A superb collection of very early Kubelik recordings, including numerous world premieres.

This is an excellent collection honoring Rafael Kubelík. The two jam-packed CDs of live 1940s broadcasts include his central repertoire, works he championed very early on, and indeed multiple world-premiere recordings. Not least is the first-ever recording of Shostakovich’s Ninth Symphony, a live concert dating from December 1946; we also get a live reading of Dvorak’s Piano Concerto with Rudolf Firkusny, from the first-ever Prague Spring festival, and, although the booklet doesn’t identify the premiere recordings, I’d be surprised if any earlier performances of the Martin? Fourth Symphony or Memorial to Lidice, or Dobiás’ Stalingrad Cantata, exist.
 
The collection begins with Dvorak’s Eighth, in quite constricted sound - turn up the volume more than normal - but glittering with the kind of brilliance Kubelík brought to the piece for his entire career. Aside from a prominent trumpet flub in the finale, it’s a highly accomplished live reading by the Czech Philharmonic, revealing they and the conductor were masters of the symphony even in the besieged year of 1944. The piano concerto, in sound which suggests that the orchestra is playing somewhere very far away, nevertheless powers forward with energy and vigor. Firkusny plays the old “revised” piano part, with the absolute command which explains why he has long been associated with this piece. Luckily for us, the recording of his piano is much better than we’d expect from the murky-sounding orchestra. Firkusny’s cadenza is especially fine, although more recent interpreters - Aimard with Harnoncourt, say - are more to my liking in the poetic slow movement with its beautiful opening horn solo.
 
Shostakovich’s Ninth - the first recording of the work - is given a performance unlike any since. The outer movements are remarkably speedy affairs, with some live sloppiness but a lot of spirit and neoclassical sharpness; by contrast the second movement sprawls over ten minutes, the slowest I’ve ever heard it. Compare 10:33 to Vasily Petrenko’s 8:46, Leonard Bernstein’s 8:10, or indeed Rudolf Barshai’s 5:43. The scherzo is rather languid, too. All in all a fascinating account of how different it is from the way the symphony is performed today, and it’s worth overlooking the constant audience noise. What may cause distress is the fact that distortion in the tape results in the entire symphony sounding like it is being performed in E rather than E flat!
 
Bohuslav Martin?’s Fourth, a celebratory masterpiece inflected with joy, energy, and inner peace, receives a great performance here (1948). It’s hard to imagine a more thrilling scherzo than Kubelík’s, whirling forward in a great rush of excitement, but by contrast he really milks the gorgeous romanticism of the slow movement, unafraid to play up the different moods - doubt at the beginning, something very like love after 6:00. Belohlávek’s recent recording on Onyx with the BBC Symphony may be preferable in the finale, where the new account’s freer tempos underscore the triumph of the ending, which Kubelík - maybe intentionally - leaves more ambivalent. The recorded sound is sufficient to give the orchestral piano its place, although you will miss some bass lines and timpani and the incredible colors of the opening pages. Supraphon engineers have, as elsewhere, used technology which removes the hisses and pops but at the expense of a slightly constricted acoustic.
 
The disc is rounded out with Martin?’s Memorial to Lidice - a moving rendition which goes more slowly and tragically than many, although Eschenbach’s reading on Ondine is the most anguished I’ve heard - and a novelty, the Stalingrad Cantata of Václav Dobiás. Written in 1945, the cantata for baritone, male chorus, and orchestra is an eleven-minute paean to the Soviet forces, or at least I’m assuming so, because the sung texts are not provided. The music sounds a bit like a ramshackle Nevsky Cantata, with the same wildness and raw masculine energy but without the tunes or distinction. It counts as a welcome rarity, though, because recordings of Dobiás are otherwise basically non-existent.
 
These are valuable historical broadcasts all around, then, from the world premiere recordings of Shostakovich’s Ninth and probably a few other works too, to the Dvorak concerto from the first Prague Spring festival. Rafael Kubelík’s conducting is consistently superb and insightful; his Martin? is energetic but powerful, his Shostakovich like nobody else. This can all be had in more modern recordings - the Dvo?ák symphony from Mackerras or Kubelík himself, the Martin? from Belohlávek or Thomson - but as a two-disc monument to Kubelík’s superb work with the Czech Philharmonic, this can’t be beaten. For a one-CD tribute to that pairing of great artists, though, we must remember the unforgettable Smetana concert they gave after the end of the Cold War.
 
