Please do not misunderstand me. Let me make it absolutely clear. I have enormous respect for CPO. I regularly buy their cds. Their enterprise in rescuing so very many composers from total neglect has, over the past couple of decades, been a major part of my listening experience and my gratitude to the company is boundless. Although they have not recorded much British music their complete cycles of the symphonies of Benjamin Frankel and Humphrey Searle stand out for me. CPO has done more for Scandinavian, and now for Dutch, music than any other label.
Ernst Krenek, Emil von Reznicek, Ernst Toch, Egon Wellesz, Heitor Villa-Lobos, Aulis Sallinen, Darius Milhaud, Gunter Raphael, Richard Wetz, Hendrik Andriessen, Henk Badings, Jan van Gilse, Julius Rontgen, Andzej Panufnik, Kurt Atterberg, Lars-Erik Larsson, Wilhelm Petersen-Berger, Allan Pettersson, Ture Rangstrom, Ahmed Adnan Saygun, George Antheil..........
It is an amazing contribution.....and it continues
I can however offer some (I hope) gentle criticism. That criticism is the result of a lack of patience on my part. Having spent much of my listening life-of over 50 years now-hoping against hope that some of the music of these composers would become available it is both amazing and wonderful that companies like CPO in Germany and Lyrita and Dutton in the UK are now meeting my dreams. CPO has a more 'open policy' than other companies-which tend to keep their recording plans a totally guarded secret. I can speculate about which musical treasures Lyrita have in the pipeline....but I have no concrete evidence because Lyrita's plans are secret. CPO, on the other hand, let us know that they have recorded, say, the Johann Nepomuk David symphonies, sometimes even to the extent of including forthcoming cds in their published catalogue, and then sitting on the cds for many, many months before releasing them. Indeed years can pass before a recording gets its commercial release. That is tantalising....and frustrating for some of us.
Yes...that is a criticism but it is certainly not intended as "CPO-bashing". It is a criticism which pales into insignificance compared with my respect for the company and my profound gratitude for all they have and are doing for the music of neglected composers.
