Recordings by James Kreger

New York Cello Masterpieces: Dvořák/Herbert

Antonin Dvořák: Klid ('From the Bohemian Forests,' No.5)
Cello Concerto in B minor
Victor Herbert: Cello Concerto in E minor

James Kreger, cello
Djong Victorin Yu, conductor
Philharmonia Orchestra

This CD may be ordered from Guild Music, ArkivMusic.com and Amazon.com. Available for download at Amazon.com and iTunes.

Dvořák's New World Symphony inspired Herbert's Cello Concerto No. 2, which in turn inspired Dvořák to write his Cello Concerto, a masterpiece among concerti. Dvořák's Silent Woods begins the disc.

"Recording this Dvořák Concerto, which has been recorded by virtually all the great cellists of the 20th century … is quite a challenge. The veteran American cellist James Kreger meets it handsomely. His highly disciplined cello playing is uniformly rich in sound, pure in intonation, and convincing in phrasing."

Fanfare

Mendelssohn CD

Mendelssohn: Complete Works for Cello and Piano
Cello Sonata No. 2
Variations Concertantes
Cello Sonata No. 1
Song Without Words

James Kreger, cello
Gerald Robbins, piano

CD is available at the Juilliard Bookstore.

“Kregers’s interpretation is absolutely magnificent …. He has all the qualities for playing these works. The precision, intonation, virtuosity, sound, more indispensable here than elsewhere, because Mendelssohn is also a composer of immediate seduction, of a charm of the first order that must be founded on a beautiful sonority and on beautiful phrasing validating the ineffable cantabile line.”

Répertoire (France)

Strauss CD

Richard Strauss
Also sprach Zarathustra, Op.30
Don Quixote, Op.35

Philharmonia Orchestra
Djong Victorin Yu, conductor
James Kreger, cello
Roger Benedict, viola

CD available at Guild Music, ArkivMusic.com and Amazon.com. May be downloaded at Amazon.com and iTunes.

Dvořák from the Marlboro Music Festival

Trio for Piano and Strings No. 3, in F minor, Op. 65
Quartet for Piano and Strings No. 2, in E flat major, Op. 87

Glenn Dicterow, violin, David Golub, piano (trio), James Kreger, cello, Karen Dreyfus, viola,  Gerald Robbins, piano (quartet)

CD may be ordered from ArkivMusic.com and Amazon.com. Available for download at iTunes.

“Both dramatic and rhapsodic, the F Minor Trio (1883) pulses with declamatory and lyric fervor. The cello part — passionately put forth by Kreger — possesses a decidedly virtuosic, solo character …. The cello speaks for Dvorák’s songful soul in the Poco adagio, where Dicterow’s violin joins Kreger for several lovely intertwinings.”

Audiophile Audition

Salute to France

Jacques Ibert: Concerto for Cello and Winds

James Kreger, cello
Steven Richman, conductor
Harmonie Ensemble
Plus four other ensemble works by Hahn, Milhaud, Poulenc, and Ibert

CD may be ordered from ArkivMusic.com.

“Moving toward the heart of the disc, we find Ibert's little-known gem, Concerto for Cello and Wind Instruments (1925), the lyrical answer to Milhaud's spareness. Soloist James Kreger rises to the formidable technical and expressive demands of the piece and then transcends them. His interpretation is broad and passionate without being cloying. Even in the percussive sections, he never sacrifices his singing tone. For such a commanding solo presence, Kreger is surprisingy sensitive in the passages which call for dialog with instruments of the ensemble.”

High Performance Review