ARTISTS
Isador Goodman, piano
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Patrick Thomas

TRACKLISTING
ADDINSELL: Warsaw Concerto
RACHMANINOV: Paganini Rhapsody - 18th Variation
RÓZSA Spellbound Concerto
EVANS: Idyll
GERSHWIN: Rhapsody in Blue
BATH: Cornish Rhapsody
LITOLFF: Scherzo
GOODMAN: New Guinea Fantasy
WILLIAMS: Dream of Olwen
RACHMANINOV: Piano Concerto No 2 - Adagio sostenuto

For a variety of reasons, the Romantic piano concerto remains one of the most engaging ambassadors for classical music. In the collective mind of the world audience, the names of Tchaikovsky, Liszt and Rachmaninov are synonymous with large and spectacular musical works during which a symphony orchestra and a dazzling pianist are set to engage in a musical contest in which all end up winners. All being well the listener wins as well. Of course, these great works are much more than that, but this strong image is important in keeping this repertoire in the public's eyes and ears at a time when so much other music jostles daily for attention. Many have them have been made famous through their 'silver screen' associations and these sumptuous performances by Australian pianist Isador Goodman are now once more available - and at bargain price!

ARTISTS:
Lilya Zilberstein, piano

TRACKLISTING
LISZT
Two Legends, S.175
Consolations, S.172
Fantasia and Fugue on the name B-A-C-H, S.529
Ballade No. 2 in B minor, S.171
Valse oubliée No. 1 in F sharp major, S.215
Impromptu in F sharp major, S.191                                                                                                                     

As a favourite piano partner of Martha Argerich, Lilya Zilberstein is earning many accolades for her performances around the world. Here is a rare and early recital she recorded for DG of both popular and lesser-known Liszt fare, including the famous Legend St Francis of Paola walking on the water and the confiding six Consolations.

'This richly varied recital shows Liszt in many guises: as religious visionary, prophet, lyricist and epic teller of tales. And Lilya Zilberstein, an imperious virtuoso to say the least, is fully equal to the many and various challenges. Her all-Russian command can be properly engulfing in the rhetorical storms of the Fantasia and Fugue on the name B-A-C-H , particularly when, as John Ogdon so aptly put it, the music appears capable of carrying the very heavens on its back.' Gramophone

ARTISTS
Kiri Te Kanawa, soprano
Roger Vignoles, piano

TRACKLISTING
PURCELL (arr. Britten): The Blessed Virgin's Expostulation
LISZT: Die Lorelei · Comment, disaient-ils · Oh, quand je dors · Pace non trovo
RAVEL: Cinq Mélodies populaires grecques
RACHMANINOV: Vocalise                                                                                                                 
GRANADOS: La maja y el ruiseñor                                                                                                     OBRADORS: Cinco canciones clásicas españolas

One of Kiri Te Kanawa's rare recorded excursions into song repertoire, this consummate recital is once more restored to the Decca catalogue. Including such popular favourites like the Rachmaninov and Granados, it includes Obradors' wonderful Cinco canciones clásicas españolas and a quartet of beautiful songs by Liszt.

'A rich ripe peach of a recital, and in case that suggests something altogether too sweet and lush to satisfy a fastidious taste it should immediately be added that the soprano's tone is fresh, her responsiveness to words keen, the pianist's touch very evidently guided by a refined, lively intelligence, and the programme a delight in the variety as well as the generous melodic appeal of its contents.' Gramophone

ARTISTS
Arleen Augér, soprano
Alfreda Hodgson, contralto
Anthony Rolfe Johnson, tenor
Gwynne Howell, bass
The London Chamber Choir
The Argo Chamber Orchestra
John Birch, continuo
László Heltay

TRACKLISTING
HAYDN: Stabat Mater

The Stabat Mater was one of those works which served to promote Haydn's reputation in the rest of Europe, for a successful performance in Paris in April 1781 was followed by a lengthy and highly complimentary article in Le Mercure de France, publication of the full score in London (1783) and Paris (1785), and a number of further performances.

