Par BRUCH MAX. Thanks to the premiere performance by Joseph Joachim and to the release of the printed edition in 1868, Max Bruch's Violin Concerto #1 zipped onto the road to success and has never left it since. Yet from the preface of the 'BreitkopfUrtext' edition,one can infer how things looked like behind the dazzling facade. After the world premiere, the composer struggled for the definitive form. He wrote '3, 4 development sections in the finale,' and sought the advice of celebrated virtuosi such as Joseph Joachim and Ferdinand David to revise the solo part. And after all this was done (see above), Bruch suffered under the work's popularity: 'Have I written nothing but this one concerto?' The new Urtext edition is based primarily on the first edition. Next to the main source and the autograph, what is supremely interesting is a solo part with entries by Joachim and Bruch. It confirms how intensively the two men collaborated on honing the final form of the work./ Répertoire / Orchestre

A Cantata for Christmas-From John Leavitt comes this elegant cantata for Christmas set up in the form of a classic Lessons and Carols service. A colorful tapestry of beautiful sounds this major work has great variety in its scope and style. Whether presented with piano or John's chamber orchestration the sensitive writing will showcase the artful approach of a master arranger making this compilation of carols and readings a thoughtful choice for churches universities and community choruses. Highly recommended! Songs include: Veni Veni Emmanuel: People Look East: The Angel Gabriel: He Is Born the Divine Christ Child: Resonet in laudibus: What Sweeter Music: Tomorrow Shall Be My Dancing Day: WeThree Kings of Orient Are: Sing Noel Alleluia! Score and Parts (fl 1-2/pic ob cl 1-2 bn perc 1-3 timp hp vn 1-2 va vc db) available as a Printed Edition and as a digital download.

Niels Marthinsen's Symphony No. 2 - Snapshot Symphony (2009). 1st movement Fiesta Mexicana: fortissimo accelerando (ca. 6 minutes) 2nd movement Arabian Nights: adagio intensivo e furioso (ca. 11 minutes) 3rd movement Great Fireworks in China: giocoso esplosivo e marcatissimo (ca. 8 minutes)   Programme note I’ve never been to Mexico and Arabia or to China. But I love the way those countries sound in Hollywood movies and inpop culture generally: When Clint Eastwood rides south of the border when Disney’s Alladin or Mulan takes me far east when arabic pop music roars past me out of the open windows of a car... and bull fighter music and the sound of acrobatic beat-em-up’s in John Woo’s Hong Kong karate movies – and so on: powerful images splashed all over my eye balls and ear drums. My recollections of this ethnic-pop-film-music has turned itself into a symphony. And I don’t even have to just remember what I have heard: A few internet clicks gives me access to incredible sound libraries containing live-and-kicking ethnic music from my three favorite countries just waiting to be put together in new combinations and energize my personal imagery.  The symphony is like a huge slide show – musical snapshots from my travels in the western pop culture versions of three exotic locations: Mexico Arabia and China – original and popular melodies welded together by my personal musical language and associations. I use all the effects of modern pling-plong-music plus a few of my own inventions to create a spectacular contemporary orchestral sound sporting a bee hive of melodies from either East or West played simultaneously in different keys and differents tempos at once while kept firmly in place by

In the early years of our century when vital new forces were revolutionising the arts Russian-born Alexander Scriabin (1872-1915) was one of the visionary pioneers who sought a new musical language. At least a full decade before the advances of Stravinsky and Schoenberg Scriabin had begun the process of a complete break with all musical conventions. By 1905 he was immersed in a search for a way to express in sound the mystical and theosophical ideas obsessed him. Scriabin’s last two orchestral works were the products of a virtual delirium of composing. Simultaneously refining his poem called Poem of Ecstasy andcompleting the symphony that grew out of it (and shared its name) Scriabin never forgot the rapture of composing this work about creation and self-fulfilment: “I gasp for breath but oh what bliss! The very meter kindles the meaning…” Prometheus: Poem of Fire – Scriabin’s last and most revolutionary symphony – portrays Man’s epic journey from the mists of beginning time to a wonderous self-realisation given the gift of fire and light to make creative vision possible. Massively scored Prometheus incorporates a “colour Organ” to bathe the performance space in a vast interplay of coloured lights. For the music professional and every student of composition orchestration and conducting both scores are strikingly original and instructive. Equally fascinating are Scriabin’s approach to composition the extraordinary sonorities of his orchestra and his fanciful often supercharged performance instructions that replace conventional words for tempo mood and expression.

So he too is nothing more than an ordinary man. [...] he will place himself above everyone else and become a tyrant!' is what Beethoven is said to have shouted full of rage when Napoleon had declared himself emperor, and supposedly tore the title page of Symphony No. 3 headed 'Bonaparte' to pieces. Despite his anger, however, the work was again headed 'Bonaparte' when he wanted to publish it in 1804. But it was the first edition of 1806 which finally bore the title of Sinfonia eroica. Symphony No. 3 was Beethoven's first work in which he had come to terms with his progressing deafness and left the boundaries of the musical conventions far behind. / Préface : Max Unger / Partition /