Rodrigo: Concierto de Aranjuez (CD review)

Also, Goss: The Albeniz Concerto; Albeniz: Espana; Rodrigo: Invocacion y danza. Xuefei Yang, guitar. Eiji Oue, Orquestra Simfonica de Barcelona I Nacional de Catalunya. EMI 50999 6 98361 2 1.

If the thought of a relatively young Chinese woman playing the solo guitar part in Rodrigo's most-famous concerto gives you pause, it shouldn't. Xuefei Yang (b. 1977) is a superb guitarist and presents a worthy, if slightly different, take on the music. What's more, she offers three other pieces on the disc that deserve attention. Let's take them one at a time.

First, there's the celebrated Concierto de Aranjuez, which Joaquin Rodrigo (1901-1999) wrote in 1939 and which pretty much established Rodrigo's reputation as a leading composer for the classical guitar. Despite the fact that Rodrigo always claimed the gardens of Palacio Real de Aranjuez inspired the writing, because he wrote it at the end of the Spanish Civil War, one can't help thinking that at least a part of it is tinged by the melancholy of those war years. Rodrigo's wife denied this, saying the slow movement drew on both their happy days together and a miscarriage she endured. Whatever, it's a beautiful, evocative piece of music, and Ms. Yang pulls it off nicely.

The opening movement is lively enough, yet Ms. Yang also brings to it a sense of great dignity and refinement. It's more than just pretty music; it's quite emotionally shaded. Still, it's Ms.  Yang's handling of the middle-movement Adagio that may raise eyebrows. I don't think I've ever heard it played with such heartfelt sentiment and delicacy. The guitarist seems to put her soul into each note she plays, and the listener cannot help coming away with a newfound respect for the concerto and for Ms. Yang. Rodrigo described the concerto itself as capturing "the fragrance of magnolias, the singing of birds, and the gushing of fountains" in the gardens of Aranjuez, and certainly the final movement, marked Allegro gentile (suggesting music played quickly, cheerfully, yet gracefully and genteelly), conveys just such a spirit most of all. Ms. Yang gives her thanks in the booklet note for having a real Spanish orchestra (Orquestra Simfonica de Barcelona I Nacional de Catalunya) supporting her in the music, the same orchestra that premiered the work so many years ago. It certainly doesn't hurt.

Among the other pieces on the program is The Albeniz Concerto by Stephen Goss (b. 1964). Goss wrote his concerto in 2009 as a tribute to Isaac Albeniz (1860-1909), the great Spanish pianist and composer, Goss using many of the man's piano themes for the piece, which Ms. Yang and the Barcelona Orchestra commissioned. While the work may not achieve the stature of Rodrigo's concerto or the virtues of Albeniz's piano music alone, it does have a pleasant style and goes down easily.

The final two pieces on the album are for solo guitar: Albeniz's Espana, Op. 165, with its prominent "Tango" the salient feature, here presented in a transcription for guitar and played as sensitively as I've ever heard it done on any instrument; and Rodrigo's Invocacion y danza (1961), probably the composer's most-popular solo guitar work, "a homage to Rodrigo's friend and mentor Manuel de Falla." It's a slightly gloomy but fascinating affair, and one Ms. Yang seems to know quite well.

Although it's hard not to enjoy Ms. Yang's music making, not everyone may appreciate the sound of the disc. EMI recorded it in 2010 at L'Auditori, Pau Casals Hall, Barcelona, placing a good deal of emphasis on the guitar. By that, I mean that while the orchestra is nicely reproduced, clean and clear, the guitar seems disproportionately large, looming out in front of the ensemble in a rather fat, bulbous manner. The fact is, the guitar doesn't sound well integrated with the orchestra but rather as though it were miked somewhere else and added later. I'm sure that wasn't the case, but with the guitar as big and soft as it appears, that's the impression it leaves. Otherwise, hardly a complaint.

JJP

Meet the Staff

Meet the Staff
John J. Puccio, Founder and Contributor

Understand, I'm just an everyday guy reacting to something I love. And I've been doing it for a very long time, my appreciation for classical music starting with the musical excerpts on the Big Jon and Sparkie radio show in the early Fifties and the purchase of my first recording, The 101 Strings Play the Classics, around 1956. In the late Sixties I began teaching high school English and Film Studies as well as becoming interested in hi-fi, my audio ambitions graduating me from a pair of AR-3 speakers to the Fulton J's recommended by The Stereophile's J. Gordon Holt. In the early Seventies, I began writing for a number of audio magazines, including Audio Excellence, Audio Forum, The Boston Audio Society Speaker, The American Record Guide, and from 1976 until 2008, The $ensible Sound, for which I served as Classical Music Editor.

Today, I'm retired from teaching and use a pair of bi-amped VMPS RM40s loudspeakers for my listening. In addition to writing for the Classical Candor blog, I served as the Movie Review Editor for the Web site Movie Metropolis (formerly DVDTown) from 1997-2013. Music and movies. Life couldn't be better.

Karl Nehring, Editor and Contributor

For more than 20 years I was the editor of The $ensible Sound magazine and a regular contributor to both its equipment and recordings review pages. I would not presume to present myself as some sort of expert on music, but I have a deep love for and appreciation of many types of music, "classical" especially, and have listened to thousands of recordings over the years, many of which still line the walls of my listening room (and occasionally spill onto the furniture and floor, much to the chagrin of my long-suffering wife). I have always taken the approach as a reviewer that what I am trying to do is simply to point out to readers that I have come across a recording that I have found of interest, a recording that I think they might appreciate my having pointed out to them. I suppose that sounds a bit simple-minded, but I know I appreciate reading reviews by others that do the same for me — point out recordings that they think I might enjoy.

