The Flemish Connection IV (VRT Muziek Edition) Vlaams Radio Orkest & Jan Latham-Koenig

• Peter Benoit (1834 - 1901):
• 1Benoit: Charlotte Corday (VRT Muziek Edition)09:52
• 2Benoit: Charlotte Corday: Entr'acte - valse de la scène de bal (VRT Muziek Edition)03:10
• 3Benoit: Vertelsels en balladen: Vertelsel in F (VRT Muziek Edition)02:28
• Lodewijk Mortelmans (1868 - 1952):
• 4Mortelmans: Evangelische Diptiek: I. Driekoningen/Epiphany (VRT Muziek Edition)05:25
• 5Mortelmans: Evangelische Diptiek: II. Plechtige tocht naar Gethsemani (VRT Muziek Edition)04:04
• Lodewijk De Vocht (1887 - 1977):
• 6Vocht: In Ballingschap / In exile (VRT Muziek Edition)12:12
• 7Vocht: Towards a higher Light (VRT Muziek Edition)07:31
• Arthur Meulemans (1884 - 1966):
• 8Meulemans: Evasies: I. Allegro (VRT Muziek Edition)01:38
• 9Meulemans: Evasies: II. Andantino (VRT Muziek Edition)01:50
• 10Meulemans: Evasies: III. Poco vivo (VRT Muziek Edition)02:31
• 11Meulemans: Evasies: IV. Lento (VRT Muziek Edition)04:57
• 12Meulemans: Evasies: V. Allegro giocoso (VRT Muziek Edition)01:17
• Jef Van Hoof (1886 - 1959):
• 13Hoof: Symphonic introduction to a festive occasion (VRT Muziek Edition)09:34
• Gaston Feremans (1907 - 1964):
• 14Feremans: Het bronzen hart: Preludium en fughetta (VRT Muziek Edition)03:42
• Total Runtime01:10:11

Info for The Flemish Connection IV (VRT Muziek Edition)

Our age has a passion for media omnipresence, dominated by a ridiculously derisory number of celebrities, best-offs and big names. All too often, this tiny, tyrannical population overshadows the myriad voices that are different, distinct, refined and singular. While there's no point in crying miracle or genius when you take the back roads, there's nothing to stop you gleaning something to enrich your knowledge, sensation and feeling. "Flemish Connection IV' is a perfect illustration of this.

The Flemish Radio Orchestra (now known as the Brussels Philharmonic) and conductor Jan Latham-Koenig perform with talent and good taste orchestral scores by six Flemish composers who are completely unknown to the general public and the media, even though they are major players in Belgian and Dutch-language music. This established situation should in no way prejudge the intrinsic qualities of the pieces recorded. Would it be a redhibitory statement to suggest that each opus fits naturally into a musical trend devoid of prior conflict or ideological rejection of the beautiful, and on the contrary open to an inspired reception of a euphonic, tonal and melodic Romantic heritage, assertive and beautifully crafted?

The symphonic poem En Exile (1914) by Lodewijk de Vocht leads us towards a nostalgic atmosphere revealing a delicate and disillusioned thought, which Lodewijk Mortelmans' Epiphanie (1893, orchestration 1933) comes close to with its delicate pages of great clarity and spirituality. The variations on La Marseillaise (and other revolutionary songs such as Ça ira, La Carmagnole and Chant du départ) developed by Peter Benoit in his Overture for the drama Charlotte Corday (1876), though anecdotal and forgettable, nonetheless reveal a fine orchestrator. The other pieces on this recording are in no way inferior and deserve to be listened to, very honestly defended by perfectly committed and effective performers at the service of very decent composers.

Luc Tooten, cello
Vlaams Radio Orkest
Jan Latham-König, conductor

Luc Tooten
was for more than fifteen years the first cello soloist of the Brussels Philharmonic.

He studied at the Brussels Royal Conservatory with Carlo Schmitz and completed his education with Edmond Baeyens and Reine Flachot . He also attended the masterclasses of Gerhard Hamann, Anner Bijlsma and Mstislav Rostropovitch.After winning several international prizes, he made his debut as a soloist performing the Saint Saëns Cello Concerto with the Belgian Radio Symphony Orchestra.

His performance of the Korngold Cello Concerto was broadcast by the VRT, the Flemish Television. His recording of the symphonic poem “Naar Hoger Licht “, a composition for cello-solo and orchestra by Lodewijk De Vocht, received a Choc award from the music periodical Monde de la Musique. In 2015 he was invited in Saint Petersburg to make a CD recording of the Triple Concerto of Beethoven with the St.-Petersburg State Symphony Orchestra.

He performed as a soloist under the direction of conductors such as Andrej Borejko, Jan Latham-Koenig, Yoël Levy, Walter Proost, Alexander Rahbari and Tan Dun. At Tan Dun’s request, he played the Belgian premiere of the cello concerti Crouching Tiger and The Map. As a chamber musician he has performed in Europe, Israel, Canada, China, Mexico and the USA.

