Musical mastery is in the details

RACHMANINOFF: Symphonic Dances, Etudes-tableaux (orch. Respighi). Vocalise (orchestral version). Minnesota Orchestra; Eiji Oue, conductor. Reference Recordings 96. ADD.

Recently I had my kitchen painted, including all the cabinets and drawers.

When the painters finished, I told them what a splendid job they had done. But they said they were not finished yet. They'd be back the next day to "detail" their work.

So when they finished their work the next day, I went again to my kitchen to see how they might have improved an already very good job. I was surprised! What had been a very good job had become a demonstrably better one.

That's the way I feel about the recordings of the Minnesota Orchestra under their brilliant young conductor, Eiji Oue. I should love to have the privilege of attending one of their rehearsals. My guess is that conductor Oue spends some considerable amount of his rehearsal time "detailing" the way the orchestra plays.

I seem to gain an added appreciation of the orchestra's capabilities each time I review one of its recordings. Indeed, I have not been so impressed with the playing of the orchestra since the days of one of the really great conductors of the last century, Antol Dorati, who was music director of the Minneapolis Orchestra (since changed to the Minnesota Orchestra) from 1949 to 1960. And, of course, since then, the personnel of the orchestra has probably changed almost entirely.

There is nothing mysterious about Oue's conducting. He simply stresses the basics: ensemble, balance of orchestral choirs, dynamics, attacks, ritards and so forth. The excellence of his conducting is seen (heard) in the way he gets the orchestra to accomplish these basics so very well.

The works on this disc are excellent examples of pieces that will enable a fine orchestra to "show its stuff." And the Minnesota Orchestra has a lot of "stuff" to show.

Symphonic Dances was Rachmaninoff's final complete work. He wrote it the summer of 1940. Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra gave it its premier in early January 1941.

One could make the argument that "Symphonic Dances" is Rachmaninoff's finest work for orchestra. The biggest argument to such a contention would be that the work does not contain the quantity of gloriously romantic melody that many of his other works do ... his Second and Third Piano Concertos for example. Or his Second Symphony. Not that the composer's great gift of romantic melody is not demonstrated in "Symphonic Dances." It is. But not so much as in certain other works.

What is different about Symphonic Dances is that it reveals the composer entering new territory. The creation of orchestral color became a primary factor in his orchestration of what had originally been a two-piano version of a work that was to have become a ballet. The ballet idea was dropped. Now the composer set himself the task of writing with the idea of letting the sounds of different instruments of the orchestra play a position front and center. He even included the alto saxophone in his instrumentation, and when we hear the soulful sound of this instrument ... which we usually associate with jazz and the music of the big-band era ... we can well wonder why more composers haven't made use of the instrument.

"Etudes-tableaux" was written for piano and later orchestrated by one of Italy's greatest orchestral composers ... some would say the greatest ... Ottorino Respighi (Pines of Rome, Fountains of Rome, Roman Festivals). He did a beautiful job with the orchestration. But what we hear is Respighi's orchestral music, not Rachmaninoff's. We hear the same thing when we listen to Ravel's orchestration of Moussorgsky's piano work "Pictures at an Exhibition." We hear Ravel, not Mussorgsky. And that's the way it should be. We are listing to one composer paying tribute to the work of another composer.

Let me say at once that Oue and the orchestra do a splendid job with Vocalise. But ... Vocalise was originally written for soprano and orchestra, and once you have heard it, especially when it is sung by a great soprano, listening to it in any other form simply has to be second best.

A splendid disc. Highest rating.

RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Scheherazade; solo violin, Herman Krebbers. BORODIN: Symphony No. 2 in B Minor. Concertgebouw Orchestra, Kirill Kondrashin, conductor. Philips 50, 464 735.

Let me compare this recording by Kirill Kondrashin with one by Sir Thomas Beecham with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (EMI 47717). I do so because the two recordings prove dramatically how a great composition can accommodate a variety of equally fine readings.

Kondrashin stresses the excitement of this delightful fairy tale. Beecham focuses more on the romantic love story. Both interpretations are perfectly valid. And we are fortunate to have both of them.

The symphonies of Alexander Bordin do not rank with those of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich and Prokofiev, but they don't have to. They are fine symphonies and they are Russian to the core.

Scheherazade was recorded in 1980, the Borodin in 1984. The remastered sound is excellent.

Kondrashin was one of the very best of the Russian (Soviet) conductors of the 20th century. He conducted works across the literature, and he was especially noted for his interpretation of Russian music. No surprise there.

Both of these recordings deserve to be in Philips 50, Great Recordings of the last century.

(c)Copley News Service

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Author: King Durkee