Description
All four volumes of the acclaimed Avie Records series comprising the complete symphonies of Hans Gál and Robert Schumann, available, while supplies last, at a very special price!
Vol. 1 – Schumann and Gál Third Symphonies
Vol. 2 – Schumann Symphony no. 2 and Gál Symphony no. 4
Vol. 3 – Schumann Symphony no. 4 and Gál Symphony no. 2
Vol. 4 – Schumann and Gál First Symphonies
For more details, please go to the Bobby and Hans home page.
Critical Reaction:
“…consummate craft in a mostly consonant, mellifluous style seemingly little touched by the great tragedies of the 20th century or his personal troubles…Mr. Woods and the orchestra do a fine job of revealing the qualities of this peculiar master.”
James R. Oestreich, The New York Times
“a wonderful outpouring, at once deeply personal and vividly outgoing. Energy and eloquence combine for a score that simply stays fresh, thrilling and entrancing… Kenneth Woods and his willing band of Swans give a superb performance, lithe, neat, nimble, poetic (the glorious slow movement really touches the heart) and passionate. A chamber performance it may be, but there’s no lack of power and passion when required and it’s also a reading studded with detail …. Woods and Swan are right up there, charting this marvelous work with a very special dedication and insight.”
Colin Anderson, Classical Source
“What an exquisitely crafted piece Hans Gál’s Fourth Symphony is… a work that succeeds splendidly on its own terms…Another triumph then for Kenneth Woods and the Orchestra of the Swan.”
Gavin Dixon, Classical CD Reviews
“Throughout his career, Gál felt himself to be in the Brahmsian tradition, though his music seldom sounds particularly Brahmsian. Yet Brahms himself– usually so niggardly of praise for the efforts of the younger generation—would surely have found warm words of admiration for Gál’s Symphony no. 4…Schumann’s C major Symphony.. receives a first-rate performance.. with a wonderful sense of expansiveness and profound and delicate feeling in the slow movement”
International Record Review, Calum MacDonald
“Woods proves in this recording to be a front rank conductor, capturing the feeling of sorrow and compassion of the symphony [Gál}. Woods has
seized on the essence of this Schumann Symphony. His reading is smooth, grand and exciting… one of the best recordings available. Highly
Recommended- five stars”
Zan Furtwangler, Audiophile Audition
“Didn’t you think it was very well-played? Because I don’t think anyone could do better than that”
Chris De Souza: BBC Radio 3 CD Review
“All those many things going on form a coherent discourse in this performance [Schumann] Another ingredient is how they build fearlessly not only to one climax but to an overall climax for the whole work… truly poetic.. But let me harp again on the divine madness – the insane glee, the visceral delight… like any number of recordings of Bernstein or Furtwangler… In this performance the speed is not hectic but ecstatic. YES! Divine madness, like this, must be experienced. On top of this, you get the Hans Gal Fourth, written in 1975, when it would have seemed “backward” in idiom -ha! Give it a chance: it will come to move you deeply. And it’s hard to imagine a better performance. If my blog had a star system, this disc would certainly get 5 of them.”
Musicologist Bernard D Sherman
” Woods continues his distinguished Gál cycle recorded at Stratford-on-Avon…a worthy endeavour, which should keep the name and music of holocaust survivor Hans Gál (1890-1987) before the public as long as CDs continue to be bought…”
Peter Grahame Woolf, Musical Pointers
“Gál is worth getting to know and the Swan does it proud, giving also a spruce and eloquent performance of Schumann’s Second. Four stars”
Geoffrey Norris, The Saturday Telegraph
“Schumann’s C major symphony shares the Gal’s combative spirit, as it was written in the 1840s when the composer was battling depression. In his own words it represents the ‘power of resistance of spirit’. Woods conducts it with profound romanticfeeling, the repeated statements never repetitive, the conscious striving neverself-conscious. It may yet prove to be a landmark…”
Rick Jones, Words and Music
“Kenneth Woods draws crisply alert playing for the splendid Orchestra of the Swan… He is particularly good at controlling tempo changes precisely… highly recommendable.. He is just as sympathetic in the Gál symphony, making this a highly recommendable offering in this Avie series, beautifully recorded to bring out the benefits of performances on chamber scale”
Edward Greenfield, Gramophone
“Under Woods, the Orchestra of the Swan plays with magnetic conviction and unwavering technical assurance. There’s an ardour and resolve here which leaves the listener in no doubt that these musicians and their conductor believe in the worth of every bar of this music and it would be hard not to remain gripped throughout this traversal. Plangent string textures and solo wind contributions of character and distinction show just how far the Orchestra of the Swan has progressed during the relatively short period of its existence and it plays with more involvement, commitment and individuality than some of its better known rivals. That includes the Northern Sinfonia under Zehetmair, whose more dutiful approach suggests that neither conductor nor players have much faith in the music. Beside the sharp-edged and ever-insightful conducting of Woods, who brings Gál’s music fully to life with unfailing vividness and lucidity…”
Michael Jameson, International Record Review
“Above all, Gál develops his memorable material with the natural resourcefulness and sureness of purpose that are the hallmarks of a true symphonist. Kenneth Woods and the Orchestra of the Swan (which is based in Shakespeare’s Stratford-upon-Avon) lend this radiant and substantial score the most eloquent and affecting advocacy, and go on to give a comparably accomplished and invigorating account of Schumann’s masterly Fourth Symphony – a strikingly fresh-faced, spontaneous-sounding display, full of illuminating touches, personable warmth and genuine freshness of new discovery. Do investigate this bold, enormously rewarding coupling.”
