Also available on Blu-ray

Recorded live at the Gwandhaus in 2018, this excellent program from the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig and their conductor Andris Nelsons features Tchaikovsky’s Symphonies Nos. 4, 5, and 6, as well as works by Mozart, Mussorgsky, Shostakovich, and Weinberg, making for a thrilling and well-rounded programme. Andris Nelsons is Music Director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Gewandhauskapellmeister of the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig. These two positions, in addition to his leadership of a pioneering alliance between both institutions, have firmly established Grammy Award-winning Nelsons as one of the most renowned and innovative conductors on the international scene today. “Andris Nelsons conducted with concise focus and vigor and elicited the orchestra both tonal beauty and technical precision and visible enthusiasm.” (THE BOSTON GLOBE)

 

REVIEW:

 

Tchaikovsky’s “Pathétique” shows a dynamic use of tempo: In general, the fast music is very fast, the slow music quite slow, and Nelsons speeds up and slows down as the mood of the music changes. The first movement has lovely woodwind solos, particularly the important ones for clarinet. There is fine attention to dynamics, particularly in the second and fourth movements. The ending disappears into silence, and the hall remains silent for what seems like an impossible length of time before finally erupting into applause.

 

Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony is a fairly standard reading, although there is lots of rubato and expressive use of tempo modifications. The first movement is exciting; the second-movement horn solo is excellent.

 

This all-Russian concert concludes with Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony. Nelsons’s approach is similar to the way he conducts the Fifth: standard tempos which are modified according to the nature of the passage; rhythmic precision, notably in the difficult development section of the first movement; and, no funny business like a huge ritardando or unwritten pause in the coda. The second movement is effective at a rather slow tempo, with excellent dynamics. The Scherzo is fast and virtuosic, the Finale energetic.

– Fanfare

Alexandra Dariescu makes her concerto debut with Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No. 1 with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Alexandra Dariescu has garnered an impressive reputation for her outstanding solo recordings and concert performances and was recently named as one of 30 pianists under 30 destined for a spectacular career in the International Piano Magazine.

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Also available on standard DVD

Three romantic heroes each with a solitary destiny: Tatiana, a Romanesque young woman seeking absolution, Onegin, a distant dandy hiding emptiness under affected haughtiness, and Lenski, abandoned by his literary idol. Between these three, barren affections presage the inexorable social ruin. All the resources of the Bolshoi Theatre of Moscow are brought to bear to ensure this opera performance is exceptional evening of theatre and song: a vocal line-up of the highest order with notably the baritone Mariusz Kwiecien and the Bolshoi Orchestra and Chorus conducted by Alexander Vedernikov. With a stage setting as sombre as it is effective - a great dining table appears in the middle of a salon - the director Dmitri Tcherniakov separates two different worlds and lends the drama a clarity rarely reached. The exceptional quality of this production, and the great success encountered by its first edition, inevitably led to the remastering in high-definition of this program to celebrate the 10th anniversary of its original release.

ITALY


 


The Places


Our tour of Italy stars in Verona, with its reminiscences of Romeo and Juliet. Then to Florence, for some 300 years, from 1434, the seat of the powerful Medici family, whose artistic patronage has left an impressive cultural legacy. The tour ends in the south, with Naples, originally a Greek colony and later a Roman port, and then capital of a kingdom, ruled by Normans and later from Spain. Briefly a Habsburg possession, from 1734 it belonged to the Bourbons, before the unification of Italy in 1860.


 


The Music


Tchaikovsky stayed in Florence on two occasions in 1878, after the disaster of his marriage, hastily contracted, had led him to seek respite abroad. A visit to Rome in 1880 led to the composition of the Italian Capriccio and his opera The Queen of Spades was written in 1890 in Florence, recalled in the same year in his Souvenir de Florence. The other music heard here is the Fantasy Overture, Romeo and Juliet, written in 1869 and based on Shakespeare's play, set in Verona.


 


Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: Dolby Digital / DTS Surround
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Running time: 72 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

There have been many recordings of the three great Tchaikovsky ballets by the same conductor, and Slatkin’s recordings typically get overlooked in any discussion of them. This is a pity, because his versions are uniformly superb, beautifully engineered, and wholly idiomatic. Is it because no one regards the Saint Louis Symphony as the major orchestra it is? Is it Slatkin himself, a splendid conductor who hasn’t ever gotten the respect he surely deserves based on the excellence of his discography? I don’t know and I don’t care. Now you can get all three ballets in this budget box, and even if you have other performances in your collection, you’d be foolish not to listen.

