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Contrastes
Bohuslav Martinů, Johannes Brahms, Alfred Schnittke

Kacper Nowak & Christia Hudziy

Contrastes

Price: € 14.95
Format: CD
Label: Antarctica
UPC: 0608917730821
Catnr: AR 008
Release date: 05 October 2018
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Label
Antarctica
UPC
0608917730821
Catalogue number
AR 008
Release date
05 October 2018
Album
Artist(s)
Composer(s)
EN
NL
DE

About the album

This recording traces the heritage of Romanticism in postmodern times. Its vintage opener is the first Cello Sonata by Brahms, a pinnacle of unspeakable but mind-controlled beauty. Martinů’s second Cello Sonata, written in American exile in 1941, revisits Brahms’s old world, but with wider tonality, more expressive shifts, and the extra rhythmic pulse of Czech folk music. In Schnittke’s Cello Sonata of 1978, which builds on Shostakovich’s emaciated style, the ghosts of the desolate closing Largo usher in the death throes of Romanticism.

Contrastes trailer

De feilloze techniek en open artistieke houding van cellist Kacper Nowak en pianiste Christia Hudziy spelen een sleutelrol in de uitvoeringen van de drie werken van Martinů, Brahms en Schnittke op dit album. Op Contrastes, hun debuutalbum, tonen Nowak en Hudziy op indrukwekkende wijze dat moderne muziek meer is dan avant-garde experimenten. Op adembenemend mooie wijze maken ze zich sterk voor de gedachte 20ste-eeuwse muziek te zien als het product van onophoudelijke innovatie, maar ook van cyclische wedergeboorte.

Erfgoed van de Romantiek

Deze opname volgt het erfgoed van de Romantiek in het postmoderne tijdperk. De vintage opener is de Eerste Cellosonate van Johannes Brahms, een hoogtepunt van ongelooflijke maar door gedachten gecontroleerde schoonheid. Bohuslav Martinů’s Tweede Cellosonate, geschreven tijdens zijn ballingschap in Amerika in 1941, pakt de oude wereld van Brahms weer op, maar met een bredere tonaliteit, meer uitdrukkingsmogelijkheden en de extra ritmische puls van de Tsjechische volksmuziek. In Alfred Schnittkes Cellosonate uit 1978, die voortbouwt op de uitgeteerde stijl van Sjostakovitsj, luiden de geesten van het troosteloos eindigende Largo de doodsstrijd van de Romantiek in.

Grote belofte

Cellist Kacper Nowak wordt beschouwd als een van de grote beloftes van zijn generatie. Hij vertolkt elke noot met de hoogste vorm van muzikale artisticiteit en beheerste virtuositeit. Een bijzondere revelatie in het cellolandschap. De beroemde cellist Gary Hoffmann zegt over hem: "Kacper Nowak is een bijzonder getalenteerde jonge cellist met uitzonderlijke technische vaardigheden en een heel natuurlijke benadering, zonder enige gekunsteldheid."
Diese Aufnahme zeichnet das Erbe der Romantik in der Postmoderne nach. Der Vintage Opener ist die erste Cellosonate von Brahms, ein Höhepunkt von unglaublicher, aber gedankengesteuerter Schönheit. Martinů’s's zweite Cellosonate, die 1941 im amerikanischen Exil geschrieben wurde, greift Brahms' alte Welt wieder auf, aber mit einer breiteren Tonalität, mehr Ausdrucksmöglichkeiten und dem extra rhythmischen Puls der tschechischen Volksmusik. In Schnittkes Cellosonate von 1978, die auf Schostakowitschs Stil aufbaut, führen die Gespenster des trostlos endenden Largo in den Todeskampf der Romantik.

Artist(s)

Kacper Nowak (cello)

