Suk: Symphony No.2, 'Asrael' in C minor, Part I. Josef Suk began writing his Asrael Symphony in 1904 as a memorial to his revered teacher Antonin Dvorak, who had recently died. He had completed the first three movements when, in 1905, his young wife Otylka - the daughter of Dvorak - also passed away. Devastated, the composer turned the work into a requiem for the two, completing it in 1906. He gave it the subtitle ‘Asrael‘, the angel of death, who in the Islamic faith leads the souls of the departed to paradise. The five movements of this hour-long symphony are all connected by a network of thematic relationships, the most important of which is a ‘death motif’, with a characteristic double tritone. Filled by instances of harmonic and polyphonic flair, virtuosic instrumentation and an unbounded expressivity, the work approaches Mahler, Debussy and Strauss and was a milestone in the thirty-year-old composer’s creative development.
Classics Today 10/10: 'This is one smoking performance of Suk's masterpiece - What a great piece, and what a great performance!', Disc of the Month; Gramophone: outstanding.
