Search - Dmitry Shostakovich, Antoni Wit, Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra :: Shostakovich: Cello Concertos Nos. 1 & 2

Passionate, intense, spontaneous-sounding DSCH

John Grabowski | USA | 12/07/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is one of Naxos' very best (no small feat!). I wish I knew more about Maria Kliegel. Her passion *burns* up this CD. The only better performance I've ever heard of the First Concerto is Rostropovich's own first (live) performance, in Russia, available on the EMI boxed set "The Russian Years." While Rostropovich owned that work and there's no one else I'd rather hear play it, this release benefits from better sound. And the passion isn't just about speed and virtuosity: one of the disc's highlights is the accompanying figure in the lower strings near the beginning of the First Concerto's second movement, as the cello plays the main melody (starts exactly at 1:00). They sound like they are speaking DSCH's intimate confessions. I've never heard playing quite like that in any other version. The cadenzas throughout the disc are stunning. Throughout it all everyone sounds like they are improvising this music on the spot: the same day I auditioned this I also listened to Heinrich Schiff/M. Shostakovich on Philips in the same two works. That is also a fine disc and sonically stunning (just listen to the horns on the first movement of No. 1 there!), but this recording takes first place for conviction, intensity. By comparison, Schiff & friends sound like note-readers. And the sound on this disc is just a hair below that of Philips. (This disc also has the advantage of still being in print.)The Second Concerto, one of Shostakovich's greatest works, one of his most unique creations, pushes the cello into new realms (for the time). The Soviet body politic really must have hated this music! Listening to this work again after many years, I had the thought (probably obvious to everyone else) that it has more to do with his last string quartets than with any former cello concerto in the literature--including his own No. 1. This is bleak music, yet music that is compelling for the new way it delivers that bleakness. No one knew more shades of gray in his final years than Shostakovich. Again the musicians sound like they are composing on the spot, channeling DSCH from the grave. Words are failing me in an attempt to describe one of the best CDs in my 3,000+ collection, so I'll just say, get this disc!It's interesting that Maria Kliegel first brought attention to herself by winning the prestigious Rostropovich Competition. She is the only cellist I've ever heard to rival and maybe even (in the G Major concerto) outdo Slava. (I'll have to put on his recording again.) And at this price, this CD is a no-brainer."

Great soloist

Mr JB | Karlskrona Sweden | 10/05/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Naxos has found a wonderful soloist in Maria Kliegel, not at all sounding as cheap as the price might lead you to think. I'd actually say this is just as well played, if not better, especially concerning the soloist, as many of the more expensive versions of the 'main labels'. Kliegel plays with great intensity and passion, making the melody float around, though yet very dramatic and accentuated, in your listening room, in a way that really catches your interest in the music. The first movement of the first concerto is really a great showpiece of great modern cellomusic. The moderato that follows is played with enourmous feeling and, as much as possible in this kind of music - sensualism, giving you that lovely soft cellosound with tight vibratos (the sound engineers has done a good job) as well as thought-through playing that toghether makes you realise that Kliegel really understands this music, the intrinsical values. The same thing is to be said about the rest of the record, except maybe the forth movement of the first concerto which sounds a little too hysteric, especially from the orchestra, for my taste - but that's a minor objection to a very good recording indeed.So if the soloplaying is very good indeed, how about the orchestra and conducting? When listening to Kliegels lovely, engaged and intense playing, it surprises you that the orchestral playing is quite dull. But after listening to the concertos a few times I wonder if conductor Wit maybe wants his orchestra to sound as four-squared as it does just to, by sound, contrast the lovely handling of the soloinstrument. These concertos should be in every cellolovers collection, and I think that this is the recording for you! Lovely!"

Incredible

new music guy | NY, NY United States | 04/06/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Maria Kliegel is an amazing virtuoso, whose recordings burst with a wild vitality. Her talents are perfectly suited to these Shostakovich concerti, with their dark powerful intensity and moments of absolute starkness. This is playing that far surpasses Yo-Yo Ma's performance of the piece, and in many ways, this recording rivals the great one of Rostropovich. I would disagree with the reviewer below me, who claims that "the orchestral playing is quite dull." While Antoni Wit might not be the world's foremost conductor, he coaxes out of the orchestra a powerful, driving intensity. The timpani are too close-miked and their dynamic is too loud, but I found myself liking that by the end, and I'm not convinced it wasn't engineered that way on purpose. The piccolos might also be a bit too shrill at times, but Shostakovich's orchestration almost begs for that. Between the quality and the price, this is a must-have."