Born in Poland, Kacper Nowak began playing the cello at the age of eight. A year later, he was the laureate of the Liezen Cello Competition in Austria and entered the Fryderyk Chopin School in Poznan, in the class of Danuta Taczanowska. Having won several national and international competitions, he became a member of the National Foundation for Gifted Children.   In 2005 he won first prize at the Concours de Woluwé St-Pierre in Brussels and the following year he entered the Royal Conservatory of Brussels in the class of Didier Poskin. In 2010 he joined the class of Maria Kliegel in Cologne and won both the Van Cutsem prize and the Fely Wasselle prize. He subsequently pursued his studies with Justus Grimm at...
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Born in Poland, Kacper Nowak began playing the cello at the age of eight. A year later, he was the laureate of the Liezen Cello Competition in Austria and entered the Fryderyk Chopin School in Poznan, in the class of Danuta Taczanowska. Having won several national and international competitions, he became a member of the National Foundation for Gifted Children.
In 2005 he won first prize at the Concours de Woluwé St-Pierre in Brussels and the following year he entered the Royal Conservatory of Brussels in the class of Didier Poskin. In 2010 he joined the class of Maria Kliegel in Cologne and won both the Van Cutsem prize and the Fely Wasselle prize. He subsequently pursued his studies with Justus Grimm at the Royal Conservatory of Antwerp and in 2012 won the grand prize of the Prix Edmond Baert competition. In 2014 Kacper obtained his master’s degree and was awarded the Oranjebeurs scholarship from the Netherlands.
He has participated in a number of master classes with musicians such as Gérard Caussé, Boyan Vodenitcharov, France Springuel, Gautier Capuçon, the Danel Quartet, Walter Grimmer, Jean-Guihen Queyras and Natalia Gutman.
Since September 2014 Kacper has been studying at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel in Belgium, under the direction of Gary Hoffman where he received a scholarship by Haas-Teichen.
In 2015 Kacper becomes a laureate of the 22nd Johannes Brahms Competition in Austria and wins the first prize and the public prize at I Solisti competition in Belgium.

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Christia Hudziy (piano)

Born in Ukraine, Christia Hudziy studied piano from 1990 to 1998 at the Special Music School of Lviv. In 1999 she obtained first prize for the Alfred Roussel scholarship. At the age of 10 she won first prize at the Leopold Bellan competition (advanced level). At 14, she was the laureate of the Ukrainian New Talent competition in Kiev, which enabled her to obtain a presidential scholarship. In 1999 she was selected to play in the Cortot Hall in Paris and took part in the first “Art de l’enfance” festival. During her training at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris she was supported by the Lili and Nadia Boulanger foundation. She has won several piano competitions: first medal...
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Born in Ukraine, Christia Hudziy studied piano from 1990 to 1998 at the Special Music School of Lviv. In 1999 she obtained first prize for the Alfred Roussel scholarship. At the age of 10 she won first prize at the Leopold Bellan competition (advanced level). At 14, she was the laureate of the Ukrainian New Talent competition in Kiev, which enabled her to obtain a presidential scholarship. In 1999 she was selected to play in the Cortot Hall in Paris and took part in the first “Art de l’enfance” festival. During her training at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris she was supported by the Lili and Nadia Boulanger foundation. She has won several piano competitions: first medal at the Brest international piano competition (2002); first prize at the Mérignac international competition and at the piano competition of Saint-Nom-La-Bretèche (2003); first prize at the Giovani Talenti-Pia Tebaldini piano competition in Italy (2004); first prize at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris (2004). Christia has entered the advanced level of the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Lyon. She has taken part in many festivals (Saintonge, Menton, La Roque d’Antheron, Chartres, etc.). In 2008, she won the Yamaha international scholarship and was a finalist of the Concertgebouw chamber music competition in Amsterdam. Having perfected her skills at the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel in Belgium (Sept. 2008-June 2013) under the direction of Abdel Rahman El Bacha first and then Maria João Pires, she is currently a piano accompanist. During her years of training at the Music Chapel, she enjoyed the support of an InBev-Baillet Latour scholarship.

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Composer(s)

Johannes Brahms

Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria. His reputation and status as a composer is such that he is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the 'Three Bs' of music, a comment originally made by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow.   Brahms composed for symphony orchestra, chamber ensembles, piano, organ, and voice and chorus. A virtuoso pianist, he premiered many of his own works. He worked with some of the leading performers of his time, including the pianist Clara Schumann and the violinist Joseph Joachim (the three were close friends). Many of his works have become...
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Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria. His reputation and status as a composer is such that he is sometimes grouped with Johann Sebastian Bach and Ludwig van Beethoven as one of the "Three Bs" of music, a comment originally made by the nineteenth-century conductor Hans von Bülow.
Brahms composed for symphony orchestra, chamber ensembles, piano, organ, and voice and chorus. A virtuoso pianist, he premiered many of his own works. He worked with some of the leading performers of his time, including the pianist Clara Schumann and the violinist Joseph Joachim (the three were close friends). Many of his works have become staples of the modern concert repertoire. Brahms, an uncompromising perfectionist, destroyed some of his works and left others unpublished.
Brahms has been considered, by his contemporaries and by later writers, as both a traditionalist and an innovator. His music is firmly rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of the Classical masters. While many contemporaries found his music too academic, his contribution and craftsmanship have been admired by subsequent figures as diverse as Arnold Schoenberg and Edward Elgar. The diligent, highly constructed nature of Brahms's works was a starting point and an inspiration for a generation of composers. Within his meticulous structures is embedded, however, a highly romantic nature.

