The Guildhall String Ensemble's first record appeared last December, when in collaboration with George Malcolm at the harpsichord they accompanied Michala Petri in Vivaldi concertos (RCA RL86656; (1) RD86656). Now this group of former Guildhall School of Music students have the chance to shine on their own under their regular violinist/director, Robert Salter. The impression conveyed is not so much that of an ensemble controlled by one mind, but of I I gifted musicians, each of whom has a distinctive contribution to make. This is not to suggest anything other than a common sense of purpose in the playing, or that there is any lack of discipline, but that the performances have that certain quality of colour and character peculiar to chamber musicmaking. The only drawback is that sometimes one would wish for a bigger body of tone in works which were all conceived in terms of at least a small string orchestra.

It is good to have one or two unusual items in a programme which mostly contains what might be called English string favourites. So instead of Elgar's Serenade we have a group of five little pieces by this composer which have been rescued by Percy Young from sketches for a late and unfinished opera. Not vintage Elgar, by any means, but charming nevertheless and very attractively played. Then there are sympathetic performances of two typically grave, wistful Finzi pieces, rare items indeed in the concert hall, but familiar to many English music enthusiasts through Boult's recordings (Lyrita). Ireland originally composed A Down/and Suite as a test piece for brass band, and later arranged two of the movements for string orchestra. I rather wish that the ensemble had included the beautiful "Elegy" in its programme as well as the "Minuet", for it brings a good sense of style to the latter piece. There is space left only to say the Hoist and Warlock suites are spiritedly played, and that there is an authentic flavour to the Delius and Walton pieces.

I hope we shall hear this group on record again soon, for they play very well indeed, and with a good deal of personality. The recording quality is attractively warm and vivid.

-- Gramophone [9/1988]

HAYDN: 6 PARIS SYMPHONIES SAN

*** This title is a reissue of a Japanese release with liner notes in Japanese. ***

Following the sensational popularity of Faust, Gounod was keen to enjoy a similar success, and believed Shakespeare’s play would provide a suitable vehicle. He was right, although Roméo et Juliette is somewhat uneven, mainly because Gounod was prepared to bow to the demands of conventional French grand opera: for example, there is an invented trouser role and a ballet with other extensive additions to Act IV that are – perhaps happily – omitted here. Nevertheless, the libretto provided Gounod with opportunities to compose some of his most effective dramatic music. In this enjoyable recording, the grand set pieces, such as the Capulet’s ball, are vividly evoked, with strong support from the chorus, and Slatkin largely manages to avoid indulging Gounod’s tendency to grandiloquence and religiosity. More impressive are the intimate passages, such as the scene in Juliet’s garden and the lovers’ duets in Act IV – here, Slatkin brings out the grace and melodiousness of Gounod’s music. As the star-cross’d lovers, Domingo and Swenson sing with conviction and lyricism, although hardly with great youthfulness; and elsewhere Kurt Ollmann is a robust Mercutio and Alastair Miles makes an imposing Friar Laurence.

Performance: 4 (out of 5), Sound: 4 (out of 5)

-- William Humphreys-Jones, BBC Music Magazine

LEGENDARY PERFORMERS - PIATIGO

Another rerelease of an RCA classic: The "Living Stereo" reincarnation of Gluck's Orfeo ed Euridice has been superbly remastered. With the noble Orfeo of the great Rise Stevens, and the masterful, sublime conducting by the peerless Pierre Monteux, this an Orfeo for the ages.

-- James Camner, FANFARE [Want List, 2000]

*** This title is a reissue of a Japanese release with liner notes in Japanese. ***

One of the glories of Ormandy’s RCA discography... This CD is a Gem.

The main work here, recorded in 1971, is one of the glories of Ormandy’s RCA discography. Based on Russian folklore, Ilya Murometz is a sprawling, magnificent, elaborate score that showcases the virtuoso orchestra in a rich, late-Romantic style. Ormandy was almost certainly introduced to this score by Leopold Stokowski, who recorded it in 1940 during a period in which he was still conducting the orchestra in recordings, even though Ormandy had taken over as the sole music director. Ormandy first recorded the work in 1956, only a year before Columbia began recording in stereo. Both he and Stokowski took fairly radical cuts; playing the symphony complete did not become fashionable until the arrival of the CD era. Here Ormandy shows no signs of age; he luxuriates in the sounds his orchestra makes, and while the celebrated Philadelphia strings are astonishing in Gliére’s intricate figurations, it is the brass section that really carries the day. Unless almost 59 minutes of Ilya Murometz are not enough for you, this performance and recording will knock your socks off.

