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Reviewed by RICHARD FREED, DAVID HALL, GEORGE JELLINEK, IGOR KIPNIS, PAUL KRESH, ERIC SALZMAN, PAUL KRESH, ERIC SALZMAN ARENSKY: The Fountain of Bakhchisarai, Op. 46. TCHAIKOVSKY: Dmitri the Impostor and Vassili Shuisky; Undine (excerpts). Irina Arkhipova (mezzo-soprano); Tamara Milash kina (soprano); Evgenii Rakov (tenor); Moscow Radio Chorus and Orchestra; U.S.S.R. Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra, Aleksandr Melik Pashayev and Evgenii Akulov cond. WESTMINSTER GOLD WGS-8300 $3.49. Performance: Fairly good to very good Recording: Very good The well-chosen contents of this release taken from the Russian Melodiya catalog add up to some forty minutes of music rare and well done, served up with engineering of unusual depth and richness. Anton Arensky's five-part incidental music to the Pushkin poem The Fountain of Bakh chisarai has little individuality; echoes of Tchaikovsky run through it, mixing with some Borodin-styled orientalia. It is well performed by the chorus and orchestra, however, and Zarema's aria, which is by far the longest and most significant episode, is sung by the popular Russian mezzo-soprano Irina Arkhipova with a smoldering passion tempered by a creamy tone. Tchaikovsky's music for Ostrovsky's historical pastiche Dmitri the Imposter and Vassili Shuisky, something of a sequel to Pushkin's Boris Godounov, is youthful (1866), quite obscure, and without an opus number. The two excerpts heard here (Introduction and Mazurka) are characteristic and pleasant. Undine, his second opera (1869), survived Explanation of symbols: = reel-to-reel stereo tape = eight-track stereo cartridge = stereo cassette = quadraphonic disc X = reel-to-reel quadraphonic tape = eight-track quadraphonic tape Monophonic recordings are indicated by the symbol The first listing is the one reviewed; other formats, if available, follow it, only in fragments. Some of the material is quite effective, including a sweeping adagio melody Tchaikovsky utilized many years later in his Swan Lake. After some initial unsteadiness, soprano Milashkina handles her high-lying part impressively, but her tenor partner's sturdy tone suffers from a bleaty quality. Still, despite the shortcomings, partisans of Russian Romanticism will find these unusual excerpts rewarding. G J. BEETHOVEN: Romance No. 1, Op. 40; Romance No. 2, Op. 50 (see GOLDMARK) BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 3, in E-flat Major, Op. 55 ("Eroica"); Coriolan Overture, Op. 62. London Symphony Orchestra, Leopold Stokowski cond. RCA ARL1-0600 $6.98, ARS1-0600 $7.98. ARK1-0600 $7.98. Performance: Mostly swift and brilliant Recording: Excellent BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 3, in E-flat Major, Op. 55 ("Eroica"). Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Pierre Monteux cond. LONDON STS 15190 $3.49. Performance: In the grand classic mold Recording: Good enough Stokowski's first recorded essay of the Eroica offers a very stately opening movement, but for the remainder of the music the over-ninety-year-old conductor lets no grass grow un der his feet. The great fugal episode of the funeral march suffers at Stokowski's pace, but the scherzo and finale come off brilliantly, and special kudos are due the horns for their traversal of the celebrated central episode of the scherzo. The recording is fine-open and full- and, except for a slight misalignment of flute and violins at the moment of moving out of the first fugato and toward the "Hungarian" variation in the finale, the London Sym phony's playing is impeccable. The Stokowski reading of Coriolan fairly seethes with nervous energy and high drama. The London Stereo Treasury reissue of Monteux's Eroica reading (originally released on RCA Victrola in 1963) is most welcome. The conception is in the classic mold exemplified by Felix Weingartner, with the somber grandeur of the funeral march looming as the towering peak of the French maestro's realization of the score. To my ear, the violins are just a mite out of focus relative to the rest of the orchestra, but even with this minor flaw, I would rate the Monteux as currently the best buy among the budget-price Eroica recordings in stereo. D.H. BERG: Lulu, Suite. R. STRAUSS: Salome, Final Scene. Anja Silja (soprano); Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Christoph von Dohnanyi cond. LONDON OS 26397 $6.98. Performance: Cool Recording: Smooth, clear There is a curious contrast between these performances. The Lulu Suite, mainly orchestral, gets a cool and strangely uninvolved performance that makes its supposedly difficult "expressionist" music sound much less far out than Richard Strauss. But Anja Silja's version of the final scene of Salome-certainly the more interesting performance here, whatever its shortcomings--has a great deal of musico-dramatic presence. It is not exactly a secret that Silja had a long love affair with the late Wieland Wagner that ended only with his death. She was, in effect, his protegee, and he created a very striking production of Salome for her. More than an echo of the intensity of that production can be heard here. Silja was never a remarkable singer from the point of view of size of voice or tonal beauty (and she is well over her head in the rather brief singing required in the Lulu Suite). Nevertheless, even in a recording, she projects something very real. The disc shows off excellent recorded sound of a remarkable clarity. Texts and translations are provided for the Strauss work only. E.S. BRUCKNER: Symphony No. 5. Vienna Philharmonic. Lorin Maazel cond. LONDON CSA 2238. $6.98. Performance: Medium-weight Recording: Good This is a solid performance of medium weight. Lorin Maazel is meticulous, and the Vienna Philharmonic never sounds less than wonderful. But I get a certain sense of distance from the music that robs