Luc is a frequent guest at festivals where he performs with well-known musicians such as Martha Argerich, Boris Berezovsky, Ivry Gitlis, Jean-Bernard Pommier, Eliane Rodrigues, Paulina Leschenko, Michel Letiec, Frank Braley, Itamar Golan, Michael Guttman and Vadim Repin, ./..

He made many recordings for Pavane Records Belgium, such as Franz Liszt and Lalo’s complete works for cello and piano, and also the sonatas by Frédéric Chopin, Claude Debussy, Camille Saint-Saëns and Franz Schubert.

Together with Trio Portici (Damien Pardoen, violin and Stéphane De May, piano) he recorded chamber music by Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, Frédéric Chopin, Claude Debussy, Sergey Rachmaninov, George Onslow, Robert Schumann, César Franck and Franz Schubert. Kalidisc released also a CD with previously unpublished works by tango composers like José Bragato and Ástor Piazzolla.

Jan Latham-Koenig
studied at the Royal College of Music in London and started his career as a pianist. But in 1982, he decided to devote himself wholly to conducting. He performed with all the leading European orchestras. From 1989 to 1992, he was music director of the Orchestra of Porto, which he founded at the request of the Portuguese government.

In 1988, he made a sensational debut as an opera conductor with Macbeth at the Vienna State Opera and became its permanent guest conductor from 1991, giving about one hundred performances. He now regularly conducts in the world’s leading opera houses, including Covent Garden, the Opèra National Paris-Bastille and the operas of Berlin, Hamburg, Rome, Lisbon and Santiago in Chile.

Jan Latham-Koenig was Music Director of both the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg and Opéra National du Rhin from 1997 to 2002. In 2005, he was appointed Music Director at the Teatro Massimo in Palermo. He is the first British conductor to hold such a post at one of the major Italian theatres, though he previously held the position of Principal Guest Conductor of the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma in the 1990’s.

From 2007 to 2010 Jan Latham-Koenig was Music Director at the Teatro Municipal of Santiago in Chile. In different years he enjoyed directorship with the Wrocław Symphony Orchestra in Poland, the «Wratislavia Cantans» International Festival, artistic directorship of the Cantiere Internazionale d’Arte di Montepulciano and of the Young Janacek Philharmonic; he was also Principal Guest Conductor of the Filarmonica del Teatro Regio in Turin; Artistic Director of the Orquesta Filarmónica de la UNAM in Mexico City (2012–2015). Since 2013, he has been Artistic Director of the Flanders Symphony Orchestra in Bruges (Belgium).

Jan Latham-Koenig is greatly in demand as a guest conductor. He has appeared with orchestras world-wide and performs regularly in Italy, including with the orchestras of the Teatro Comunale in Florence, RAI Turin and the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome. As a guest conductor, some recent appearances include the Orchestra Ensemble Kanazawa, New Japan Philharmonic and Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, and in China the Beijing Symphony Orchestra, Hangzhou and Qingdao Philharmonic. He has conducted the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, Dresden Philharmonic and Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra.

Jan Latham-Koenig started to work with the Novaya Opera Theatre in 2008 when he participated in the production of Wagner’s Lohengrin. In April 2011, he was appointed Chief Conductor of the Novaya Opera. Since January 2019, he has been chief guest conductor of the theatre. Since March 2013 he has been acting as the Head of the Artistic Board.

Jan Latham-Koenig is the Music Director of Wagner’s Lohengrin and Tristan und Isolde, Verdi's Il trovatore, Ravel's L'enfant et les sortileges, Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro, Strauss’ Salome, Gounoud's Faust, Weinberg's The Passenger. Also, he conducts Verdi’s Nabucco and Rigoletto, Borodin’s Prince Igor, Puccini's La bohème.

In January 2010, Jan Latham-Koenig conducted Britten’s War Requiem during the 6th Epiphany Week International Festival. In January 2014, he conducted Walton's suites from the incidental music to Laurence Olivier's films Henry V and Hamlet and Mendelssohn's incidental music to Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream during the Epiphany Festival at Novaya Opera. In August 2014, the maestro conducted Britten's The Turn of the Screw (production of the Northern Ireland Opera) during the UK/Russia Year of Culture. In June 2016, he conducted the Russian premiere of Krzysztof Penderecki’s St. Luke Passion.

Jan Latham-Koenig has participated in the Novaya Opera's tours in Israel (the Israeli Opera, Tel-Aviv),the UK (English National Opera, London),Germany (International May Festival in Wiesbaden),Estonia (the concert halls in Tartu, Tallinn and Narva),China (Shanghai Grand Theatre) and Ireland (Bord Gais Energy Theatre in Dublin). The Novaya Opera company performed Verdi's La Traviata and Puccini's La boheme under the baton Jan Latham-Koenig at the 63 Festival Puccini in Torre del Lago (Italy, 2017).

This album contains no booklet.