Roaring Twenties

Calefax Reed Quintet, Cora Burggraaf

16,9928,49
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Original Recording Format: DXD
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The Roaring Twenties

It is a century ago that World War I swept across the European continent, a massacre of hitherto unheard-of scope and savagery. In the ensuing years, Europe licked its wounds, commemorated its dead and reflected on the events of the war. The industrial revolution, which had offered the promise of prosperity, had instead become the engine for weapon production and implementation, one whose ethical ramifications no one could have predicted.
The United States of America, still a young nation, suffered relatively little. While the country had indeed played a key military role in the war, sacrificing many young American lives, the battlefield was still thousands of miles from home. The economy did not suffer – on the contrary, the US weapons industry had made a substantial contribution and reaped the profits. American households were suddenly afforded luxuries until then they had only dreamt of: automobiles, radios, the first washing machines! Dance halls and cinemas offered entertainment outside the home, and the airwaves were filled with jazz. The ‘Roaring Twenties’ were about to unfold. These developments influenced society as well: racial segregation, still common in many states, was challenged, and women made headway in gaining the right to vote. Newfangled clothes and hairstyles (the ‘bob’, a blunt cut reaching the chin) were popular with women, and dances became more individual and free. Men, to balance the picture, were expected to wear a moustache or beard.

 

Tracklist

Please note that the below previews are loaded as 44.1 kHz / 16 bit.
1.
Breezin' along with the breeze
02:40
2.
Sentimental Melody (Blues)
02:04
3.
Cabaret Songs- Tell me the Truth about Love
04:42
4.
Cabaret Songs- Funeral Blues
02:35
5.
Cabaret Songs- Johnny
04:17
6.
Cabaret Songs- Calypso
02:10
7.
Dreigroschensuite- Ouverture
02:13
8.
Dreigroschensuite- Moritat von Mackie Messer
02:34
9.
Dreigroschensuite- Seeräuber Jenny
02:45
10.
Dreigroschensuite- Zuhälterballade
03:07
11.
Dreigroschensuite- Finale
06:20
12.
La petite tonkinoise
02:07
13.
Youkali
05:41
14.
An American in Paris- Allegretto grazioso
08:04
15.
An American in Paris- Andante ma con ritmo deciso
04:56
16.
An American in Paris- Allegro
05:18
17.
Surabaya Johnny
05:31

Total time: 01:07:04

Additional information

Label

SKU

CC72657

Qualities

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Channels

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Artists

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Composers

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Genres

,

Cables

Siltech

Digital Converters

dCS DSD

Mastering Engineer

Bert van der Wolf

Mastering Equipment

Avalon Acoustic

Microphones

Sonodore

Instruments

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Original Recording Format

Producer

Bert van der Wolf

Recording Engineer

Bert van der Wolf, Brendon Heinst

Recording location

Evangelisch Lutherse Kerk Haarlem, Holland

Recording Software

Merging

Recording Type & Bit Rate

DSD64

Release DateJune 27, 2015

Press reviews

Proper Music

This recording presents a fascinating collaboration between the highly-regarded Calefax Reed Quintet and mezzo-soprano Cora Burggraaf. The album features the group’s own arrangements of works by Kurt Weill, George Gershwin, Benjamin Britten, and Aaron Copland, as well as other popular pieces of the period.

The Calefax Reed Quintet is a forward thinking group of musicians that arrange and perform music by composers past and present. Dutch mezzo soprano Cora Burggraaf has been the recipient of many prizes including the 2009-2010 ECHO Rising Star Award. She has appeared at many of the world’s greatest opera houses, including La Scala in Milan, the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, and the Royal Opera House in London (for which she was awarded ‘Most Promising Newcomer of the Year’ by The Observer).

The album opens with “Breezin’ Along with the Breeze” a piece in the Charleston style which was made popular by the singer and actress Josephine Baker. The “Cabaret Songs” are a collaboration between the poet W.H. Auden and the composer Benjamin Britten. The texts are the fruits of Auden’s wild time in Berlin in the early thirties. The celebrated Die Dreigroschenoper (The Threepenny Opera) by Bertold Brecht and Kurt Weill is an ode to down-and-outs, thieves, thugs, con men and whores of Victorian London. George Gershwin’s trip to Europe and sojourn in Paris had a significant impact on his career. He met Kurt Weill in Berlin and countless Parisian artists. More importantly, however, was his growing awareness of a uniquely American, jazz influenced style. In ‘An American in Paris’ Gershwin sketches the awe-struck impressions of an American ambling through the chaotic Paris of the 1920s.

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