The work underwent considerable 'revision' by pupils and publishers alike (some only recently discarded editions contain entirely fictitious extra wind parts), and a fully authentic score has been produced only in recent years. Haydn's Stabat Mater has often invited comparison with the setting by Pergolesi (not surprisingly, perhaps, as Haydn himself knew the earlier work), and its dramatic power and eloquent mode of expression made this one of the most successful compositions of the earlier part of his career.

It remains a rarity, however, and this despite the fact that it contains some of the composer's most rich and deeply felt writing. This glowing Decca performance, featuring the wonderful voice of Arleen Augér, now reappears in the catalogue, and at bargain price!

ARTISTS
Orchestra of the Welsh National Opera
Richard Bonynge

TRACKLISTING
MESSAGER: Les deux Pigeons

ARTISTS
Takács Quartet
Gábor Takács-Nagy, violin I
Károly Schranz, violin II
Gábor Ormai, viola
András Fejér, cello

TRACKLISTING
HAYDN
String Quartet in G major, Op. 77 No. 1
String Quartet in F major, Op. 77 No. 2
String Quartet in D minor, Op. 103 (incomplete)

The high spirits of the opening movement of Haydn's String Quartet, Op. 77 No. 1 are totally infectious, and the playing of the 'original' Takács Quartet is without peer - with sweep and a vocalism so particular to their ensemble.

ARTISTS
Kiri Te Kanawa, soprano
The Mormon Tabernacle Choir
(Jerold Ottley, music director )
Utah Symphony Orchestra
Julius Rudel

TRACKLISTING
J. STRAUSS II: Nuns' Chorus
GOUNOD: O Divine Redeemer
VERDI: Chorus of the Hebrew slaves
MENDELSSOHN: Hear My Prayer
BEETHOVEN: Hallelujah
BACH / GOUNOD: Ave Maria
MASCAGNI: Easter Hymn
FRANCK: Psalm 150
MENDELSSOHN : On Wings of Song
TRAD.: Come, Come, Ye Saints
RODGERS & HAMMERSTEIN: You'll Never Walk Alone
BISHOP: Home Sweet Home
RODGERS & HAMMERSTEIN: Climb Ev'ry Mountain

For their 1989 festival the committee of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir invited Dame Kiri Te Kanawa to join the Choir and the Utah Symphony Orchestra under maestro Julius Rudel. The choice of repertoire remained open, and Dame Kiri selected a highly appropriate program of inspirational works that she could share with the choir and its international audience.

It was not surprising that, within hours, every one of the 6000 seats in the Tabernacle had been taken, and the overflow from this capacity audience had to be accommodated in the large Assembly Hall next door. Fortunately the concerts were also broadcast by a local radio station, and a television crew video-taped the event for future network presentation. The two concerts of 23 and 24 February were recorded and there was an additional recording session later, so that individual items could be 'topped and tailed' to remove the enthusiastic applause and any other unwanted 'audience participation' that might intrude upon enjoyment of the finished recording.

The music seems tailor-made for Dame Kiri's cream-and-honey vocalising, and the two rarities - by Beethoven and Franck - nicely balance the popular nature of the rest of the program.

ARTISTS
Barry Tuckwell, horn
Marie McLaughlin, soprano
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Vladimir Ashkenazy, pianist & conductor

TRACKLISTING
RICHARD STRAUSS
Horn Concerto No.1 in E flat major, Op.11
Andante for Horn and Piano, Op. posth.
Introduction to the Final Scene of Capriccio
'Alphorn', Op. 15 No.3 for soprano, horn and piano
Introduction, Theme and Variations in E flat major for horn and piano
Horn Concerto No.2 in E flat major

Barry Tuckwell provides his own, insightful liner notes for this, his second recording of the Strauss Horn Concertos (the first being with István Kertész). What makes this a particularly sought-after release is the inclusion of the rarities and the fact that Tuckwell has gone back to the original manuscripts. The Final Scene from Capriccio is not a rarity at all, but is included for its luminous horn solo and, in Tuckwell's words, 'as a tribute to the great composer, as a bonus for the listener and as an indulgence for the soloist'.

