Crsipy, precise, emotionally moving - trademark of Sondeckis' orchestras
356864
I am a  huge fan of Sondeckis' orchestras, because they present exceptional performances 30+ years: every detail is polished and spiritual content is always focused and emotionally moving. Maestro always selects the best soloists to work with. And we hear on this CD a brilliant performance by Gernot Winischhofer. Enjoy!

[...]
2577749
Some marriages are made in heaven, others in hell. At first sight the combination of the lush, impressionist, romantic, sensual and sentimental music of Ravel and the brisk, dry, accurate, ultra-modern conducting of Pierre Boulez might seem to be the latter. However, all brief summaries fail to some extent and fortunately Ravel is not just the former. He is also a magician of the orchestra and a master orchestrator. Whereas Boulez has not for nothing become one of the foremost interpreters of early 20th century French music. Boulez' conducting style is almost unique in music. Whereas most great conductors are able to subtly adjust the tempo of the music to suit the volume and intensity, Boulez almost invariably follows an almost strict tempo (please note the qualifications - this is no metronomic conductor),instead he relies on a very dramatic micro-variation of volume, which produces a kind of pulsating sound, unlike almost every other interpreter. He also has an extraordinary ear for sonority and this, when put together with the finest orchestra in the world, the Berlin Philharmonic, produces a sound of matchless quality. All of the pieces on this record, have important solo passages and the quality of the BPO in this respect cannot be overestimated.
  There are many fine pieces of music written for/about children. None finer than " Mother Goose". As a child I remember enjoying most "Tom Thumb" and "The Princess of the Pagodas" without knowing in the slightest who she was. Today it is "The Fairy Garden" I cannot listen to without emotion. This is surely the finest evocation of a child's view of heaven ever written. Mahler in the 4th Symphony isn't even close; maybe he wasn't really trying. If the previous movements had not been played with such meticulous attention to detail this final splurge of sound would not have been at all so effective. How to be modern and sentimental at the same time...
  The two pieces that follow, Une Barque sur l'cean and Alborada del Gracioso, A Boat on the Ocean and Dawn Song of a Clown, are both orchestrations of piano pieces. Messiaen said that the former was unorchestratable. Unorchestratable? Ravel? Nonsense. It's a mesmerizing piece, almost themeless but with endless subtle repetitions. I went into a trance listening to it. Maybe it's because I love sailing, but that boat never left my mind's eye for a second. Arpeggios? The way he did it he didn't need them. Apparently Ravel later rewrote it again. You have got ot be a perfectionist to do that. Alborada del Gracioso is pure Cervantes. The Fool's grandiose illusions are both silly and magnificent at the same time. Here Boulez uses his gift for dynamic contrast to ultimate effect. "Rapsodie espagnole" to some might be kitsch, but if you've never dreamed as a youngster of far away, beautiful places and impossibly beautiful (wo)men, well, I feel sorry for you. Impeccable playing. The habanera must be one of the sexiest pieces for orchestra ever written.

  The only piece I found at all disappointing was the Bolero itself.  Ravel's tempo marking is "moderato assai" ie. pretty steady. The danger is, if you allow it to become "allegro" you lose all the pent up tension and sexual energy that is stored up in the piece. Boulez just never gets this right and the result is, I'm sorry to say, forgettable. This is an easy piece to play badly, whereas often quite mediocre performers and conductors do it brilliantly. What is there to learn from that?
  I have heard enough on this record, however, to want to listen to more and if one day any enterprising record company does want to produce a Complete Orchestral Works of Maurice Ravel - his output is not vast and it surely deserves this - then I would like it to be this conductor and this orchestra. 5 stars.
2320369
You can guess from this review's title that it will be a rave. Until I heard Rorem's symphonies (also on Naxos) a couple of years ago, I had no idea that Ned Rorem could write so beautifully for orchestra. Well, I did know, too, because years ago there were recordings of some of his tone poems (String Symphony, Sunday Morning, Eagles -- Louis Lane, Atlanta Symphony) but that was long enough ago that it had slipped from memory.  Since hearing this CD I pulled them out and reveled in their beauty, too. On this disc we have two concerti that are entirely engaging, the Flute Concerto and the Violin Concerto, and for 'filler' another tone poem, 'Pilgrims' (for string orchestra).

