Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Wonderful renditions, October 22, 2003
By A Customer
This is a great find... two of Faure's best chamber pieces, spanning his career...violin sonata in A (op 13) and the late piano trio (op. 120), plus assorted other lollipops, including a number of transciptions from his suites. Of course, with Faure, a "lollipop" is probably the wrong term since that connotes lighthearted folly. These are serious romantic pieces, which, when deftly played, convey both Faure's romantic ardour and a certain French delicacy. Listen with a glass of rich southern french wine. Shaham plays them to a "t" in my opinion
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Finally, Fauré, January 1, 2004
Rumor has it-at least according to the CBC Radio-that Deutsche Grammophon, prior to electing not to renew Mr. Shaham's contract, dictated that there was no audience for the chamber music of Gabriel Fauré. It's no wonder that there is a shirking market for recorded classical music with such gross errors in judgment being made by a label that until recently educated and informed the listening public, and in doing so created its audience rather than truckle to the demands of a rather bland, poorly imagined performances of a smattering top-twenties lists of war horses. This is one of Shaham's finest and most intimate recorded moments that shouldn't be missed simply because classical recording labels perpetuate a "combination platter" of the Saint-Saens First, the Debussy, Frank and Ravel violin and piano sonatas-and occasionally the Fauré First-with the expectation that re-mediated in this way, audiences will be drawn in by a "sampling."
The efforts of Shaham, Eguchi, and Smith are accurate and very acutely intellectualized in their approach to a composer who is too often discounted as the author of salon pastels. Each of the ensembles results in a combination of both a tension and fluidity of color that forms the arch of the trajectory of the composer's rather wide and varied chamber output. There is a sweetness to Shaham's playing without any of the cloying sentimentality that is far too often read into much of this work, which seems to be a return to his most fully-realized performances like those in his recordings of the Barber, Wieniawski Second and Sibelius concerti. His intonation and musicality combine both a youthful freshness and a muscular exuberance for these works with the seasoned knowledge of their construction.
Shaham is to be congratulated also on the assemblage of Canary itself. This CD has all of the wonderful "thingness" that seems to have gone out of recorded classical music packaging: the artwork informs the listener without what seems to be the perfunctory distraction of glamour that likens the performer to a fashion model; the liner notes by Jessica Duchen provide detailed descriptions and historical data without the chatty trans-historical musings that other classical labels have begun to want to think necessary to sell the product. Instead, Shaham has offered a package as smartly formulated and detailed as his performances.
If I have any one major criticism of this recording it is the absence of Fauré's Second Violin Sonata. The CD clearly sets out to dispel the myth Fauré's limited palette as a composer; it seems a shame that a work that so keenly illustrates Fauré's shift toward neo-classicsim (much more so than the opus 120 Piano Trio) should be so carelessly ignored. The title "The Fauré Album" suggests that it may be the only Fauré album, and audiences may not benefit from yet another clarification of this composer's legacy from Mr. Shaham. And where Shaham may have set out to pay tribute to Fauré, he may simply be mirroring the shortsightedness of his former studio by denying his audience this incredibly significant utterance in the Fauré oeuvre. Yet there's comfort in the warmth of affection Shaham has for this project as evidenced in the "extraneous noise" aforementioned in the earlier reviews on this page. It is his breathing--not a "careless bow"--life into each passage before it is modeled and shaped in the air. Like Gould's humming, for those of us who like are recorded chamber music to seem up-close, personal, it is an intimacy in Shaham's recordings--with all of their lustrous and technically proficient playing--that makes them so incredibly human and alive.
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The real Gil: working under his own paramters, January 19, 2004
No one can play everything well but when you are working under your own guidelines I would think your chances of high quality improve? I believe many of Gil Shaham's recordings were made before he was ready and under conditions not completely favorable, hense less than desireable results.This is Gil Shaham's first recording on his own label playing what he wants, with who he wants, and when he wants according to an old issue of The Strad. I have spoken many times of the beautiful tone and vibrato of Gil Shaham and of the incredible music of Faure and the sense of mystery I get from hearing his music. The great thing about the music of Faure is the incredibly robust harmony of the piano parts and unique signature that only he can offer. It is nice to hear these works with high quality modern recording technology and a fully-inspired musician who is working under conditions he freely chooses.
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