Search - Arnold Schoenberg, Jean-Jacques Kantorow, Tapiola Sinfonietta :: Schoenberg: Verklärte Nacht / String Quartet / Chamber Symphony

What wonderful music!

Nathaniel R. Brown | Edmonds, Washington | 01/31/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The previous review of this CD is proof in and of itself that some listeners have mediocre ears and musical understanding, and are alienated by music that does not conform to "the likes of strauss, pfitzner, schreker, ravel, Debussy" - whatever that means, for it is hard to see what these gentlemen, for all their various and varying excellences have in common. This disc does not contain the most challenging music of Schoenberg, by a long shot. Much of it is deeply beautiful as well as wonderfully complex. Composers have always played games with form: listen to Mozart, or Bruckner, or Bach; and there have always been "critics" who seem purposefully not to understand what is new and different. But thankfully, the Beckmessers are usually relegated to the same footnotes of musical history where Hanslick's views on Wagner lie buried, while, somehow, the great music lives on without their approval, and finds advocates among the finest musicians of each age. If Schoenberg's own games with form and tonality scare you - as they did me at one stage - listen with an open mind to the wonderful music on this CD to confirm the great beauty that shines though structural and tonal games that are not different from played through the ages by all great composers."