Serendipity and Serebrier: A Life of Symphonic Succes
article published by Naxos, you find hier
How
admirable that Reference Recordings (a firm associated with high-end
sound quality) have embraced the less obvious repertoire. While
Janacek is hardly obscure he remains outside the mainstream of concert
seasons. It is notable that RR and Serebrier have recorded two volumes
of orchestral Janacek and two volumes of orchestral Chadwick (the
latter also recently repackaged as a two for the price of one item).
May they continue their pursuit of the highest standards of hi-fi
using the best of neglected music. I rather hope that they look
at some of the orchestral works of Bax. A disc coupling Bax's Sixth
Symphony and Winter Legends for piano and orchestra could be an
absolute knockout both as an audio exhibition and as an complete
artistic experience. Taras and Sinfonietta have become a standard
coupling ever since the LP days of Supraphon and Ancerl. So it has
continued into the CD era, now approaching twenty years of age.
The competition in this sphere is hot. For those wishing to relive
analogue splendours, Supraphon will soon have the original Ancerl
coupling available in their Ancerl Golden Series and I am hoping
to review that at some stage. In addition there are creditable recordings
from Naxos, Chandos (Belohlávek on CHAN 241-7), EMI
Classics, DG, Decca (VPO/Mackerras) and a small host of alternatives
from Supraphon including a historic coupling from Bakala and Jilek.
From the momentous rolling fanfares of Sinfonietta the sonorous
trumpet choir are sharply placed on high in the aural landscape.
The rest of the fruitily burred brass and the tetchily impatient
woodwind also convey the impression of being recorded in a big space.
The Sinfonietta is one of those works that is a core 'must have'
for any general classical collection. Slav without being Russian,
exotic without being repugnant, optimistic without being puerile.
Janácek's fanfares lodge firmly in the memory and
are rivalled in his output only by those in the Glagolitic Mass.
This recording, in particular, made me wonder whether Copland heard
this work before writing Fanfare for the Common Man. The bass presence
is remarkable but once again the great depth of the soundstage contributes
to the poetics (track 3). This depth consolidates the sense of Martinu-like
plangency. The brass are in resplendent form and their manic death-hunt
whooping and barking at 3.51 (track 3) is an audio and musical highlight.
This is amongst the finest of modern recordings and interpretations.
The Lachian Dances are, as a work, a disappointment by contrast.
My first impressions of this work, formed by hearing an LP (Decca,
1971) recording conducted by Francois Huybrechts (whatever happened
to him? Didn't he record Nielsen's Espansiva as well?) are confirmed
by the present disc. Low voltage stuff. The sound picture is just
as impressive as for Sinfonietta but the music is so relaxed as
to seem casual - almost ordinary. The dances are an addition to
the Dvorák Slavonic Dances and Rhapsodies but truth to tell
nowhere near as inspired. Highlights include a generous airborne
horn section in the second dance and a sprinkling of rustic charm
and jollity. Taras is interesting as a piece and is well advocated
by the artists. I was struck for the first time by the presence
of the harmonium and also by the debt Copland seems again to have
owed to Taras. The diffuse self-questioning of the first movement
is followed by greater concentration in the second movement. Stabbing,
angular, thrusting figures launch heroic contributions from the
brass (notably trombones) in steady, deliberate, poised and pulsed
heroism. The finale is resonates with the pealing of bells. In Sinfonietta
and Taras Reference have two works (especially the former) that
are natural 'spectaculars'. You will go a long way to find a better
recorded or interpreted big-sound version of these pieces. Sinfonietta
bids fair to be the best available version. Taras is impressive
but as a piece lacks the compelling invention of the Sinfonietta.
As for the Dances they remain a chummy and relaxed make-weight:
nice to have but not in themselves the stuff of compulsive acquisition.
For the second disc we get some 'pure' Janácek but
the two big items are confections assembled by other hands: Talich/Smetacek
and Serebrier. The Cunning Little Vixen opera is the most immediately
beautiful of his works. The suite begins heavily with chattering
and stabbing figures from the orchestra. This is much more successful
than Taras Bulba for example. At 4.10 a superb violin dance played
with a cogently watery tone by the concertmaster of the Czech State
PO. The atmosphere speaks of magic and woodland pools before the
first section ends in crashing tragedy. The second and final part
leaves the Lachian Dances way behind with all their inconsequential
innocence. There is a projection of great emotive power here familiar
perhaps from Rimsky's Antar but with much more steel. This is a
work of high and refined romance. The two operatic suites sandwich
two preludes however everything here derives from the operas. The
atmosphere of the Jealousy prelude is of baying unrest as you might
expect from the title. There are yelping horns (echoing Sinfonietta),
a petulantly swirling violin solo, a trumpet section that is not
just stratospheric but ionospheric, playfully complex eddies of
romance and great clashing isobars of music. Do get to hear this
music. The Prelude to In the House of the Dead is claustrophobically
similar to Jealousy with the repeat fanfare at the end rumbling
and tumbling in Straussian hysterics. It ends with a reminiscence
of Sinfonietta. Serebrier's ‘synthesis’
(a typical project for a Stokowski pupil) includes a dance of the
grotesques and positively seethes with aural interest. The squealing
violins toss and turn like oiled quicksilver. Barking horns bring
the work to a reeling and clawing climactic closure. Reference Recordings
have a deserved reputation for big sound which conveys the poetry
and subtlety of the quieter passages. That reputation is maintained
and by this set. The selection of repertoire is slightly 'off-centre'
â€∫ and very welcome too. Eight pages of helpful
booklet notes by Richard Freed in English only. The only competition
I am aware of is the Chandos twofer. This is very good but I prefer
the Serebrier Sinfonietta which for me remain a top recommendation.
