del 9/95 - Sony 7/95 pop cat
Includes work(s) by Sergei Prokofiev. Ensembles: New York Philharmonic Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra. Conductors: Leonard Bernstein, Eugene Ormandy.

Includes work(s) by Sergei Rachmaninov. Ensemble: Philadelphia Orchestra. Conductor: Eugene Ormandy. Soloists: Philippe Entremont, Gary Graffman.

Includes work(s) for orchestra by various composers.

ORIGINAL RAGTIME CLAUDE BOLLI

BALLET GREATEST HITS I ORMAND

MAHLER: SYMPHONY NO 3, KINDERT

Perahia's playing is wonderfully poetic, the rubato so natural, so unmannered, so poised.

This is just the performance for anyone who normally criticizes Chopin's youthful E minor Concerto as vapid note-spinning. What struck me first was the strength of Murray Perahia's characterization throughout, realized with fingers as strong as they are fluid and gleaming. On the HMV/Pollini/Kletzki version the customary Allegro maestoso heading to the first movement is followed by the word risoluto, and it is that quality, i.e. resolution, that I think Perahia emphasizes even more than Pollini or Zimerman (DG), not least in the strongly accented and ardently urgent development section (incidentally so much speed is gained in the excitement that there is an uncomfortably abrupt gear-change at the orchestral start to the recapitulation). That said, let me hasten to add that the first movement's lyricism, like that of the central Romanze (an orchestrally accompanied nocturne), is wonderfully poetic too. The rubato is so natural, so unmannered, so poised. The finale's teasing charm is conveyed without a trace of archness. Its coda, like that to the first movement, is bursting with brio.

– Joan Chissell, Gramophone [6/1981], reviewing the concerto on LP

NIELSEN: SYMPHONY NO 1, LITTLE

"Feltsman's stakes a claim as one of the finest 'central' recordings of the Liszt Sonata. He is helped in this by one of the finest piano recordings I have heard from CBS. Given that his insight into lyrical and mysterious paragraphs surpasses Ousset's, that would seem to confirm his superiority. But it has to be said that every now and again he momentarily sacrifices dramatic continuity by mannered delays (track 1 at 1'21'', track 3 at 1'35'' and 2'23'') or softenings (track 3 from 3'20'' and at 7'27'')—the last of these seriously undermines what should be the most overwhelming climax of all. I mention these things not to dissuade anyone from hearing what I am convinced is one of the finest Liszt Sonatas on record, but just as a caution that is only one of the finest. In their own very different ways Brendel and Richter offer experiences of transcendence which Feltsman does not, or does not yet, reach out for. And Peter Donohoe on his recent EMI recording carries the listener through dramatic paragraphs with a far-sightedness Feltsman has yet to learn (Donohoe's cantabile is no match for Feltsman's though).

The remainder of Feltsman's recital is every bit as fine. The Petrarch Sonnets are exquisitely done, drawing the listener in by the power of their dreamily evocative lyricism. Incidentally, the gap of eight seconds between the last note of the Sonata and the first of the Petrarch Sonnets is quite inadequate. Just occasionally there are signs of the same premature easing-off which affects the late stages of the Sonata, and there is one textual reading—B flats from 1'47'' to 1'52'' in ''Sonetto 47''—which seems to me highly implausible. For a truly visionary account of ''St Francis preaching to the birds'' Lisztians must hunt down Ervin Nyiregyhazi's LP recording on International Piano Archives (IPA111); but Feltsman is still wonderfully eloquent. This is surely the finest of his recordings to date and it deserves to be widely heard."

-- Gramophone [5/1990]

This recording features the cast of the 1988 Lincoln Center production of this operetta.

Includes song texts in German, French, and English.

STRAUSS: SINFONIA DOMESTICA, B

An unusually intriguing program. There is no better wind band curtain-raiser than Vaughan Williams's Toccata marziale, and his Variations for brass is from his 'autumn' years, boldly harmonized and dark hued.

Telarc may well have spoiled us forever with their exceptional recordings of this marvellous band. CBS miss something of the bloom, the ripeness and range of the sonorities with their tighter and drier imaging. But it's a harsh comparison on which to start and I wouldn't want to discourage you from investigating an unusually intriguing programme. There is, of course, no better wind band curtain-raiser than Vaughan Williams's Toccata marziale, a classic of its kind, despatched here with all due regimental swagger, but I have returned already to Donald Hunsberger's expanded scoring of the richly inventive Variations for brass band. Here's a piece from Vaughan Williams's 'autumn' years, boldly harmonized and dark hued, bearing something of Percy Grainger's celtic bleakness in its moments of solitude. The low brasses are generously accommodated (and tellingly supported here by string bass and harp), there are piccolo trumpets and flugelhorns, indeed the whole gamut of possibility on offer from the contemporary American wind band. This is a beautifully made scoring from one who plainly knows his forces from the inside.

For the rest, we've the baby brother of Hindemith's Symphony for concert band—his earlier Konzertmusik for wind: an edgy, slightly sinister mix of poker-faced military gestures and an almost enforced Weillian jazziness shot through with Hindemith's dry, characteristically academic counterpoints. Each to his own. Karel Husa's Music for Prague 1968 is essentially a dramatic colour piece, a cry from the heart for a lost homeland, full of obvious Nationalistic symbols: a recurrent bird-call (symbol of liberty), an old Hussite war-song (symbol of resistance), feverish climaxes built upon fanfares of distress, bells of alarm and victory remembered from the ancient Czech capital's countless church towers. What counts here is impact, visceral impact, and Husa's musical engineering is entirely geared to just that.

-- Gramophone [11/1989]

Salonen shows nobility and dignity in this eloquent performance of Nielsen.

...In all three pieces [Esa-Pekka Salonen] gets very responsive playing from the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra... [I]t is a pleasure to welcome the present well-characterized performance... I rather like Salonen's youthful, impulsive opening [to The Four Temperaments], which plunges us straight into the action, breathless with anger. It is brisker than the rival versions from Chung and Ole Schmidt... Even if he could afford to give himself more space (and he does steady himself a little later), he captures the choleric character perfectly. He also gives an idiomatic account of the second movement, a lazy waltz-movement portraying a phlegmatic youngster without any apparent care in the world... The most impressive of the four, however, is the melancholic where Salonen shows both nobility and dignity, and secures eloquent and expressive playing from the orchestra... [T]his is without doubt the best thought-out reading of the [Nielsen] cycle and the Stockholm orchestra responds with real enthusiasm... Pan and Syrinx is atmospheric... [T]he Aladdin Suite is imaginatively done and the orchestral playing is excellent. Salonen gets a silky, sensuous quality from the strings and the wind playing is sensitive too. It strikes me as every bit as good as and often superior to Myung-Whun Chung and the Gothenburg orchestra... This issue deserves a warm welcome...

-- Robert Layton, Gramophone [2/1990]

POULENC: COMPLETE MUSIC FOR SO