Works for Cello and Piano by Amalie Stalheim

Francis Poulenc, Igor Stravinsky, Claude Debussy

Amalie Stalheim

Works for Cello and Piano

Format: CD
Label: Lawo Classics
UPC: 7090020182827
Catnr: LWC 1260
Release date: 25 August 2023
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Label
Lawo Classics

UPC
7090020182827

Catalogue number
LWC 1260

Release date
25 August 2023

Album

Artist(s)

Composer(s)

About the album

The music of the Suite Italienne originated in IGOR STRAVINSKY’s ballet score Pulcinella of 1920. The music for this ballet, scored for three solo voices and chamber orchestra, was arranged by Stravinsky from various 18th-century pieces which for many years were believed to be by the Italian composer Pergolesi (1710-36). However, subsequent research has shown that about half of these attractive pieces are actually by other composers such as Gallo, Chelleri, Parisotti and “Anon”. Masterminded by Serge Diaghilev, the ballet was premiered at the Paris Opera in May 1920. Stravinsky arranged a suite of several orchestral movements from the original ballet score, then in 1925 he produced a version for violin and piano. This came about when Stravinsky and the violinist Samuel Dushkin were preparing a recital programme and Stravinsky decided to arrange a selection of movements from the Pulcinella ballet as “Suite Italienne”. Collaborating with the virtuoso cellist Gregor Piatigorsky, he subsequently (1932) completed a quite different cello-and-piano selection of music from Pulcinella – again entitled Suite Italienne. As Dushkin observed, Stravinsky was never interested in routine arranging, but always “rewrote or recreated the music in the spirit of the new instrument” – whether violin or cello.

FRANCIS POULENC’s most frequently performed works include the Organ Concerto, his ballet score Les biches and a setting of the Gloria, but he also composed three operas, much choral music and concertos for piano, two pianos and harpsichord. He was among the outstanding 20th-century composers of songs and he wrote many fine pieces for solo piano. His extensive list of works does feature chamber music, but these compositions favour wind or brass, rather than strings. There are several duo-sonatas with piano – for flute, clarinet, oboe, violin and cello respectively, as well as sonatas for two clarinets; clarinet, bassoon and piano; oboe, bassoon and piano; and horn, trumpet and trombone. Poulenc admitted to struggling when writing for solo strings – he even destroyed two early violin sonatas – but nevertheless the mature sonatas for violin and cello are both attractive and characteristic works.

Poulenc completed his cello sonata in 1948, though his sketches date from eight years earlier. Having advised on the cello part, the distinguished soloist Pierre Fournier gave the premiere with Poulenc on 18th May 1949 in the Salle Gaveau in Paris.

In 1915 CLAUDE DEBUSSY planned a series of six sonatas for different combinations of instruments. Seriously ill with cancer, he lived to complete only the violin and cello sonatas and the sonata for flute, viola and harp. The latter indicates a new interest in unusual instrumental groups, which Debussy intended to further pursue in the other sonatas – for oboe, horn and harpsichord, and for trumpet, clarinet, bassoon and piano. Debussy is just one of many composers who have shown classical tendencies – a new clarity, economy and simplicity – in their late works, and he would also have been aware of Saint-Saëns’ determination to revive the dominance of classical forms in French music. Debussy’s Cello Sonata is an elusive work of wide expressive range, its 11-minute duration encompassing frequently changing moods and tempo fluctuations. When he described his new work to his publisher the composer stressed “The proportions are almost classical ... in the best sense of the word.”

Artist(s)

Christian Ihle Hadland (piano)

Christian Ihle Hadland has established himself as a true craftsman of the piano, a musician whose delicate, refined playing and individual touch have led him to the most prestigious stages in the world.
Christian came to international attention in 2011 as a BBC New Generation Artist. As an NGA he performed with all four of the BBC’s symphony orchestras and broadcast solo and chamber recitals for the corporation in London. He also made his debut at the BBC Proms in London where he was praised by critics for his ‘pearly’ and ‘otherwordly’ sound.
Christian was born in Stavanger in 1983 and received his first pian lessons at the age of eight. At the age of eleven he entered the Rogaland Music Conservatory, and in 1999 began lessons with Professor Jiri Hlinka, both privately and at the Barratt Due Institute of Music in Oslo. He made his professional concerto debut at the age of 15 with the Norwegian Radio Orchestra (KORK). He has since performed with all the major orchestras in Scandinavia including the Swedish Radio and Danish National Symphony Orchestras, and the Royal Stockholm, Helsinki and Oslo Philharmonics and the Swedish Chamber Orchestra. In the UK he has appeared as a soloist with the Hallé Orchestra, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and Manchester Camerata, in addition to his work with the BBC orchestras.
Christian is highly sought after as a chamber musician. He has been Artistic Director of the International Chamber Music Festival in Stavanger, his hometown, since 2010 and is a frequent guest at Wigmore Hall. Christian has performed at the BBC Proms Chamber Music Series and in 2015 gave a three-week tour of Australia with the Australian Chamber Orchestra and mezzo soprano Susan Graham. In 2006, he performed with soprano Renée Fleming at the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony in Oslo.