-- Brian Reinhart , MusicWeb International

This compilation presents a selection of the recordings that were the fruit of the cooperation between the conductor and the orchestra. Sawallisch's programs in Prague repeatedly included pieces by Mozart and Beethoven, as well as major works by Czech composers (Smetana, Janacek, Martinu, Kalabis, Eben, etc.). Sawallisch's relationship to Czech music is probably best described by the following quotation from a contemporary review: 'He apprehends and interprets music by Czech composers as though he himself had been brought up in their language.' the precious Czech Radio live recordings are released by Supraphon for the very first time to mark the 90th anniversary of the late conductor's birth.

Live recording from the work’s world premieres on 11 and 12 December 2008.

This is not the first case of a premiere performance of a work by Bohuslav Martinu (1890-1959) decades after his death. On 11 December 2008 the sold-out Rudolfinum in Prague heard for the first time a work which ranks among Martinu’s most significant and which the composer himself highly esteemed. Martinu originally composed the opera Juliette in Czech. However, so as to ensure appropriate publicity for the work, he wanted – already armed with a French libretto – to place extracts from the most relevant scenes on French radio. Yet Three Fragments from the Opera Juliette (The Key to Dreams) was not broadcast on the radio and had to wait some 70 years for its first performance. This was entrusted to the safe hands of that most competent of conductors Sir Charles Mackerras, who has devoted a great part of his life to discovering Czech music and promoting it on world stages. Thanks to Martinu’s dreamily beautiful music and the remarkable engagement of all the interpreters, the conductor’s December leave-taking of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra was transformed into a joint triumph. After experiencing Magdalena Kožená in the role of Juliette, it is hard to imagine another star singer in her place. The Australian tenor Steve Davislim, who performed in the role of Michel, was a splendid partner to Magdalena Kožená in the lyrical and dramatic position. On this CD, Three Fragments is supplemented by the orchestral suite from the same opera, which sensitively treats the music of all three Acts and corresponds with the “dreamy logic” of the original.

REVIEWS

"I don’t think I’ve ever heard a performance of any part of this score that captures its sheer beauty and fantasy so well." -- International Record Review, June 2009

"Mackerras directs a wonderful performance and while Kožená sings the title-role beautifully she is in excellent company. The Czech Philharmonic Orchestra play superbly throughout, not least in the sensible coupling of Zbyn?k Vost?ák’s expert arrangement of three of Julietta’s orchestral episodes. I cannot recommend this scintillating disc highly enough."-- Gramophone, June 2009

"Magdalena Kožená is magnificent as the volatile Julietta and is excellently matched by Steve Davislim’s Michel. Davislim is also terrific in the opera’s almost unbearably poignant finale. Along with three orchestral excerpts, including the opera’s prelude, these fragments provide a fitting tribute to Mackerras’s profound understanding of Martin?’s musical character." -- BBC Music Magazine, June 2009

"The sure hand of Charles Mackerras, a master of exceptionally high calling, succeeds in drawing out all the wealth of the score, letting the music shine with its most beautiful colors as he wields a world-class ensemble, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra. The bright, at times seemingly transparent mezzosoprano of Magdalena Kožená proves to be ideal for the role of Julietta, a girl losing her memory, a being from another world, sensuous and yet ungraspable. Davislim proves to be an ideal partner for her."-- Das Opernglas, June 2009

"Sir Charles Mackerras can scarcely be equalled for the way he lives this music, for the way it breathes and blooms under his direction. Thanks to the crystal-clear luminosity of the Czech Philharmonic’s finely detailed sound and the extraordinarily sensitive performances of world-class singers Magdalena Kožená and Steve Davislim, Mackerras has succeeded in fully revealing the suggestive quality of the music, carrying listeners away to a world of dreamlike surrealism. In the hands of Mackerras, a Martin? expert, the score becomes a magical tome." -- Fono Forum, July 2009

Karel Ancerl's incomparable recording of Janácek's resplendently barbaric Sinfonietta remains not only the finest available version of the work, but also is the best recorded, particularly in this incredibly vivid new transfer. Although it was captured as long ago as 1961, no other version so effectively conveys the panoramic splendor of the trumpet-led opening across the stereo spectrum, no other offers such clarity in passages such as the finale's hair-raising wind writing, and no other balances the orchestra against the massed brass of the closing pages so naturally and cleanly. Technically it's quite an achievement, and Martinu's Parables sound equally fine--only The Frescoes of Piero della Francesca show their age in comparison, though the sound is still quite good.