ARTISTS
Andras Schiff, piano
Takács Quartet

TRACKLISTING
BRAHMS
String Quartets, Op. 51 Nos. 1 & 2
String Quartet, Op. 67
Piano Quintet, Op. 34

The Takács Quartet began their exclusive association with Decca in 1988 and one of their first recordings was the disc containing Brahms's two Quartets, Op.51. This was followed by a disc containing the only other string quartet by Brahms - Op.67 - and this was coupled with the Piano Quintet, Op.34, in which the Takács Quartet was joined by a fellow-Hungarian, pianist András Schiff.

ARTISTS
Chantal Juillet, violin
Pierre Amoyal, violin
Pascal Rogé, piano
Quatuor Ysaye
Richards Piano Quartet
François Le Roux, baritone
Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal
Charles Dutoit

TRACKLISTING
CHAUSSON
Symphony in B flat
Poème pour violon
Poème de l'amour et de la mer
Piano Quartet
Concert pour violon, piano et quatuor à cordes

Chausson's musical output is not vast and his career was short-lived. His earliest works date from the late 1870s and his last were produced shortly before he was killed as a result of a cycling accident in 1899. A few stage pieces represent his large-scale works, along with the Symphony in B flat (1889-90) - one of the few French symphonies to have gained a small foothold in the repertory - and performed here by one of Decca's famous artistic partnerships: Charles Dutoit and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. They provide superb support in one of Chausson's most popular works, the Poème for violin and orchestra in which Chantal Juillet is soloist. Chausson's only large-scale work for voice and orchestra is his Poème de l'amour et de la mer. Normally sung by a soprano or mezzo, here the piece receives an idiomatic and persuasive performance from French baritone François Le Roux.

At the other end of the scale there are Chausson's handful of chamber works. There is a Piano Trio and String Quartet and one of his fairly regularly heard pieces, the Concert pour violon, piano et quatuor à cordes (written 1889-91) and the Piano Quartet of 1897.

ARTISTS
Joan Sutherland, soprano
Tito Gobbi, baritone
Christa Ludwig, mezzo-soprano
National Philharmonic Orchestra
Richard Bonynge

TRACKLISTING
LEONI: L'Oracolo
PUCCINI: Suor Angelica
PUCCINI: Vissi d'arte ( Tosca )

Joan Sutherland is not usually associated with the verismo repertory and her excursions into that area were limited to a few performances of Suor Angelica in Sydney in 1977 (a year before this recording was made) and her participation in the legendary 1972 Decca recording of Turandot , in which she sang the title-role. In addition she recorded this absolute rarity in 1975, Leoni's L'Oracolo. Set in San Francisco's Chinatown and ending with death by pigtail strangulation, the opera had its world premiere on 28 June 1905 at Covent Garden.

'Joan Sutherland makes a tender, affecting Ah-Joe, singing both her set-pieces with nice vocal and verbal inflections, and going suitably off her head when she discovers her beloved San-Lui's body. Richard Bonynge conducts the piece as though he wholly believes in it.' Gramophone July 1977 (L'Oracolo)

'... this is a performance, warm without sentimentality or self-indulgence, which combined with vivid recording and effective stage-production ... makes this the most involving version yet of a work which seems to grow in strength with the years.' Gramophone December 1979 (Suor Angelica)

ARTISTS
Kyung Wha Chung, violin
Paul Neubauer, viola
Robert Cohen, cello
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
London Symphony Orchestra (Violin Concerto)
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra (Viola / Cello Concertos)
Vladimir Ashkenazy
André Previn (Violin Concerto)