Pride of place goes to the alluringly beautiful Flute Concerto. Written for and played here by the principal flutist of the Philadelphia Orchestra, Jeffrey Khaner, it is a collection of six movements that have little to do with classical concerto forms; Rorem himself says it could just as properly be called a suite (and the same applies to the Violin Concerto). Taking his inspiration partly from the flute music of the impressionists, particularly Debussy, we hear music of many moods. The separate movements have more or less arbitrary titles -- implying but not really outlining some sort of narrative. Rorem has said that no matter what kind of music he is writing he always has silent song lyrics in mind -- 'words that are not there' -- and this gives his music both a narrative feel and a rhapsodic construction. For me the two movements that I connected with most are 'Leaving-Traveling-Hoping' with its pastoral calm, and 'False Waltz' with its repeated timpani figure and skittering flute. (Interestingly, there is a movement in the violin concerto that also has a repetitive timp figure as a kind of chaconne bass.) Khaner, whose name I knew but whose solo work I didn't, is a nonpareil flutist. I particularly like that he doesn't have the fruity vibrato so commonly heard from European flutists. Still, he has numerous tone colors at his disposal; not an easy thing with an overtone-poor instrument like the flute. I am eager to hear more from him.

The Violin Concerto is from 1985 and has previously been recorded by Gidon Kremer, a recording I have not heard. Rather more expressionistic that the Flute Concerto, it too is a six-movement suite rather than a classic concerto. Phillippe Quint, whose recording of William Schuman's violin concerto I quite liked, is a marvelous advocate for this virtuosic work. Still, I am less struck by this concerto than the Flute Concerto, which I feel confident will enter the repertoire.

The 'filler' is Rorem's 1959 'Pilgrims' which doesn't refer to America's founding fathers but takes its title from a passage in Hebrews (11:13) and actually was prompted by a passage quoting that verse in Julien Green's novel 'Le voyageur sur la terre' (we will remember that Rorem lived in France a number of years and is an ardent Francophile). For string orchestra and lasting about seven minutes, it is elegiac and richly harmonized with much use of divisi strings.

The performances here could hardly be bettered. Jose Serebrier, who earlier recorded the three Rorem symphonies with the Bournemouth Symphony, conducts the excellent Royal Liverpool Philharmonic in idiomatic and persuasive accounts of this music. He also contributes the helpful booklet notes.

Enthusiastically recommended, particularly for the Flute Concerto.

Scott Morrison
977657
Believe or not, you will be exception witness of one of the most expressive and incisive versions you may get in the market.

Leopold Stowoski was so far to be an assiduous director in Mahler, but as you know there were a set of circumstances of fortunate circumstances that surrounded this special and unforgettable concert in Royal Albert Hall, London 30 July 1963.

The Allegro Maestoso is specially effective; the emotional tension, the dramatic agony; the redemption song after the introductory theme possesses that pastoral character so typical of Mahler where the sharp reflection and the autumnal memory seem to shake hands, that progressively reaches that affirmative brightness that reminds us so much the similar parallelism respect the last movement of the First symphony. Stokowski underlines  so brilliantly this bucolic feature, clearly precognitive anticipatory of the storm that gets near. The re exposition of the main theme is still much more tenebrous and dark, with the metals, winds and strings displaying all their retrospective fierceness of somber nostalgia, suggesting a nightmare alley without possible escape. The main theme reappears to remind us we must awake of the dreamy illusion; and now we must deal the death face to face.

The third movement is a dance with death; this macabre scherzo tinged of lugubrious poetry  is superbly underlined by Stokowski; he gets to extract the essential dramatic nucleus with austere elegance.