As to the performances--well, what is there to say? They are simply the last word in excitement, accuracy, passion, color, and expressive immediacy. The Sinfonietta erupts form the speakers like a primal force. What other performance propels the second-movement ostinatos so forcefully, or builds the third movement's central climax with such explosive energy? Who else observes the various tempo changes in the brief fourth movement so effectively, wringing every drop of variety from its many repetitions of its opening trumpet tune? And who else drives the finale to positively expressionistic extremes of tension, making the return of the opening fanfares a moment of apocalyptic grandeur? Much as I love this work, and enjoy other performances (including Kubelik, Neumann, Jilek, and Mackerras), this is one of those rare occasions where you really can point your finger to a single version and say, "This is the best."


The same holds true for the two Martinu works, though of course they have been less frequently recorded and so comparisons are less thick on the field. As noted above, the sound in The Parables, one of Martinu's late masterpieces that easily could pass for one of his symphonies, is no less splendid than the Janácek, and the work itself is a shimmering, sensuous delight. The opening of the third movement, with its buzzing strings and flecks of xylophone, is quite unforgettable. Ancerl conducts both this piece and The Frescoes (dedicated to Kubelik, who recorded the work for EMI) with the same authority as the Janácek, and although all three of these performances have been kicking around in various couplings for some time, the sonic improvement certainly warrants acquiring this new edition. The playing will simply have you sitting on the edge of your seat. Stunning!
--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Halina Czerny-Stefánska, who was born in Kraków in 1922 and died there in 2001, achieved international fame as an interpreter of Chopin. On the 150th anniversary of the Polish composer's birth, the state-owned record company Polskie Nagrania produced a comprehensive collection of his works, featuring a number of her exemplary recordings, which form a major part of this set. One incident makes particularly clear what high esteem Chopin interpreter Czerny-Stefánska had achieved in the world of music: Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 1 was released in the West as an LP featuring the brilliant, short-lived pianist Dinu Lipatti. Fifteen years passed before it transpired that the artist on this recording was not Lipatti, but Czerny-Stefánska, with the conductor Václav Smetácek. The mistake was admitted and corrected.

After more than eighty years, Supraphon has revived it's historical sublabel bearing the name of ARTONA and released it's first title: PRAGUE CLASSICS - a musical souvenir from Prague. Originally, ARTONA was a sublabel of the ULTRAPHON gramophone company, predecessor of today's SUPRAPHON publishing house. For the first time this label appeared in the spring of 1932 bearing the supplementary characteristics of "local product". The main reason for establishing the side label was Ultraphon's effort to come up with recordings that might appeal to the general public both by their contents and price. Supraphon now re-introduces this sublabel with the aim of publishing compilations that will please the lovers of the most famous and popular melodies offered by classical music. On the present release, A Musical Souvenir from Prague, experience the magic atmosphere of Prague through the works of classical music written by composers who were in one way or other connected with Prague. We offer you here a musical walkthrough with Antonín Dvorák, Bedrich Smetana, Leoš Janácek, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Gustav Mahler as well as leading Czech orchestras and ensembles. Quite rightly, Prague is considered to be one of most beautiful European cities. It's monuments including the Prague Castle, the Charles Bridge, the astronomical clock of the Old Town City Hall or the Old Jewish Cemetery make the "golden city" one of the most frequently visited tourist destinations in Europe. Prague's unique charm also attracts artists from all over the world and it's "genius loci" has inspired a number of composers both locally and internationally. Allow the city and it's music to charm you too!

