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The Bard festival has been mentioned, just wanted to add that Reicha's op. 49 no. 1 string quartet in c minor will be featured on Saturday, August 10, as well as other rare pieces.

The Balourdet Quartet is a shockingly virtuosic young group; I'm so excited!

https://fishercenter.bard.edu/events/bmf24-p2/

Program

1 pm • Preconcert Talk with Jonathan Kregor
1:30 pm • Performance: Jana McIntyre, soprano; Rebecca Ringle Kamarei, mezzo-soprano; Tyler Duncan, baritone; Noël Wan, harp; Michael Stephen Brown and Erika Switzer, piano; Balourdet Quartet; and others

Hector Berlioz (1803–69)

Le montagnard exilé (1822–23)

Songs

Luigi Cherubini (1760–1842)

Etude No. 2 (1804)

Anton Reicha (1770–1836)

String Quartet in C Minor, Op. 49, No. 1 (1803)

Carl Maria von Weber (1786–1826)

Invitation to the Dance, Op. 65 (1819)

Elias Parish Alvars (1808–49)

Introduction and Variations on Themes from Bellini's Norma, Op. 36 (n.d.)

Arias by Jean-François Le Sueur (1760–1837); Gaspare Spontini (1774–1851); Ambroise Thomas (1811–96)

I've posted before, but if you are in America, I'm gradually putting together a map of concerts filterable by composer/piece. It currently covers 266 orchestras for the 23/24 concert season. Much lower hit rate for composers of interest to folks here than it would be if I covered Europe--but on the other hand, the small Longmont Symphony Orchestra in Colorado restored Reicha's G Major symphony for a performance last year, which for me at least is about as exciting as it gets, so it's still worthwhile to browse! Let me know if you find any particularly exciting concerts.

https://www.classicalconcertmap.com/

I have been thinking about the discrepancy, in the United States (my only point of reference), between the billions of dollars private donors give to fund the operation of classical music ensembles and the thousands of dollars required to produce a permanent recording of a never-before-recorded piece. If only we could take .01% of the billions and use it to finish the Evergreen Symphony's Lachner cycle!

I get the sense that many of the wealthy enthusiasts who fund classical music in America via donations to their local orchestras do so because that is a sort of default option--there is no easy way (is there *any* way??) to donate money towards the recording of music rather than the live performance of it, other than obviously buying recordings (the equivalent, in my imagination, of buying a concert ticket, which is not nearly enough to fund the ensemble performing). Perhaps not many donors have an interest in obscure composers--but some do or might with the right influence.

It also occurs to me that if any group of enthusiasts has ever contemplated this exact question, it is you all, and so I ask you, what would it take to make it easier to fund recordings of unsung composers? If you had the option to help fund recordings of the unrecorded pieces you are most curious about, would you?

Detroit Symphony Orchestra will be performing Pejacevic's symphony this weekend! Along with ultra-rare Mussorgsky and Grieg (haha).

https://www.dso.org/events-and-tickets/events/22-23-winter/night-on-bald-mountain

BTW, I am working on a concert database and interactive map that might be of interest to you all, though it is in its early stages: classicalconcertmap.com. Forgive the self-promotion (though this will be free and open permanently, no commercial ambitions here).

Well, more googling has paid off, as usual: it looks like the "Reicha Quartet" has successfully kickstarted a recording of Reicha's weird, weird Quatuor Scientifique:

https://www.reichaquartet.eu/en
https://www.hithit.com/en/project/4773/reicha-quartet-records-anton-reicha-quatuor-scientifique

I am excited.

Hello folks,

I emailed the Kreutzer Quartet recently regarding their sadly discontinued Reicha string quartet project (vols 1&2, Toccata label, are what launched my interest in unsung composers--they are extraordinary, to say the least), and heard the following from their cellist:

"Yes, we are planning to record more. The one thing that has slowed us down is funding - we would have done more by now if we had financial backing."

I see on the violinist's website that the final 2 quartets of op. 49 have been recorded but not released: http://www.peter-sheppard-skaerved.com/2013/05/anton-reicha-quartet-op-49-no-2/

I wanted to ask you experts and enthusiasts here whether anyone knows of any other Reicha string quartet recordings or even performances in the pipeline? There are 2 other easily available sets that I know of: Quatuor Ardeo recorded the C minor quartet that Kreutzer did plus two others, also excellent, and the Quatuor Girard recorded a much later, Spohr-like quartet for the 3-disc album of Reicha chamber music under the Alpha label.

I'm very hungry for more.