Track listing
7 tracks · 72:30Kalevi Aho
- 1 Symphony No. 5 (1976) 29:05
- Symphony No. 7 (1988) 43:40
- 2 I. The Tramp, the Parasitic Hymenopter and its Larva 7:25
- 3 II. The Butterflies (The Foxtrot and Tango of the Butterflies) 4:32
- 4 III. The Dungbeetles (Grief over the Stolen Ball of Dung) 3:30
- 5 IV. The Grasshoppers 6:10
- 6 V. The Ants (the Working Music of the Ants and War Marches I and II) 9:49
- 7 VI. Dayflies (Lullaby for the Dead Dayflies) 11:59
About this recording
This CD contains two symphonies by Finnish composer Kalevi Aho. His multi-layered, polyphonic Fifth Symphony is coupled with the six-movement suite-like "Insect Symphony", which is regarded as one of the leading works of Finnish Post-Modernism. Based on Aho's opera Insect Life (1987), each of the six movements of the tragi-comic symphony is named after an insect, and every single movement constitutes a separate micro world of its own.
The recordings were made in Leipzig in spring 1991, with the Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra led by its then Chief Conductor Max Pommer. The composer is featured as Assistant Conductor in the Fifth Symphony, and the Seventh Symphony includes solos by Andreas Hartmann and Hans-Werner Mehling (violin), Wolfgang Weber (cello), Dieter Zahn (double bass), Eberhard Uhling (euphonium) and Stefan Sandow (tuba).
Features
Booklet with liner notes written by the composer, in English, German, French and Finnish
The artists
Max Pommer
Max Pommer was born in Leipzig in 1936. His international breakthrough as a conductor came with the "New Bach Collegium Musicum", which he founded 1978 and brought to international recognition. The recordings made by this ensemble received international awards and were well known in Europe and the USA long before the German reunification.