it of some of its inner intensity. The recorded sound is gorgeous. E.S. DEBUSSY: Etudes. Anthony di Bonaventura (piano). CONNOISSEUR SOCIETY CSQ 2074 $6.98. Performance. Light-fingered Recording: Excellent The relative obscurity of the Debussy Etudes is a perpetual puzzle to me-the set of twelve piano studies contains some of the compos er's most wonderful music. This recording catches a special side of the music: its wit and color fantasy. Di Bonaventura's performances are nimble, light-fingered, and full of delicacy and nuance. This is not the only way to treat this music, but it is certainly a most entrancing one. Technically, the recording is excellent, achieving presence without the ugliness that often mars close-up piano sound. E.S. FERNANDEZ: Brasileira, Suite No. 2 (see VILLA-LOBOS) RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT GOLDMARK: Violin Concerto in A Minor, Op. 28. BEETHOVEN: Romance No. 1, in G Major, Op. 40; Romance No. 2, in F Major, Op. 50. Nathan Milstein (violin): Philharmonia Orchestra, Harry Blech cond. (in Gold mark: no conductor listed for Beethoven). SERAPHIM S-60238 $3.98. Performance: Glorious fiddling Recording: Good Much as I enjoy Goldmark's Rustic Wedding Symphony and earnestly hope for a new recording of his Sakuntala Overture, his violin concerto had always struck me as impossibly tedious and overdrawn. Nathan Milstein's extraordinary performance, however, makes me feel foolish for having overlooked it when it was first offered on Capitol in 1958. Certainly it was less convenient in its original format, spread over both sides of a full-price disc: all thirty-one and a half minutes are on a single side of the Seraphim reissue, and the sound is more than respectable. If Milstein doesn't transform the concerto into a great work, his glorious fiddling is so filled with beauty and nobility of its own that one either excuses or simply overlooks the basic emptiness of Goldmark's score. There are no grand gestures here, but a thoroughly comfortable and unselfconscious sort of brilliance, built on spontaneous, sweet-toned lyricism and apparently real affection for the piece. Harry Blech and the "old" Philharmonia mesh perfectly with Milstein every step of the way, and they too seem to be enjoying the assignment. These recordings of the Beethoven Romances, for which no conductor is identified, have not been released before on any label. They sound as if they were taped a little later than the Goldmark, probably during the period in which Milstein served as his own conductor in concertos of Bach, Vivaldi, and Mozart. They, too, are aglow with both elegance and warmth, and with a chamber-music intimacy superbly apposite to these lovable pieces. There is a discernible tape splice about halfway through the G Major, but it is not bothersome. R.F. GUARNIERI: Dansa Negra; Dansa Brasileira HAYDN: Mass No. 12, in Bilat Major, "Harmoniemesse" (see Best of the Month, page 85) RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT KHACHATURIAN: Spartacus (complete ballet). Bolshoi Theater Orchestra, Algis Zhura tis cond. COLUMBIA / MELODIYA D4M 33493 four discs $20.98. Performance: Roman extravaganza Recording: Terrific Aram Khachaturian has conceded that "we know nothing of the music of ancient Rome," but he calls his score for the four-act ballet Spartacus "a monumental fresco describing the mighty avalanche of the antique rebellion of slaves on behalf of human rights" and says he has "tried to capture the atmosphere of ancient Rome in order to bring to life the images of the remote past .... " At the same time, undoubtedly mindful of having received the Lenin Prize in 1959 for Spartacus, he is predictably careful to point out the "spiritual ------------- ANJA SIUA: A Salome who "projects something very real" affinity of Spartacus to our own time" when "many of the world's oppressed people are waging an intense struggle for national liberation and independence ... ," an after thought that ought to go over big in, say, Czechoslovakia or Hungary. But "monumental fresco" this surely is, a sprawling, intensely romantic accompaniment for the Bolshoi's ballet spectacle, replete with the vigorous rhythms and alluring melodies that have marked all this composer's scores, especially the popular Gayne, Masquerade, and much of his movie music. The ancient Roman "atmosphere," in fact, exudes, at times, more than a trace of Armenian flavoring. And as this music splashes around the huge orchestra, it sounds every so often like one of those overblown soundtracks from a Cecil B. DeMille movie (indeed, Alex North wrote just such a score for the 196-minute Stanley Kubrick version of the Spartacus story in 1960). Listening to this full blooded music, it's hard to believe that Khachaturian, back in 1948, was reproved by Soviet officialdom, along with Prokofiev and Shostakovich, for "vicious, anti-popular and formalist trends and bourgeois ideology." Yet a good deal of Spartacus is more than the mere musical wallpaper we have come to associate with movie spectacles or "socialist realism." From the opening triumphal march when the victorious legionnaires lead in their slaves to the final, wordless requiem, much here is distinguished by a sense of grace and form and particularly a fecundity of invention that makes hearing the whole work a fascinating experience. It has form, it builds and moves, and it always gets where it is going. Here are explosive passages of circus mu sic, gloriously vulgar in their full-color pageantry, dances enough for a miniature dance festival, a bluesy nocturne, bacchanale music, and a chorus of large lamentation. The very bigness of it all, the reliance on repetition to build huge passages out of simple themes, the sense of sweep and pageantry-all are reminiscent of Giiere's Ilya Murometz, which also deals with a larger-than-life hero in ultra-romantic musical terms, and