–Andrew Achenbach, Classical Ear
“structural genius… contrapuntal mastery…committed performance…splendid sound, warmly recommended.”
Gramophone
“Best Recording of 2011″
Everything but the Music
“Top Ten Classical CD’s of 2011- “The Gal is a real find, especially the slow movement; and the Schumann is a joy after the many punched-up but four-square performances I’ve suffered through… It’s an awesome CD, folks.”
Bernard D. Sherman
“Best Classical Recordings of 2011″
WFMT-Chicago
”Woods shows his luminous interpretive vision in the Schumann, which blasts away the cobwebs of the composer’s reputation as a dull, borderline inept, orchestrator. As Schumann’s final of four works in the symphonic idiom, Op. 97 is full of energy and inspiration. Never has the outline of Schumann’s composition been clearer. Woods shapes exemplary phrasing from Orchestra of the Swan; the clarity does not amount to some kind of antiseptic dissection, but something more at the opposite extreme: a new lease on life for a familiar masterwork.”
Indianapolis Star
“Gál is truly worth rediscovering ; Woods’s recording project for Avie has intrigued and delighted me and I’m only left wanting more.”
Classic FM Magazine
““an excellent disc…a substantial work, deeply felt and deeply thought…obvious empathy and understanding..with admirable clarity of texture and finely honed musicianship… could hardly be bettered”
International Record Review
“The ‘Rhenish’ Symphony is given a superb outing, gloriously joyous in the outer movements, exuberant without being pushed, and also generously lyrical when needed, not least in the triptych of middle movements, beautifully phrased and sounded, breathing and shapely, sensitively addressed and lovingly detailed… . As for alternative recordings of the ‘Rhenish’, Woods holds his own against such wonders as Sawallisch (Dresden rather than Philadelphia), Celibidache (Munich), Giulini (Chicago) and immediately becomes a favourite for this delectable work. ”
Classical Source
“Gál’s impassioned, well-crafted late romanticism is readily accessible and quietly moving – there’s a lot to enjoy here. He’s good at subtle transitions – the way that the delicious opening melody segues into the first movement’s more agitated fast section, and its brilliant, ghostly close…brilliant, exuberant work”
The Arts Desk
”Gal’s Third Symphony is written for a relatively small ensemble, but it makes the most of the limited orchestral resources, giving every player a real workout…. and all rise to the challenge magnificently… Woods knows that his woodwind soloists can give him all the emotion the music needs, without him having to pull the tempos around, and they more than repay his trust…..
Classical CD Reviews
“A first recording shouldn’t be a swansong, but Orchestra of the Swan really does sing for Woods, in long, arching melodic lines, Gál’s writing favouring the woodwinds especially.”
The Classical Review
“This account is a joy to hear from start to exuberant finish, perfectly paced and superbly played… Very strongly recommended!”
Guy Rickards- Gramophone
“His Schumann is a revelation: transparent, graceful, melancholy, exquisitely romantic. He’s comartistxcite.complemented by the symphonic opus of the Viennese expressionist Hans Gál… This album marks the finale of a four-album complete recording of Schumann‘s and Gál’s symphonies. The final result may be the most compelling reawakening of Schumann in the last decades – and simultaneously a long-overdue vindication of Hans Gál.”
Rainer Aschemaier- artistxcite.com
“Not one but two Schumann Spring Symphonies hove into earshot. Kenneth Woods and the Orchestra of the Swan versus Yannick Nezet-Seguin and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. Woods wins it. One needs express no surprise when the committed outfit with its own conductor beats the prestige youngsters under the rising star jet-setter. The Woods performance is tighter, rhythmically crisper, richer in contrasts, more characterful and always closer to the composer’s wishes. ”
Rick Jones- Words and Music
“I would find it hard to imagine anyone handling it any better than Woods, nor any orchestra playing it with more accuracy and enthusiasm.”
John Puccio, Classical Candor
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