a r t i s t : Thomas Demenga
t i t l e : Chonguri
d a t e : 2004
l a b e l : ECM
g e n r e : Classical
r l s. d a t e : May/2007
t r a c k s : 20
b i t r a t e : VBRkbps
s i z e : 58,8 MB
_______________________________________________________________________
Thomas Demenga - cello
Thomas Larcher - piano
Teodoro Anzellotti - accordeon
A journey through time, space, and states of mind û from Bach
via Webern to two works from his own pen, from Georgia via
Vienna to New York, and from Gaspar Cassad≤'s Danse du diable
vert to Franz Liszt's La lugubre gondola. With Chonguri, the
Swiss cellist Thomas Demenga has fulfilled a long-cherished
dream and presented an unconventional program of encores,
creating an exciting arc of tension in which ethnic,
nostalgic, and abstract inflections surprisingly blend and
interact.
In 2002 ECM issued the last installment in Demenga's highly-
touted Bach cycle, in which each of the six cello suites was
juxtaposed with a piece of chamber music by a contemporary
composer such as Holliger, Carter, Veress, or Bernd Alois
Zimmermann. This new anthology of short pieces is a similar
attempt to find illuminating combinations and surprising
cross-effects. As he points out in his liner notes for the new
album, his special concern is the ôNo-Man's land of the erasö
and the ôintersticesö in the composer's handwriting. Precisely
timed pauses between the tracks, along with carefully wrought
harmonic transitions that maintain the tonic or migrate to
related keys, transport the listener into a world transcending
the bounds of the pieces themselves.
Surely even more unusual in this respect than Anton Webern's
atonal Drei kurze Stⁿcke, which form the exact midpoint of the
program, are the four chorale settings from Bach's
Orgelbⁿchlein and Schⁿbler Chorales, which Demenga himself has
judiciously arranged for cello and accordion. As their titles
suggest, all of them tie in with the album's overriding
leitmotif: farewell and death, world-weariness and the hope of
redemption. The sound of Teodoro Anzellotti's accordion
kindles memories of the organ while covering the music with a
nostalgic patina.
Despite Demenga's concern for an overriding theme, Chonguri is
also a collection of his personal favorites. Among these are
his own two compositions as well as three pieces by FaurΘ and
two Chopin nocturnes. The Georgian composer Sulkhan Tsintsadze
(1925-1992), on the other hand, is a new discovery for
Demenga. Tsintsadze began his career in the 1940s as a cellist
in the State String Quartet and advanced to become one of his
country's leading twentieth-century composers. His catalogue
of compositions includes two operas, five symphonies, twelve
string quartets, and much else besides. Hardly any of his
music is known in the West. The short piece for unaccompanied
cello that has lent its title to our album imitates the sound
of Georgia's traditional long-necked lute with its chordal
pizzicatos.
Thomas Demenga was born in Berne in 1954 and studied with
Antonio Janigro, Leonard Rose, and Mstislav Rostropovich. He
also received formative stimuli in chamber music from Claus
Adam, Felix Galimir, and Robert Mann at New York's Juilliard
School. He has been a professor at Basle Musikhochschule since
1980 and the artistic director of the "Young Artists in
Concert" Festival in Davos since 2000. Demenga performs
regularly as a soloist and chamber musician in the major
festivals and concert halls of the world. He maintains an avid
interest in contemporary music and has presented a great many
world premieres. His own compositions are also increasingly
drawing attention: the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne has
commissioned a work from him for two cellos and orchestra, to
be premiered in the fall of 2007. He has been recording for
ECM since the 1980s, this new album being his ninth release on
the Munich label. Demenga plays an instrument built by the
brothers Antonio and Girolamo Amati in 1595.
Born in Innsbruck in 1963, the pianist and composer Thomas
Larcher is considered one of the most versatile performers of
our time and a keen connoisseur of both the solo and chamber
music repertoires. From 2001 to 2004 he headed a piano class
at Basle Musikhochschule. He has presented a program of piano
pieces by Schubert and Schoenberg on ECM New Series and rubbed
shoulders with artists of the stature of Michelle Makarski,
Thomas Zehetmair, and Heinz Holliger. For years he has been
one of Thomas Demenga's most stalwart musical companions. The
two musicians made a joint appearance at ECM in a double album
of works by Bach, Hosokawa, and Yun. Larcher's recording debut
as a composer, entitled Naunz, brought the two men into
contact with the violinist Erich H÷barth. In autumn 2006 ECM
will issue a CD with further examples of Larcher's chamber
music, again featuring Demenga, but this time including such
musicians as Christoph Poppen and the Rosamunde Quartet.
Born in Apulia, Teodoro Anzellotti is a leading innovator in
accordion technique who has decisively influenced the
contemporary repertoire for his instrument. Working in close
cooperation with composers, he has premiered more than three
hundred new works to date. He has taught at Berne's Hochschule
der Kⁿnste since 1987 and at the Freiburg Musikhochschule
since 2002. His previous recordings for ECM include
appearances on Heinz Holliger's Beiseit / Alb-Chehr and the
final installment of Thomas Demenga's Bach cycle.
_______________________________________________________________________
01-sulkhan tsintsadze - chonguri [01:23]
02-johann sebastian bach - das alte jahr vergangen ist [02:27]
03-johann sebastian bach - herr gott, nun schleuss' den [01:53]
himmel auf
04-gaspar cassad≤ - danse du diable vert [03:20]
05-frΘdΘric chopin - nocturne in c sharp minor, op. post. [04:10]
06-gabriel faurΘ - romance [03:56]
07-anton webern - drei kleine stuecke; i. maessige [01:01]
08-anton webern - drei kleine stuecke; ii. sehr bewegt [00:20]
09-anton webern - drei kleine stuecke; iii. Aeusserst [01:00]
ruhig
10-anton webern - zwei stuecke; i. langsam [02:55]
11-anton webern - zwei stuecke; ii. langsam [01:58]
12-johann sebastian bach - ich ruf' zu dir, herr jesu [03:36]
christ
13-gabriel faurΘ - aprΦs un rΩve [03:00]
14-frΘdΘric chopin - nocturne in e flat major, op. 9 no. [05:05]
2
15-franz liszt - la lugubre gondola [07:39]
16-thomas demenga - eine kleine erregung [04:29]
(Ueber berg und bach)
17-johann sebastian bach - meine seele erhebt den herrn [02:06]
18-gabriel faurΘ - berceuse [03:21]
19-darius milhaud - vocalise-Θtude pour voix ╔levΘes [01:03]
20-thomas demenga - new york honk [02:14]
-------
56:56 min