Berg, Britten: Violin Concertos

1	Violin Concerto: Part 1.
2	Violin Concerto: Part 2.
3	Violin Concerto in D mino
4	Violin Concerto in D mino
5	Violin Concerto in D mino
Berg, Britten: Violin Concertos
1.	Violin Concerto 29:09
	Composed by Alban Berg
	Performed by BBC Symphony Orchestra and Daniel Hope
	Conducted by Paul Watkins
2.	Violin Concerto in D minor, Op. 15 35:44
	Composed by Benjamin Britten
	Performed by BBC Symphony Orchestra and Daniel Hope
	Conducted by Paul Watkins

Barnes & Noble

Despite their considerable stylistic differences, Benjamin Britten's and Alban Berg's violin concertos share profound themes of grief and loss, as well as much gorgeous, darkly elegiac music and hushed endings that linger in the memory long after the final notes have died away. What an inspired idea it is, then, to pair these two 20th-century masterworks for the first time on one disc. Add the raptly lyrical playing of the up-and-coming British violinist Daniel Hope and the sure-handed accompaniment of Paul Watkins and the BBC Symphony Orchestra, and the result is a recording that is as musically rewarding as it is illuminating. Berg's concerto (1935), as its admirers well know, is dedicated "to the memory of an angel," namely Manon Gropius, the daughter of Alma Mahler and Walter Gropius who died from polio at 18. And while there are many fine versions of this serialist favorite to choose from, Hope's recording sets itself apart by being the first based on a new critical edition of the score, which corrects several long-standing errors in the original printed version. In contrast, Britten's work (1939), an equally heartfelt elegy for those who fell while fighting against Franco in Spain, remains curiously underperformed, although with any luck, Hope's highly expressive reading will go a long way toward making this neglected gem a concert hall regular. (Indeed, the arrival of this disc just a year after an equally worthy one from the Russian virtuoso Maxim Vengerov, on EMI, may indicate that a revival is already at hand.) First-rate sound quality that flatters everyone involved tops off a valuable and vividly performed recording. EJ Johnson

All Music Guide

There's no question that everybody should have a copy of Berg's "Violin Concerto." The most beautiful violin, the most moving, the most profound, and the most transcendent violin concerto of the twentieth century, Berg's violin concerto "To the Memory of an Angel" belongs in every civilized home. But which recording should be the one?

The argument could be made that this 2003 recording by violinist Daniel Hope with Paul Watkins conducting the BBC Symphony should be the one. Hope and Watkins' is the first recording of the new critical edition and the notes on the page are now closer to those that Berg, rather than his posthumous copy editors, intended. And while that doesn't make a whole lot of difference most of the time, when it makes a difference as the opening of the Part II, it does make a big difference.

Daniel Hope is a bit of a madman, playing with so much expressivity, so much intensity, so much rapture that at times the music gives way beneath him. But Watkins' and the BBC stay with him all the way from inferno to paradise and their performance together is wholly unified in conception and execution. Warner's sound is warm and immediate. James Leonard

All Music Guide

There's no question that everybody should have a copy of Berg's "Violin Concerto." The most beautiful, the most moving, the most profound, and the most transcendent violin concerto of the twentieth century, Berg's violin concerto "To the Memory of an Angel" belongs in every civilized home. But which recording should be the one?

The argument could be made that this 2003 recording by violinist Daniel Hope with Paul Watkins conducting the BBC Symphony should be the one. Hope and Watkins' is the first recording of the new critical edition and the notes on the page are now closer to those that Berg, rather than his posthumous copy editors, intended. And while that doesn't make a whole lot of difference most of the time, when it makes a difference as the opening of the Part II, it does make a big difference.

Daniel Hope is a bit of a madman, playing with so much expressivity, so much intensity, so much rapture that at times the music gives way beneath him. But Watkins' and the BBC stay with him all the way from inferno to paradise and their performance together is wholly unified in conception and execution. Warner's sound is warm and immediate. James Leonard

New York Times

These are probing and viscerally exciting performances of two milestone 20th-century works that could not be more different. Anthony Tommasini

Gramophone

Assured playing makes this a welcome first coupling of two elegiac concertos.