For readers who might be wondering about what kind of system I am using to do my listening, I should probably point out that I do a LOT of music listening and employ a variety of means to do so in a variety of environments, as I would imagine many music lovers also do. Starting at the more grandiose end of the scale, the system in which I do my most serious listening comprises Marantz CD 6007 and Onkyo CD 7030 CD players, NAD C 658 streaming preamp/DAC, Legacy Audio PowerBloc2 amplifier, and a pair of Legacy Audio Focus SE loudspeakers. I occasionally do some listening through pair of Sennheiser 560S headphones. I miss the excellent ELS Studio sound system in our 2016 Acura RDX (now my wife's daily driver) on which I had ripped more than a hundred favorite CDs to the hard drive, so now when driving my 2022 Accord EX-L Hybrid I stream music from my phone through its adequate but not outstanding factory system. For more casual listening at home when I am not in my listening room, I often stream music through the phone into a Vizio soundbar system that has tolerably nice sound for such a diminutive physical presence. And finally, at the least grandiose end of the scale, I have an Ultimate Ears Wonderboom II Bluetooth speaker for those occasions where I am somewhere by myself without a sound system but in desperate need of a musical fix. I just can’t imagine life without music and I am humbly grateful for the technology that enables us to enjoy it in so many wonderful ways.

William (Bill) Heck, Webmaster and Contributor

Among my early childhood memories are those of listening to my mother playing records (some even 78 rpm ones!) of both classical music and jazz tunes. I suppose that her love of music was transmitted genetically, and my interest was sustained by years of playing in rock bands – until I realized that this was no way to make a living. The interest in classical music was rekindled in grad school when the university FM station serving as background music for studying happened to play the Brahms First Symphony. As the work came to an end, it struck me forcibly that this was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard, and from that point on, I never looked back. This revelation was to the detriment of my studies, as I subsequently spent way too much time simply listening, but music has remained a significant part of my life. These days, although I still can tell a trumpet from a bassoon and a quarter note from a treble clef, I have to admit that I remain a nonexpert. But I do love music in general and classical music in particular, and I enjoy sharing both information and opinions about it.

The audiophile bug bit about the same time that I returned to classical music. I’ve gone through plenty of equipment, brands from Audio Research to Yamaha, and the best of it has opened new audio insights. Along the way, I reviewed components, and occasionally recordings, for The $ensible Sound magazine. Most recently I’ve moved to my “ultimate system” consisting of a BlueSound Node streamer, an ancient Toshiba multi-format disk player serving as a CD transport, Legacy Wavelet II DAC/preamp/crossover, dual Legacy PowerBloc2 amps, and Legacy Signature SE speakers (biamped), all connected with decently made, no-frills cables. With the arrival of CD and higher resolution streaming, that is now the source for most of my listening.

Ryan Ross, Contributor

I started listening to and studying classical music in earnest nearly three decades ago. This interest grew naturally out of my training as a pianist. I am now a musicologist by profession, specializing in British and other symphonic music of the 19th and 20th centuries. My scholarly work has been published in major music journals, as well as in other outlets. Current research focuses include twentieth-century symphonic historiography, and the music of Jean Sibelius, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and Malcolm Arnold.

I am honored to contribute writings to Classical Candor. In an age where the classical recording industry is being subjected to such profound pressures and changes, it is more important than ever for those of us steeped in this cultural tradition to continue to foster its love and exposure. I hope that my readers can find value, no matter how modest, in what I offer here.


Bryan Geyer, Technical Analyst

I initially embraced classical music in 1954 when I mistuned my car radio and heard the Heifetz recording of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto. That inspired me to board the new "hi-fi" DIY bandwagon. In 1957 I joined one of the pioneer semiconductor makers and spent the next 32 years marketing transistors and microcircuits to military contractors. Home audio DIY projects remained a personal passion until 1989 when we created our own new photography equipment company. I later (2012) revived my interest in two channel audio when we "downsized" our life and determined that mini-monitors + paired subwoofers were a great way to mate fine music with the space constraints of condo living.

Visitors that view my technical papers on this site may wonder why they appear here, rather than on a site that features audio equipment reviews. My reason is that I tried the latter, and prefer to publish for people who actually want to listen to music; not to equipment. My focus is in describing what's technically beneficial to assure that the sound of the system will accurately replicate the source input signal (i. e. exhibit high accuracy) without inordinate cost and complexity. Conversely, most of the audiophiles of today strive to achieve sound that's euphonic, i.e. be personally satisfying. In essence, audiophiles seek sound that's consistent with their desire; the music is simply a test signal.

Mission Statement

It is the goal of Classical Candor to promote the enjoyment of classical music. Other forms of music come and go--minuets, waltzes, ragtime, blues, jazz, bebop, country-western, rock-'n'-roll, heavy metal, rap, and the rest--but classical music has been around for hundreds of years and will continue to be around for hundreds more. It's no accident that every major city in the world has one or more symphony orchestras.

When I was young, I heard it said that only intellectuals could appreciate classical music, that it required dedicated concentration to appreciate. Nonsense. I'm no intellectual, and I've always loved classical music. Anyone who's ever seen and enjoyed Disney's Fantasia or a Looney Tunes cartoon playing Rossini's William Tell Overture or Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 can attest to the power and joy of classical music, and that's just about everybody.

So, if Classical Candor can expand one's awareness of classical music and bring more joy to one's life, more power to it. It's done its job. --John J. Puccio

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"Their Master's Voice" by Michael Sowa

"Their Master's Voice" by Michael Sowa