Each of these performances has outstanding features. The Nutcracker reveals Slatkin’s deft hand with Tchaikovsky’s most colorful score, and evokes a genuine fairytale atmosphere. The big transformation scene in act one really glitters, while the famous dances in act two have all the necessary energy and character. Sleeping Beauty, the greatest ballet of the three, if not necessarily the most popular, has plenty of the requisite drama and lyrical impetus plus that genuine, hard to define, balletic lilt, while Swan Lake simply has never been better done. Check out Slatkin’s handling of the finale, with its intelligent treatment of Tchaikovsky’s ridiculously overscored percussion parts (sound clip). Has the music ever sounded clearer and more honestly triumphant? I don’t think so. Get this.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

"The gem of this disc is the Wieniawski concerto, with which Heifetz not only created a sensation on his American debut at the age of 16 but which he was the first to record. A virtuoso work par excellence, it affords him infinite opportunities to display his phenomenal brilliance, impeccable intonation and (in the Romanze) beautiful phrasing and soulfully emotional tone—which, as all violinists observe with fascination, owes much to his individual fingerings. The tuttis in this work have been somewhat cut, but that is of little consequence in a purely solo vehicle like this. The perfection of his rapid spiccato bowing in the finale is enough to make mere mortal string players despair. The recording still sounds well after nearly 40 years."

-- Lionel Salter, Gramophone [11/1992]

Past praise for some of the recordings that make up this set:

Symphony No 1, The Nutcracker Suite
Abbado's Adagio begins mysteriously, but soon becomes rapturous in a way that belies its subtitle, “Land of gloom, land of mists.“ The scherzo is not particularly playful—perhaps the fault is Tchaikovsky's, but I think a lighter approach, which I heard in Thomas and hear in Mariss Jansons's recording, would have helped this movement. The last movement is impressive in its breadth, and in the lovely sound that Abbado gets from his orchestra. I find Abbado's Nutcracker Suite delightful. I find almost any Nutcracker Suite delightful. This one is exquisitely played and recorded. Abbado approaches these pieces with exuberance and fervor, and the recording brings out the full range of his orchestra, including the sweeping accompanying figures in the March.

– Michael Ullman, Fanfare

Symphony No 2, The Tempest
In every detail—pacing, shaping, instrumental balance—Abbado and the sumptuous-sounding orchestra bring us a marvelous realization of the exhilarating Second Symphony. I don't know of a more detailed—yet spontaneous-sounding—performance, every section of each movement flowing with a wonderful sense of continuity, with fresh, pointed, refined phrasing from the solo winds and with a rich, glowing sound from the strings.

The Tempest is a fine piece deserving more frequent performances. Again, Abbado and the virtuosic orchestra are compelling, with some especially imposing playing from the brass.

– Howard Kornblum, Fanfare

Symphony No 3, 1812 Overture
Abbado shapes and paces the music with great effect. Abbado gives us a sharply contoured, rousing version of the 1812, culminating in the now requisite display of high-caliber ordnance.

– Howard Kornblum, Fanfare

Symphony No 4
Abbado's Tchaikovsky Fourth is one of the outstanding recordings of recent years.

– Don C. Seibert, Fanfare

Symphony No 5
Here is a first-rate Tchaikovsky Fifth, most notable for its vigorous, forthright sense of continuity and its razor-sharp orchestral playing. Abbado's pacing is on the quick side for the most part, and his shaping of the music is unswervingly straightforward, producing from the orchestra alert, urgent, ardent, tonally suave playing, with the brass especially robust, sonorous, and cleanly articulated.

– Howard Kornblum, Fanfare

The incomparable Siberian baritone Dmitri Hvorostovsky — best known for his Verdi roles — is joined by rising star soprano Asmik Grigorian and other notable singers in a gripping album of Russian arias and scenes that marks his return to the operatic masterpieces of his homeland.

-----

REVIEW:

There is much to enjoy here. The magical opening from Prokofiev’s War and Peace finds him in terrific form, moving from dejection to hope as he overhears Natasha sing of her joy in life.

This is followed by excerpts from Tchaikovsky’s Mazeppa and Iolanta. More intriguing are two arias from Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades. Hvorostovsky, 53, made his Metropolitan Opera debut in that work in 1995 as the lovesick Prince Yeletsky, but here he takes on the role of the brash, cynical Count Tomsky, with invigorating results.

Best is the finale of The Demon by Anton Rubinstein. With its long melodic lines, the music is particularly well-suited to Hvorostovsky’s talents.

– AP (Mike Silverman)

