Beethoven: Symphony No.5, Triple Concerto Op.56

ニューヨークで最も熱い室内オーケストラ「ザ・ナイツ」

「ザ・ナイツ(騎士)」は、ニューヨークで創造的音楽パフォーマンスを行い、高い評価を得ている室内オーケストラで、チェリスト兼指揮者のエリック・ジェイコブセン、ヴァイオリンのコリン・ジェイコブセン兄弟によって結成された。彼らはヨーヨー・マのシルクロード・プロジェクトのメンバーでもあり、彼らとその仲間たちによるこのアンサンブルの演奏は、世界中の様々な民族音楽やバロック奏法からミュージカルまで幅広い演奏の経験を取り入れ、アメリカ中のクラシック・ファンを熱狂の渦に巻き込んでいます。このアルバムの「三重協奏曲」では、彼らの演奏の良き理解者でもあるチェリストのヤン・フォーグラーとアンティ・シーララが参加。 「運命」での斬新な風のすがすがしさとコーダに向かっての盛り上がりなど、新鮮で刺激的なベートーヴェンを聴くことができます。
ソニー・ミュージック

Despite the two works' closeness in time of composition and common tonal orientation around C, the contrasts between Ludwig van Beethoven's Triple Concerto in C major and his Symphony No. 5 in C minor are the subject of this 2012 Sony release by the Knights. This New York chamber orchestra has played Beethoven on a few occasions, but this is the first time it has devoted an album to his works, and the match-up is instructive and appealing. The cheerful nature and genial camaraderie of the Triple Concerto is quite at odds with the obsessively driven mood of the Fifth Symphony, and the differences between a concertante work, which is by definition a show piece, and a symphony, which is more of an essay, are easy to grasp. But Beethoven is certainly identifiable in both works, and the aim of the Knights is to make the totality of his expression evident, whether in the amiable, conversational vein that violinist Colin Jacobsen, cellist Jan Vogler, and pianist Antti Siirala explore in the Triple Concerto, or in the pugnacious, take-no-prisoners style of conductor Eric Jacobsen in the Fifth. In both works, the music is played with great passion and brio, and fans of the Knights' melding of mainstream and period techniques and timbres will find the playing is a happy medium between the two schools of thought. The trio is quite closely recorded, so its sound is boomier than the rest of the ensemble, and some intonation slip-ups, scrappy passagework, and incidental noises are evident. The recording of the Fifth, however, is free of mishaps.