The Amit Peled Peabody Cello Gang (2017)

The Amit Peled Peabody Cello Gang consists of students of the American-based Israeli cellist, a professor at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, together with Peled himself. This kind of teacher-student collaboration is difficult to pull off, but Peled does it here: the program has a kind of informality that manages to convey the teaching process; the playing is not flawless, but the enthusiasm has not been squeezed out. A good part of the album's success comes from the fact that the program is suited to the students' ... Read More

The Amit Peled Peabody Cello Gang consists of students of the American-based Israeli cellist, a professor at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore, together with Peled himself. This kind of teacher-student collaboration is difficult to pull off, but Peled does it here: the program has a kind of informality that manages to convey the teaching process; the playing is not flawless, but the enthusiasm has not been squeezed out. A good part of the album's success comes from the fact that the program is suited to the students' talents. Worth the money in itself is the Requiem, Op. 66, of David Popper, a 19th century cellist who was closely connected to both Brahms and Liszt. This work is unique. It is not a choral requiem mass but exists in versions for three cellos and orchestra and three cellos and piano; the latter version is heard here. Written in memory of Popper's Hamburg publisher, it has an unmistakably elegiac tone even with the absence of text. Sample toward the end of the Requiem, where the piano... Read Less