The Name You Trust for Classical Music

Read reviews, listen to the music, and purchase the COMPACT DISC Spohr: Clarinet Concertos Nos. 1 and 3 / Potpourri, Op. 80

Customer Service Toll Free 866.489.4152

Flash 9 required. Click to download.

Narrow your search
with our Music Browser

Classical Music

        Ballet
        Chamber Music
        Choral
        Concertos
        Film Music
        Folk Legends
        Instrumental
        Musicals
        Opera / Operetta
        Orchestral
        Vocal

Jazz

Jazz Contemporary
Jazz Icons

New Age

Wind Band

World

        Ballad
        Bhuddist
        Chinese Music
        Classical (World)
        Early Music (World)
        Folk
        Gamelan
        Gypsy
        Hindustani
        Jazz (World)
        Klezmer
        Sufi
        Vocal (World)
        World

Special Offers:

Free MP3 Downloads

A Special Offer for Valentines

Catalogs

Internship Opportunities

Celebrating Black History

Masters of American Music

53rd Annual Grammy� Award Winners

Clearance

Penguin Guide

200 Essential Recordings

Recently Released

Upcoming Releases

SACD

DVD

        Ballet DVD
        Classical Concert
        Classical Documentary
        Dance Documentary
        Opera DVD

Audio Books

        Anthologies / Collections
        Arts
        Biographies
        Children's Classics
        Classic Fiction
        Great Epics and Tales
        History
        Junior Classic Fiction
        Junior History
        Literature
        Music Biographies
        Music Education
        Non-Fiction
        Philosophy
        Plays - Others
        Plays - Shakespeare
        Poetry
        Religion
        Samplers
        Sports
        Wine Guide

NaxosDirect Podcasts

Video Librarian Reviews

Labels

Naxos Label

        Naxos American Classics
        Naxos Best Of...
        Naxos Box Sets
        Naxos Cinema Classics
        Naxos Classics
        Naxos DVD
        Naxos DVD-Audio
        Naxos International
        Naxos Jazz
        Naxos Limited Edition
        Naxos Milken Archives
        Naxos Night Music
        Naxos Opera
        Naxos Orchestral
        Naxos Special Release
        Naxos Wind Band Classics
        Naxos World

Composers

Conductors

Ensembles

Orchestras

Choirs

Artists

Instruments

Producers

Spohr: Clarinet Concertos Nos. 1 and 3 / Potpourri, Op. 80

Home

Classical Music

Concertos

View large image

$9.99 (COMPACT DISC)

In Stock - Usually ships within 24 hours.

Link to this COMPACT DISC Link to this page

Louis Spohr (1784 - 1859) Clarinet Concerto No.1 in C Minor, Op. 26 Clarinet Concerto No.3 in F Minor, WoO 19 Potpourri for clarinet and orchestra, Op. 80...

Read more about this recording

Louis Spohr (1784 - 1859)

Clarinet Concerto No.1 in C Minor, Op. 26

Clarinet Concerto No.3 in F Minor, WoO 19

Potpourri for clarinet and orchestra, Op. 80

Louis Spohr was born in Brunswick in 1784, the son of a doctor and descendant of a family that had for some generations been firmly established in the cure of souls or of bodies. The family moved to Seesen in 1786 and here Spohr began to develop his innate musical interests, with violin lessons and attempts at composition.

From 1797 he was able to pursue a sounder course of general and musical education in Brunswick, where, in 1799, he was accepted as a violinist in the court orchestra, with the encouragement of the reigning duke, a nephew of Frederick the Great. It was through this patron that violin lessons were arranged with Franz Eck, a musician from the old Mannheim orchestra, whom Spohr accompanied on a concert-tour to Russia. His return to Brunswick, now with the first of his violin concertos published with a dedication to the Duke, led to promotion and a successful concert-tour to other German cities. The result of this was his appointment in 1805 as Konzertmeister at Gotha, where he met and married Dorette Scheidler, daughter of a singer and herself a harpist and pianist. In Gotha he was able to continue his activities as both composer and virtuoso violinist, while securing a good standard of performance from the orchestra in a court that paid proper attention to music.

There followed further compositions, some for violin and harp to be played by himself and his wife, and concert-tours that spread his reputation further afield. It was as a result of success in Vienna that he was invited in 1813 to join the Theater an der Wien as director of the orchestra. The appointment now gave him a chance to broaden his activities as a composer, with the possibility of the staging of any opera he might write, although the first result of this, his Faust, was rejected, to be given its first performance in Prague in 1816.

