All year one wonders what 10 recordings really deserve to be included in such a list, and wonders if any potential inclusions might not be a stretch. Then, in the last few weeks, suddenly a slew of recordings, late discoveries that might have been lying about for months or weeks, force themselves upon the ears and one could easily extend the list to 20. On the ionarts website I just cheated by creating an “Almost List.» Here I will ostentatiously lament that there was no room to include Thomas Fey’s latest Haydn (Hänssler Classic), who continues his spark-plug cycle of all the Symphonies. Nor pianist Ivan Ilić’s The Transcendentalist (Heresy Records), a mesmerizing mix of beguiling Alexander Scriabin, John Cage and Morton Feldman. Nor the Chorus sine nomine’s new take on Allegri’s Miserere (Gramola), in which composer Vladimir Ivanoff and improvising saxophonist Michael Krenn allow the familiar music to arise in a new aural guise—recorded in Vienna’s Otto Wagner church with near eight seconds of reverb which become an integral part of the composition. Or the rocking Le nozze di Figaro of Theodor Currentzis’ (Sony ) which rings in something of a new Mozart opera-recording age much as René Jacobs did (and still does) with his recordings of the Mozart operas. Or Ralph van Raat’s new recording that shows why Frederic Rzewski remains one of the most important living composers for piano (Naxos).
A.Adam
Ballet
12+