On An Overgrown Path

When I went in search of Pablo Casals last week I repeated Stravinsky's dismissive comment about the young wives of Casals and Zoltán Kodály . I am now indebted to the excellent Through These Ears for telling us that the ladies, in fact, had the last laugh. Marta Casals Istomin (seen above with her husband) went on to become President of Manhattan School of Music as well as holding many other distinguished posts before retiring in 2005, while Sarolta Kodály Péczely is a visiting professor of voice at the Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music in Budapest , an institution whose faculty has also included Béla Bartók , Zoltán Kodály, Jenő Hubay , Ernő Dohnányi , Leó Weiner , Dávid Popper , Bence Szabolcsi , Sándor Végh , Imre Waldbauer and Ede Zathureczky . When will they ever learn? Photo with full acknowledgements from Joys and Sorrows, reflections by Pablo Casals edited by Alert E. Khan (Macdonld ISBN 356030482) - out of print but well worth buying from specialists . Any copyrighted...

Sometimes we forget that it's the music that really matters. To remind us here is a photo I took recently in L'Eglise Saint-Pierre in Commequiers in south-western France. The Ensemble Vocal de la Cathédrale de Nantes directed by Louis-Marie Burgevin with organist Nicolas Daviaud (check out details of that beautiful new French classical style organ here) were performing the exquisitely balanced programme below. But I was in deepest rural France for a specific reason, find out why later this week . Ave Maria - gregorian Ave Maria - Tomás Luis de Victoria Beata Virgo - William Byrd Ave Maris Stella - manuscript of Limoges Stabat Mater - Zoltán Kodály Tota Pulchra - Pau Casals Salve Montserratina - Pau Casals Magnificat - anonymous Concerto in E - Vivaldi/Walther (organ) Credo - Vivaldi Now read about a Bach chorale's secret French connection. Photo (c) On An Overgrown Path 2008. Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co...

XL is the new choral work by English composer Antony Pitts . It uses the same forces as Tallis' sublime 40 part motet Spem in Alium , and was composed as a companion piece. XL is on a new Harmonia Mundi CD sung by the Rundfunkchor Berlin directed by Simon Halsey. It also includes the Tallis motet, Knut Nystedt's Immortal Bach , and Zoltán Kodaly's substantial Laudes organi. Other posts linking to the work of Antony Pitts, and well worth reading are Jerry Springer rebel grabs Gramophone accolade and Raindrops are falling on my chant .