TRACKLISTING
WALTON
Symphony 1
Symphony 2
Violin Concerto
Viola Concerto
Cello Concerto

This program conveniently brings together Walton's two symphonies and three concertos onto 2 well-filled discs (around 155 minutes). This is music of wide contrasts; from the spiky wit, rhythmic vitality and brilliance that characterises the First Symphony and the Violin Concerto, to the Mediterranean warmth and romanticism that permeates the Cello Concerto. These works cover a major part of Walton's creative life with the earliest piece being the Viola Concerto of 1929 (revised in 1961 - as recorded here) through to the Second Symphony that was first heard in Edinburgh in September 1960.

Kyung Wha Chung's now legendary recording of the Violin Concerto was made in 1972 in the presence of the composer and immediately drew the most enthusiastic reviews: '... she gets to the heart of this music, demonstrates its toughness as well as its soul-searching lyrical warmth ... Chung's incisiveness compasses the fearsome virtuoso writing of the Scherzo not just with assurance but with wit and obvious enjoyment in display ... here in sum is a great, deeply involving performance.' Gramophone May 1973

The other concertos included here are from a much-praised survey of Walton's major orchestral works and concertos made with Andrew Litton and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, while the recordings of the Symphonies are from an enthusiastically reviewed disc Vladimir Ashkenazy made during his tenure as music director of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra: 'Vladimir Ashkenazy ... understands the need not to treat the score too literally, giving Walton's nagging syncopations a degree of jazzy freedom, and treating the great romantic melodies with the sort of expressiveness apt for Rachmaninov ... an account of the First Symphony which confirms Ashkenazy's Waltonian credentials ... with brass blazing Ashkenazy is superb in the finale.' Gramophone April 1993

MARKETING PLANS
TV
Advertised on SBS throughout February including announcement of new catalogue
Press
Advertised in Limelight magazine
Advertised in selected retail catalogues

ARTISTS
Piia Komsi, soprano*
Kazushi Ono, conductor*
Patrick Davin, conductor**
David Robertson, conductor***
Stefan Asbury, conductor****
Samuel Favre, percussion****
Dimitri Vassilakis, piano****
Ensemble Intercontemporain

TRACKLISTING
UNSUK CHIN
Akrostichon-Wortspiel (1991-93)*
Fantaisie méchanique (1994)**
XI, pour ensemble et électronique (1999)***
Doppelkonzert, pour piano, percussion et ensemble (2003)****

This is a Portrait CD of Korean woman composer Unsuk Chin. She has studied with György Ligeti and is now regarded as one of the leading composers of her generation. She regularly works with important international ensembles for contemporary music and lives in Germany.

Unsuk Chin's music is often characterized by a highly coloured expression and new exploration of sound shades, often times trying to unite contradictory concepts like improvisation and predetermined structure.

'I've tried to write a music of highly coloured bearing and expression, free-flowing and agile, unfolding sometimes in completely unexpected directions.' - Unsuk Chin.

Recently Unsuk Chin was awarded the prestigious Grawemayer award for her violin concerto, one of the most prized awards for composers worldwide. Her breakthrough piece was her early composition Akrostikon-Wortspiel (1991-93) that experiments with language and music.

All the pieces here are world premiere recordings and enjoy the advocacy of the renowned Ensemble Intercontemporain.

ARTISTS
Tashi
Boston Symphony Orchestra
Seiji Ozawa
Hiroshi Wakasugi

TRACKLISTING
TAKEMITSU
Quatrain for clarinet, violin, violoncello, piano and orchestra
A Flock Descends into the Pentagonal Garden
Stanza I for guitar, harp, piano/celesta & vibraphone, with female voice
Sacrifice for alto flute, lute and vibraphone, with antique cymbals
Ring for flute, terz guitar and lute
Valeria for violin, violoncello, guitar & electric organ, with two piccolos

In 2005 Toru Takemitsu would have been 75, and Deutsche Grammophon is marking this occasion in 20/21 echo with two important releases (see also 477 5382: Garden Rain).

