Tüür, Erkki-Sven

From My Home: Music from the Baltic Countries

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Nice Album
Mists and lakes, lonely seashores...
Kremer's genius and heart poured into this six star CD
Nostalgic and hauntingly beautiful 20th century music

From My Home: Music from the Baltic Countries
Gidon Kremer , Erkki-Sven Tüür , and Georgs Pelecis
Manufacturer: Teldec
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Kremerland
Vivaldi and Piazzolla: Eight Seasons
Tracing Astor
After Mozart
The Russian Seasons

ASIN: B000005823
Release Date: 1998-02-17

Tracks:

Elegie For Violin And String Orchestra
Fratres For Violin, String Orchestra And Percussion
Partita For Violin Solo: Prdium
Partita For Violin Solo: Scherzo
Partita For Violin Solo: Grave
Partita For Violin Solo: Toccata
Partita For Violin Solo: Epilog
Musica Dolorosa For String Orchestra
Nevertheless
Two Grasshopper Dances for violin solo: Sad Dance
Two Grasshopper Dances for violin solo: Happy Dance
Conversio for violin and piano

Amazon.com essential recording

One can't accuse Latvian-born violinist Gidon Kremer of forgetting his roots. He continues to perform the music of his homeland and even formed chamber ensemble Kremerata Musica so that young musicians from Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania could bathe in the spotlight. On this disc, Kremer showcases some of the very best music composed by Baltic-based composers in the last 50 years. With Vadim Sacharov on piano and the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie, Kremer delivers soul-stirring intensity to these seldom-heard compositions. Balys Dvarionas's moving Elegy for Violin and String Orchestra teeters between romantic passages and somber string movements. Peteris Vasks's Musica Dolorosa for String Orchestra is atmospheric and grand. Two Grasshopper Dances for Solo Violin by Peteris Plakidis are stunning, short pieces that play on atonal harmonics and a cute folk melody. Arvo Pärt's Fratres is one composition you may have heard before, but Kremer delivers a stunning, intense performance. All in all, a great showcase of underappreciated composers, and of Kremer himself. --Jason Verlinde

Customer Reviews:

Nice Album.......2007-01-18

After hearing a clip from "Nevertheless" on NPR, I searched for and found the album. I'm not disappointed! That piece alone made the purchase worthwhile. I'm not quite so enthused about the piece that follows. But, overall, I really like the album.

Mists and lakes, lonely seashores..........2007-01-10

This is an exquisite collection of contemporary Baltic music, selected and played by a master of violin Gidon Kremer. My favourite is Nevertheless dedicated to him by the composer Georgs Pelecis, a friend from schooldays. It's haunting. I bought the album for that piece and then was introduced to all this other fine evocative music. Kremer writes " I associate the Baltic States with the grey of the sea..I do not mean to imply by this that Baltic music is itself grey, simply that it belongs to the Northern Hemisphere If I allow my imagination free rein, I think of mists and lakes , lonely sea-shores and the possibility of finding concentration and tranquility" And that sums up the collection beautifully.

Kremer's genius and heart poured into this six star CD.......2002-08-27

I bought this disk a few years back after I heard "Fratres" on the radio. Somehow I had never run across this piece and it stunned me. Now, like a word you have just learned and hear everywhere, I realize how popular and well known it is. But it was new to me then and it is what led me to this great disk.

As I listened to the other pieces I was exceptionally pleased. They are all written after the Second World War and most of the composers were still living when the disk was made (and likely are still with us). Kremer's notes mentions that he knows most of them and went to school with some. However, none of the music has the sound of the serialist movement that was so dominant in the fifties and sixties (not that that is bad, just don't expect that sound). Much of it is downright tonal, if not common practice era style.

All of the pieces are of different character. The opening Elegie is beautiful and quite a romantic piece. Pärt's "Fratres" is wonderful and full of interesting colors, rhythms, and effects. The Partita is edgy and the most "modern" sounding (in the old fashioned sense of "modern"), but that is not pejorative, it is quite beautiful.

The "Music Dolorosa for String Orchestra" is simply great, dark, and even delicious.

