The celestial cellists

This is music played by an ensemble most of us will hear only on recordings: 12 cellists! That`s it. Nothing else. On this recording they play works by Heitor Villa-Lobos - his Bachianas Brasileiras Nos. 1 and 5, Wilhelm Kaiser-Lindemann, Chabuca Granda, Jorge Ben, Astor Piazzolla, Horacio Salgan, George Faust, Ludwig Quandt, Dietmar Schwalke, Richard Duvan, Christoph Igelbrink, Olaf Maninger, Martin Menking, Knut Weber, Nikolaus Romisch, David Riniker, Jan Diesselhorst, Martin Lohr - and Burt Bacharach.

The works just about run the gamut of compositional style. Soprano Juliane Banse is featured in the Villa-Lobos Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 and in Piazzolla`s "Chiquilin de Bachin." The album takes its name from the Bacharach composition, "South American Getaway." And whether you realize it or not, you probably know this piece. It was played in the hit motion picture "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid."

It may be that many of these pieces are by composers whose works you don`t know. My advice is to be less concerned about individual composers and concentrate on the great variety of musical expression that can come out of an ensemble of 12 cellos. At least I`d do that for the first listening session. Later on, it would prove an interesting exercise to match specific composers to specific works.

The quality of the playing? These are the 12 cellists of the Berlin Philharmonic. And what you hear will be as close to perfection as you ever are likely to get. Juliane Banse performs regularly at the world`s great opera houses and with leading conductors and orchestras. She sings the works by Villa-Lobos and Piazzolla most idiomatically.

A FRENCH ROMANCE: Bizet, Debussy, Saint-Saens, Ravel, Faure and Satie. Carol Rosenberger, piano; Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo; James DePriest, conductor. Delos 3202.

It`s August. Summer is at its height. And you still can`t bring yourself to do battle with the challenging heavy artillery of the world of music. Don`t be embarrassed. You`ve got lots of company. There`s no reason you shouldn`t finish the month with music on the lighter side. And it doesn`t mean it`s lesser music.

All that is great in music is not bombast and technical complexity. There`s nothing wrong with just beautiful melody for summertime. This is an album that should fit your desires to a T. Some of the works are presented in their entirety: Debussy`s Clair de lune, and Prelude a l`apres-midi d`un faune, Satie`s Gynnopedie No. 3 (arranged for orchestra), Faure`s Pavane and Ravel`s Pavane pour une infante defunte. The rest of the offerings are excerpts from complete works.

Carol Rosenberger plays the second movement of Ravel`s Piano Concerto in G Major. The Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo has enjoyed a plethora of world renowned guest conductors and an outstanding list of permanent conductors. James DePriest became music director of the organization in 1994. On this disc we are offered a wide variety of French music most handsomely played and recorded. And perhaps, as you milk your summertime listening pleasure for all it`s worth, that`s just what you`re looking for.

TCHAIKOVSKY: "Swan Lake" (complete ballet). Utah Symphony Orchestra; Maurice Abravanel, conductor. Amadeus 7005/6; two CDs; AAD.

The orchestral suite from the ballet "Swan Lake" is one of the most popular suites in the repertoire. This is the way we almost always hear the work at a symphony concert. To hear the entire score would take too long. Indeed, I think many in an audience would find it difficult to sustain interest that long. The work was, after all, written to be performed with dancers. Looked at in that way, the music becomes, certainly not secondary, but something for the dancers.

We can understand that when the composer wrote a score for a ballet he had the dancers and what they do in mind. Nevertheless, there are times when we do want to hear the complete orchestral score for a ballet. This most probably is when we have seen the ballet, and the music enables us to remember certain of the action onstage.

This is a very good complete score of "Swan Lake." Maurice Abravanel and the Utah Symphony Orchestra catch the fairy-tale atmosphere of the work perfectly. In its remastered form on the Amadeus label, the sound is excellent.

(c) Copley News Service

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Author: King Durkee