which is also something of an endurance contest to hear in full. Like the Bolshoi Ballet's production, which Clive Barnes has lauded as the more significant accomplishment, Khachaturian's "mighty avalanche" has been undergoing revision since 1956 when it received its premiere in Leningrad, and a lot has been removed in the process. But for those listeners who can't get enough of Spartacus, even over seven LP sides, there's an eighth side containing four movements eliminated from the original. Known as "Suite No. 4 from Spartacus," this supplementary plate of leftovers includes a "Tarantella" and a "Saturnalia" along with a Bacchantes' Dance and an "Incident at Night"-all of a piece with the rest of the score, but all, I think, fairly dispensable. P.K. MENDELSSOHN: Piano Concerto No. 1, in G Minor, Op. 25; Piano Concerto No. 2, in D Minor, Op. 40. Murray Perahia (piano); Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, Neville Marriner cond. COLUMBIA M 33207 $6.98. Performance: Fluent Recording: Good I have always been partial to Mendelssohn's tautly dramatic and brilliant G Minor Piano Concerto and have found its D Minor companion work, except for the lovely slow movement, a bit dull. There are two distinct schools of thought about the performance of the concertos--one favoring the impetuous and febrile, the other leaning toward the romantic and lyrical. Herein lies the essential difference between Perahia and Marriner (romantic) on the one hand and Serkin and Ormandy (impetuous), also on the Columbia label, on the other. A choice between the two is, in my opinion, purely a matter of taste (mine generally tends toward the impetuous). In any event, Perahia's pianism is wonder fully fluent and beautifully nuanced, and he gets crisp accompaniment from Marriner's skilled players. I do hope, however, that Mr. Perahia's next concerto recordings will feature repertoire even more truly in keeping with his remarkable gifts-to wit, the Schumann and Chopin concertos. D.H. MENDELSSOHN: String Quintet No. 2, Op. 87 (see VERDI) RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT MERIKANTO: Juha. Matti Lehtinen (bari tone), Juha; Raili Kostia (soprano), Marja; Hendrik Krumm (tenor), Shemeikka; Mai ju Kuusoja (contralto), Mother-in-law: others. ---- SPARTACUS: Vladimir Vasiliev in the Bolshoi Ballet production Finnish National Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Ulf Soderblom cond. MUSICAL HERITAGE SOCIETY MHS 3079/80/81 three discs $10.50 (plus 75e handling charge from the Musical Heritage Society, Inc., 1991 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10023). Performance. Very good Recording: Excellent Juhani Aho's novel Juha is something of a Finnish literary classic, and the opera's libretto, by the famous soprano Aino Ackte, is said to be faithful to the book to the point of containing verbatim quotations. Aarre Merikanto (1893-1958) completed the opera in 1922 and submitted it to the management of the Finnish Opera, who rejected it and thus relegated it to virtual dormancy for the remaining thirty-six years of the composer's life (it was broadcast in 1957 and 1958). Its first stage performance in 1963 achieved the success, in Finland at least, that its creator had sought in vain during his lifetime. That success is fully understandable. The story is rather basic but contains the stuff strong operas are made of: a love triangle with echoes of Pagliacci, II Tabarro- or Porgy and Bess. Honest, middle-aged, crippled Juha is married to Marja, a much younger and love-starved woman. She falls for a traveling merchant named Shemeikka and, after a very brief period of inner struggle, runs away with him. Later, on discovering her lover's shiftlessness and shoddy character, she returns to AARRE MERIKANTO (1893-1958) Vital operatic music her husband. He is ready to forgive her, but Marja cannot stop lying to him. When Juha discovers the truth in all its ugly ramifications, he cripples Shemeikka in a fight and commits suicide. Marja survives, bearing the scars in her soul. This passionate tale is developed with terse effectiveness in three acts of two scenes each. Juha is a highly theatrical opera to which an arctic setting and certain ethnic qualities lend an added dimension of interest. While Merikanto's music is undoubtedly eclectic, it is tense, turbulent, and immensely skillful. His vocal writing reveals some of the arioso sweep of Italian verismo (Giordano, in particular, comes to mind) or such verismo-influenced cosmopolitan operas as D'Albert's Tiejland, but the power and wide coloristic palette of Merikanto's orchestra recalls the Richard Strauss of Elektra. There are lively imagination and excellent theatrical craft in the way he employs certain elements-low brass, trombone glissandos, percussive combinations, harp effects-to dramatic ends. This is vital operatic music with a harmonic language freed of older tonal strictures but un bound by the enervating shackles of later schools as well. The performance is on a consistently high artistic level, spearheaded by the bass-baritone Matti Lehtinen, an artist of international stature. Soprano Raili Kostia brings great emotional commitment to the role of Marja, tenor Hendrik Krumm is a bit shrill but dramatically effective, and the supporting singers are never less than adequate and frequently much better. Orchestra and chorus are first class. Thoroughly stage-worthy, well-written, singable contemporary operas are not easy to come by. Juha is all of these, and I recommend it to any adventurous listener. MIGUEZ: Nocturne (see VILLA-LOBOS) RAVEL: Bolero; Rapsodie Espagnole; La Valse. Boston Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa cond. DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 2530 475 $7.98. Performance: Sleek Recording: Powerful RAVEL: Rapsodie Espagnole; Ma Mere l'Oye; Pavane pour une Infante Defunte; Bolero. Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra, Andras Korodi cond. HUNGAROTON SLPX 11644 $6.98. Performance: Sympathetic but flawed Recording. Good Seiji Ozawa is clearly not overawed by the Boston Symphony Orchestra's long history of Ravel performances under Monteux, Koussevitzky, and Munch. He has his own ideas about the three works on his new Deutsche Grammophon disc; some listeners may find them characterized more by efficiency than by poetry, but the performances are unarguably sleek. The BoMro, a little faster than Ravel indicated, but by no means headlong or un-atmospheric, is a "straight" performance--I missed the trombone slurs, which are not at tempted here- but, with the superbly main tained rhythm and virtuoso playing, it makes quite an impact. La Valse is sumptuous and seductive for the most part, but lacks the subtlety Bernstein, Monteux, and others have shown in their handling of the piece. Most effective of all is the fire-and-ice brilliance of Ozawa's Rapsodie Espagnole, but that work is gratuitously split for turnover after the Malaguena in one of those deplorable "sandwich" arrangements that contravene the basic premise of the long-playing disc. The Hungaroton disc is laid out more sensibly and more generously-but I don't think it is really in the running. The sound is realistic, and Korodi's Rapsodie is vivid and warm, his Mother Goose (the original five sections only, not the full ballet version) touchingly evocative. Poor horn tone disfigures the otherwise attractive Pavane, though, and the wind playing in the well-paced Bolero is disappointingly lackluster. R.F. ROSSINI: String Sonata No. 1 (see VERDI) SAINT-SAENS: Violin Concerto No. 3, in B Minor, Op. 61; Havanaise, Op. 83. Louis Kaufman (violin); Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra, Maurits Van Den Berg cond. ORION ORS 75177 $6.98 Performance: Soulful Recording: Spotlights violin Louis Kaufman, at three score and ten, has lost neither his "hot" tone nor his left-hand dexterity when it comes to whipping through these warhorses of the French violin repertoire. In the pre-LP days, when he was the behind-the-scenes fiddle in almost every other Hollywood movie, Kaufman recorded this concerto with the Santa Monica Symphony under Jacques Rachmilovich for the Disc la bel: if memory serves, his new reading is pretty much the same brilliant fiddling, and totally un-Gallic when placed alongside the work of a Francescatti, a Grumiaux, or even a Milstein. The more obviously tropical Havanaise is more appropriate to Kaufman's bow. The essentially competent orchestral accompaniment seems rather spread out and cavernous here, and the very bright spot lighting of the violin unfortunately tends to make the entire production pall on the ear well before the conclusion of side two. D.H. SIBELIUS: Symphonies (see The Basic Repertoire, page 56) R. STRAUSS: Also Sprach Zarathustra, Op. 30. St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, Walter Susskind cond. TURNABOUT QTV-S 34584 $3.98. Performance: Good Recording: Good R. STRAUSS: Also Sprach Zarathustra, Op. 30. Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg, Alain Lombard cond. ERATO STU 70873 $6.98. Performance: Adequate Recording: Over-reverberant R. STRAUSS: Also Sprach Zarathustra, Op. 30. Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Richard Strauss cond. Whipped Cream Waltz, from Schlagobers, Op. 70. Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, Richard Strauss cond. TURNABOUT THS-65021 $3.98. Performance- Unique document Recording: World War II vintage Among the dozen or so currently available recordings of Richard Strauss' Nietzschean tone poem-from the headiness of Mehta's version to the expansive lyricism of Karajan's, with sonic standards ranging from good to superb--there must surely be one to suit just about any listener. The three latest en tries are each highly distinctive in provenance, performance style, or both. Turnabout not only offers top dollar value, at $3.98, for the general quality of performance and excellence of sound, but its St. Louis Symphony rendition appears to be the first one recorded specifically for quadraphonic (QS) playback of the "ambiant" rather than the surround type. The performance, except for a touch of stodgy pacing in the "Science" fugue, is alert and marked by particularly distinguished playing by solo violinist Max Rabinovitsj in the Dance Song section. Overall, the sound is clean and bright, though side one of my re view copy was audibly off-center and the surface noise throughout was fairly heavy. Alain Lombard's Strasbourg Philharmonic is a very competent aggregation, certainly on a par with the St. Louisans if not with Karajan's Berliners or even Mehta's Los Angelinos, but the character of the Strasbourg hall and Erato's microphone placements prevent this recording from joining into real competition with the others. The balance, as heard through my speakers, tends to favor brass and timpani at the expense of the all-important violins. This one is definitely out of the running in the Also Sprach sweepstakes. Turnabout's Historical Series recording of a performance conducted by the composer himself is quite another matter. Last January, I reviewed a pressing (of doubtful legitimacy) on the Olympic label derived from the same original (presumably radio-broadcast) source as the Turnabout disc. The Turnabout issue, however, evidently bears not only the sanction of the Strauss family, but its processing has resulted in decidedly better sound than what I heard nine months ago. Then I found the orchestra sound dim, distant, and muddy in Zarathustra and only slightly better in the musically negligible Schlagobers excerpt. On the Turnabout issue, however, despite drop outs here and there in the tape and some sloppy detail work on the part of the Vienna players (but a fine solo violin), the basic outlines of the composer's own conception come through strongly. This is no disc for hi-fi buffs, but I shall certainly hang on to it along with the other Richard Strauss recordings that I prize most highly, those of Don Quixote and Till Eulenspiegel. D.H. R. STRAUSS: Salome, Final Scene (see BERG) TCHAIKOVSKY: Dmitri the Imposter and Vassili Shuisky; Undine, Excerpts (see AREN SKY) TCHAIKOVSKY: Symphony No. 6, in B Mi nor, Op. 74 ("Pathetique"). Orchestre de Paris, Seiji Ozawa cond. PHILIPS 6500 850 $7.98. Performance: Cool, elegant Recording: Good TCHAIKOVSKY: Symphony No. 6, in B Mi nor, Op. 74 ("Pathetique"). Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra, Gennady Rozhdestvensky cond. MELODIYA/ANGEL SR 40266 $6.98. Performance: Fiery Recording: Variable Seiji Ozawa's way with the Pathetique in this performance, though by no means lacking in urgency, is rather on the cool and elegant side. Consequently, it is the lighter and more lyric aspects of the score that come across to best effect here. This is particularly true of the 5/4 movement, which is exceptionally well played and achieves beautifully effective details of nuance throughout the trio section. Technically, the recording is first-rate throughout. If Gennady Rozhdestvensky had had the services of the Leningrad Philharmonic and really topnotch engineering for his Melodiya/ Angel recording, his realization of the Pathetique might have ranked among the best of the more than two dozen currently avail able disc versions. Even with sloppy orchestral detail in the early pages, and despite somewhat tubby and constricted sonics, the performance is fiery and passionate almost to the point of rawness in the gut-racking final pages. There are stunning points made in the ferocious Slavic quickstep scherzo, in which the delineation of the inner wind parts and the savage unison runs before the reprise are most striking. The production is uneven, but this recording is well worth the while of those who fancy their Tchaikovsky in the truly Russian vein. D. H . VAUGHAN WILLIAMS: Sir John in Love (see Best of the Month, page 84) RECORDINGS OF SPECIAL MERIT VERDI: String Quartet in E Minor. New Vienna String Quartet. MENDELSSOHN: String Quintet No. 2, in B-fiat Major, Op. 87. Vienna Philharmonia Quintet. MUSICAL HERITAGE SOCIETY MHS 1865 $3.50 (plus $0.75 handling charge from the Musical Heritage Society, Inc., 1991 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10023). Performance: Fluent; Recording: Very good VERDI: String Quartet in E Minor (arranged for string orchestra). ROSSINI: String Sonata No. 1, in G Major. English Chamber Orchestra, Pinchas Zukerman cond. COLUMBIA M 33415 $6.98. Performance: Sumptuous Recording: Rich Verdi's solitary string quartet is not a student work, but a product of his sixtieth year, roughly contemporaneous with Aida and the Requiem: everything in it bespeaks not only maturity but a melodic richness and inventiveness fully comparable with Verdi's finest achievements in the realm of opera. Its link with Aida and pre-echoes of Falstaff have been remarked upon frequently, and in his notes for the MHS disc Mark Gantt cites actual motifs derived from Un Ballo in Maschera and Don Carlo. All of which makes it hard to understand why the work is not a staple of the quartet repertory. It is hardly ever played by any of our major chamber-music ensembles; prior to the two releases under review here, there had been only two recordings of the work available in this country in the last twenty years-both of them in the string-orchestra arrangement (which Verdi may or may not have had a hand in preparing, but which he certainly approved). The music is marvelously attractive in either form, but it is especially good to have the original version available again. In many respects, the interpretative differences between these two performances might appear to be directly related to the sizes of the respective ensembles, but they really go be yond such a consideration. The New Vienna Quartet gives an eloquent and straightforward account of the work, while Pinchas Zukerman conducts a more sumptuous, highly inflected and dramatic one, as if he were consciously stressing the "operatic" character of the mu sic. On MHS the sinuous and nocturnal first movement is fluent and persuasive in strictly chamber-music terms; on Columbia it is given a grand and lavish stage setting. The differences in the two approaches to the second movement are even more pronounced: Zukerman is very free with the rhythm, pulling it about to underscore the aria-like shape of the theme, which in the process becomes heavily accented and somewhat erratic in its course: the NVQ, mindful that Andantino is not very slow, is more strict in its rhythm and allows the theme to flow more naturally. The third-movement situation is more frustrating. Here the NVQ evidently feels that Prestissimo is not very fast, and its approach is far less compelling than Zukerman's exultantly energetic one. But then there is the NVQ's marvelous trio, a ravishing cantilena which is infinitely more appealing sung by a single cello, with the pizzicato accompaniment making its full effect, than in the expanded version, in which the accompaniment recedes into the background. Both performances of the finale are splendid. I would not hesitate to choose the NVQ performance if only its Prestissimo didn't sound so undernourished. But that is the only flaw, and taking the matter of couplings into consideration--not to mention price-- I would have to prefer it, anyway, for the overside performance of the Mendelssohn quintet. Another relatively neglected work (and an even more substantial one in a sense, though it boasts nothing like the voluptuous allure of Verdi's themes), it is a winner in every respect; the MHS disc is a must for this side alone. Zukerman's performance off the Rossini sonata is a handsome one