"Nevertheless" takes up a large part of this disk. I have to admit to being attracted to this piece and yet its simplicity and purposeful naiveté seem to not allow me to become fully involved in the whole 27 minutes. When the piano is playing simple major scales as accompaniment it jars me out of the piece. And yet, it is such an attractive piece with so many wonderful aspects along with Kremer's magnificent playing, that I have to recommend it and enjoy listening to it.

The short pieces by Pakidis are attractive.

The "Conversio" is quite good and despite being the most recent is absolutely accessible and tonal in interesting ways. The piece is very rhythmic and almost minimalistic with the repetitions that term implies without becoming sonic water torture. It is interesting and fun throughout.

It is such a great disk that I wish I could give it six stars. Enjoy! I would love you to email me your comments after you have heard the disk.

Nostalgic and hauntingly beautiful 20th century music.......2000-01-23

From first hearing the deeply moving opening piece "ELEGIE" by Dvarionas I knew this is something of a very special recording. One of Kremer's most successful discs, he poured out his whole heart in each of these very interesting contemporary music. All the pieces hear are very easy to listen even for those who don't normally like 20th century music. Beautiful melodies without being too conventional, this is music for the soul & spirit. Though the music here is much more extrovert and direct than the mystical and spiritual music of Pärt, there is an inner spirituality in much of the music offered by these composers on this disc.

There is much nostalgia in the music, especially in "NEVERTHELESS", a piece written by Kremer's friend for him and is the most touching piece in the program. Intense and even painful moments are found in "MUSICA DOLOROSA". It is a very moving piece, thanks also to the great contribution by the solo cellist, Francoux. FRATES, the most often played work here, has a mysterious haunting effect, typical that of Pärt. The most modern compositions are the GRASSHOPPER DANCES and CONVERSIO, very fun pieces that seem to be tailor-composed to Kremer's vivacious playing style, but may sound rather chaotic to the untrained ear, and towards the end of CONVERSIO the repeated conversations between the violin and piano can seem endlessly tiring.

Tracks:

Architectonics VI
Passion
Illusion
Crystallisatio
Requiem

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Erkki-Sven Tüür: Crystallisatio

Manufacturer: Ecm Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Requiems | Vocal Non-Opera | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music

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Tuur: Symphony No. 2; Lighthouse; Architectonics III & IV; Conversio

ASIN: B000024WZO
Release Date: 2000-02-01

Tracks:

Architectonics VI
Passion
Illusion
Crystallisatio
Requiem

Average customer rating:

Animated and liberated

Erkki-Sven Tüür: Flux

Manufacturer: Ecm Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Erkki-Sven Tüür: Exodus

ASIN: B0000244W6
Release Date: 2000-02-01

Tracks:

Symphony No.3: Contextus I
Symphony No.3: Contextus II
Concerto for Violoncello And Orchestra
Lighthouse For Strings

Amazon.com

Estonian composer Erkki-Sven Tuur is one of today's brightest lights, creating works that combine drama, mystery, and emotional directness within complex structures. His music is listener-friendly; its rhythmic life, deep textures, and compelling sound world reward repeated listenings. The Symphony No. 3 is in two movements, the first building from barely audible cymbal splashes to jazz-like plucked basses to scurrying strings and chaotic winds, rising to a shattering brass-led climax that gives way to delicate coloristic effects. Those first four minutes are typical of Tuur's music, pulsating with energy and unexpected blocks of sound. The Cello Concerto is just as fetching; Gergingas's lyrical soliloquizing blends nicely with the imaginative orchestration. Lighthouse, for strings, is a contemporary take on the baroque and makes a fine filler. Highly recommended. --Dan Davis

Customer Reviews:

Animated and liberated.......2000-04-12

Imagine a mad genius bent over a sequencer, cranking away wildly at the tempo and pitch controls - except in this case it isn't a sequencer, it's a string section! Erkki Sven Tuur sheds new light on the relevance of arpeggios and looped motifs in contemporary music and the effect is as invigorating as it can be unsettling. His music has both linear and harmonic density - a soup with a whole new flavour and texture....

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Architectonics
Erkki-Sven Tüür , and Absolute Ensemble
Manufacturer: Ccn'c
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: B00005PJDY
Release Date: 2001-09-25

Tracks:

IV 'Per Cadenza Ad Metasimplicity'
V
II
III 'Postmetaminimal Dream'
VI
VII
I

Average customer rating:

a fantastic violin concerto & 2 energetic orchestral works
Energy!