In the fourth movement we find the excel voice of Janet Baker in a true lullaby; and finally we have the center of gravity of this work; a chilling struggle between the death and the life, trough this admirable sequel of allusive themes as Dies Irae and homologue themes that announce the final victory, accompanied by jubilee songs and exultant bells and that would seem to reaffirm the triumph of life above the irreversibility of the death.

One of the most relevant musical documents in this famous director.
2088961
Lost in the obsession with 20th-century composers like Stravinsky, Schonberg, and Shostakovich is the fact that many smaller countries began producing distinguished musicians of their own. Suddenly Germans and Russians were joined at the forefront of the musical world by Danes (Rued Langgaard), Swedes (Hugo Alfven), Japanese (Koscak Yamada), and now, according to this sensational new Naxos disc, Greeks. This is one of the first releases in the record label's new Greek Classics series, and boy is the series promising! (It should be. Naxos was a Greek island before it was a record company.)

Manolis Kalomiris wrote in a wondrous blend of styles, with exotic eastern melody, absolutely brilliant orchestration, the rhythmic drive of Khachaturian, and a sound-world all his own. His "Triptychon" is a particularly impressive work; the central section, a funeral march, gets a bit repetitive at times, but works because of the extraordinary orchestral sound (I especially love the closing moments, when varied solo instruments begin to transfigure the main theme and add folk-style colors). The finale comes to a smashing climax, providing one of the biggest adrenalin rushes in all music.

The Symphony No. 3 is more modernist in stance, and employs an unusual device: at various points, a narrator recites poetry over the music. This could be strange, but narrator Nikitas Tsakiroglou (who's been a prominent Greek movie actor since the 1970s) has the perfect voice for the job, foreboding, touching, emotional, and just a little creepy. The music matches that mood.

The three Greek Dances are the most immediately appealing works, perhaps, since they are modeled on Dvorak's Slavonic Dances in style and are quite simple. They, too, are enjoyable, and the brief little poem that finishes the CD is a nice encore.

All told, an excellent disc of world premiere recordings. The Athens State Orchestra, which premiered "Triptychon" under the baton of the composer himself, plays superbly, and the sound quality is wonderful. Big climaxes (like in "Triptychon") come off marvelously, and generate real excitement. Give credit to conductor Byron Fidetzis, too, for a job very, very well done.

Highly recommended for anyone wishing to sample a unique voice from the 1930s and 1940s, and for anyone who wants to try out Greek classical music. My only fear is that, having heard this one, I'm going to be compulsively buying every new disc in this Greek Classics series. That could become an expensive - but highly enjoyable - habit.
1135876
Perhaps ultimately lacking in sheer heft (as produced by Dorati and his Hungarica on Decca) in the Dances of Galanta, the first class instrumentalists of the St Paul Chamber Orchestra more than compensate - especially in the winds (there's that lovely flute again!) and Hugh Wolff is yet again a sure footed and sensitive director with an unerring knack of finding the right tempo.

But above all it is the QUALITY of the acoustic and deeply satisfying beautiful TONE of this recording that sets it apart from others in the field. Please investigate the recently refurbished and state-of-the-art acoustically engineered Ordway Music Theater in Minnesota where this recording was made. What a glorious tribute to the privatised arts scene in the USA! Not that I am condoning it - Europe can do even better with its healthy state funding! And there are too many to list beautiful concert halls there which are just as good and much better. All the same....

Having just refurbished my four way tower floor standing loudspeakers this was champagne to my ears (and no doubt to the cones of the drivers) and I also found the programme split between Hungarian compatriots Kodaly and Bartok very very pleasing. It all works.

A wonderful unmissable addition to one's Kodaly or Bartok shelf.
1549693
Here is yet another superlative PentaTone release using somewhat unfamiliar forces. In this case, the fabulous Alexander Vedernikov is on the podium. I had not encountered his conducting before this disc. Glancing at Amazon's listings for this conductor, it appears he specializes in Russian operas and has also done some accompaniment work (Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich) and a smattering of ballet excerpts. I am mightily impressed here. He conducts with real Russian fire and passion - none of the homogenous, monotonous, anonymous orchestral mush that we typically hear nowadays from today's boring batch of conductors. Alexander Vedernikov has this stuff in his very blood.

