Pál Hermann: Complete Surviving Music, Volume Three – Chamber Instrumental and Vocal Music
Pál Hermann, born in Budapest in 1902, was not only one of the leading cellists of his generation; he was also an important composer, one of the major figures in Hungarian music in the generation after his teachers Bartók and Kodály. But since only two of his works were published before his early death – in 1944, at the hands of the Nazis – and many more of them were lost, he has not had the esteem that he deserves. The kaleidoscopic variety of the works on this third, and final, volume of his surviving compositions – biting Bartókian piano pieces, Neo-Baroque essays of considerable contrapuntal ingenuity, songs with a French Impressionist flavour, even a sly transcription of a foxtrot – underlines how much was lost with his murder.
Nicolas Horvath, piano
Dimitri Malignan, piano
Elizaveta Agrafenina, soprano
Sára Gutvill, mezzo-soprano
Irina Bedicova, mezzo-soprano
Paul van Gastel, tenor
Pierre Mak, baritone
Matthieu Walendzik, baritone
Reine-Marie Verhagen, soprano recorder
Inês d’Avena, alto recorder
Dante Jongerius, tenor recorder
Punto Bawono, Baroque lute
Olena Zhukova, harpsichord
Olena Matselyukh, organ
Jean-Pierre Dassonville, horn
Sadie Fields, violin
Mikko Pablo, cello
Listen To This Recording:
- Allegro for piano solo (1920) (3:08)
- Toccata for piano solo (1936) (3:53)
Quatre Épigrammes for piano solo (1934) (4:58)
- No. 1, Allegro (0:56)
- No. 2, Andante in modo arabo (1:21)
- No. 3, Allegro assai (1:00)
- No. 4, Allegro ma non troppo (1:41)
Pièces pour piano à quatre mains (1939)* (7:09)
- I. Andante (1:06)
- II. Tempo giusto, ben ritmico (0:51)
- III. Andantino (1:21)
- IV. Allegro risoluto (0:56)
- V. Moderato assai (1:04)
- VI. Tempo di Jazz (1:10)
- VII. Allegro non troppo (0:41)
- Zeven kippen hebben wij for five voices (1930)* (1:50)
Suite for three recorders (c. 1930)* (5:27)
- I. Andante (1:57)
- II. Andantino (1:10)
- III. Allegro (2:20)
- Sarabande for lute (c. 1930)* (5:27)
Divertissement for harpsichord (1938)* (11:48)
- I. Toccata (4:51)
- II. Interludio (2:34)
- III. Gigue (4:23)
- Inventio for organ (1920)* (1:33)
- Allegretto for horn and piano (1920)* (0:58)
- La Ceinture for baritone and piano (1934) (2:18)
- La Dormeuse for baritone and piano (1934) (2:59)
- Ophélie for baritone and piano (1939) (7:41)
Henry Marshall, Richard Whiting & Raymond Egan, arr. Pál Hermann
- Somebody’s Wrong: Foxtrot for violin and cello (1923, arr. unknown)* (4:06)
Schubert arr. Hermann
- Moment Musical,D. 780: No. 3 for cello and piano (publ. 1828, arr. unknown)* (2:10)
Chopin arr. Hermann
- Grande Valse brillante, Op. 18 for cello and piano (1833, arr. unknown)* (6:05)
*First Recordings
MusciWeb International :
‘The performances are attractive, the various recording locations sympathetic and Dimitri Malignan’s booklet notes ever-excellent.’
—Jonathan Woolf, MusciWeb International
Charlottesville Classical :
‘Hermann’s surviving music shows a composer of great imagination and promise. […]
Hermann did not survive the war, but his music did. It’s take a while, but that music lives again in these Toccata Classics recordings. And to my ears, they sound as fresh and inventive as the day they were penned.
Recommended — and not just this volume, but the entire series.’
—Ralph Graves, Charlottesville Classical