Description
Hans Gal (1890-1987)
Serenade in D major, opus 41 (1931)
Trio in F-sharp minor, opus 104 (1972)
Hans Krasa (1899-1944)
Tanec (1943)
Passacaglia and Fuge (1944)
Caroline Chin- violin, David Yang-viola, Kenneth Woods-cello
Recorded in the Concert Hall, Millfield School, December 16-18, 2011
Produced, engineered and edited by Simon Fox-Gal
Avie Records
RELEASE DATE- September 2012
Gramophone Critic’s Choice “Ensemble Epomeo provide ravishing accounts of both Gal works, fully in sympathy with the idiom… Even finer than their Nimbus rivals, Daniel Hope, Philip Dukes and Paul Watkins, with superior sound. A splendid disc I cannot get enough of.”
Guy Rickards, Gramophone Magazine
Recording of the Month “The Ensemble Epomeo play all four compositions with huge commitment and brilliant flair revealing every nuance in four wonderful works for string trio. These can sit alongside anything written in this genre. In every way this is a fantastic disc that listeners will want to hear again and again.”
Steve Arloff, MusicWeb International
“Ensemble Epomeo capture the charm of Gál’s delightful neo-Classical Serenade (1932) with a sense of line and subtlety of texture…A warmly-recorded and thought-provoking disc.”
Matthew Rye, The Strad
“Vividly recorded, the three instrumentalists of Ensemble Epomeo – closely balanced in a slightly too big and resonant acoustic – play superbly individually and as a team and with obvious commitment; clearly Kenneth Woods’s burgeoning conducting career is not to the detriment of his artistry on the cello.”
Colin Anderson, The Classical Source
“Krása’s Passacaglia and Fugue is a brilliant revelation, a savage takedown of artistic ideals in which order and luxuriance devolve into chaos. It’s a compact, unforgettable masterpiece, and the Ensemble Epomeo – which includes Woods along with violinist Caroline Chin and violist David Yang – gives it a superb performance.”
Joshua Kosman, San Francisco Chronicle
“I place this new recording slightly above the Nimbus rival.. for the treatment of the Passacaglia.. where Woods and his colleagues, adopting a very broad tempo, discover even deeper refinements of instrumental tone and character in differentiating the individual variations. Indeed, all the performances radiate sympathy for the music and a focused intensity that bespeaks both familiarity with this out-of-the-way repertoire and considerable musicianship; these are not easy works to bring out in such vital and well-characterized interpretations. Avie’s recording, too, is splendidly resonant and warm. A very recommendable disc for anyone interested in either composer.”
Calum MacDonald, International Record Review
“Wow”
Andrew Patner, WFMT
“Ensemble Epomeo does both composers a great service with their precise, lively and stylistically astute performances. The clarity in all the textures allows both men’s contrapuntal innovations to shine through… the quality of these performances may help to initiate a new era in the reception of their works, and especially of Gál’s. His Serenade definitely deserves a central place in the recital repertoire, even if it requires performances of this high standard to make its many qualities fully apparent.”
Gavin Dixon, Classical CD Reviews
“Sound quality is very good. In their debut recording, Ensemble Epomeo (named after an Ischian mountain) are thoroughly convincing from beginning to end. Their sense of ensemble is democratic, their attention to the score attentive and respectful, and their tone warm and welcoming. Expressively they are as much at home with the elegant, small-R romantic classicism of Gál as with the more semantically ambiguous colourings of Krása.”
Byzantion, MusicWeb International
“Beautiful performances from the Ensemble Epomeo.”
Martin Anderson, Klassik Magazine (Norway)
“I think I can say that the Epomeo’s musicians are more than up to the technical task of their business and that they sound intensely engaged in the emotional worlds of these two composers and their music. I would now look forward to hearing the ensemble in something more familiar, like Mozart’s great Divertimento in EI Major, K 563, or the Beethoven string trios. Meanwhile, this new, excellent recording is strongly recommended.”
Jerry Dubbins, Fanfare
“Ensemble Epomeo play with finesse and sensitivity, nicely capturing Krasa’s manic grotesqueries as well as Gal’s elegance and tenderness.”
Mark, Lehman, American Record Guide
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