BELA BARTOK

 

Music for Strings, Percussion & Celeste, Divertimento

 

ZOLTAN KODALY - Dances of Galanta

 

Scottish Chamber Orchestra/ Sir Charles Mackerras

 

Sir Charles Mackerras is one of the greatest interpreters of Eastern European music conducting today. His output includes a plethora of award-winning recordings of Czech and Hungarian music, but this is Sir Charles' first recording of Bartók's Music for Strings, Percussion & Celeste.

 

Bartók had a fascination with folk-dance rhythms and colourful expression.  Both works represented here would figure in any round-up of 20th century masterpieces and they share an intense expressiveness.  Music for Strings, Percussion and Celeste is Bartók's tour de force, a colourful and spectacular work, while the Divertimento is a deeply emotional piece written in the shadow of the Second World War.

 

Kodály shared Bartók's fascination with folk music and his Dances of Galánta is a symphonic poem distinguished by brilliant orchestration and cast in rondo form, taking its material from 18th-century verbunkos (Hungarian dance) music.

 

Linn Super Audio CD CKD234