The present CD contains some classic and rare recordings by the virtuoso chamber group Tashi, with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Seiji Ozawa, as well as by distinguished Japanese artists in a group of chamber works, directed by Hiroshi Wakasugi.

Both orchestral works are obsessed with numerology; four in the case of Quatrain , five in A Flock Descends into the Pentagonal Garden, one of Takemitsu's most celebrated pieces. In it, the Flock, represented by a melodious solo oboe, traverses a static succession of harmonic fields, symbolizing the (Japanese) garden.

The chamber works are all from the 1960s and 'clearly convey the composer's effortless ability to create beautiful sounds (and eloquent silences) and to unfold them at a daringly deliberate and poised pace' (Stephen Arnold, booklet note).

Long a successful item in DG's 20th-Century Classics series, this CD presents the perfect companion to Garden Rain.

ARTISTS
Heinz Holliger, oboe
Tadamaro Ono, sho
Aurèle Nicolet, flute
Ursula Holliger, harp; tape
Kiyoshi Shomura, guitar
Ida Kavafian, violin
Peter Serkin, piano
Philip Jones Brass Ensemble
Hiroshi Wagasugi, conductor

TRACKLISTING
TAKEMITSU
Garden Rain for bassoon, 4 trumpets, 3 trombones, bass trombone and tuba
Le son calligraphié I - III
Hika
Folios I - III
Distance
Voice
Stanza II
Eucalypts I
Eucalypts II

2005 would have seen the 75th birthday of Toru Takemitsu, the greatest Japanese composer of the last century and one of 20th-century's most original voices, who died prematurely in 1996.

Two of our current batch of 20/21 echos feature the music of Takemitsu. This CD is undoubtedly one of the most exciting releases to be included: a wide-ranging anthology of Takemitsu's early and middle-period works for soloists and small ensembles, with world-class performers and stunning performances - all appearing on CD internationally for the first time!

Until this release Le son calligraphié I - III, Distance and Eucalypts I& II had not been available on CD at all.

The present issue combines two short CDs released in Japan in the mid 1990s (the recordings were made in the 1970s), retaining the original order of both. This respects the composer's original concept because they were conceived as unities.

The first sequence starts with the slow-moving, widely-spaced chords of Garden Rain (1974), Takemitsu's first piece for brass ensemble, followed by the three sensuous pieces making up Le son calligraphié for strings (1958/1960). Next comes the elegiac Hika (1966) for violin and piano and then follows the marvellous Folios (1974), surely three of the 20th-century's most attractive guitar works.

The second sequence features oboe, flute and harp, built around the talents of Heinz Holliger, Aurèle Nicolet and Ursula Holliger, who all appear in solo works (aided and abetted by tape and the Japanese sho), and then are brought together in the two Eucalypts (1970) with a string ensemble and as a solo trio.

When you consider the calibre of the artists involved, this all adds up to an impressive representation of Takemitsu's art.

ARTISTS
Claudia Barainksy · Siri Torjesen · Sara Olsson, sopranos
Malena Ernman · Lilli Paasikivi, mezzo-sopranos
Michael Schönheit, organ
Mdr Chor Leipzig
Gewandhausorchester Leipzig
Herbert Blomstedt

TRACKLISTING
SANDSTRÖM: The High Mass for three sopranos, two mezzo-sopranos, chorus, organ and orchestra
LIDHOLM: Kontakion for orchestra

Sven-David Sandström's The High Mass is a monumental piece with phenomenal structures of sound on the same scale as Bach's B minor Mass, yet absolutely modern and individual in expression. It is a spectacular work, a Carmina Burana for the 21st century, following in the footsteps of Sweden's rich choral tradition.

