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CDs now available....
The following CDs can be purchased directly from me, from the manufactures listed below, from CD baby.com or from a number of download e-music suppliers such as iTunes. A number of the reviews quoted below can be seen in full on my 'reviews page'.
Now available! Greatest Hits of All Time...
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This recording includes some of the most exciting music being written for the oboe today - it ranges from the sublime to the astoundingly virtuoso and pushes the performers to the limits. Many of the works explore the oboes extended techniques especially the upper range and the multiphonics.
The Performers: Christopher Redgate: oboe, Kreutzer Quartet, Ensemble Expose conducted by Roger Redgate
The Music: Roger Redgate: Quintet for oboe and strings, Eperons, Michael Finnissy: Greatest Hits of All Time, Ceci n'est pas une forme, Christopher Fox Oboe Quintet, James Clarke Quintet for oboe and string quartet, Howard Skempton Garland for oboe and string trio.
Press Reviews:
The CD has recently received several significant reviews teh most recent being on the web:
The CD has been choses as recording of the month in MusicWeb International, Carla Rees states:
"Oboe virtuoso Christopher Redgate has worked tirelessly to create contemporary music for his instrument, and to extend the practical capabilities of the instrument. This disc features British works for oboe and ensemble....
This is an excellent disc of well written and imaginative repertoire. Christopher Redgate’s playing is dazzling throughout, and the ensembles with whom he performs are similarly excellent. Redgate deserves to be commended for all he has achieved in developing his instrument’s repertoire, and while this complex contemporary music may not be to everyone’s taste, it demonstrates the capabilities of both the oboe and its performer, both of which have much to offer. "
The full review can be seen at: http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2009/Dec09/Greatest_hits_msv28513.htm
Patric Standford writing in Music and Vision:
"The Redgates, oboist Christopher and conductor Roger, again join forces to produce a stimulating recital of challenging recent pieces focussing mainly on works for oboe and strings all performed by Christopher, the masterly virtuoso. There are two pieces by Roger Redgate, a short Quintet written in 2003 and Éperons, an earlier work from 1988 for oboe and percussion (Julian Warburton) which explores a remarkable range of technical boldness... Excellently recorded with clarity, this is a recital to capture a wide range of interest."
The full review with sound clips can be seen at: http://www.mvdaily.com/articles/2009/10/redgate.htm
Paul Driver writing in Times On-Line writes...
"The title of this not unesoteric disc of seven works for oboe and strings, and other combinations, mostly written for Redgate, comes courtesy of the second item, Finnissy’s 13-minute piece of that name, which draws on Beethoven piano sonatas, Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and Mahler’s Sixth Symphony (the hammer blows), as well as Korean music. Finnissy casts all this in four simultaneous layers and the result is fascinating. The other works are so good that the disc title is warranted none the less. Quintets by Roger Redgate, Christopher Fox and James Clarke are striking. Clarke’s is eight minutes of unadulterated microtonal fierceness. Redgate plays with tremendous zest. "
Andrew Clemments writing in the Guardian writes...
Christopher Redgate regularly takes the oboe into musical territory that pushes the capabilities of his instrument to the limits of what is technically possible, and his latest collection of works for oboe and ensembles of various complexions is as much a stylistic survey of the demands that British music can make today as it is a showcase for his own talents. The musical range of the seven works here is wide. There is the enchanting melodic simplicity of Howard Skempton's tiny Garland for oboe and string trio, and the tangled webs of oboe and string textures and the dense, rebarbative textures in Roger Redgate's and James Clarke's Oboe Quintets respectively. Then there are the folksy hints and ghosts from Stravinsky's Symphonies of Wind in Christopher Fox's Quintet, and the more obvious borrowings from traditional musics in Michael Finnisy's Greatest Hits of All Time (which references Mahler, Beethoven and Vivaldi, too). Redgate's command of the whole spectrum of effects is extraordinary; the disc is sometimes challenging, but always engrossing.
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Edwin Roxburgh: Oboe Music
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A CD representing Roxburgh's oboe music from the 1960's through to today. It includes music for solo oboe, music for oboe and piano and music for solo oboe and ensemble.
The Performers: Christopher Redgate: oboe, Stephen Robbings: piano and Ensemble Expose conducted by Roger Redgate
The Music:
Study 1 - solo oboe
Aulodie - oboe and piano
Images - oboe and piano
Eclissi - oboe and string trio
Antares - oboe and piano
Elegy - oboe, electronics and ensemble
Cantilena - oboe and piano
Press Reviews:
“...stylishly performed...” Paul Driver - Sunday Times
“Christopher Redgate plays wonderfully throughout, be it in the somewhat simpler works or in the more complex and demanding ones. He gets superb support from all concerned and the whole is beautifully recorded. I was particularly delighted to listen to a disc of music for oboe without being disturbed by the various clicks or breathing noises that sometimes disfigure such collections…
This very fine disc is an excellent survey of Roxburgh’s oboe music. It splendidly demonstrates the composer’s breadth of vision, from the straightforward to the more complex without ever losing anything of his personality.”
