Nash Ensemble Pairs Tchaikovsky and Korngold

courtesy of PIAS

According to my archives, I have not listened to an album of the Nash Ensemble for about eleven years. I was still writing for Examiner.com when I encountered their album Brundibár: Music by Composers in Theresienstadt (1941–1945). This coming Friday Hyperion will release their latest album, which will involve fewer players than Brundibár. It offers a pair of sextets, the first being Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Opus 70 in D minor, given the title “Souvenir de Florence,” followed by Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s Opus 10 sextet in D major. The performers will be violinists Stephanie Gonley (the only player that was also on the Brundibár album) and Jonathan Stone, violists Lars Anders Tomter and Rachel Roberts, and cellists Adrian Brendel and Gemma Rosefield.

It goes without saying that this new release is not as adventurous or provocative as Brundibár was, but attentive listening does not live by provocation alone! The fact is that I was familiar with both of these compositions before I began listening to this new release. The Tchaikovsky offering has been a longtime favorite; and, unless I am mistaken, I have been fortunate enough to listen to it in a recital performance. I “discovered” the Korngold in March of 2020, when it was released by Chandos to complement a performance of his violin concerto with Andrew Haveron as the soloist. The thing about chamber music, however, is that it is highly personal; and I had no problem with another encounter with another ensemble, particularly since this is music I have yet to hear in a recital setting.

I suppose what draws me to the Korngold is that, even at a young age, he was not afraid to venture into provocative territory. While the opening movement makes for an accommodating introduction, things start to get interesting with the dissonant jolt that opens the second movement. This is when it becomes clear that Korngold’s “turf” is a far cry from Tchaikovsky’s. Whether that gesture can be taken as a response to his father’s accusation that he was “bathing” in lush harmonies is left as an exercise for the reader to decide!