This 90-minute piece by one of the leading and most influential living Swedish composers requires forces almost as large as those of a Mahler score using a full symphonic orchestra, a massive choir and five vocal soloists.

Sandström's composition is a fusion of the Catholic mass, using Bach's B-Minor Mass as a starting point then mixing Ligeti-esque tone clusters, moments of Mahlerian tonal colour and occasional elements of jazz.

Lidholm was Sandström's composition teacher and his piece Kontakion is based on the 'Hymn of the dead' from Russian Orthodox liturgy. The two works on this CD form a fascinating juxtaposition.

Both the works of which this program is comprised were recorded live.

ARTISTS
Sinfonieorchester des Norddeutschen Rundfunks
Giuseppe Sinopoli

TRACKLISTING
MADERNA
Quadrivium for four percussionists and four orchestral groups
Aura for orchestra
Biogramma for large orchestra

Maderna was a composer strongly bound to tradition, but there were no firm boundaries along the line from his compositional work through his instrumentations and realizations (of Schubert dances and pieces from the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book) to his activity as an editor of early music (by Giovanni Gabrieli, Vivaldi, Monteverdi, Viadana and others).

He was among the first Italian composers to produce electronic music, but it was not in technical progress that he saw the future of music. Maderna was also a successful conductor which sometimes overshadowed his compositional work. In 1972 he became chief conductor of the RAI Symphony Orchestra, but he was already suffering from the illness which led to his death on 13 November 1973 in Darmstadt.

Quadrivium, for four percussionists and four orchestral groups, was composed for the Royan Festival. The orchestral groups are all similarly made up of strings, woodwinds and brass, while the soloists have at their disposal an immense array of unpitched instruments and also two xylophones, two vibraphones, two marimbas, two glockenspiels and two sets of tubular bells. The spatial conception of the piece relates to a venerable tradition in Maderna's native city: the Venetian polychoral style of the Gabrielis and others.

Aura, commissioned by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for its 80th birthday, was first performed in Chicago in 1972 under the direction of the composer. The division between precise notation and guided aleatory writing is deliberately effaced in a work whose splendour of sound at times recalls Berg in expressiveness.

Biogramma, a work in three parts for large orchestra, was commissioned by the Eastman School of Music to mark the 50th anniversary of the University of Rochester. Here again the sound palette is characteristic of Maderna: there are numerous percussion instruments, including several with definite pitches (celesta, two harps and piano). There is also another glimmer of the polychoral principle, in the opposition of two equally large string orchestras. And also in this work Maderna's Italianate personality, his subtle feeling for melodic expression, is revealed in a lyrical cor anglais solo in the first section and at the start of the second, with its tender melodies departing from strange chordal sounds

ARTISTS
Pierre-Laurent Aimard · Florant Boffard, piano
Sophie Cherrier, solo mid flute
Emmanuelle Ophèle · Pierre-André Valade, flutes
Ensemble Intercontemporain
Pierre Boulez

TRACKLISTING
BOULEZ
Notations I-XII
Structures our deux pianos - Livre II
Chapitre I
Chapitre II (Pièces 1-2, Encarts 1-4, Textes 1-6)
...explosante-fixe...
Transitoire VII - Interstitiel 1
Transitoire V - Interstitiel 2
Originel

Pierre Boulez's music belongs in the energetic state of a trapped bang where ideas, mere musical instants, can have implications that run on through great lengths of composed time, through many decades in their composer's career, and indeed through our own lives after we have heard them.

Along the line of his own output, Notations had its origins in the first Improvisation sur Mallarmé, where two of the set (Nos. 5 and 9) are adapted to make interludes, and then into Notations for large orchestra, a sequence of extended transcriptions begun in the late seventies. Notations is the earliest composition he has published and it provides so many snapshots of his emergent musical personality.

