Hisato Ohzawa - Piano Concerto No. 2; Symphony No. 2 (Ekaterina Saranceva; Dmitry Yablonsky)

Information

Composer: Hisato Ohzawa

• Piano Concerto No. 2
• Symphony No. 2

Ekaterina Saranceva, piano

Russian Philharmonic Orchestra

Dmitry Yablonsky, conductor

Date: 2008

Label: Naxos

https://www.naxos.com/CatalogueDetail/?id=8.570177

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Review

Hisato Ohzawa (1907-1953) studied in Boston and Paris, and his music certainly shows the influence of the Parisian capital. You might call it “Les Six with no sense of humor”, in that Ohzawa writes confidently for the orchestra, enjoys colorful sonorities, and adopts a certain neo-classical fastidiousness that’s very French. The Piano Concerto has plenty of flashy moments for the soloist, and Ekaterina Saranceva handles them all with aplomb. The symphony is a major work that features a very interestingly structured second movement: two arias, for English horn and for two clarinets, alternate with two toccatas for solo violin and then all four previous solo instruments. If only both here and in the concerto the thematic material itself had been more memorable. As it stands, these are interesting works very much of their period (1934/35), quite well performed and recorded. If you’ve been following Naxos’ enterprising Japanese composers series, you’ll want to add this release to your collection.

-- David Hurwitz

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Hisato Ohzawa (August 1, 1907—October 28, 1953) was a Japanese composer and conductor. He grew up in Kobe, studying piano, organ and choral singing. During the 1930s, Ohzawa studied in Boston and Paris under Frederick Converse, Roger Sessions, Arnold Schoenberg, Paul Dukas and Nadia Boulanger. He returned to Japan in 1936, where his works were met with mixed reactions, being technically too difficult for Japanese orchestras of the time. After the Second World War, Ohzawa taught at the Kobe College, composing light music and jazzy concertos. There has been wide neglect of his work since his sudden death in 1953.

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Dmitry Yablonsky (born 1962) is a Russian classical cellist and conductor. He studied with Lorne Munroe and Zara Nelsova at the Juilliard School of Music, and with Aldo Parisot at Yale University. As a cellist he has played in such venues as Carnegie Hall, La Scala, Moscow Great Hall, St. Petersburg Philharmonic Hall, Taiwan National Hall, Teatre Mogador, Cite de la Musique, and Louvre. For several years Yablonsky has been Principal Guest Conductor of Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra. He has made more than 70 recordings as conductor and cellist for Naxos, Erato-Warner, Chandos, Belair Music, Sonora, Connoisseur Society.

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