For the Record, Op. 239: Daniel Hope; cellist Maya Beiser; Trio Wanderer; Curtis Stewart

June 1, 2023, 10:26 PM · Welcome to "For the Record," Violinist.com's weekly roundup of new releases of recordings by violinists, violists, cellists and other classical musicians. We hope it helps you keep track of your favorite artists, as well as find some new ones to add to your listening!

Violinist Daniel Hope. Image ©Superbass/CC-BY-SA-4.0 (via Wikimedia Commons).

Music for a New Century
Daniel Hope, violin
Alexey Botvinov, piano
New Century Chamber Orchestra

The four pieces featured on this album were all commissioned or co-commissioned by the San Francisco-based New Century Chamber Orchestra. "One might not automatically think of putting these four composers together," said violinist and New Century music director Daniel Hope, "but by doing so, we’re celebrating the orchestra and its creative engagement with new music." The album includes Philip Glass's Piano Concerto No. 3; Jake Heggie's Overture; Tan Dun: Double Concerto (for violin and piano); and Mark-Anthony Turnage's Lament for Solo Violin & Orchestra. BELOW: Tan Dun: Double Concerto for Violin, Piano, and String Orchestra with Percussion - II. Misterioso:

Franck: Violin Sonata, Piano Trio No.1 & Piano Quintet
Trio Wanderer
Jean-Marc Phillips-Varjabédian, violin
Raphaël Pidoux, cello
Vincent Coq, piano

Trio Wanderer follows up its multi-award-winning Schumann set with an exploration of the fascinating world of César Franck. The gulf between his youthful trios and the prodigious works of his maturity reveals a fundamental turning point in the history of French chamber music. Continuing along the trail that Franck blazed with such brio, Louis Vierne’s deeply moving Quintet offers an echo of the older man’s work. BELOW: Franck's Piano Quintet, II. Lento con molto sentimento, with Catherine Montier and Christophe Gaugué.

InfInIte Bach
Maya Beiser, cello

In her first recording of the complete Solo Cello Suites of J.S. Bach, cellist and producer Maya Beiser re-explores works that were always central to her playing. "The Suites were ingrained in my daily practice," Beiser said. "Even as I was getting ready to perform a new work by Steve Reich, Louis Andriessen, or David Bowie, I would still begin every day playing a movement from the Suites. Over the years I was experimenting with the process of unlearning the doctrine I was taught about this music, until last year when I took the time to relearn it anew." Beiser made this album in her converted barn in the Berkshires in Massachusetts. "I spent 2022, my 60th year of life, immersed in recording, and rerecording, deconstructing and decontextualizing, experimenting and exploring sounds, reverberations, harmonics...engaging with Bach’s cello Suites." BELOW: Maya Beiser: InfInIte Bach (Official Music Video) Water, The Prelude in D minor.

of Love.
Curtis Stewart, violin

GRAMMY-nominated violinist and composer Curtis Stewart releases "of Love.," an album dedicated to his mother, Elektra Kurtis-Stewart, who died of brain cancer on Sept. 7, 2021, at age 66. On "of Love.," a through-composed collection of 20 works, Stewart celebrates the perseverance of his mother, a violinist and composer herself. Recorded in his late mother’s Upper West Side, Manhattan, apartment — the apartment where Stewart was raised, the apartment where he cared for his mom during her dying days — "of Love." charts a course of grieving, and of coming to grips with loss. "Loss should be a vital part of our cultural lexicon," Stewart said. "You cannot gain without the threat of loss. You cannot love without it either." BELOW: "Drift to Wake."

If you have a new recording you would like us to consider for inclusion in our "For the Record" feature, please e-mail Editor Laurie Niles. Be sure to include the name of your album, a link to it and a short description of what it includes.

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For the Record, Op. 239: Daniel Hope; cellist Maya Beiser; Trio Wanderer; Curtis Stewart

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