The recording of the concert performance in Nazi-occupied Prague of Bedrich Smetana’s My Country (SU 4065-2) conducted by Václav Talich, which took place on 5 July 1939, drew considerable attention worldwide (Special Historic Gramophone Award 2012). It seemed that Talich’s discography had thus been rounded off for good. Yet the personal effects of the late soprano Marie Podvalová, renowned for her outstanding portrayal of Princess Libuše, provided yet another gem. A week prior to the mentioned performance of My Country, on 29 May 1939 a recording was made at the National Theatre of Talich’s account of Smetana’s opera Libuše. Fragments of Act 3 have been reconstructed from the miraculously surviving foils (the present album also contains the 1940 recording of the Overture). In 1939, Libuše’s prophecy in Act 3 of Smetana’s opera must have sounded to Czech ears like an immensely bold declaration of national pride and courage. Although incomplete and far from being perfect in terms of the quality of sound, the recording’s value is truly immense. It is the one and only recording of an opera conducted by Talich, the oldest surviving transmission of an opera performance from the National Theatre in Prague, and the last staging of Libuše during the Nazi occupation before its performances were strictly banned. The audience’s long tumultuous applause and spontaneous singing of the national anthem attest to the moment’s enormous emotional gravity, imbuing the recording with exceptional energy. Talich’s unique account of Libuše – a bold manifestation of national pride and bravery in 1939 in Nazi-occupied Prague

In 1935 Talich brought the Czech P.O to London, where he made legendary Dvorak recordings including this Eighth Symphony - in which he felt truly in touch with the composer. Stanislav Novak's violin solos are exquisite, the pacing of the traditionally shaped performance is flawless and the strings sliding up and down in the Scherzo are irresistible. In 1938, just after the Munich betrayal, conductor and orchestra were back at Abbey Road to record supple accounts of Dvorak's Sixth and Seventh symphonies and, (here..) their loveliest Talich recording, Suk's Serenade for Strings. Here everything is dewy-fresh and transparent, the solo playing (Alexander Plocek) is light as gossamer (Suk wrote the passage for solo strings at the end of the Adagio specially for Talich)." [Gramophone Awards 2005]

Musical America has just announced its awarding of Conductor of the Year to Semyon Bychkov. To learn more, click here.

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After their critically-acclaimed recording of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony, the Czech Philharmonic and Semyon Bychkov continue their Pentatone Mahler cycle with a rendition of the composer’s Fifth. The Fifth Symphony marks an important turning point in Mahler’s symphonic output, away from the prominence of vocal movements in his previous symphonies. And whereas the Fifth seems to follow a teleology from darkness to light like its predecessors, the trajectory is much less straightforward, and full of enigmatic turns. Bychkov’s exceptional eye for detail and pacing make him an ideal guide through this work, while the Czech Philharmonic is capable of letting all the colors of Mahler’s score shine.

The Czech Philharmonic is one of the world’s most acclaimed orchestras, with a rich tradition of performing Czech masters and music from Central Europe. Semyon Bychkov has led the greatest orchestras of the world, and is Chief Conductor and Music Director of the Czech Philharmonic as of the 2018/2019 season. Orchestra and maestro made their Pentatone debut with a recording of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony (2022), kicking off a complete Mahler cycle.

REVIEWS:

Bychkov is careful to keep the strings’ lyric funeral-marches objective, and it’s fascinating how the Adagietto sounds otherworldly until the cellos bring in a richly portamentoed human warmth.

The pace generally keeps things on the move – crucial in what I think of as Mahler’s trickiest movement, the ‘stormy, vehement’ sequel to the opening ritual, paced to perfection – though there are a couple of unmarked slackenings in the outer movements. Only here does Bychkov seem to me to fall briefly victim to seeing ‘nicht eilen’ (don’t hasten) and ‘unmerklich etwas einhaltend’ (imperceptibly somewhat holding back) either side of the last big build and slamming on the brakes.

I’d have liked a bit more wildness in the central Scherzo, though the end is uproarious, and from the opening trumpet solo through the lopsided horn obbligato at the dancing heart of the work to the reassertion of the chorale at the end, the brass both individually and collectively play their parts in underlining that this is still very much one of the world’s great orchestras. In all there’s clarity and beauty of tone. The luminous recording captures both high and low frequencies with exceptional vividness.

-- BBC Music Magazine

Bychkov’s version opens up a very different way of seeing this virtually ubiquitous symphony and he delivers on that vision with great panache and total commitment from all involved. Bychkov has emerged in the last few years as an unmissable conductor and the thought of what he might do with the Sixth symphony after hearing this Fifth has me tingling with anticipation.

-- MusicWeb International (David McDade)