Recent Releases No. 65 (CD Reviews)

by Karl Nehring

Sommernachtskonzert 2023. Bizet: Carmen Suite No. 1; L'amour est un oiseau rebelle (Habanera); Lili Boulanger: D'un matin de printemps; Berlioz: Le Corsaire Overture, Op. 21, H. 01 Gounod: Sapho, Act III, No. 19 - Ô ma lyre immortelle; Ravel: Daphnis et Chloé Suite No. 2, M. 57b      ; Saint-Saëns: Samson et Dalila, Op. 47 - Mon coeur s'ouvre à ta voix: Ravel: Boléro, M. 81; Johann Strauss II: Wiener Blut, Op. 354. Elīna Garanča, mezzo-soprano; Vienna Philharmonic; Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Sony Classics 19658818969

The Summer Night Concert by the Vienna Philharmonic was held this year on June 8th, 2023. It is an annual open-air event that has been held since 2008, something of a complement to the famous New Year’s concerts with their much older tradition. Musically, these summer concerts are far more interesting than their winter counterparts, presenting as they typically do a more varied program than the mostly Strauss waltzes and such that are heard in January in the  gilded Musikverein. As you can see from the above program listing, the summer concert is more musically substantial, and because it is summer, the park of Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna is the outdoor setting for the concert, allowing for a far larger audience to attend. 

Like the New Year’s concert, the Summer Concert is led bya top-flight conductor – Yannick Nézet-Séguin in 2023, following in the footsteps of Georges Prêtre, Daniel Barenboim, Franz Welser-Möst, Lorin Maazel, Christoph Eschenbach, Zubin Mehta, Semyon Bychkov, Gustavo Dudamel, Daniel Harding, and Andris Nelsons. Also like the New Year’s Concert, the event is televised worldwide (PBS carries it in the USA) and is made available on DVD, Blu-Ray, and – obviously – CD.  To be perfectly honest, I would think most folks would prefer to see a video version of this concert rather than merely to listen to the CD. Don’t get me wrong, though; it’s an excellent release, a well-recorded concert CD of a substantial and highly entertaining musical program, well-performed, and even the CD booklet is well-done – but the concert really is something you might want to see as well as hear if you get the chance.  

A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving: Original Soundtrack Recording (50^th Anniversary Special Edition). The Vince Guaraldi Quintet (Vince Guaraldi, piano and voice; Seward McCain, bass; Mike Clark; drums; Tom Harrell, trumpet and brass arrangement; Chuck Bennett, trombone). Lee Mendelson Film Productions LM02302 

A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving premiered on CBS television  on November 23, 1973. This was the tenth Peanuts special, and earlier that summer, Vince Guaraldi had entered the studio with his fellow musicians to work on the score. Jazz fans might recognize the names of Tom Harrell, who would go on to become a legendary trumpeter on the New York scene, and Mike Clark, who toured with Herbie Hancock’s Headhunters band in the 1970s and who, along with Dave Garibaldi, the drummer for the Bay area group Tower of Power, became well-known for their driving, powerful style of drumming. (As a side note, Clark and Garibaldi have teamed together with the noted drummers Greg Errico [Sly and The Family Stone], Lenny White [Return to Forever], and Greg Shrieve [Santana] on a series of YouTube videos called Stick People, which features in-depth interviews with other musicians. You can see their first episode here.) 

Also recognizable to most people of a certain age should be the general style and some of the musical themes included in the program. Although not quite as endearing as the music for the A Charlie Brown Christmas special from 1965 – who can ever forget “Christmas Time Is Here?” – the Thanksgiving music has an upbeat, feel-good, jazzy energy to it that makes for some engaging listening. With Harrell’s contributions (plus a little help from an unidentified guitar player) adding extra color and pizazz to Guaraldi’s tunes, the net result is an album that swings from start to finish – and that is something for which to be thankful this holiday season.

Recent New Releases (CD mini-reviews)

By Karl W. Nehring

Hilary Hahn: Paris
Chausson: Poème; Prokofiev: Concerto for Violin and Orchestra No. 1; Rautavaara: Deux Sérénades. Hilary Hahn, violin; Mikko Franck, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France. Deutsche Grammophon  483 9847.