This is a splendid collection of 3 ballet suites. They are so idiomatically, excitingly and gloriously played here by the fabulous Russian National Orchestra that the disc has whetted my appetite for some full-length ballet recordings from this team. This is absolutely not the olden days of those old, raw Melodiya recordings, yet this music-making is unmistakably, utterly Russian in flavor and passion - far more involving and energetic than we usually hear from U.S. and European orchestras, even those who have conductors with Russian roots but yet fail to bring a real Russian musical heritage to their music-making. (Kirill Karabits comes first to mind - he makes his Bournemouth Symphony sound about as Russian as Lawrence Welk.)

Add to this one of the most spectacular recordings I have yet heard from any source and you've got an incredible listening experience. Indeed, other record labels should take a listen to this to hear how you record a symphony orchestra. And I have a big tip for the folks at Reference Recordings: THIS is how you record a bass drum. The impact of its presence in the Death of Tybalt selection from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet is breathtaking - riveting, even. And yet, it never overwhelms the soundfield, it doesn't bloat or boom all over the place, nor does it drown out the entire orchestra like it does in Reference Recordings's latest batch of poor recordings in Kansas City (and elsewhere). No, this is a beautifully, fantastically, realistically reproduced bass drum sound including a well-defined percussive strike and the resultant soundwave filling the hall, just as it does when hearing it in a live concert. And it knocks your socks off. It's not supposed to knock dishes off their shelves, Reference Recordings. Just saying.

Ranting aside, I recommend and praise this disc so highly that I count it among the very best in my collection. And I believe over half of my top 10 recordings all come from PentaTone! It doesn't seem to matter in which hall they hang their microphones, they have got this process down to a science. I haven't enjoyed a disc this much since, well, since the last PentaTone disc I listened to.
2862160
I heard this extraordinary recording first, last week, on the original 78.  Yes, there is a higher than normal noise-floor but this fact should not deter one from listening to Pfitzner's startling, moving performance.  Pfitzner, somehow, finds an optimistic, liquid, and lyrical voice for this pre-holocaust performance that is neither maudlin nor didactic.  It is, instead, breath-taking in its sensitivity to Beethoven's sense of orchestral color.  In his rendering of nature, Pfitzner is emotional engaging for his tempos and lyricism.
I sincerely wonder if any post-holocaust conductor would dare imbibe of the innocence why reveling in the passion Beethoven's extraordinary symphony suggests.  This performance has caused me to re-think both how this symphony might be rendered as well as how we might recover Pfitzner's sense of lyrical optimism today.
763444
While arguments about what is the definitive recording of these works can be made, it goes without saying that this recording is of tremendous musical value. Even if I don't particularly like a tempo that Casadesus chooses (particularly the last movement of the Sonatine), the performance still remains marvelously musical and true to the composer. Much of the playing is quite thrilling actually (take Scarbo, for example). Jeux d'eau is gorgeous as is the Tombeau de Couperin. I believe the highlight of the set is the bonus addition of the Left Hand Concerto with Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra. Simply put...it is SPECTACULAR! Casadesus' command of the piano, as well as Ormandy's command of the orchestra, is masterful and moving. I highly recommend this set to anyone with a broad appreciation for musical interpretation.
2311810
Galuppi is known primarily for his operas. His entry into 'pure' instrumental music brings fascinating and somewhat unexpected results. Speaking generally, these concerti combine archaic compositional elements into a kind of Italianate 'sturm und drang' expressiveness. The harmony is constantly shifting and moving in unexpected and surprising directions in a manner that reminded me of C.P.E. Bach and his adventurous and creative works. What is especially neat about this is Galuppi's methods. He is expert at counterpoint, and uses imitative counterpoint throughout the music, giving it an austere and evocative character that is quite absorbing to the ear and mind. The craftsmanship and effort is superb and Galuppi clearly put serious effort into crafting music that would be lasting and admired by musicians as well as non performing music lovers.

