collectif9 - No Time for Chamber Music (2021) [Hi-Res]

Collectif 9 is a Montreal-based string ensemble whose main focus is an original exploration of the classical repertoire, including transcriptions for chamber ensemble of large-scale works. Alpha is starting a collaboration with this innovative group and now presents its very first album, recorded in 2018 and consisting of music by (and inspired by) Gustav Mahler, "No Time for Chamber Music", a nod to Luciano Berio’s Sinfonia, inspired in its turn by Mahler’s Second Symphony.

Mahler himself often quoted his own works, and his rich instrumental textures have provided a source of inspiration for composers and arrangers alike. The programme begins with two works drawn from his First Symphony, "Comme un bruit de la nature" (Like a sound of Nature) and "L’Enterrement du chasseur" (The hunter’s Burial), inspired by a woodcut by the nineteenth-century artist Moritz von Schwind in which the animals mourn the death of the hunter.

The ensemble’s double bass player, Thibault Bertin-Maghit, made the arrangements, while Philippe Hersant has written a Fantaisie based on fragments from a number of works by Mahler.