Turn to the second book of Structures (1956-61) and turn from seeds to luxuriant jungle. In the interim, the first book of Structures (1951-2) had been started as a severe exercise in following up the twelve-note principles of Notations, but during the course of writing it Boulez had discovered how the two-piano medium offered the opportunity to follow not one ruthlessly determined time-track but two fluid ones. The harmonies are static; what propels the music is the energy of executing them and the repercussions between the two players.

The dialogue between rule and imagination, basic to Boulez's thinking, found a new model some ten years later in ...explosante-fixe... The principal flute is caught as if in a hall of mirrors, its line imitated in what the other flutes play, and then in the contributions of the larger ensemble. The play of reflections creates a labyrinth, and the soloist, like Ariadne, leads the way out, following a thread of derivatives that will lead to an exit point on the focal note. Each movement's journey is a voyage with its own justification, as well as being part of the greater trek that is the entire work. Electronic transformation not only alters the flute tone but magnifies it, so that these movements, especially the 'Transitoires', sound as if from and through a wall of flute.

ARTISTS
Emerson String Quartet

TRACKLISTING
HARBISON: String Quartet No. 2
WERNICK: String Quartet No. 4
SCHULLER: String Quartet No. 3
 
John Harbison: String Quartet No. 2
This piece draws some of its sound and some of its techniques from the Baroque age. Its writer didn't grow up, as many do, with the Beethoven and Haydn quartets, but with the Bach cantatas and the Purcell fantasias. The opening of the piece, from which all the music flows, seems to suggest the Italian string concertos in whose gold and silver resonances the whole of modern string exploration originates.

But this is not to suggest that the essence of this very large and intricate piece is not of today. Every artistic impulse that grows organically contains seeded within it the capacity to express how it feels to live now. The forms, motives and sonorities that echo back to the pre-quartet era are not there for nostalgia, taxidermy or reassurance. They are cited in the movement headings to celebrate their capacity for rejuvenation and transformation.

Richard Wernick: String Quartet No. 4
The Fourth Quartet does represent, in a significant way, a synthesis of Wernick's musical thought. In it he grapples with serious questions about the relationship of the past and the future. What do we save from the past? What do we reject? Can the past be re-created? Or can only the 'ethos' of the past be recreated, and if so, what does it mean for the future of art? What do we do about 'old fashioned' things like polyphony and harmony and formal structure? Are they really dead? Or is there a continuous thread through all art in which nothing is really old and nothing is really new?

The Fourth Quartet is cast in two movements. The first is cast in ABA form, the B section being the main body of the movement and containing two principal themes. The dedication 'Homage to A.D.' refers to the juxtaposition of duple and triple rhythms which occurs at the beginning of the second movement of Antonín Dvorák's F minor Trio. Wernick says 'Unable to purge this gesture from my head for weeks on end, I felt that at the very least I could put it to good use. Although each of the Scherzo I sections is developed in a way that might make poor Mr. Dvorák weep, I trust to his returning the favour for a fellow composer "From the New World".'

Gunther Schuller: String Quartet No. 3
Gunther Schiller recounts 'The third movement of this quartet incorporates a quotation from a Beethoven manuscript. This 13-bar fragment in G minor was evidently written by Beethoven on the spur of the moment for an English autograph-seeking lady admirer. Little did I anticipate at the time the amazing coincidence - reaching across some 180 years - that the first seven pitches of Beethoven's theme, Eb-D-A-C-Bb-F#, correspond exactly to the first seven pitches of my row, a relationship that is exploited in a variety of ways both harmonically and melodically. It occurred to me afterwards that the situation is not dissimilar to the one encountered by Alban Berg in 1935, when he discovered in the writing of his Violin Concerto that the first four notes of the Bach chorale that he was quoting, 'Es ist genug', were identical to the last four notes of the concerto's twelve-tone row.'

The work is brought to a climatic finish with highly virtuosic (mostly unison) passages in a subtle allusion to the coda of Schubert's 'Death and the Maiden' Quartet, a favourite of the Emerson String Quartet (who gave the Third Quartet's première).