The performing group, Ensemble il Falcone is adept enough and alert to the subtleties in the music. In music that has constant rising and falling motives, long phrases and complex harmonic schemes, it can be a severe challenge to remain alert to the logic that underpins and combines all of these complex elements and emerge with a cogent musical argument. The musicians rise to the occasion very well in these regards and are sympathetic to the force and spirit that makes this music unique and so interesting. I have to point out that this is one of those cases where 'original' instruments can sound edgy and acidic at times. You have to make allowances for this and adjust or it can become an impedement to fully enjoy the music. This is a sound and timbre issue only and generally only in the violin in the higher register. In the moments where the music becomes denser and all the players are more active, the edginess dissapates and the sound mellows very well. Those familiar with 'period' instrument recordings know that sound engineers and musicians have found ways to sound very sweet and light and for whatever reasons, this is not one of those results. Still, this music can be enjoyed greatly. It is up to the listener whether he can accept or adjust to the occasional acidic phrase. If this is not a problem then I would contend that this recording has much to give. Listen to the excerpts two or three times and to find out if the sound is ok for you.

The music lover who relishes Baroque and early Classical music that has real substance will find much to revel in here. If you are unfamiliar with shifting, unexpected harmonies and resolutions this music might be somewhat severe - this is not Pachelbel's canon. Also check out the sound samples to hear the period instruments in their different ranges and combinations because it can be challenging. So with those mild caveats out of the way, I strongly recommend this very creative and interesting result of Galuppi's step away from opera and into pure music.
3361970
This isn't just the umpteenth recording of the Sibelius Cto., nor is it a case of another international virtuoso ticking off another box in his discography. Frank Peter Zimmermann puts an unusual stamp on the work, because he is in his way quite literal. Like Heifetz, he resists the romantic overtones of Sibelius's post-Tchaikovsky idiom. Instead of emoting, zimmermann plays the notes almost as cleanly as he might play Bach, but with real sensitivity in the phrasing -- Romanticism enters in as a warm atmosphere but not as big gestures. The playing is still big in scale, and when Sibelius wants an aching outpouring, Zimmermann delivers it, but in between he returns to  quieter emotional plane. What I like is that tis plane is mysterious, foreshadowing the less romantic, more enigmatic and mystical side of the composer that would come out in the symphonies after the First.

The Helsinki Phil. must be heartedly tired of this work, but they don't show it. Conductor  conductor John Storgards, who is Finnish, 46, and himself a violinist,  stays in line with his soloist, providing a restrained but expressive accompaniment. Frankly, I am tired of the Sibelius Concerto, so this change of pace was very refreshing. It's often as crisp as the Heifetz but less chilly and laser-focused.

 As for the fillers, they are just as long taken together as the main work. The Bard was composed in 1913, ten years after the concerto, and is eight minutes long. Evocative, hushed chords introduce a bardic harp in rippling arpeggios rather than a leading melody. I take Sibelius's incidental music with a grain of salt -- there are too many duds -- but this miniature tone poem, like its big brother En Saga, weaves an indefinable spell, all the more cryptic for seeming to be made up of fragments blown on the wind. I was very glad to make its acquaintance, especially with Ondine's lovely transparent sound.

By comparison, the Wood Nymph is a sizable tone poem (24 min.) dating from 1895, three years after the young composer became a national hero with his epic Kullervo Symphony.  In his maturity Sibelius grew skeptical of is output form that era -- he suppressed Kullervo in his lifetime. The musical idiom is episodic and melodious, akin to Dvorak's late symphonic poems, and the tale upon which it is based reminds one of Mahler's enchanted forest in Das Klagende Lied and Bartok's Wooden Prince.  It concerns "the adventures of the hero Bjrn in the forest, where evil dwarfs are carrying out their malicious schemes and a curvaceous wood nymph lures Bjrn into making love to her. The spell he is under cannot be broken: Bjrn can no longer love his wife. Nor does he feel like working. He dies alone and full of yearning." To me, the level of musical interest is about the same as in Karelia--both contain a striking march. A loose-limbed, sprawling ramble brings by events evocative of storms, magic, and Nature.