in an expansive style, but it is carried off with more swaggering wit by Louis Auriacombe on Nonesuch. As I hope I have indicated, though, the two versions of the Verdi quartet are both so enjoyable, and in such different ways, that any one who loves the work might well want them both, irrespective of couplings. R.F . VIANNA: Dansa de Negros; Jogos Pueris (see VILLA-LOBOS) RECORDINGS OF SPECIAL MERIT VILLA-LOBOS: A Prole do Bebe, Suite No. 1; Bachianas Brasileiras No. 4, Preludio; As Tres Marias; Rudepoema. Nelson Freire (piano). TELEFUNKEN SAT 22547 $6.98. Performance: Superb Recording: Excellent VILLA-LOBOS: A Prole do Bebe, Suite No. 1; Ciclo Brasileiro-Festa no Serra, Impressties Seresteiras; Charm No. 5 ("Alma Brasi leira"). VIANNA: Dansa de Negros; Jogos Pueris. MIGUEZ: Nocturne.GUARNIERI: Dansa Negra; Dansa Brasileira. FERNANDEZ: Brasileira, Suite No. 2-Ponteio, Moda, Catareti. Cristina Ortiz (piano). ANGEL S-37110 $6.98. Performance: Scintillating Recording. Good Nothing need be said at this late date about Brazil as a source of phenomenally gifted pianists, represented on records by the illustrious Guiomar Novaes and a current crop that includes such formidable talents as Joao Carlos Martins, Antonio Barbosa, and Rober to Szidon. What is curious is that none of these Brazilian pianists had recorded any music by their compatriots since the famous Novaes set of Columbia 78's. These two new discs, then, are doubly welcome-both for the repertoire itself and for the exhilaration of the brilliant playing. Nelson Freire, of course, is a known quantity to discophiles: he made some sensational concerto recordings for Columbia back in 1968, and a good one of the Chopin Preludes, but he hadn't been heard from since-an astounding case of neglect. Cristina Ortiz, heard in last year's Angel release of Constant Lambert's The Rio Grande and in a new pairing of the Shostakovich concertos, is twenty-four, started winning international competitions at fifteen, and has studied with Magda Tagliafer ro and Rudolf Serkin ; her first solo recital disc is called "Alma Brasiliera" ("Brazilian Soul"), after one of the shorter Villa-Lobos works she plays, and the title is validated by the evocative impact of her performances as well as the obvious "survey" nature of the collection. Both of these discs are knockouts, really, and many collectors will want them both, since only the fifteen-minute Prole do Bebe sequence is duplicated. Even that is not quite a strict duplication, for Ortiz reverses the order of the two final numbers, ending with "Polichinello" instead of "The Witch-Doll" (the liner gives the original sequence only and makes no reference to the switch), and her shaping of some of the numbers is strikingly different from Freire's. Freire brings a crisper and more individualized character to such pieces as "The China Doll" and "The Rubber Doll," while Ortiz displays what strikes me as a more Ravelian manner. Both are enormous ly successful, but if forced to choose I would take Freire, who further benefits from superior sound and whose disc has separating bands visible between the eight pieces in the suite. Overall, too, Freire's all-Villa-Lobos pro gram is a stronger one than the Ortiz assortment, though the latter's variety is by no means unattractive. The Three Marias is charming but lightweight, and I would much rather have the entire Bachianas No. 4 in stead of just the Preludio, but the Telefunken disc is invaluable for the staggering performance of the Rudepoema, which is surely Villa-Lobos' keyboard masterpiece. The work is a musical portrait of Artur Rubinstein, com posed in the early 1920's and filled with ex plosive passages (many of them marked Tres sauvage) suggesting that the pianist must have been a fireball in his "young years." The Telefunken annotation has a goodly share of errors, and the English translation is not the best, but that is the only even partially negative element in this stunning production. The three unduplicated Villa-Lobos items in the Ortiz collection are brief but extremely effective examples of his folk-nostalgia manner, and this might be said of the pieces by the four lesser-known composers as well, except the Nocturne of Leopoldo Amerigo Miguez (1850-1892, founder of Brazil's National Conservatory), which shows no identifiably national strain. The Guamieri Dansa Brasileira is the one we all know in its original orchestral guise, and the similarly flavored pieces by Oscar Lorenzo Fernandez and Fructuoso Vianna- especially the latter's Jogos Pueris (Children's Games)-are quite ingratiating. Ortiz displays real commitment in every one of them, bringing out the individual character of each and making one really eager to hear more of what must be a sizable treasury of Brazilian music-as well as more of whatever else Ortiz may offer. R.F. YSAVE: Six Sonatas for Violin Solo, Op. 27. Ruggiero Ricci (violin). CANDIDE QCE 31085 $4.98. Performance: Virtuosic Recording: Very good The unaccompanied violin sonatas of Eugene Ysave, probably the most skillful examples of the genre since Bach and Paganini, show indebtedness to both of those great predecessors, but they also display the great Belgian violinist's own style. Joseph Szigeti, to whom Sonata No. 1 was dedicated, characterized it as full of "those sinuous, baroque, nervous Ysayean passages, arabesques, and whimsical musical ideas." All six sonatas were dedicated to eminent violinists: Jacques Thibaud, Georges Enesco, ------------------- -- NELSON FREIRE, CRISTINA ORTIZ: two knockout discs from young Brazilian pianists. Fritz Kreisler, Mathieu Crickboom (an Ysaye pupil and associate), and Manuel Quiroga are the others. Difficult, extremely challenging pieces, they are regularly used at the Brussels competitions established in 1937 in the Belgian master's honor. David Oistrakh, the win ner of that first competition, made at least