Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra & Mario Venzago - Berg: Orchestral Works (2022) [Hi-Res]

The works on the present album span Berg’s creative career from his first published piece, the Piano Sonata, Op. 1, here performed in the orchestration by Theo Verbey, to the Violin Concerto and the Symphonic Pieces from the Opera ‘Lulu’, the last works that were fully completed when Berg died at the age of fifty in 1935.

The Dutch violinist Isabelle van Keulen performs the Violin Concerto, for which she is well known. The Cincinnati Enquirer wrote last year: ‘Van Keulen brought Manon Gropius vividly to life in the concerto, matching her tone and expression to each episode; flighty and cheerful in the first, plucky and aggressive in the second, serenely resigned at the end, where Berg quotes a Bach chorale. The enigmatic folksong woven into both movements (hardly Bachian with its risqué text) had a mysterious feel, and van Keulen tied it all up in a performance as narrative as it was nimble.’

This comprehensive collection, performed by the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra (the National Orchestra of Sweden) under its former Principal Conductor Mario Venzago.

"Thanks to the lucid conducting of Mario Venzago, the magnificent and fearless playing of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, and a Chandos recording which combines clarity and enormous weight, this set represents an outstanding addition to the catalogue…" (BBC Music Magazine)

"That the suites from Wozzeck and Lulu are the most pressing reasons to hear this set is due in large part to the stature and eloquence of Geraldine McGreevy's contributions, for if she ever sang either of Berg's hapless heroines on stage in the UK, I would beat a path to the opera-house door." (Gramophone Magazine)

"The main orchestra works come off extremely well here...the orchestral suites from Wozzeck and Lulu have both intensity and atmosphere. The Three Pieces, Op. 6 have more warmth here than usual, though the finale has a fine sense of impending doom." (Penguin Music Guide)

Isabelle van Keulen,violin
Geraldine McGreevy, soprano
Robert Murray, tenor
Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra
Mario Venzago, conductor