Eliza, ou Les voyages au glaciers du Mont St-Bernard, opera in 2 acts: Overture
Listeners may be puzzled to see the overture to Luigi Cherubini's opera Éliza on a program of Brahms works, but a bit of booklet-reading or research will yield the key (and plenty more information about Brahms' admiration for this nowadays-neglected composer). The Cherubini overture preceded Brahms' Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15, at the concerto's first performance in 1859, and there are other historically authentic details as well. Pianist Alexander Melnikov plays a Blüthner piano made around that year, and the ...
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Listeners may be puzzled to see the overture to Luigi Cherubini's opera Éliza on a program of Brahms works, but a bit of booklet-reading or research will yield the key (and plenty more information about Brahms' admiration for this nowadays-neglected composer). The Cherubini overture preceded Brahms' Piano Concerto No. 1 in D minor, Op. 15, at the concerto's first performance in 1859, and there are other historically authentic details as well. Pianist Alexander Melnikov plays a Blüthner piano made around that year, and the whole is nicely recorded by the Sinfonieorchester Basel and conductor Ivor Bolton in a Swiss hotel hall that is entirely appropriate to the music. One wonders why the Cherubini overture was not placed in its original slot preceding the concerto, with the other framing work, Brahms' Tragic Overture, Op. 81, at the end, but the concerto performance itself is wonderful. The Blüthner piano is a step or two short of a modern grand in sheer power, but it brings out the lyrical passages in...
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