This is probably a recording from the world premiere (Berwaldhallen, Stockholm, 12 December 2003). The soprano is Lena Hoel and the orchestra conducted by Susanna Mälkki is the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra (and Chorus).
The real tragedy here is the coughing fits throughout Hamelin's performance, which (of course) are at their worst right when the final resolution to B minor happens. Hamelin was delivering a beautifully nuanced and hushed close as well... nearly drowned out entirely :/ Also-and I can't believe I'm saying this-but I actually really enjoyed Gould's stretching the tempi to their limits?
That has got to be insanely hard to play. The cellist has to have really long fingers to be able to play those octaves of which neither note is an open string, and later sometimes you have to play arco and pizzicato simultaneously, while the pianist sometimes has to play more notes than they have fingers. Congratulations to the performers for being able to pull this off. And then this composition also has some crazy rhythms for both instruments -- that can't be easy to play either. And that's before you get into reading that original score, although I've seen worse (except for a couple of places where it looks like the paper got folded over before being scanned).
I first heard these many years ago in a small room in Huddersfield (not long after they were written) performed by Rzewski himself. An experience I will never forget. When the recording (Ursula Oppens) came out it did not leave my turntable for a week. A magnificent piece. Rzewski is one of the great composers of our time. Greatly missed. RIP
I still love #1 in B Minor (1911), with its incredible finale -- the largest for any symphony without chorus. Composed by a teenager, it seems like it can go against now popular works of Mahler, Bruckner, Strauss and even early Schoenberg (the influence of Gurrelieder is apparent).
In no way can it go against the works of Mahler, Bruckner, Strauss, and Schoenberg. Just because you can make a cool texture with a huge orchestra doesn't mean you have the complete grasp of composition as in the case of the aforementioned composers.