The brief Rachmaninoff folk-song settings are late works, written in 1926 and given their world premiere performance by the Philadelphia Orchestra under Stokowski; this is Ormandy’s only recording of them, sung in English. They show Rachmaninoff to be, as I have claimed before in these pages, the most underrated orchestrator of the 20th Century. In the first song Rachmaninoff makes a miniature tone poem of the simple, strophic tune sung by unison male voices; the second, written for unison women’s voices, hints at the Symphonic Dances in its woodwind figurations. The whimsical third, usually given the title “Powder’d Paint” in English, was a favorite of Rachmaninoff’s; RCA’s complete edition of his recordings includes a performance of this by a Russian folk artist with the composer improvising a piano accompaniment. This CD is a gem.

-- Richard Kaplan, Fanfare

The high quality of the music and the full spectrum of its moods is displayed in this brilliantly played, scrupulously balanced recording.

The binding medium in this programme is the music for a 'broken' consort, the mixed-family instrumental band that took shape as an adjunct to the Elizabethan theatre; Julian Bream's devotion to consort music has remained undimmed through three decades, though the personnel of his group has changed, the modern flute has given way to its renaissance ancestor and the violin to the treble viol. Ten of the items come from Thomas Morley's ''First Book of Consort Lessons'', arrangements of various pieces by Morley, Philips, Dowland, Strogers and Alison; two more are drawn from other sources, one, the Fantasia of Byrd, presented by a 'whole' consort of three viols. Did lutenists then use the right-hand nails (as Bream, also a guitarist, does) to help their elaborate divisions (variations) to be heard as they deserved to be? We do not know, nor, when they are so brilliantly played in such a scrupulously balanced recording, do we need to. The high quality of the music and the full spectrum of its moods, coupled with the ingenuity and variety of the 'orchestration', exclude any risk of monotony, but for good measure the proceedings are punctuated with smaller-scale diversions.

Nancy Hadden acts the part of the peripatetic van Eyck as well as 'joyning hands' with Bream in Nicholson's The Jew's Dance, James Tyler plucks the humble cittern from the 'rhythm section' with an anonymous solo setting of Grimstock, and Robert Tear, in splendid voice, supplies two lute songs. The whole is a sampler of a rich area of English music that has never been really adequately represented on disc in excellent performances, and herewith recommended without apology or reservation to anyone to whom English music pre 1600 (or thereabouts) is not anathema. Acquire and enjoy.'

– John Duarte, Gramophone [2/1989]

To put it with what may well be deceptive simplicity, the rather modest purpose of this album is to achieve a kind of stereophonic travelogue - an intention, by the way. that is announced at the outset by the tom-toms in Ernesto Lecuona's Jungle Drums. For all its seeming unpretentiousness, though, this is a rather slipperier aim than one might think. There is the fact, for instance, that - except for Rapsodia Negra, which was never recorded before - none of the selections are exactly surprises or innovations. Thus, Morton Gould - the noted American composer-conductor who has distinguished himself in his serious compositions as well as in his numerous arrangements and original popular works - had to demonstrate that familiarity need not necessarily breed contempt. He accomplished this by approaching the material as if it had never been heard before, utilizing it, so to speak, as a kicking- off place from which to summon up the peculiar enchantment of the exotic and tropical.