Spohr's position in Vienna proving unsatisfactory, in spite of his success with the public, he arranged for the termination of his contract and after a year spent in Italy moved in 1817 to Frankfurt as Kapellmeister at the opera, where his Faust was staged. In 1820 he resigned, undertaking engagements in London, Paris and Dresden and in 1822 accepting the position of Kapellmeister in Kassel. This appointment did not put an end to his concert-tours, which he was able to resume during the course of the next thirty-five years. Nevertheless his association with Kassel was to continue, for better or worse, until his death in 1859.

During this period he consolidated his reputation abroad and in German- speaking countries as one of the leading composers of the time, a position that, by the time of his death, he had begun to lose. Spohr represented a link with the old classical tradition and fashions were now changing. While much of his violin music, the duets, concertos and the Violinschule, remain of importance for students of the instrument, and compositions like the Nonetare still heard, much of Spohr's work is only now undergoing a slow process of revival.

Spohr's concertos for the clarinet are in a measure exceptions to this general neglect of his work. They come at an important stage in the development of the instrument and its repertoire and thus hold a special position among players. The first of them, the Clarinet Concerto in C minor, Opus 26, was written in the autumn of 1808 for the clarinettist Johann Simon Hermstedt in response to a commission from his employer, Prince G�nther Friedrich Carl of Schwarzburg-Sondershausen. The clarinet part necessitated various changes in the instrument itself, which Hermstedt was able to secure, ensuring a proper response throughout its register. The dramatic opening Adagio includes the germ of the first subject of the following Allegro, taken up by the clarinet and embroidered with some brilliance. The same thematic material is the source of the lyrical second subject, interwoven with the orchestra as the movement unfolds. Although Weber claimed ignorance of the instrument before writing this concerto, he nevertheless demonstrates a sure handling of the special qualities of its contrasting registers and its effectiveness in arpeggios, rapid scales and ornamentation, as well as in sustained operatic melody. The second movement, an Adagio, starts with a clarinet melody of moving simplicity and potential dramatic content. The serenity of the Adagio gives way to a final Rondo, its principal theme announced by the clarinet. This lively movement provides a brilliant conclusion to a concerto that makes some demands on the dexterity and endurance of a performer, demands that Hermstedt seems to have met with distinction.

In 1810 Hermstedt asked Spohr for a second concerto, to be played at the Frankenhausen Festival, where it was received with enthusiasm, and in 1821 proposed a third work for his use, the Clarinet Concerto in F minor, to be played at a festival in Alexisbad. The new concerto opens with a dramatic orchestral exposition, followed by a display of agility from the soloist in music that constantly suggests the operatic in its lyricism, replete with the feeling that lies behind much of the writing in the violin concertos. Here again Spohr captures the characteristic tone of the solo instrument in music admirably suited to its peculiar propensities. The orchestra introduces the second movement Adagio, soon followed by the solo clarinet in a slow-moving melody of pent emotion, the principal theme again operatic in mood, as it is gradually developed. The tranquillity of its conclusion is followed an elegant and dramatic finale, its thematic material and its treatment moving from the tender to the histrionic. Seven years later Hermstedt asked for a fourth concerto, to be played at a festival at Nordhausen, as it was with now predictable success.

Spohr's Potpourri, Opus 80, was written for Hermstedt on the occasion of the Frankenhausen Festival of 1811. Here the composer uses themes from Peter von Winter's opera Das unterbrochene Opferfest, a work that enjoyed some contemporary popularity after its first performance in Vienna in 1796, although Spohr entertained reservations about Winter in other respects. Horns introduce the opening Larghetto, immediately followed by the clarinet, in material that is a reminder of the historical position Winter occupies between the opera of Mozart and that of Weber and German romanticism. Here relatively simple themes are embellished by the clarinet, which announces the classical Singspiel melody that opens the Allegro, before proceeding to embellish and vary it, in a movement that again exploits the virtuosity of the soloist.

