Only one of the seven works on this release by Chinese-Australian cellist Li-Wei Qin is called a concerto; the rest are simply works for cello and orchestra, and some were arranged from other media, at that. But this is a grouping of well-played performances that will likely introduce even confirmed Russian music fans to some unfamiliar pieces. Perhaps the four works by Glazunov in the middle of the program are the highlights. The cello writing is beautiful in these: sample the Concerto ballata in C major of 1931, which has ...
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Only one of the seven works on this release by Chinese-Australian cellist Li-Wei Qin is called a concerto; the rest are simply works for cello and orchestra, and some were arranged from other media, at that. But this is a grouping of well-played performances that will likely introduce even confirmed Russian music fans to some unfamiliar pieces. Perhaps the four works by Glazunov in the middle of the program are the highlights. The cello writing is beautiful in these: sample the Concerto ballata in C major of 1931, which has a gentle idiom somewhat like that of the composer's Saxophone Concerto from a few years later. There is nothing terribly adventuresome about any of the Glazunov works here, but each of them is something Tchaikovsky might have written had he lived longer, and that is nothing to be dismissed. Tchaikovsky himself is represented by the Variations on a Rococo Theme, Op. 33, a Mozartian work played in the version by its dedicatee, Wilhelm Fitzhagen. That's the best-known piece on the...
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