orchestra, Choral Symphony To Music and Symphonies 6, 7, 9, 10 and 11, all of which cry out for recordings. I wouldn't necessarily say that Chadwick is "absurdly neglected"; he is, without a doubt, the most well-represented on disc of the composers you group him with. The only major work of his that remains unrecorded is his Symphony no. 1 in C. But Converse, Gilbert, Heinrich, Hadley, Edward Burlingame Hill, Arthur Farwell, Louis Coerne, Philip Greeley Clapp (composer of 12 symphonies, no less!), Arthur Shepherd-all these and more composers are seriously neglected even though they played major roles in mid to late 19th-early 20th century Americana. For starters, I'd like to see recorded all five Converse symphonies, nos. 1, 3 and 5 of Hadley and Farwell's Rudolf Gott Symphony, which is reputedly a massive, Brucknerian composition. Based on the magically mysterious Gods of the Mountain Suite and a couple piano pieces I've heard, Farwell had something of an original voice, and a powerful one.

P.S. I also agree with you about Piston's slow movements-so poignant yet restrained. Who knew a neoclassical composer could write such effective slow movements (Stravinsky's Aria II from his VC is another example that comes to mind)? The gorgeous slow movement from Piston's Divertimento for nine instruments almost brought me to tears, I kid you not!
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britishcomposer
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« Reply #12 on: July 26, 2013, 10:35:20 pm »

For starters, I'd like to see recorded all five Converse symphonies, nos. 1, 3 and 5 of Hadley and Farwell's Rudolf Gott Symphony, which is reputedly a massive, Brucknerian composition. Based on the magically mysterious Gods of the Mountain Suite and a couple piano pieces I've heard, Farwell had something of an original voice, and a powerful one.

Latvian uploaded the premiere performance of the Farwell symphony upon my request in UC days. This was on Saturday 12 May 2012. You can still find it in the archive thanks to Sidney's UC-copy.
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kyjo
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« Reply #13 on: July 26, 2013, 10:39:03 pm »

Re Dutton-I am not dismayed like Colin and others are about the latest Dutton batch, but I would generally agree that there are composers of greater merit that the company should be giving equal, if not greater attention. The release that disappointed me most was the Foulds-just as bad as similar barrel-scraping attempts in the outputs of Elgar and Bax ::) We shouldn't give up hope on Dutton yet-hopefully Mr. Foreman will ponder on Colin's-I'm sure-sincere e-mail :)
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kyjo
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« Reply #14 on: July 26, 2013, 10:40:56 pm »

Latvian uploaded the premiere performance of the Farwell symphony upon my request in UC days. This was on Saturday 12 May 2012. You can still find it in the archive thanks to Sidney's UC-copy.

Thanks for bringing that to my attention!
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