Arnold Schoenberg: Piano Concerto; Pelleas und Melisande

Arnold Schoenberg (Composer), Matthias Bamert (Conductor), Michael Schønwandt (Conductor), Danish National Symphony Orchestra (Orchestra), Scottish National Orchestra (Orchestra), Amalie Malling (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Amalie Malling
• Orchestra: Danish National Symphony Orchestra, Scottish National Orchestra
• Conductor: Matthias Bamert, Michael Schønwandt
• Composer: Arnold Schoenberg
• Audio CD (February 22, 2005)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Chandos
• ASIN: B0006SGF0K
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #356,303 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gorgeous!, December 12, 2007

By 

T. Beers (Arlington, Virginia United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Arnold Schoenberg: Piano Concerto; Pelleas und Melisande (Audio CD)

These are two of the most beautifully conceived -- and recorded -- Schoenberg performances I have ever encountered on disc. Bamert's masterful reading of Schoenberg's early, over-the-top and very Mahlerian tone poem "Pelleas and Melisande" is fully the equal of Karajan's great DG analog recording, and with vastly more realistic (full digital) sound. But it's the performance of Schoenberg's 1942 Piano Concerto that should make you run out to buy this disc. Notoriously hissed at its first performance (an NBC Symphony broadcast conducted by Stokowski) and still resisted by many listeners today, this recording triumphantly validates Schoenberg's claim that his concerto is a latter day descendant of the great Brahms B flat concerto. Sweepingly romantic in conception and execution, this deeply moving Danish performance positively glows in Chandos' sumptuously three dimensional digital recording. I have heard (and I own) marvelous performances of this music by Brendel, Uchida, and Peter Serkin, but this one bests them all, IMHO. If you're still a skeptic about Schoenberg's serial music, buy this disc for the marvelous reading of his thoroughly tonal "Pelleas" and you'll come to love the concerto as a mind-stretching bonus!