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The new CD of Béla Bartók's "44 Duos" is an exemplary one. Without exception the artists capture the composer's limitless imagination in recreating Hungarian and other Central European historic styles. Perhaps most evident is the heartening way Bartók's rhythmic vitality is made accessible to the listener, an accomplishment requiring precise articulation, the delineation of phrase structure, and a secure sense of the music's interior metrical pulse.
In addition, Bartók's marvelous variety of styles is conveyed by the élan of the performers. Everything is here - dark, somber folk melodies, spritely dances, childlike moments (suiting the music´s underlying pedagogical intent), graceful imitative lines, and a strong sense of improvisation.
The Duos are brief micro-moments but bare a musical soul that is rich, deep, and long-lived. This recording should be at the top of the list for 2006 and beyond.
Cecelia Porter Classical Music Critic, The Washington Post
Béla Bartók (1881-1945) was one of Hungary´s leading composers. He was also an ardent collector of folk music from his own country and of neighbour countries such as Transylvania, Slovenia, Serbia, Rumania, Ukrainie and even Arabia. This music became a part of his own musical language. The 44 Duos were put together by Béla Bartók in the years 1930 - 1932, on commission from the German Violin Pedagogue Erich Doflein, who intended those as teaching material. All of the numbers of the 44 Duos stem from Bartók´s folk music collection except for number 36a/b, which are his original compositions. Those short pieces tell a story of everyday life, joys and sorrows. They take the player and the listener on a journey through those different countries with their different climates, customs and temperaments of their people.
Duo Landon, Hlíf Sigurjónsdóttir and Hjörleifur Valsson performed these 44 Duos at 2005 summer concert series in the Sigurjón Ólafsson Museum. A week later they recorded them in the same hall commissioined by their violin maker Christophe Landon.
CD HBS02. Price USD 12
After working as an organist and court musician, Johann Sebastian was appointed to the court of Margrave Wilhelm Ernst of Weimar in 1708. Six years later he became the concertmaster of the court. In 1717 he left Weimar for the court of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Cöthen, where he remained until 1723. He then went to Leipzig, where he lived and worked until his death in 1750. In Leipzig Bach was the cantor at the church of St. Thomas and from 1729 also the director of the Collegium Musicum, which had been founded in 1702 by Telemann.
At Weimar, Bach was employed as an organist, and he wrote many of his organ works during this period. He achieved renown as a virtuoso organist. In Cöthen, on the other hand, he had no ecclesiastical duties, but was responsible for all the music performed at the court. At this time he composed many pieces for a variety of instruments. In Leipzig he composed both devotional and secular works.
Bach composed the six solo violin works - three sonatas and three partitas - in Cöthen in 1720, when he was 35 years old. He based them upon the rich traditions of the German violin school. It has been suggested that he may have composed them as studies, as Paganini later did with his 24 Caprices. It is very clear that Bach was thoroughly familiar with the violin, and his fertile imagination discerned previously unknown potential in the instrument and its music.
"I have been familiar with these compositions since I began studying the violin at an early age with the concertmaster of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra, Björn Ólafsson. He saw these compositions as the violinist´s Bible, and I was fortunate enough to play them all under his guidance. Ólafsson's tutor had been Adolf Busch.
My last teacher, Gerald Beal, has left his mark on my artistic approach as well with his inventive fingering solutions and a clear musical approach. His teacher was Jascha Heifetz."
June 2008 - Hlíf Sigurjónsdóttir
Booklet - PDF
HBS03, Double CD. Price USD 20
Now available at classicalCDs.net
Booklet - PDF
HBS04, Limited number. Price USD 10