two recordings of the D Minor Sonata (No. 3), but this is the first time that the entire Op. 27 has been recorded. The two shortest sonatas (Nos. 3 and 6), each consisting of two well-contrasted movements, are the kind even non-violinists will find enjoyable. My own favorite, however, is Sonata No. 2, in A Minor, which uses Bach's E Major Prelude as a starting point for obsessive contrapuntal interweavings of the Dies true theme. The other three sonatas are never devoid of interest, but technical intricacies at times overshadow their musical significance. Ruggiero Ricci meets the demands of this sequence with astonishing technical aplomb. If he cannot make the music consistently appealing in an involving sort of way, I suspect that the problem lies not with him but in the special kind of writing. G J. COLLECTIONS BATTLE MUSIC FOR ORGAN. Diego de Conceicao: Batalha de 5° Tom. Krieger: Schlacht. Jimenez: Batalla de Sexto Tono. Banchieri: Battaglia, Canzone Italiana Dialo go. Frescobaldi: Capriccio sopra la Battaglia. Loffelholtz: Die kleine Schlacht. Cabanilles: Batalla 11. Bull: Coranto Battle. Kerll: Feld schlacht. Franz Haselbiick (Cathedral Organ at Hildesheim, Germany). MUSICAL HERITAGE SOCIETY MHS 1790 $3.50 (plus 75¢ handling charge from the Musical Heritage Society, Inc., 1991 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10023). Performance: Generally entertaining Recording: Very good In the enormous body of program music that stems from the Renaissance and Baroque periods, there is a surprising quantity of pieces associated with warfare. These are sometimes commemorative, but more often they are merely descriptive of battles in general, involving the expected kind of musical imagery, guns and cannons, cries of the wounded, victory marches, and so on. The necessity for sequential writing and the resulting repetitious passagework are fortunately held to a mini mum in the present intriguing, often entertaining collection of battle pieces for organ. Some of the composers' names are relatively familiar: Frescobaldi, Banchieri, Bull (whose charming dance, Coranto Battle, was used by Praetorius in his Terpsichore), Cabanilles, Krieger, and Kern. There are also some rarities. Fray Diego da Conceicao's battle piece and that of Jose Jimenez (the former is an unknown sixteenth-century composer from Portugal, the latter a scarcely better known seventeenth-century Spanish organist) both imply ample use of the famous Iberian reed stops and horizontal trumpets; the Batal la de Sexto Tono of Jimenez in particular has some grandiose moments. Christoph Loffel holtz's Little Battle, stemming from a 1585 organ tablature, is possibly the earliest piece on the disc but not the most interesting. First place, I think, has to go to the large-scale Batalla 11 of the Valencian organist Juan Cabanilles (1644-1712); though predictable, this work is still the most elaborate, grand, and harmonically varied in the collection. The sound of the Hildesheim Cathedral Organ is well reproduced, the registrations imaginatively conceived, and the performances, though not dazzling, are satisfactory. I.K. BE GLAD, THEN, AMERICA! Holyoke: Processional March. Hopkinson: My Generous Heart Disdains; Beneath a Weeping Willow's Shade. Members of the New England Conservatory Collegium Musicum, Daniel Pink- ham cond. Anon.: Yankee Doodle; White Cockade; Colonel Orne's March; George Washington's March. Ives: March II; March Intercollegiate. Members of the New England Conservatory Wind Ensemble, Frank Battisti cond. Ellington: Koko; Daybreak Express. Members of the New England Conservatory Jazz Repertory Orchestra. Gunther Schuller cond. Sherwin: Sign Tonight. Anon: His Name So Sweet; Band ob Music; Wonderous Love; Psalm 21. Ives: Serenity. Anon. (arr. Copland and Wilding-White): At the River. Billings: Be Glad, Then, America! New Eng land Conservatory Chamber Singers, Lorna Cooke de Varon cond. NEW ENGLAND CONSERVATORY NEC-111 $6.98 (distributed by Golden Crest Records). Performance: Class Americana Recording: Excellent I read somewhere recently that one of our pundits had proposed that we call off the en tire Bicentennial celebration and spend the time pondering where we have gone wrong. It would certainly save the record companies a lot of vinyl. This particular collection, however, offers some reasons why we should keep celebrating. Recorded by various talented forces from the New England Conservatory of Music during a weekend of Patriots Day activities in Boston, the program adds up to a varied and colorful, if at times incongruously juxtaposed, sampling of American music since Colonial times. Members of the Collegium Musicum, under Daniel Pinkham's astute direction, open the proceedings with two love songs-a ruefully ironic one by Colonial composer Samuel Holyoke, a prim and graceful one by Francis Hopkinson, who claimed to be the composer of the "first original American song." A brace of marches, featuring a rousing Yankee Doodle and similar brisk items, is pumped out with gusto by the N.E.C. Wind Ensemble. Included are a jolly, circusy march by Ives and another, a March Intercol legiate, imbued with an unaffected campus flavor. It's something of a jolt after that to leap into two Duke Ellington tunes, but Koko and Daybreak Express are so superbly brought off under Gunther Schuller's baton-almost exactly as Ellington himself recorded them that it's possible to survive the non sequitur quite comfortably. The record ends with a series of choral works crisply sung by the Chamber Singers, who do marvelous justice to a set of hymn tunes imported by the Pilgrims, another arranged by Aaron Copland, an Ives choral piece, and a patriotic "fuguing tune" by William Billings that brings the con cert to a close with a rousing "Hallelujah." The notes are fascinating, but a text for the vocal portions of the program would have helped. P.K. EARLY GOETHE SONGS. Reichardt: Gott; Feiger Gedanken; Die schone Nacht; Einzig er Augenblick; Einschriinkung; Mut; Rhapso die; An Lotte; Tiefer liegt die Nacht um mich her. Zelter: Rastlose Liebe; Um Mitternacht; Gleich und gleich; Wo geht's Liebchen? Anna Amalie von Sachsen-Weimar: Auf dem Land und in der Stadt; Sie scheinen zu spielen. Seckendorf: Romanze. Neefe: Serenate. Beethoven: Mit Miideln sich vertragen. Kreutzer: Ein Bettler vor dem Tor. Hummel: Zur Logenfeier. Bettina von Arnim: 0 schaudre nicht. Wagner: Lied des Mephistopheles; Branders Lied. Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (baritone); Jorg Demus (Hammerflfigel). ARCHIV 2533 149 $7.98. Performance: Very good Recording: Very good Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, that giant of German literature (1749-1832), had strong opinions about music and musicians, but I suppose there was no one around, not even Beethoven, who had the temerity to tell that towering presence that in musical matters he was a dilettante. Not for Goethe's taste were the boldly individual settings of his Erlkonig or Gretchen am Spinnrade by the young Schubert; he was far more comfortable with the dutiful efforts of Johann Friedrich Reichardt (1752-1814) and, especially, Carl Friedrich Zelter (1758-1832), who shared his preference for strophic construction. This unusual collection offers not only a bouquet of early Goethe settings by these intimates of the poet, but also one song each by Johann Nepomuk Hummel and Conradin Kreutzer and even a rather inconsequential Beethoven setting from about 1790. Two brief Wagner sketches from Faust (from 1832 and heretofore unrecorded) and such isolated examples as Reichardt's Die schone Nacht and Zelter's Rastlose Liebe offer momentary interest in a sequence that otherwise ranges from the pleasantly bland to the blandly un eventful. The genius of Schubert shines brighter than ever in contrast to these predecessors. From the musico-historical point of view, however, this is a fascinating release, another exceptional Archiv contribution to our understanding of the musical past. And the performers approach these songs with a care and refinement worthy of Schubert's set tings of Goethe. G J. ANNA MOFFO: Heroines from Great French Operas. Donizetti: La Fille du Regiment: Chacun le sail, chacun le dit. Berlioz: La Damnation de Faust: D'amour l'ardente flamme. Massenet: Herodiade: Il est doux, it est bon. Werther: Letter Scene. Thomas: Hamlet: Mad Scene. Bizet: Les Pecheurs de Perles: 0 Dieu Brahma. Meyerbeer: Robert le Diable: Robert, toi que j'aime. Gounod: Romeo et Juliette: Je veux vivre. Charpentier: Louise: Depuis le jour. Anna Moffo (soprano): Ambrosian Opera Chorus; New Philharmonia Orchestra, Peter Maag cond. RCA ARLI-0844 $6.98, ARS1-0844 $7.98, [C] ARK 1-0844 $7.98. Performance: Grand Recording: Excellent After the roasting given to her Thais, it is pleasant to be able to report that Anna Moffo's album of French arias is really in the grand manner. It was always true that, to en joy Miss Moffo, one had to cotton to her style. The voice, now mature and vibrant, has a dark quality with a very particular vibrato on top (she also uses vibrato in many parts of her range as an ornament on sustained notes, an effect with a lot of historical evidence going for it). She manages the difficult and bravura passages with a certain solidity. Her specialty is, of course, a kind of vocal vamping that can be, as the occasion demands, quite affecting. My singer friends say that her technique is altogether faulty, but I'll leave the specialists to hassle that out. Perhaps the sliding up to notes, like the vibrato, is a kind of vocal defect; it sounds to me more like a mannered effect that one either digs or not. In a curious way, it is often the difficult things that she carries off with strength and aplomb, while the simple things are mannered. This is an excellently produced record with strong orchestral and vocal back-ups. E.S. RENATA TEBALDI: 18th Century Arias. Martini it Tedesco: Plaisir d'amour. Sarti: Lungi dal caro bene. Bononcini: Deh pia a me non Vascondete. Handel: Alcina: Verdi prati. Xerxes: Ombra mai fa. A. Scarlatti: Le Violette. Paisiello: La Molinara: Nel cor pill non mi sento. I Zingari in Fiera: Chi vuol la zin garella. Pergolesi: La Serva Padrona: Stizzo so, mio stizzoso. Pergolesi (attr.): Tre giorni son the Nina. Vivaldi: Piango, gemo, sospiro. Gluck: Alceste: Divinites du Styx. Paride ed Elena: O del mio dolce ardor. Renata Tebaldi (soprano); New Philharmonia Orchestra, Richard Bonynge cond. LONDON OS 26376 $6.98. Performance Fair to good Recording: Good This well-conceived sequence showcases Renata Tebaldi's current vocal estate to good advantage. Most of the music, set in comfortable keys that seldom call for singing above the staff, lies in the soprano's upper mid-range, still a source of smooth and velvety sounds. Her well-developed lower chest notes are also brought into play, at times quite effectively, at other times with exaggerations a la Horne. The inclusion of the Alceste aria, however, was a mistake, for its repeated B-flats do not come off and the whole treatment is effortful. The program contains some well-worn eighteenth-century staples, but a few surprises as well. Paisiello's "Chi vuol la zingarella" is quite delightful, and it is well sung. Miss Tebaldi realizes the comedy in Pergolesi's "Stizzoso, mio stizzoso" expertly, but over looks the fact that Paisiello's "Net cor piic non mi sento" is a comic aria too. She also rather overdramatizes Pergolesi's (?) tender Nina. The orchestral backgrounds--authentic in Handel and Gluck, otherwise arranged by Douglas Gamley based on manuscripts prob ably unearthed by the tireless Mr. Bonynge are effective, though the rapport between soprano and orchestra is not always ideal. GJ. Also see: |
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