Alexandre Tansman’s “Honegger meets Stravinsky via Bartók” Cello Concerto adds yet another strand to this neglected composer’s colorful orchestral tapestry. It’s beautifully written and scored: opening with a solo cadenza, Tansman gradually introduces more colorful orchestral elements as the ensuing Toccata pits various instruments against the cello protagonist. Two lyrical slow movements enclosing a witty central scherzo then lead to a brief and brilliant finale. Sebastian Hess digs into this challenging work with evident enthusiasm, if somewhat grainy tone. The Fantasie for cello and orchestra displays a more self-consciously Romantic idiom (for this read a greater emphasis on melody) than the concerto, beginning in a mood of bittersweet lyricism and leading to an exciting conclusion. The Ten Commandments is a 20-minute-long tone poem exploiting the contrast between chaos and order (the giving of the law) in a series of orchestral confrontations that gradually yield to a serene coda. The cool, luminous beauty of the music’s calmer sections is quite striking. Israel Yinon offers typically sympathetic interpretations and stimulates the Hanover Radio Philharmonic to committed, vital playing, very well recorded by the engineers of North German Radio. Good stuff.