Also available on Blu-ray

John Cranko’s mastery of the art of the pas de deux finds its climax in Onegin, one of the most successful full length ballets of the 20th century. Set to sweeping music by Tchaikovsky, it tells Alexander Pushkin’s tragic love story of the world-weary aristocrat Onegin and the naïve country girl Tatiana in a superbly nuanced way. Featuring world stars Friedemann Vogel and Alicia Amatriain, this production is a must for all lovers of dramatic – and romantic – ballets. With Onegin, John Cranko secured his place in the pantheon of great 20th century choreographers. He created the three act work for the Stuttgart Ballet – of which he was Director – in 1965 and revised the ballet two years later. Over the last 50 years, the ballet has entered the repertoire of almost every leading ballet company in the world, including the Paris Opera Ballet, the Royal Ballet in London, the Bolshoi Ballet, the Ballet of the Teatro alla Scala and the American Ballet Theatre. Friedemann Vogel and Alicia Amatriain – the leading couple of the Stuttgart Ballet who have been showered with international prizes and accolades demonstrate here why they are deemed the elite of the dance world. But it is legendary Marcia Haydee who creates the night’s special magic: Once Cranko chose her to be the very first Tatiana, now she guest stars as nurse; the close bonds between Haydee and the ensemble are palpable throughout and it is a truly touching moment when the original Tatiana meets the current one.“Onegin is the perfect Ballet” (Marcia Haydée) “Onegin is so good, that it can easily hold its own against any Broadway show!” (Newsday)

BERNSTEIN FAVORITES- TCHAIKOVS

RUSSIA The Places
Our visit starts in Moscow, with the Kremlin, the famous Conservatory of Music and the Tretyakov Art Gallery, with its unrivalled collection of Russian paintings. We see the splendour of some of the Metro stations in St Petersburg and much of the winter landscape in Moscow and in St Petersburg. We end with commemoration of Napoleon’s defeat in 1812 and his retreat from Moscow during a bitter winter.

The Music
Tchaikovsky’s disastrous marriage to an infatuated admirer in July 1877 ended after just a few weeks, when he left for his brother-in-law’s estate at Kamenka to escape from a wife to whom he had taken an invincible aversion. By the end of September, after attempted suicide, his marriage was at an end, and in October he left Russia to find relief in travel. In these extraordinary circumstances he nevertheless continued to work on the fourth of his six symphonies, completing it in early January 1878. Its first performance was given six weeks later in Moscow under the direction of Nikolay Rubinstein, attended by his new patroness Nadezhda von Meck, to whom it was dedicated, but in the composer’s absence.

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: PCM Stereo 2.0
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Running time: 60 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

The Muscovite Alexander Tchaikovsky (b. 1946) – nephew of Boris Tchaikovsky but no relative to Pyotr Ilich – is one of the most highly respected composers at work in Russia today, and yet his music has had little exposure to western audiences. His symphonic style owes something to that of his uncle: it likewise patiently develops enormous power over large expanses of sound, although there is also room for gently ironic touches of nostalgia – an inheritance, perhaps, from his uncle’s teacher, Shostakovich. The monumental Third Symphony (1995–2002), scored for a huge orchestra, is infused with dance rhythms: it uses material from an abandoned ballet based on Dostoyevsky’s The Devils. The Seventh Symphony is very much a work de nos jours: Tchaikovsky composed it during the Covid-19 pandemic, scored it for a socially distanced orchestra of strings, percussion and piano – at which point, as he writes, ‘the virus then took revenge’, and he fell ill himself. The message of the work is clear, as the turmoil of the first movement gives way to a message of hope in the second.

Witold Rowicki, one of Poland’s most important conductors of the 20th century and leading figure of his generation, is internationally known especially for the complete recording of Dvorák’s symphonies with the London Symphony Orchestra as well as for his impulsive Tchaikovsky performances. In his native country he was admired as the conductor to whom Witold Lutoslawski dedicated his brilliant Concerto for orchestra and who strongly promoted the music of his compatriots. The Tchaikovsky studio recordings presented here were made in 1962 (Fifth Symphony) and 1969 (Sixth Symphony) with the Südwestfunk Symphony Orchestra and in 1979 (Nutcracker Suite) with the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra. Rowicki had many other appearances with German orchestras, each of them enthusiastically greeted by the press and the public.

REVIEW:

Witold Rowicki was surely Poland’s ‘number one’ conductor in the second half of the 20th century, a fascinating musician not to be underrated, who always had plenty to tell us about whatever repertoire he tackled.

What a pity that Rowicki didn’t tackle the Nutcracker Suite in the studio. Well, happily SWR has come up with an all-Tchaikovsky double-pack featuring that very suite (with the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra, 1979) in addition to Symphonies Nos. 5 and 6, both with the SWR Symphony Orchestra.

The suite’s highlights are surely the incisive, super-swift Overture and a ‘Waltz of the Flowers’ that is elegant, unhurried and precise. Both the suite and the Pathétique are offered in reasonably good stereo sound, the symphony volatile in the extreme, the initial statement of the first movement’s secondary theme free and rhapsodic, the Allegro molto vivace third movement broadening near the close before speeding up again, the finale charged with emotion.

The Fifth (1962) is heavier, the transition to the second idea very emphatic, the Andante cantabile slow movement deeply elegiac, with raging full-orchestral interjections. The finale is broader than is generally the fashion nowadays but is none of the worse for that, its peroration speeding excitedly. A fascinating set that should prove stimulating for all fans of charismatic conducting and will hopefully prompt further Rowicki releases and reissues. There must surely be plenty of broadcast recordings hidden away in various radio archives.

-- Gramophone