Hubert Culot - MUSICWEB
“Edwin Roxburgh is … a fine craftsman with an astute ear and a real sense of structural design. He clearly hears what he writes and has, over the years, explored the idioms and resources without ever using these dialects or expressions simply because they are on offer…given superb performances by Christopher Redgate -- the most distinguished of contemporary oboe players, with pianist Stephen Robbins and Ensemble Exposé conducted by composer Roger Redgate.
This recording, made earlier this year at Kingston University in Surrey (with its generous support) is not only exquisitely performed, but clearly and sympathetically balanced. Roxburgh well deserves it…”
Patric Standford - MUSIC AND VISION
“…the highly accomplished Christopher Redgate offers a fascinating overview of Roxburgh’s prolific and visionary output from the Sixties to the present day…”
Stephen Pritchard - THE OBSERVER
“…Roxburgh’s work is in fine hands with Redgate at the wheel. Showing the proper feeling to give life to the works, Redgate knows when to lead and when to pull back letting other soloists have the space to add to the proceedings. Solid source material, solid hands on, it all adds up to something special.”
Chris Spector - MIDWEST RECORD | |
Chamber Music by Brian Ferneyhough
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Chamber music by this outstanding composer including two seminal works for oboe: Coloratura and Allgebrah
The Performers: Christopher Redgate - oboe, Ensemble Expose conducted by Roger Redgate, Bridget Carey - viola, Corrado Canonici - bass, Ian Pace - piano
The Music:
Coloratura - for oboe and piano
Allegbrah - oboe and nine solo strings
In Nomine a 3 - piccolo, oboe and clarinet
plus Trittico per GS, Incipits, Flurries
Press Reviews:
A well-programmed selection of the composer’s compositions from around the 1990s, superbly performed by Ensemble Exposé... Allgebrah is for solo oboe – the superb Christopher Redgate – and nine strings. The oboe moves around unstable string textures, colliding with and sometimes guiding them, but Redgate’s assured pyrotechnics make what is otherwise ferociously taxing music easier on the ear.
Andy Hamilton - The Wire
“Brian Ferneyhough’s recorded representation continues to grow, and there are few more persuasive advocates of his chamber output that Ensemble Exposé….
The performances are as persuasive as one has come to expect from an ensemble that has championed music of the so-called ‘new complexity’ for almost a quarter of a century. Christopher Redgate achieves feats of meaningful agility…”
Richard Whitehouse - INTERNATIONAL RECORD REVIEW
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oboe+: berio and beyond...
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Oboe+ :Berio and Beyond is a cutting edge contemporary classical music album. This is the most technically challenging oboe music around. The music pushes the oboe to its absolute limits!
The Performers:
Christopher Redgate - oboe and oboe d'amore
Julian Warburton - percussion
Roger Redgate - violin
The Music:
'...sting of the bee...' Improvisation - Christopher Redgate
Ausgangspunkte - Roger Redgate
Argrophylax - Michael Young
Pavasiya - Michael Finnissy
Recoil - Sam Hayden
Sequenza VII - Luciano Berio
Press Reviews:
"What better choice than Christopher Redgate to present a selection of contemporary British works....Each work receives performances which are both technical feats of virtuosity as well as the products of a virtuosic imagination. Interestingly, listening to Sequenza VII after the other works, which push the oboe beyond the extremities of register and technique, reveals new perspectives on the work – never have I experienced such a tender reading of the work, particularly during the final section in which the multiphonics stand so elegantly poised."
SPNM on-line review. Philip Thomas.
"This extraordinary disc from the oboe fanatic's label is a showcase for multiphonics, triple tonguing, flutter tonguing and circular breathing. But while the sounds and their production are compelling, this is intensely meaningful virtuosity. Although primarily an interpreter, Redgate improvises on "Le Api" ("The Bees") by 19th century oboist Antonino Pasculli, blasting through a compendium of extended techniques like a free jazz wildman...Forget the instrument's bucolic image, this is a great recording of new music."
Andy Hamilton: The Wire
"Christopher Redgate is a tireless champion of music that embraces extended oboe techniques...throughout Christopher Redgate gives everything, not only in terms of his commitment, but also in his undying energy."
