WGBH Radio WGBH Radio theclassicalstation.org

Brassucopia / Chicago Brass Quintet

Chicago Brass Quintet / Various
Release Date: 08/17/2010 
Label:  Crystal   Catalog #: 211   Spars Code: n/a 
Composer:  Claudio Monteverdi,  Edmund Haines,  James Hopkins,  James Mattern,   ... 
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Number of Discs: 1 
Recorded in: Stereo 
Length: 0 Hours 48 Mins. 

Special Order: If we cannot ship this title in 45 days, your order will be cancelled and you will be notified via email.  

Notes and Editorial Reviews



BRASSUCOPIA • Chicago Br Qnt • CRYSTAL CD211 (48:25)


MONTEVERDI Deus in Adjutorium. Ecco Mormorar. HAINES Toccata. HOPKINS Brass Quintet No. 1. MATTERN Sonata Breve. FALLA 3-Cornered Hat: Miller’s Dance. Read more El Amor Brujo: Suite. BARTÓK Folk Song Suite. MUSSORGSKY Hopak. SHOSTAKOVICH The Golden Age: Polka. SCRIABIN Prelude. RIMSKY-KORSAKOV Flight of the Bumblebee. ROSSINI William Tell Overture: Finale.


The Chicago Brass Quintet, founded in 1964, is one of the most long-lived ensembles of its kind, and deservedly so. This release follows a typical Crystal practice of rereleasing an old LP recording and supplementing it with some newly recorded selections. The pieces by Haines, Hopkins, Mattern, Falla, and Bartók were recorded in 1981; those by Monteverdi, Mussorgsky, Shostakovich, Scriabin, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Rossini (in arrangements by ensemble member and trombonist James Mattern) were recorded in 2009. However, despite the 28-year gap and change in three of the five members, there is little discernable difference in either the ensemble’s sound or the quality of the recording.


Most of the works here are orchestral compositions offered in transcription; in some cases (the Falla and Rossini selections) the arrangement is of a highly abridged version. As for the three original works, the Toccata by Edmund Haines (1914–74), a pupil of Copland, Harris, and Hanson who taught at the University of Michigan and Sarah Lawrence College, is a brief (92 seconds), lively, and attractive work. The three-movement quintet of James Hopkins (b. 1939), a onetime faculty member of Northwestern University and the University of Southern California, is a nine-minute foray into the thickets of atonality that offers little I find attractive. By contrast, the four-movement Sonata Breve of Mattern is unabashedly imitative of Paul Hindemith—no bad thing in my book, and very well done at that.


The performances are top-notch. My one complaint is that, as with so many titles that Crystal is recycling onto full-priced CDs from its old LP catalog, timing of the disc is rather stingy, and the contents of the original album could easily have been combined with those of another Crystal LP release by a different ensemble to provide one well-filled CD. Despite that caveat, if you are a fancier of brass music and price is not an object, this issue is well worth acquiring.


FANFARE: James A. Altena
Read less

Works on This Recording

1.
Madrigals, Book 2: Ecco mormorar l'onde by Claudio Monteverdi
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Baroque 
Written: by 1590; Cremona, Italy 
 Date of Recording: 2009 
Venue:  Rockefeller Chapel 
Length: 3 Minutes 7 Secs. 
2.
Toccata for brass quintet by Edmund Haines
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Modern 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 1 Minutes 36 Secs. 
3.
Quintet for brass No 1 by James Hopkins
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Modern 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 2 Minutes 0 Secs. 
4.
Sonata breve, for brass quintet by James Mattern
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Modern 
Written: 1959 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 7 Minutes 32 Secs. 
5.
El sombrero de tres picos: Miller's Dance "Farruca" by Manuel de Falla
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1919; Spain 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 3 Minutes 19 Secs. 
6.
El amor brujo: Excerpt(s) by Manuel de Falla
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1914-1915; Spain 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 6 Minutes 15 Secs. 
7.
Sorochintsy fair: Hopak by Modest Mussorgsky
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Romantic 
Written: Russia 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 1 Minutes 23 Secs. 
8.
Age of Gold, Op. 22: Polka by Dmitri Shostakovich
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1927-1930; USSR 
 Date of Recording: 2009 
Venue:  Rockefeller Chapel 
Length: 2 Minutes 27 Secs. 
9.
Prelude(s) for Piano by Alexander Scriabin
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Modern 
 Date of Recording: 2009 
Venue:  Rockefeller Chapel 
Length: 2 Minutes 16 Secs. 
10.
Tale of Tsar Saltan: Suite, Op. 57 - Flight of the bumblebee by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Romantic 
Written: 1903; Russia 
 Date of Recording: 2009 
Venue:  Rockefeller Chapel 
Length: 1 Minutes 36 Secs. 
11.
Guillaume Tell: Overture - Finale by Gioachino Rossini
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Romantic 
Written: 1829; Italy 
 Date of Recording: 2009 
Venue:  Rockefeller Chapel 
Length: 1 Minutes 18 Secs. 
12.
Vespro della Beata Vergine: Deus in adjutorium by Claudio Monteverdi
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Baroque 
Written: by 1610; Italy 
 Date of Recording: 2009 
Venue:  Rockefeller Chapel 
Length: 1 Minutes 43 Secs. 
13.
Mikrokosmos, Sz 107: Book 4, no 116, Melody by Béla Bartók
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1926-1939; Budapest, Hungary 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 1 Minutes 43 Secs. 
14.
For Children, Sz 42: no 42, Swineherd dance by Béla Bartók
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Modern 
Written: 1908-1910 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 1 Minutes 48 Secs. 
15.
Hungarian Dance by Béla Bartók
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: Modern 
Written: 1890-1945 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 1 Minutes 12 Secs. 
16.
Mikrokosmos, Sz 107: Book 3, no 95, Song of the Fox by Béla Bartók
Orchestra/Ensemble:  Chicago Brass Quintet
Period: 20th Century 
Written: 1926-1939; Budapest, Hungary 
 Date of Recording: 1981 
Venue:  Chicago's Temple Emanuel 
Length: 1 Minutes 49 Secs. 

Customer Reviews

Be the first to review this title
Review This Title
Review This Title Share on Facebook