Peter Breiner is a long-standing associate of the Naxos label and has taken more than his share of critical heat from the classical establishment for some of his projects, such as concerto grossi based on Beatles songs and his jazzy cadenzas to piano concertos of Mozart. However, Breiner is Czech, despite his German-sounding name, and has turned his attention to the more germane matter of developing orchestral suites from the operas of arch-Czech composer Leos Janácek. Janácek did not create orchestral suites from his own ...
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Peter Breiner is a long-standing associate of the Naxos label and has taken more than his share of critical heat from the classical establishment for some of his projects, such as concerto grossi based on Beatles songs and his jazzy cadenzas to piano concertos of Mozart. However, Breiner is Czech, despite his German-sounding name, and has turned his attention to the more germane matter of developing orchestral suites from the operas of arch-Czech composer Leos Janácek. Janácek did not create orchestral suites from his own operas; the familiar suite from The Cunning Little Vixen was cobbled together by conductor Vaclav Talich well after Janácek's death in 1928. Perhaps the reason Janácek himself never broke any concert music out of his operas is that he never realized just how popular they would ultimately become. Breiner is pulling suites from the eight operas not exploited by Talich, and Naxos' Janácek: Orchestral Suite from the Operas, Vol. 2, featuring Breiner leading the New Zealand Symphony...
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