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Alfred Schnittke

Alfred Schnittke was the son to German-Jewish father and Volga-German mother from Frankfurt am Main. His musical education started in 1946 in Vienna, where his father worked as a journalist and translator, and from 1948 he continued his studies in Moscow. From the 1970s, he would fully dedicate himself to composing.  Schnittke's style was initially avant garde, strongly influenced by the Western composition techniques such as serialism and aleatorism. Like so many of his generation, Schnittke found these techniques to be unsatisfactory, and so he created his own style which he called polystylism, inspired by Charles Ives, Luciano Berio and Bernd Alois Zimmermann, but also Gustav Mahler,It is characterised by the parodic combinations of styles from different periods, by some recognised as postmodernism.   
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Alfred Schnittke was the son to German-Jewish father and Volga-German mother from Frankfurt am Main. His musical education started in 1946 in Vienna, where his father worked as a journalist and translator, and from 1948 he continued his studies in Moscow. From the 1970s, he would fully dedicate himself to composing. Schnittke's style was initially avant garde, strongly influenced by the Western composition techniques such as serialism and aleatorism. Like so many of his generation, Schnittke found these techniques to be unsatisfactory, and so he created his own style which he called polystylism, inspired by Charles Ives, Luciano Berio and Bernd Alois Zimmermann, but also Gustav Mahler,It is characterised by the parodic combinations of styles from different periods, by some recognised as postmodernism.


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Bohuslav Martinů

Bohuslav Martinů was a Czech composer of modern classical music. Martinů wrote 6 symphonies, 15 operas, 14 ballet scores and a large body of orchestral, chamber, vocal and instrumental works. Martinů became a violinist in the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, and taught music in his home town. In 1923 Martinů left Czechoslovakia for Paris, and deliberately withdrew from the Romantic style in which he had been trained. In the 1930s he experimented with expressionism and constructivism, and became an admirer of current European technical developments, exemplified by his orchestral works Half-time and La Bagarre. He also adopted jazz idioms, for instance in his La revue de cuisine ('Kitchen Revue'). In the early 1930s he found his main fount for compositional style, the...
more
Bohuslav Martinů was a Czech composer of modern classical music. Martinů wrote 6 symphonies, 15 operas, 14 ballet scores and a large body of orchestral, chamber, vocal and instrumental works. Martinů became a violinist in the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, and taught music in his home town. In 1923 Martinů left Czechoslovakia for Paris, and deliberately withdrew from the Romantic style in which he had been trained. In the 1930s he experimented with expressionism and constructivism, and became an admirer of current European technical developments, exemplified by his orchestral works Half-time and La Bagarre. He also adopted jazz idioms, for instance in his La revue de cuisine ("Kitchen Revue").
In the early 1930s he found his main fount for compositional style, the neoclassicism as developed by Stravinsky. With this, he expanded to become a prolific composer, composing chamber, orchestral, choral and instrumental works at a fast rate. His use of the piano obbligato became his signature. His Concerto Grosso and the Double Concerto for Two String Orchestras, Piano and Timpani are among his best known works from this period. Among his operas, Julietta and The Greek Passion are considered the finest. He is compared with Prokofiev and Bartók in his innovative incorporation of Central European ethnomusicology into his music. He continued to use Bohemian and Moravian folk melodies throughout his oeuvre, usually nursery rhymes—for instance in Otvírání studánek ("The Opening of the Wells").
His symphonic career began when he emigrated to the United States in 1941, fleeing the German invasion of France, to compose his six symphonies, which were performed by all the major US orchestras. Eventually Bohuslav Martinů returned to live in Europe for two years starting in 1953, then was back in New York until returning to Europe for good in May 1956. He died in Switzerland in August 1959.

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