Take, for example, Hawaiian War Chant, which was a glory of the Tommy Dorsey band in the forties. Fundamentally it is a kind of musical poster art - a bravura piece that had been reduced to mere bombast by too many overformularized performances. Now, under Morton Gould's revitalizing ministrations, it suddenly emerges as something arrestingly different - something with the texture of a steel guitar. It scarcely need be said that this would not have been possible prior to the advent of high fidelity recording and reproduction. The vividness of Villa-Lobos' Little Train, a delightfully whimsical, cross-rhythmed little portrait, also benefits prodigiously from the technical advances of recent years. This whole album, indeed, is as revealing of Gould's resourcefulness as it is of the various composers' creative inspiration. The celebrated Ritual Fire Dance, for example, certainly is immeasurably enhanced by the fact that Gould chose to interpret it with a hi-fi ear. Swamp Fire, on the other hand, owes its effectiveness in this compendium to the fact that Gould chose, in his own words, "to make the flames spread." As a result, a fairly modest little number becomes a virtuoso, razzle-dazzle performance. In the case of his own Tropical, however, he was content merely to emphasize its airy lyrical beauty. With Duke Ellington's Caravan, on still another hand, he adopted a highly stylized approach in order to heighten the fantasy and imagery.

Obviously, the common denominator of the 15 performances in "Jungle Drums" is percussive. Every selection, whether it be sprightly, stately or swirling, is underlined by strong rhythmic accents. But the percussion in this album - which ranges from a Harlem resident's interpretation of an alien land in Caravan to Falla's evocation of the primitive in the Ritual Fire Dance; from the lush potpourri by Lecuona to Mr. Gould's own diffident Tropical - is neither effete nor intellectualized, unlike the drumming in modern jazz. Basically, indeed, it betrays nothing more complicated than an urge to provide an irresistible beat. And that, after all, is the way the drums were meant to be played. And that, too, is why "Jungle Drums" seems so uncontrived and singularly appropriate a title for the album.

Notes by GEORGE FRAZIER
1957
original liner notes

RCA's classical film score series with Chuck Gerhardt never should have gone out of print, so it's particularly good to see Arkivmusic.com bringing the whole series back "on demand". These days the rage is to record the complete scores, and even though Korngold's music is more continuous than most, I can very readily imagine many listeners preferring these shorter selections of suites and individual scenes. You get nothing but the best tunes--indeed, Another Dawn and The Prince and the Pauper became the first movement and finale, respectively, of the Violin Concerto--and an even greater range of mood and contrast than any one work can possibly display.

More to the point, the performances in this series are all splendid, the engineering wonderfully sumptuous, and the selections unfailingly intelligent. For example, we get to hear Korngold's entire Cello Concerto (all 12 minutes of it, reworked from the music originally in Deception) rather than the single film cue that's only about half as long. Furthermore, as programs designed for continuous listening, this series was unbeatable. Playing times on these pre-digital-era LP releases aren't as long as we have come to expect today, but when the quality of the product is this high it would be churlish to complain. Great stuff!

--David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday.com

Music by Larry Grossman, words by Hal Hackady.

Principal Cast: Joel Grey, Ann Reinking, Louis Zorich, Jay Garner, Richard B. Shull, Grace Keagy, Susan Browning

Music by Jules Styne, lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green.

Principal cast includes: Phil Silvers (Hubert Cram), Nancy Walker (Kay Cram), David Burns (Brains Berman), Nancy Dussault (Tilda Mullen), and John Reardon (John Henry Wheeler).

Recorded at the Manhattan Center, New York on January 8, 1961. Liner notes written by Steven Suskin and Mary Martin.

Track Listing:
1. Spanish Lady, The
2. Ballynure Ballad, A
3. Last Rose Of Summer, The
4. Bridget Cruise - (harp solo)
5. Carolan's Concerto - (harp solo)
6. Bonny Bunch Of Roses, The
7. Skibbereen (Ballad Of The Famine)
8. Fanaid Grove, The
9. Believe Me, If All Those Enduring Young Charms
10. Carolan Medley - (harp solo)
11. I Know Where I'm Going
12. Green Grows The Laurel
13. Black Ribbon-Band, The
14. Light Of The Moon, The
15. My Brown Haired Boy (My Buachaillin Donn)
16. Next Market Day, The
17. Johnny, I Hardly Knew Ye!
18. Brian Boru March - (harp solo)
19. Parting, The
20. Cockles And Mussels

GIDON KREMER PLAYS SIBELIUS: V

[T]hose who want these classic and electrifying performances are going to find the sound dramatically improved, warmer and less strident.

-- BBC Music Magazine [reviewing the box set RCA 66656, of which these recordings were originally a part]