Conductor Leif Segerstam and the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra have released several albums of minor Beethoven works, and in general, they're valuable additions to a Beethoven shelf or hard drive. No one would put Die Ruinen von Athen, Op. 113 (The Ruins of Athens), in the top tier of Beethoven's works, but neither is it a potboiler. The work consists of incidental music for a play by August von Kotzebue, and it includes not only instrumental pieces, but also Singspiel-like spoken dialogue (some of it orchestrally ...
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Conductor Leif Segerstam and the Turku Philharmonic Orchestra have released several albums of minor Beethoven works, and in general, they're valuable additions to a Beethoven shelf or hard drive. No one would put Die Ruinen von Athen, Op. 113 (The Ruins of Athens), in the top tier of Beethoven's works, but neither is it a potboiler. The work consists of incidental music for a play by August von Kotzebue, and it includes not only instrumental pieces, but also Singspiel-like spoken dialogue (some of it orchestrally accompanied, which is novel), choruses, recitatives, and narration. This is apparently the first recording of the work to include the latter. The first four tracks on the album pertain to a later revival of the play for the opening of a new theater in Pest (now part of Budapest, Hungary); Beethoven added an overture, now known as Die Weihe des Hauses, Op. 124, two small choruses, and an aria, all quite rare except for the overture. Much of the music is pretty simple, but Segerstam, as usual,...
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