It happened last night and it was beyond wonderful – it was extraordinary. Our local Boston Discovery Ensemble:

http://www.discoveryensemble.com/

….visited last night the WGBH’s Frazer Studio and played life some fragments from Beethoven Third and something that we do not hear frequently:  the Martinu’s Double Concerto for Two String Orchestras, Piano and Timpani. I am not so thrilled with the Eroica – it was a bit too academic and too plain to my tasted and they do not have proper instrumental tone to play the work interestingly but the Martinu’s Double Concerto was absolutely beyond believe.

The pieces itself is probably is the most magnificent music was composed in end of 30s reflecting the way how people felt in the end of 30s in Europe. If you feel that Shostakovich had “universal voice” in 30s then listen the Martinu work.  I hear the work only from Prague Philharmonic under Charles Mackerras before but Discovery Ensemble took it at all new level. They maintain such an amassing balance between the “invisible rhythm” and sustaining of the very right amount of anxiety pressure that only this set the Discovery’s performance is one of those unique events what the stars come together.

You can listen the whole even at CRB’s site

http://www.wgbh.org/programs/episode.cfm?featureid=21483

….but it does not give a full picture. It need to be loud and it need to be with FULL LOW END extension… with full lower end it has that “pressure” that  serenity and tranquility of  Schoenberg’s Verklärte Nacht but combined with Allegro  from Shostakovich 5.  Martinu was geniuses in the Double Concerto and the last nigh play of Discovery Ensemble paid a great tribune to it. This Martinu Double Concerto has been saved on the drive of my most cherished FM recordings ever….