MARIO CASTELNUOVO-TEDESCO (1895-1968): Piano Quintets No. 1 and No. 2 “Memories of the Tuscan Countryside”.

Description: C-T is another composer who found it impossible not to write catchy tunes, whether lyrical, cantabile or incisive and dance-like, often with the color and sweep of the film scores he was also so adept at providing to the film industry in Hollywood. These two works without opus numbers come 20 years apart. The earlier (1932) is an in memoriam piece for an Italian pianist but this quality is confined to its elegiac second movement (aslo notable for a lovely cello part) while the remaining three are much more lively. The second, a nostalgic remembrance of his homeland, comes with programmatic titles “The Hills”, “The Cypresses”, “Procession in the Month of May” and “The Harvest” - but there is more joy than melancholy here also; Castelnuovo-Tedesco was also seemingly incapable of depression. Massimo Giuseppe Bianchi (piano), Aron Quartet..