Sibelius conducted The Wood Nymph often but kept it in manuscript rather than publishing it.  It wasn't until the 1990s that the music was rediscovered and found to be emotionally charged and exciting. This new reading is beautifully recorded and leads me to eat my words. Sibelius incidental music can be very rewarding at times, and although we hear little of the mature composer, this tone poem would please any concert audience.
1870532
I found the American orchestra slightly synthesized where as the London recording has a wonderfully classical orchestration that fits the piece to the tea.  The numbers flow from one to the other without any detectable breaks.  As others before have said, I find the whole piece more operatic than musical theatre.  I imagine that opera companies will take to performing Passion like they've done with Sweeney Todd and A Little Night Music.  His composing ability is at its top form comparable to any modern classical composer.

I do challenge the people who say the musical contains no songs to look deeper than the surface.  There is the Love that Flies duet, I Read solo, I wish I could forget you, and Happiness.  Everything, the song, the dialogue, and the music, is about the scene.  The craft of construction is more Wagnerian than pop like your Stephen Schwartzes (who I like by the way).  Each is crafted with beautiful melodies that twist the subtle changes in lyrics.  As an example "just another love story that's what they would claim" to "Just a simple love story needn't end the same" (probably misquoting, but you get the idea).  Georgio with the same theme makes an about face in his concept of love.  Sondheim has used his lyrics extremely well in revisiting the same melodies with new shading completely changing the meaning.  The desperation and pain in Fosca with the first statement of the melody is restated by Georgio as his desperation and pain toward the end of the musical.  The king of lyricists, he remains strong and firm with scepter in hand.

I found that the London cast tends to act more and read lines less.  Some of the scenes on the Broadway recording sounded read as opposed to really acting the musical.  Maria Friedman's voice is rough and dispirit while singing and husky while speaking.  I believe it works well for the tragic Fosca.  Michael Ball, clearly the star of this recording whether you are listening or just looking at the cover, dominates the recording with vocal power.  Jere Shea's Georgio is a wilting flower compared to Ball and his force of will.  He is no victim in this recording.  Helen Hobson has a nice soprano voice, a good contrast to Friedman's, but sinks into the background in this recording.  I read once, as said by the director of the Kennedy Center's production of Passion in 2003, that the musical requires a balance between the three leads.  He said Donna Murphy so wonderful in her performance destroyed the Broadway production because she overshadowed the other performers.  That is why I don't find the dueling divas in this production distressing.  It is the conflict between Georgio and his choice of Clara or Fosca.  I am not sure what Hobson could have done to be more prominent, but she does a good job in the recording.

 The first time I listened to this musical I hated it.  I didn't get it.  It wasn't until the third time I listened to it; I actually began to enjoy the skill and craftsmanship.  Passion is not a passive musical it requires active listening.  Now I think it is wonderful and endearing.
3734637
John Bucchino's music has among its superlative qualities one that is remarkably rare in theater music and classical music alike:  it is seemlessly organic; matching sound and rhythm to word and idea. The music draws you in and holds you entranced ultimately lifting you up to the realizations about your own life.  Throughout this album the listener is exposed to a level of craft that brings to mind composers like George Gershwin.  The result is that the songs' emotions hit home, breaking down the barrier between singer and listener, and invariably giving good cause for introspection.  Throughout the piece, which was created from material written by Mr. Bucchino over the last several decades, the listener feels like they get to know these five singers from the different ways that they deal with feelings that are familiar to each of us.  The material in the songs is derived directly from the composers' life and consequently they are more warmly personal than almost anyone writing songs today.  The composer's own extraordinary and indiosyncratic pianism delights the ears with sumtuous textures that only add another level of sophistication.
2067934
This is yet another example of Jarvi conducting at his uninhibited and vibrant best supported by equally vibrant and trenchant orchestral playing, especially the brass, and all caught superbly well by the typically open and clear Chandos sound.