Repertoire across the two sets is not identical. If you missed the
separate discs first time around then you have little excuse now
when you can get both discs in a single width case for the price
of one.
Rob Barnett
Like many early 20th-century Eastern European composers, Leos Janácek
(1854–1928) drew inspiration from folk sources — in
his case, not only the songs and dances of his native Moravia but
everyday speech patterns in the air. This helped him to produce
rustic rhythms and piquant textures of undeniable allure and to
spin melodies of boundless color. Janácek was a master melodist
in whatever setting, from the dusky lines of the opera Kátya
Kabanová and the song cycle The Diary of One Who Vanished
to the luminous instrumental singing of the solo piano music and
his two string quartets.
Janácek's ability to make an orchestra sing is on full display
here, thanks to the resourceful José Serebrier and the composer's
hometown band, the Czech State Philharmonic of Brno. Janácek
rarely wrote for the orchestra alone, but Serebrier bolsters three
favorites from among that small symphonic oeuvre with a set of suites
and preludes from the operas Jenufa, The Cunning Little Vixen, The
Makropoulos Case and From the House of the Dead. This unique collection
is made possible via a two-CD reissue (priced as one disc) of a
pair of late-'90s Reference albums, each of 24-bit, demonstration-standard
recording quality.
Disc One features the tuneful, brass-accented Sinfonietta, the bucolic
romp Lachian Dances and the volatile orchestral rhapsody Taras Bulba,
which glosses Gogol's tale of the titular 17th-century Cossack hero.
The cascading horns in "Fanfares" at the opening of the
Sinfonietta cohere ideally under Serebrier, and he brings out the
heart-teasing string melody of the slow "Queen's Monastery"
section with relish; yet it's the grand peals and percussion of
the final movement, "The Town," that show off the Czech
players' natural brilliance in this piece — a veritable anthem
for Brno. While the Lachian Dances make for sophisticated light
music, Taras Bulba is a deeper, more evocative masterpiece, redolent
of hard-driven emotions and full of echt-osteuropäisch color;
here it is played with both strength but subtlety.
Yet Disc Two, with some of Janácek's key dramatic music in
distilled form, is this set's real attraction. It opens with the
highlight of the entire collection: the Talich/Smetácek suite
from The Cunning Little Vixen, which condenses the 1924 opera down
to a transcendent quarter-hour of animal-world atmospherics and
sheer sunburst lyricism. The openhearted Brno strings make the music
seem like it's as much of a joy to play as it is to hear. The emotions
are more mixed in the tone poem Jealousy, which was the prelude
to Jenufa before Janácek cut it in favor of a more abrupt
opening just prior to the opera's 1904 premiere. Another brief,
bittersweet item included is the prelude to Janácek's Dostoevskian
opera From the House of the Dead; those familiar with the composer's
unfinished Violin Concerto (subtitled "Pilgrimage of the Soul")
will recognize the Dead prelude's strangely lyrical motifs, although
it is this piece that makes the most direct use of them.
The new and most substantial work in this set is Disc Two's half-hour
"symphonic synthesis" of themes from Janácek's
1926 opera The Makropoulos Case. Arranged by Serebrier (the Stokowski
protégé is also a composer), the work condenses each
of the three acts into an orchestral movement, even though there
is far less "pure" orchestral music available in this
opera than in, say, The Cunning Little Vixen. Serebrier "grafted"
the opera's interwoven instrumental and vocal lines into an orchestral
fabric, without changing any of the composer's original, extremely
vivid orchestration. The result is an utterly engaging, even moving
sequence of music. In another nod to authenticity, Serebrier worked
on his orchestration at Janácek's home; in the liner notes,
he describes the experience: "Sitting at his desk in Brno,
passing by his house daily on the way to the recording sessions,
absorbing the air and spirit of his beloved Moravia, I felt the
humility that comes over one in the presence of a genius of genuine,
striking originality."
Those who have cherished benchmark Janácek recordings by
the likes of Rudolf Firkusn? (a former student of the composer who
recorded the complete piano music for Deutsche Grammophon) and Sir
Charles Mackerras (who has conducted all the operas on record for
Decca and Supraphon) would do themselves a favor by searching out
this economical collection. The inevitable repeat listenings to
The Makropoulos Case synthesis and the sublime Cunning Little Vixen
suite alone will make the modest cost worthwhile.
© andante Corp. February 2002. All rights
reserved.
It is incidental to note that there have not been any recent recordings of Tchaikovsky symphony cycles in recent months so BIS have taken a bold step in issuing what appears to be a complete traversal of these oft recorded works under Jose' Serebrier. However, this lovingly recorded issue could well be a major symphonic cycle as first impressions are truly outstanding. The Fourth Symphony is one of Tchaikovsky's better works and here it receives a white-hot interpretation. The Bamberg Symphony is an alert and responsive band of players who are completely attuned to their conductor's idiom. The expansive First Movement is held together with an iron grip yet the tension is not allowed to fade and here, I would compare Serebrier with the magnificent Sanderling (coupled with Mravinsky in the 5th and 6th on a DG Originals double) who is the other outstanding advocate of this work. The Andantino is lovingly played with the BIS engineering particularly kind to the Bamberg strings. The hilarious Scherzo and titanic Finale are also well played with a huge amount of power and wit carefully harnessed to provide the right effect. The accompanying 'Francesca da Rimini' is also superb and here I would place Serebrier on top of a pedestal of great interpretations of this piece alongside Britten and the irrepressible Markevitch on BBC Legends. As I have already said, this is an indispensable issue for any Tchaikovsky enthusiast and I will follow the cycle with enthusiasm.
