Track Listing

1. La Variations
2. Five Images After Sappho: Tell Everyone
3. Five Images After Sappho: Without Warning
4. Five Images After Sappho: It's No Use
5. Five Images After Sappho: The Evening Star
6. Five Images After Sappho: Wedding
7. Giro, for Orchestra
8. Mania for Violoncello Solo and Ensemble
9. Gambit, for Orchestra

Product Details

• Released on: 2001-01-01
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Dimensions: .23 pounds
• Running time: 75 minutes

Customer Reviews

interesting stuff
I really like this disc. I listen to a lot of orchestral music, but very little of it Modernism (or post-Modernism, or post-post-Modernism, or whatever era it is Salonen belongs to). These pieces range from vaguely tonal to freely atonal, and are quite dissonant in either case (though never stridently so). Yet Salonen's ideas are compelling and are presented and developed with clarity; the lines are not at all difficult to follow and the architecture of each piece is intelligently conceived and constructed. The orchestration is often quite striking and the performances are very good. I think Giro, Mania, and Gambit are excellent; the jury is still out on L.A. Variations, and I didn't like Five Images After Sappho at all. Were I more familiar with this kind of music - and once I've listened to this particular disc a few more times - my rating may well increase to a four out of five.

Esa-Pekka Salonen: a great conductor...and a great composer
Wait a minute...isn't he just a conductor? No, this Finnish-born conductor is also a composer. This CD is his first release and it contains 5 world premiere recordings. Salonen has always been a promoter of new music and now he shows us what he can do. The three orchestral works are diverse and show off the ability of the ensemble he conducts full time. Dawn Upshaw, soprano, and Anssi Karttunen, cello, grace this CD as featured soloists on two of the pieces. Dawn Upshaw sings beautifully on Salonen's "Five Images After Sappho." The Ojai Festival and the London Sinfonietta commissioned this work. Anssi Karttunen, for whom this work was composed, performs "Mania" for violoncello solo and ensemble.

This CD is a great companion to the (also) Finnish-born composer Kaija Saariaho's recording of Graal Theatre, Chateau De L'ame, and Amers.

They have something going on
Salonen, Lindberg and Saariaho is a triptych "gang" of clever, brilliant composers from my neighbor country Finland and if you like postmodern classical music you should check ALL three of them out (these three mentioned above often "sit in" or help each other in one way or another).

This is a stunning record and Salonens five songs (beutiful singing from D. Upshaw on those 5 songs) are something special.

This disc has almost everything. A criteria for... well maybe not a genuis but def. a very good, innovative composer.

Salonen is a good conductor and also an extremly talanted composer.

A must disc. This is something extraordanary in the postmodern classical music area.