As an interpretation I feel that it is a viable alternative to the excellent but more sober account by Haitink which I have also enjoyed since it was first issued years ago. Jarvi offers more sonic thrills but maybe at the expense of some expressive depth plumbed by Haitink. The two scherzi are really quite different in their effect here for example. Kurt Sanderling offers rather a dour but effective alternative too but this will not be to all tastes - rather a specialist interest and an astonishingly slow ending. Certainly no jollity there.

For me a crucial moment to consider is the speed of the final few bars which should not be a jolly romp home, a point that Shostakovich himself made clear. For that reason I would personally discount Previn and Bernstein.

There is a very good DVD/Blu-ray version with the BPO on EuroArts as well which manages to tick just about all the boxes.

In the end I still find Jarvi among the most satisfactory with thrilling playing and thrilling sound and with that steady speed for the ending. The suite from The Bolt makes a generous extra item with varied music ranging from the industrially aggressive to the humorous. The actual ballet is not in the least humorous.
40157
Well, I think Pope Music has pretty much gone under, but not before the company managed to give us several CD's of excellently recorded music.  Here is included a stunning performance of Rodion Shchedrin's famous modern Carmen Ballet, based on the equally famous older Carmen music by Bizet, but somehow resulting in more than just an arrangement.  Shchedrin's incisive orchestrating skills make your ears sit up and listen to all the Bizet melodies anew.  The presence of a large percussion battery, always deployed with great subtltey and musical perceptiveness, probably helps get aural focus.  Completing the CD is a rarely heard ballet suite, number 5, from the Bolt music that Shostakovich composed. The composer put together this suite of music from various separate industrial ballet music that he wrote in the 1930's, more or less to Soviet aparatchik order.  Next to the brilliance of the Shchedrin Carmen Ballet, this suite may seem - lesser.  It is typical Shostakovich, but even in its minority it reflects that composer's sheer genius for making Soviet musical surfaces tell, or at least hint at, deeper truths silenced to the shadows of that bygone era.  Given the recent political hijinks in some former Soviet republics, we might even wonder whether or not this Bolt Suite still stands as soundtrack for what is happening in this era.

No discussion of this CD can omit sound.  Using custom electronics, Pope Music said it was making real efforts to fine tune its recording art.  Judged by this CD, the folks were getting it very right.  The Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory is a marvelous acoustic when an engineer captures it as well as this CD does.  The dynamic range is quite extended, suggesting 24-bit mastering, rather than just the red book 16 bits.  Or maybe it is some other aspect of the former Pope Music alchemy.  The dynamic range is almost too great, from pppp to FFFF.  The frequency response is lacking nothing.  Yes, all the highs and lows are there, but so is a sweet, warm middle - which after all is the heart and soul of our musical spectrums.

The Russian State Symphony Orchestra is actually a Youth orchestra.  If they are the future of Russian symphony rosters, we can look forward to decades of absolutely stunning, alert playing with almost super-human sheen and presence.  These youth players are doing every bit as well as the famous virtuoso Russian National Orchestra that has taken shape under Pletnev and other leaders.  Mark Gorenstein doesn't conduct much in North America, but while he favors a tad more deliberate tempos, he always has something interesting in mind that he wants to do with the extra air, yielding a typically transparent orchestra fabric, along with plenty of instrumental detail. Feel free to check out the similar Pope Music recordings of the Tchaikovsky Sixth  Symphony (on a CD titled, Farewell), and the Shostakovich Fifth Symphony (on a CD titled Redemption).  Both the Tchaikovsky 6 and the Shostakovich 5 more than hold their own against some very stiff competition, with even more famous brand name performers.  Part of this excellence may simply be that the youth orchestra players are not yet bored to tears with these warhorses of the classical repertoire.  Like the JDP recordings of the Mahler 5 & Mahler 10 under Barshai, these kids make you believe in the music all over again.  I even enjoyed the Richard Strauss Heldenleben, although Gorenstein takes it at a very broad tempo, indeed, rather like an older outstanding CD when Sir John Barbirolli and the LSO did it.

