Donald Satz wrote:

>Does anyone have an opinion as to the strongest area of Volkmann's output?

I have his Cello Concerto on Koch/Schwann 3-1205-2, coupled with d'Albert's
Cello Concerto.  I also have a recollection of having a symphony of his
somewhere, but it must be miscatalogued (or gone to the mysterious black
hole in the sky which also steals one half of a pair of socks from time to
time) because I can't lay my hands on it immediately.

I don't know if I would call it his strongest suit, since I don't have any
other music of his to compare it with.  I can report, however, that he is
completely at home with writing for this instrument, and he has some
interesting orchestration in the 19 minute piece.  Not an overly generous
disc (total time only 42 minutes) but I think I got it from Berkshire, so
I musn't complain!

>What surprises me about the independent labels and their advocacy of
>relatively neglected composers is that the majors generally continue
>to show neglect even though reviews are often favorable.

Hear, hear!  It's one of the permanent mysteries of life, as far as I'm
concerned.  It makes it difficult to combat the accusation from young
people I have tried to drag into classical music from time to time that
there is a limited amount of music available.

I was recently chatting with a musicologist who specialises in the
piano concerto, who told me he has catalogued over 10,000 of the species!
Now, how many of those are even recorded -- let alone played live?

Tim Mahon
Alexandria, VA
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