On two highly praised albums, Susanna MÃ¤lkki and her players in the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra have released recordings of BÃ©la BartÃ³k's three scores for the stage - The Miraculous Mandarin, The Wooden Prince and Bluebeard's Castle, all written before 1918. The team now takes on two of his late orchestral masterpieces. Composed in 1936 for the Basel Chamber Orchestra, Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta is one of the purest examples of BartÃ³k's mature style, with it's synthesis of folk music, classicism and modernism. One immediately striking feature is the unusual instrumentation: two string orchestras seated on opposite sides of the stage, with percussion and keyboard instruments in the middle and towards the back. In 1940, during the Second World War, BartÃ³k emigrated to the U.S.A., where he initially found it difficult to compose. In 1943 he received a prestigious commission from the Boston Symphony Orchestra, however, and in less than eight weeks he composed the Concerto for Orchestra. In it he worked with contrasts between different sections of the orchestra, and the soloistic treatment of these groupings was his reason for calling the work a concerto rather than a symphony.

Tracklist:

Music For Strings, Percussion & Celesta, Sz. 106: I. Andante Tranquillo
Music For Strings, Percussion & Celesta, Sz. 106: II. Allegro
Music For Strings, Percussion & Celesta, Sz. 106: III. Adagio
Music For Strings, Percussion & Celesta, Sz. 106: IV. Allegro Molto
Concerto For Orchestra, Sz. 116: I. Introduzione
Concerto For Orchestra, Sz. 116: II. Presentando Le Coppie
Concerto For Orchestra, Sz. 116: III. Elegia
Concerto For Orchestra, Sz. 116: IV. Intermezzo Interrotto
Concerto For Orchestra, Sz. 116: V. Finale

UPC: 7318599923789
Label: Bis
Release Date: 10.1.21
Format: CD

Bartok / Helsinki Philharmonic Orch - Concerto for Orchestra (CD)