Ernst Ottensamer

Ernst Ottensamer was born in 1955 at Wallern in Upper Austria and studied the clarinet at the Bruckner Conservatory in Linz, before moving to Vienna Musikhochschule, where he completed his studies in 1979. He first played with the Vienna State Opera and Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in 1978, before becoming a principal clarinettist in 1983. Since 1986 he has also been a member of the teaching staff of the Vienna Musikhochschule. Ernst Ottensamer enjoys a busy career as a founder-member of the Vienna Wind Ensemble, with which he has undertaken more than 150 engagements at home and abroad. He has appeared as a soloist with a number of leading orchestras in Vienna and performed the Weber E flat Concerto with the Vienna Philharmonic as part of the 1990 Salzburg Easter Festival.

Slovak State Philharmonic Orchestra (Košice)

The East Slovakian town of Košice boasts a long and distinguished musical tradition, as part of a province that once provided Vienna with musicians. The State Philharmonic Orchestra is of relatively recent origin and was established in 1968 under the conductor Bystrik Rezucha. Subsequent principal conductors have included Stanislav Macura and Ladislav Slovak, the latter succeeded in 1985 by his pupil Richard Zimmer. The orchestra has toured widely in Eastern and Western Europe and plays an important part in the Košice Musical Spring and the Košice International Organ Festival.

For Marco Polo the orchestra has made the first compact disc recordings of rare works by Granville Bantock and Joachim Raff. Writing on the last of these, one critic praised the orchestra for its competence comparable to that of the major orchestras of Vienna and Prague. The orchestra has contributed many successful volumes to the complete compact disc Johann Strauss II and for Naxos has recorded a varied repertoire.

Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra (Bratislava)

The Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra (Bratislava), the oldest symphonic ensemble in Slovakia, was founded in 1929 at the instance of Milos Ruppeldt and Oskar Nedbal, prominent personalities in the sphere of music. Ondrej Lenard was appointed its conductor in 1970 and in 1977 its conductor-in-chief, succeeded recently by Robert Stankovsky. The orchestra has given successful concerts both at home and abroad, in Germany, Russia, Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Spain, Italy, Great Britain, Hong Kong and Japan. For Marco Polo the orchestra has recorded works by Glazunov, Gli�re, Miaskovsky and other late romantic composers and film music of Honegger, Bliss, Ibert and Khachaturian as well as several volumes of the label's Johann Strauss Edition. Naxos recordings include symphonies and ballets by Tchaikovsky, and symphonies by Berlioz and Saint-Sa�ns.

Johannes Wildner

Johannes Wildner was born in the Austrian resort of M�rzzuschlag in 1956 and studied violin and conducting, taking his diploma at the Vienna Musikhochschule and proceeding to a doctorate in musicology. A member of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, he has toured widely as leader of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra's Johann Strauss Ensemble and of the Vienna Mozart Academy. As a conductor he has directed the Orchestra Sinfonica dell'Emilia Romagna Arturo Toscanini, the Budapest State Opera Orchestra, the Silesian Philharmonic, the Malmo Symphony Orchestra, the Dresden Philharmonic and others. He has recorded works by Schumann, Wagner and Mozart for Naxos and is one of the main conductors in the Marco Polo Johann Strauss II complete edition.

Disc 1

Clarinet Concerto No. 1 in C minor, Op. 26

(more info)

Performed by: Slovak State Philharmonic Orchestra, Kosice Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra
Composed by: Louis Spohr
Conducted by: Johannes Wildner
Ernst Ottensamer, clarinet
Recording date: 16-19 September 1991

I. Adagio - Allegro - 10:51
II. Adagio - 3:30
III. Rondo: Vivace - 5:59

Clarinet Concerto No. 3 in F minor, WoO 19

(more info)

I. Allegro moderato - 10:28
II. Adagio - 8:04
III. Vivace non troppo - 7:49

Potpourri in F major on themes from P. von Winter, Op. 80

(more info)

I. Larghetto - 3:12
II. Allegro - Allegretto - 7:12

Reviews

Be the first to review this title

FREE SHIPPING on orders
of 5 items or more!

Earn Naxos Rewards Points by opening an account and buying your favorite music today! Create your account here.

See all of our great site features here.

Flash 9 required. Click to download.

Composer(s):
Spohr, Louis

Conductor(s):
Wildner, Johannes

Orchestra(s):
Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra; Slovak State Philharmonic Orchestra, Kosice

Artist(s):
Ottensamer, Ernst

Label: Naxos Classics
UPC: 730099568821
Item Number: 8550688
Release Date: Aug 17, 1994