This is demo quality stuff, no doubt about it.  You probably will not be sorry to get hold of it, before it disappears completely from even the used CD marketplaces.
2505992
The original recordings are revealed for the fine achievements they were: beautifully balanced, clear and vivid:  the sound of the bass drum in Nightride and Sunrise couldn't be more spine-tingling in modern full-digital Technicolor, but it doesn't stand out unnaturally either.

Collins is a first-rate musical landscape-painter. He doesn't just give us the bold sweeping brush-strokes, important as they are; he shows how the landscapes team with minute life. Rustling string textures aren't blandly homogenized-tiny details catch the ear, and then vanish again. Woodwind bird calls or horn calls can be acutely expressive-some passages remind me of Sibelius's comments about quasi-human voices in the nature sounds around his forest-home. But exaggeration is alien to the Collins approach. Nothing is forced, almost everything is fresh and vital.

In fact the insight Collins offers often derives from nothing more than taking Sibelius at his word-e.g., holding to the tempo as the finale theme emerges from the scherzo triplets in the last movement of the Third Symphony.  It isn't only in the symphonies that the Collins touch is refreshing. Pohjola's Daughter comes to life as effectively as the symphonies, and this disc contains a real rarity, an entirely satisfactory Nightride and Sunrise.
3785025
You have to hand it over to Rattle and his Berliners that they'll always make for wonderful accompanists, in large part because they're never content to merely accompany.  Sarah Chang is in for more than good playing; she's in for the most exquisite of sounds coming from an orchestra whose playing will easily outshine that of a soloist.  I think Chang meets the challenge fairly well.  She plays with conviction, with a mastery of her scores that proves she's earned her place in front of the Berliners.

The Shostakovich Concerto No. 1 is a restless work that can easily come across as a bunch of disconnected emotions.  I feel that Chang and Rattle do a fine job, although I think they could have given more.  Certainly their playing is enough to send you out of this world, with super sonics from EMI.  While I don't think the concerto asks for its interpreters to sound overly confident, one can ask for sense to be made out of the piece.  It needs to point somewhere, even when the music is tossing and turning.  Both Chang and Rattle master the individual moments with the utmost of clarity, but I desire more clear direction.  That's not to say that the music gets out of hand.  In fact, I can sense reticence, which isn't a blessing in a piece that asks for the musicians' all.  The opening Nocturne sounds a bit aimless; the Scherzo is biting and tense, but still emotionally vague.  But in the Passacaglia, Rattle and Chang stop trying to hide their feelings.  For the first time in the concerto, I wonder if I'll need my handkerchief.  It is unbearably sad, both Chang and Rattle striking the very depths of our souls.  Present is the vision I felt was lacking in the two proceeding movements.  Chang plays the Cadenza impeccably, unleashing anguish and hope all at once.  In the Burlesque, Rattle finally lets loose, allowing humor and dashing spirits to come on the scene.  Pure joy and fun never take over, but I think that was Shostakovich's intention.  In the end, I feel that the 1st half of the concerto is a bit too superficial, but my complaints in the 2nd half are very small.  Perhaps the aimlessness in the opening half was intentional.  Either way, my criticisms are immaterial, and I still get a lot out of this unique performance.

I'm not moved by the Prokofiev Concerto as much as the Shostakovich, but Chang and Rattle certainly play it very well.  Sometimes I sense the same reticence that was present in the Shostakovich; Rattle in particular seems to want to linger, and he doesn't have much drive.  But is this approach suited to the piece?  Certainly this is not a concerto to raise the roof.  Right now I find myself fence sitting.  Do Rattle and Chang master the work, or do they lack some of the same vision they did in the Shostakovich?  Before I can clearly answer the question, I'll have to figure the piece itself out.  I'll keep listening and see what happens.  What is not to be questioned is the accuracy of this performance, one that will ravish your ears with wonderful details.

In closing, this is a fine disc.  Chang proves herself to be a violinist of the first rank and Rattle continues to prove that his orchestra is capable of things that were before thought impossible.  The absence of direction subtracts some from the enjoyment of the disc, but is still worth hearing.  I'm not regretting my purchase of it and I look forward to the years of listening that are ahead.