Erkki-Sven Tüür: Exodus

Manufacturer: Ecm Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Erkki-Sven Tüür: Flux
Music of Peteris Vasks
Rorem: Three Symphonies

ASIN: B000094HLC
Release Date: 2003-09-16

Tracks:

I
II
III
Aditus
Exodus

Customer Reviews:

a fantastic violin concerto & 2 energetic orchestral works.......2005-06-13

Erkki-Sven Tuur is an Estonian composer whose ambitious project is to synthesize the post-serialist and post-minimalist tendencies in contemporary classical music. If that wasn't enough, he is also increasingly incorporating elements from his early 1980s background leading a progressive rock group -- his latest Symphony No. 5 includes electric guitar! Given my view that most minimalism ranges from harmlessly pretty to painfully boring to hideously ugly, I wasn't encouraged by Tuur's inclinations, and so I haven't finally heard his music until now.

It's one of those "on the one hand, on the other hand" stories -- on the one hand, there is plenty of ferocious intelligence in these works, performed magnificently by the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, led by fellow Estonian Paavo Jarvi, and Isabelle van Keulen on violin. The concerto especially, the longest work in three movements totalling nearly 35 minutes, is outstanding, with strong virtuoso passages for violin and a series of diverse structures and moods. Unfortunately, in the title piece "Exodus," Glass-like arpeggios pour from the string section in the long main segment building up to a fortissimo roar. The overall conception is clearly not minimalist, but Tuur seems to have taken minimalism's linear repetitive drive on board these energetic works as part of their motor. The forward momentum of "Aditus" and "Exodus" is bracing, but I could do without the echoes of Glass. "Exodus" works up to a crescendo, punctuated by a drum kit, and then subsides, culminating in a quiet, mystical coda reminiscent of Arvo Part (of course, also Estonian). So Tuur seems to incorporate Eastern holy minimalism as well as Western (New York City) minimalist influences.

Lest the wrong impression be created, let me repeat that these are NOT minimalist works. Overall they are complex, dynamic, and stimulating, not mind-numbing. I look forward to repeated listening, and to future compositions from Tuur. The composer he is the most similar to is Magnus Lindberg of Finland. Lindberg, in his mature style, creates complex, energetic orchestral works not so different from Tuur, though thankfully without any repetitive arpeggios -- see my reviews of THE MUSIC OF MAGNUS LINDBERG and AURA.

Energy!.......2004-01-09

Parole in semi-libertà (atto primo). Concerto for Violin and Orchestra: stridio di violino, risposta, tensione che sale, ebollizione, botta e risposta, incrocio progressivo, flusso magmatico che sale, esplosione. Aditus: tintinnio, repentina accelerazione, urla del coro, energia, calore sempre più insostenibile, suoni fortissimi, toni acuti, apoteosi, improvviso silenzio con soffio di vapore che si perde tra le nuvole. Exodus: gente che cammina, marcia militare, piedi che battono, intensità, mal di testa, ossa che scricchiolano, silenzio. Conclusione: versami un altro bicchiere, Fred.
Artüür Cravän

Vasks: String Quartet No.2/Tüür: String Quartet/Pärt: Fratres for String Quartet

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Vasks: String Quartet No.2/Tüür: String Quartet/Pärt: Fratres for String Quartet

Manufacturer: Collins Classics
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Quartets | Chamber Music | Classical | Styles | Music

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ASIN: B000003VZG
Release Date: 1996-06-18

Tracks:

Str Qt No.2 'Sommer Gesanger': I. Aufbluhen
Str Qt No.2 'Sommer Gesanger': II. Vogel
Str Qt No.2 'Sommer Gesanger': III. Elegie
Str Qt: I. Crotchet = 80
Str Qt: II. Tempo Ad Libitum
Fratres

Tüür: Oratorio Ante Finem Saeculi/Symphony No.2

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Tüür: Oratorio Ante Finem Saeculi/Symphony No.2

Manufacturer: Finlandia
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Oratorios | Opera & Vocal | Styles | Music

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ASIN: B000005CIJ
Release Date: 1996-04-09

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