A richly colourful Smetana landscape The Czech composer’s bicentenary is celebrated in style, says
John Allison
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra/domingo Hindoyan
Onyx ONYX4244 67:04 mins
Taken from a series of recordings made during rehearsals and a concert at Liverpool Philharmonic Hall last year, this is a poised performance that holds the dramatic arc in fine tension, and underscores the tapestries of colour among the monumentality.
Bruckner’s Fourth – the ‘Romantic’, as called from the outset – was subject to three full revisions, and this performance is taken from and ‘Vltava’) are justifiably popular, it hardly needs saying that there is nothing banal about Bychkov’s meticulously mapped performances and that his attention to detail never stifles the music’s spontaneity.
Finding an almost operatic (wordless, of course) energy, he tightens the dramatic screw in ‘Šarka’ before relaxing into a joyous account of ‘From Bohemia’s Woods and Fields’ that points up, fittingly, a fleeting allusion to Beethoven’s ‘Pastoral’ Symphony. The final two panels, ‘Tábor’ and ‘Blaník’, can turn bombastic in some performances, but Bychkov finds their fervour (the Hussites lurk here) while giving the music a spiritual halo. This aura also reflects the unique warmth of the Czech Phil and its hall in the heart of Prague, the Rudolfinum, not to mention the work of Bychkov’s longstanding recording producer Holger Urbach. In sum, an enriching Má Vlast up there with the other indisputably great performances. PERFORMANCE
RECORDING the most frequently heard version, the second, from 1878-80. There is poetry in this performance, drawn from the sounds of nature, from the hunting horns that open the third movement to the birdsong that emerges throughout.
Domingo Hindoyan, the
RLPO chief conductor, guides a performance that is liquid and rich, yet full of clarity – particularly the first movement, which is in many ways a symphony in itself. He excels here in retaining long-drawnout tension and shape, the epic proportions of the final climax a sweeping, tidal wash of sound.
The Andante follows at a walking step – a true andante, although perhaps rather too low-key here at
You can access thousands of reviews from our extensive archive on the BBC Music Magazine website at www.classical-music.com first, despite returning with more assurance as the movement draws to a close. The third movement opens with the RLPO horns on fine form, muted as if from afar, returning with increasing excitement and drama with each salvo, amidst bucolics in the winds. It’s a pacey performance, building to a lush and gloriously galloping finale.
One of Hindoyan’s skills is his delicate handling of contrasts, with a sense of anxiety and urgency in the opening to the final movement. Here, the great sweep of Bruckner’s vision comes to the fore, with the RLPO in excellent form.
Sarah Urwin Jones
PERFORMANCE
RECORDING
Heidelberg Symphony Orchestra/ Johannes Klumpp
Hännsler HC23081 298:00 mins (4 discs) Most of these symphonies date from the years 1763-4, when Haydn was in his early thirties, but the last of the four CDS features works composed during the following decade. Not surprisingly, these are the finest of the bunch.
The F major No. 67 is an altogether astonishing piece, with a slow movement that ends pianissimo as the orchestra’s entire string section taps their instruments col legno (ie
with the wood of the bow). The Minuet ’s trio is a musette scored exclusively for a pair of violins, and the Finale incorporates a long slow episode whose first half is played by a solo string trio. Symphony No. 68 has a slow movement whose quiet ‘tick-tock’ accompaniment for the lower strings is periodically taken over by the full orchestra in sudden short-lived outbursts.
There’s nothing quite so wacky in the earlier works, though No. 72 (the numbering of Haydn’s symphonies at this stage of his career doesn’t reflect their true chronology) features some spectacular writing for four horns, and its finale is a set of variations in which the players – including the double bass – have solos by turns. Numbers 12 and 29 find Haydn experimenting in the unusual key of E major, and No. 23 has a Minuet written in canon throughout. Johannes Klumpp and the Heidelberg Symphony – their complete Haydn cycle is nearing its close – give lively accounts of these endlessly inventive pieces, and the energy of their playing is infectious. Klumpp’s quick tempos occasionally court danger (the first movement in Nos 13 and 29, for instance, or the Finale of No. 21), but there’s never a dull moment, even with every single repeat observed. Misha Donat
PERFORMANCE
RECORDING landscapes associated with one of her teachers, Granville Bantock. Greek mythology, chinoiserie, Spain and Gibraltar: these were among the inspirations for her bustling symphonic poems, along with the ballet score of Koong Shee, a work much stronger than its critical dismissal in 1921 suggests.
Lamia, a Proms hit in 1919 and the only work here to have been recorded before, effortlessly finds the impassioned, dramatic musical forms needed for a doomed love story inspired by Keats’s famous poem. The Rock of 1928, subtitled ‘Impressions of Gibraltar’, is equally confident in material and instrumentation, vaguely suggesting 1920s Walton at times, though without his acerbic bite. In both the early Humoresque and 1940 Divertissements (note the castanets!), light material is occasionally treated with too heavy a hand. But all of these the pieces, crisply dispatched by Rebecca Miller and the BBC Concert Orchestra, offer rewarding listening – and serve as an important reminder of a British composer who should never have vanished from sight. Geoff Brown
PERFORMANCE
RECORDING