Melinda Maxwell: Double Reed News
The British oboist and composer Edwin Roxburgh has said: "It's not simply your virtuosity which amazes me, it is the sensitivity of your artistry, especially in Roger's piece and the Berio. There is no question in my mind that yours (without exception) is the finest recording of the Sequenza and the finest performance. As for your piece, the question arises - why have you not composed more music? Perhaps you have a secret horde. If so, we should hear it. This is the finest possible tribute to your playing and to the composers you have served with such integrity.
Supporting materials:
The oboeclassics.com website contains an article on listening to contemporary music. A second article was written for the British Double Reed magazine. All of this material has been translated into German and published in Rohrblatt.
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Pasculli -
The Paganini of the Oboe
The Performers are:
Christopher Redgate - Oboe
Stephen Robbings - Piano
Suporting Materials:
The Music:
All works by Pasculli:
Characteristic Study - Le Api (The Bees)
Grand Concerto on themes from I Vespri Siciliani by Verdi
Fantasia on themes from Les Huguenots by Meyerbeer
Concerto on themes from La Favorita by Donizetti
Fantasia on themes from Poliuto by Donizetti
Press Reviews:
"This is a disc to open the ears of all oboists, and to entertain and astonish less specialist music-lovers." Anthony Burton, BBC Music Magazine
"The enterprising new label Oboe Classics maintains its highest standards with a sample of the fiendishly difficult music written by Antonino Pasculli, the 19th-century composer-performer
known as the 'Paganini of the Oboe'. Christopher Redgate needs all his considerable virtuosity to negotiate the fiendish challenges set by Pasculli on themes from Verdi, Meyerbeer and Donizetti, not to mention the 'characteristic study' Le Api (The Bees). This is fascinating music played with extreme panache." Anthony Holden, Observer
"Christopher Redgate is an oboist who thrives on technical demands, the more extreme the better, and his disc is a remarkable tour de force." Christopher Hooker, Double Reed News
"This is an incredible CD for everyone who enjoys brilliant performers and performances." Gary Higginson, Classical Music Web
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Michael Finnissy - Lost Lands
As well as some ensemble music the CD includes many of Michael Finnissy's works for oboe.
The performers are:
Christopher Redgate - oboe and oboe d'amore
Julian Warburton - percussion
Ian Pace - piano
Members of Topology
The CD is available from me or from:
Divine Art /Metier
CD Baby - where you can also hear clips of the music
The Music:
The oboe music on the CD is:
Runnin’ Wild (solo oboe)
Moon’s Goin’ Down (solo oboe)
Dilok (oboe and Percussion)
Delal (oboe and Percussion)
Press Reviews:
"Virtuosic and explosive music, with a frame of reference from jazz to Kurdistan, which proves itself fully engaged with the world Pianist lan Pace, who was the star of last year's double-CD Finnissy album from METIER (4/02), takes a back seat in this latest addition to the series. It is as well recorded as ever, and offers a substantial and memorable pro gramme. This time it's Christopher Redgate, oboist in Pace's Topologies ensemble, who is featured, and Redgate's phenomenal breath and finger control is heard to startling effect in two solo pieces whose titles - Moon goin' down and Runnin' wild evoke jazz standards, while steering well clear of the clichés often found in more explicit 'crossover' music."
Arnold Whittall The Gramophone
"This invaluable disk in Metier’s Finnissy series focuses on woodwind instruments, notably the Oboe, or, to be more precise, the Oboe as molded, manipulated and cajoled by Christopher Redgate. All seven pieces take as their starting point aspects of musical cultures that Finnissy views as being threatened in some way. This is not too hard to grasp in the Azerbaijani echoes of Keroiylu of the Arabic inspired trilogy of the Dilok,Delal, and Kulamen Dilan, the first two of which find Redgate's open throated sound wonderfully evocative of the middle eastern antecedents of the Oboe, with succinct percussion support from Julian Warburton. By contrast, it takes Finnissy's insistence that jazz is ‘an emotional state rather than a harmonic/rhythmic proscription’ to unlock the more elusive notion that the freewheeling fantasias of moons going down and running wild are blues inspired."
Christopher Dingle BBC Music Magazine
Plot in Fiction
This CD includes Luca Francesconi's - Plot in Fiction for oboe/ coranglais and ensemble
The performers are:
Christopher Redgate - Oboe /Cor anglais
Barrie Webb - Conductor
Firebird Ensemble
The recording is available direcr from me or from:
The Music:
Luca Francesconi - Plot in Fiction
Press Review:
"It (Plot in Fiction) has a solo part of stamina-sapping virtuosity, admirably played by Christopher Redgate." Christopher Thomas - Web Review
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CDs