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Amalie Stalheim (cello)

Award winning cellist Amalie Stalheim (b. 1993) is known for her technical brilliance, personal expression and unique tone and has appeared as a soloist with orchestras such as the Gulbenkian Orchestra, Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, Oulu Symphony Orchestra, the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, the Swedish Radio Orchestra, Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and Iceland Symphony Orchestra.
In addition to performing the traditional cello concertos, Amalie is very passionate about commissioning and playing contemporary classical music. She is collaborating with some of the biggest composers today, resulting in several new cello concertos being dedicated to her.
In 2023 Amalie started a collaboration with the International Festival in Bergen as initiator and mentor of “Classical Link”, a new mentoring program for outstanding, upcoming musicians in the Nordic countries.
Amalie is the winner of the Norwegian Soloist Prize 2021, the Swedish Soloist Prize 2018, the Ljunggren Competition 2015, and the Nicholas A. Firmenich Prize 2015 at the Verbier Festival.
Amalie began playing the cello in Bergen, Norway at the age of 6, and later continued her studies in Sweden with professor Torleif Thedeen at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm / Edsberg Manor, and with professor Kathryn Stott at the Norwegian Academy of Music. Amalie performs on a Francesco Ruggieri cello (Cremona, 1687) generously lent to her by the Anders Sveaas’ Charitable Foundation.

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Composer(s)

Claude Debussy

Claude Debussy was a French composer. He and Maurice Ravel were the most prominent figures associated with impressionist music, though Debussy disliked the term when applied to his compositions. He was made Chevalier of the Legion of Honour in 1903. He was among the most influential composers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and his use of non-traditional scales and chromaticism influenced many composers who followed. Debussy's music is noted for its sensory content and frequent usage of non-traditional tonalities. The prominent French literary style of his period was known as Symbolism, and this movement directly inspired Debussy both as a composer and as an active cultural participant Among his most famous works are his Clair de Lune, his Three Nocturnes...

Claude Debussy was a French composer. He and Maurice Ravel were the most prominent figures associated with impressionist music, though Debussy disliked the term when applied to his compositions. He was made Chevalier of the Legion of Honour in 1903. He was among the most influential composers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and his use of non-traditional scales and chromaticism influenced many composers who followed.
Debussy's music is noted for its sensory content and frequent usage of non-traditional tonalities. The prominent French literary style of his period was known as Symbolism, and this movement directly inspired Debussy both as a composer and as an active cultural participant Among his most famous works are his Clair de Lune, his Three Nocturnes and his orchestral piece La Mer.

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Igor Stravinsky

Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential composers of the 20th century.
Stravinsky's compositional career was notable for its stylistic diversity. He first achieved international fame with three ballets commissioned by the impresario Sergei Diaghilev and first performed in Paris by Diaghilev's Ballets Russes: The Firebird (1910), Petrushka (1911) and The Rite of Spring (1913). The last of these transformed the way in which subsequent composers thought about rhythmic structure and was largely responsible for Stravinsky's enduring reputation as a musical revolutionary who pushed the boundaries of musical design. His "Russian phase" which continued with works such as Renard, The Soldier's Tale and Les Noces, was followed in the 1920s by a period in which he turned to neoclassical music. The works from this period tended to make use of traditional musical forms (concerto grosso, fugue and symphony), drawing on earlier styles, especially from the 18th century. This style was often referred to as Neoclassicism. In the 1950s, Stravinsky adopted serial procedures. His compositions of this period shared traits with examples of his earlier output: rhythmic energy, the construction of extended melodic ideas out of a few two- or three-note cells and clarity of form, and of instrumentation.

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Francis Poulenc

Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc was a French composer and pianist. Poulenc's wealthy family intended him for a business career in the Rhone Poulenc family company and did not allow him to enrol at a music college. Largely self-educated musically, he studied with the pianist Ricardo Viñes, who became his mentor after the composer's parents died. Poulenc soon came under the influence of Erik Satie, under whose tutelage he became one of a group of young composers known collectively as Les Six. This group of French composers from the 1920s aimed to clear music of the impressionism of Claude Debussy, and German influences such as the Romanticism of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss. Their motto was 'L'art pour l'art': they composed music for the sake of...

Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc was a French composer and pianist. Poulenc's wealthy family intended him for a business career in the Rhone Poulenc family company and did not allow him to enrol at a music college. Largely self-educated musically, he studied with the pianist Ricardo Viñes, who became his mentor after the composer's parents died. Poulenc soon came under the influence of Erik Satie, under whose tutelage he became one of a group of young composers known collectively as Les Six. This group of French composers from the 1920s aimed to clear music of the impressionism of Claude Debussy, and German influences such as the Romanticism of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss. Their motto was "L'art pour l'art": they composed music for the sake of music, without any 'meaning' or extramusical intents. In his early works Poulenc became known for his high spirits and irreverence. During the 1930s a much more serious side to his nature emerged, particularly in the religious music he composed from 1936 onwards, which he alternated with his more light-hearted works.

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