This new release from the talented American violinist Hilary Hahn is a delight from start to finish. Although the album title and orchestra might lead you to assume a program featuring all French composers, that is not the case here, for in addition to the French composer Ernest Chausson (1855-1899) we have also music by the Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953) and the Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara (1928-2016). Hahn reveals her deep affection for and kinship with the City of Light in an essay in which she explains that in addition to her many other connections with Paris, her violin was made in Paris way back in 1865 by a famed luthier whose shop has in the 21st century been replaced by a convenience store. On a brighter note, she also reveals that she had long desired to record the Prokofiev, one of her favorite and most-performed pieces, but was waiting for the right combination of time, place, orchestra, and conductor, which she realized in Paris with Franck and the OPRF in June of 2019. The end result is truly lovely, well worth the wait both for her and for us. Those who might associate Prokofiev with spiky, boisterous music would do well to listen to this performance of his Violin Concerto No. 1, which is lyrical, lively, and lovely. Hahn describes the Chausson Poème with which she opens the program as “raw, lush, heartbreakingly beautiful… it takes my breath away.” Although I have in the past owned recordings of this piece, and enjoyed them, I had not heard the piece in many years until I auditioned this new recording, and yes, I found it to be much as she described. It truly is a marvelous work, well worth seeking out if you have not yet encountered it. The background story behind the Deux Sérénades by Rautavaara that complete this release is told in the liner notes, a tale that I will not relate here but will rather leave for those who might be interested to seek out for themselves. The music is quite enjoyable, but in truth, does not quite sound complete, which a reading of the liner notes will explain. All in all, Paris is a heartfelt and satisfying release from some consummate musicians.

Parallels: Shellac Reworks by Christian Löffler
Wagner: Parsifal: Closing Scene (Arr. for Orchestra). Max von Schillings, Staatskapelle Berlin (1926-27); Smetana: The Moldau (excerpt). Erich Kleiber, Staatskapelle Berlin (1928); J.S. Bach: Dir, dir Jehova, will ich singen BWV 452. Karl Straube, Thomanerchor Leipzig; Helmut Walcha, organ (1927); J.S. Bach: Gavotte from English Suite No. 6, BWV 811. Alfred Grunfeld, piano (1911); Chopin: Nocturne No. 2 in E flat Major Op. 9 No. 2 (arr. De Sarasate). Charles Cerne, piano; Vasa Prihoda, violin (1929); Bizet: Nadir’s Aria from Les pecheurs des perles. Koloman von Pataky, tenor; unknown orchestra (1928); excerpts from four works by Beethoven: Symphony No. 6. Hans Pfitzner, Staatskapelle Berlin (1930); Symphony No. 5, 2. Satz. Richard Strauss, Staatskapelle Berlin (1928); Egmont Overture. Otto Klemperer, Staatskapelle Berlin (1927); Symphony No. 3, 2. Marcia funebre. Hans Pfitzner, Berliner Philharmoniker (1929). Christian Löffler, electronics. Deutsche Grammophon 4839660.

This is a recording that truly blends the old and the new. Deutsche Grammophon has one of the oldest sound archives in the world, having taken great care to store their recorded material ever since the label’s foundation in 1898. Shellac discs (78s) that held about four minutes of music per side were the dominant recording format until the 1940s. A number of these historic recordings have now been digitized and restored, and DG recently teamed with German DJ and producer Christian Löffler, who hand-picked from this collection of digitized shellac recordings a set for modern reworking. Löffler is a self-taught musician whose productions combine elements of dancefloor techno and ambient electronica. He says that his music “is often described as nostalgic, it’s just part of my musical world. Sad music – if you want to call it that – has always been more appealing to me than happy music… I’m quite nerdy when it comes to trendy music production techniques. I’m very forward thinking and always interested in new technologies. But many of my trademark sounds come from vintage synthesizers and old effects devices. I’m just trying to catch the best of any time period to get the best possible result. My aspiration with this project was to handle the music with all due respect. That is something I always do when I work with other people’s music, be it a remix or collaboration. My aim for Parallels was to bring the soul of my own music into these original pieces. I also wanted to keep some parts of the original music almost untouched, to give the listener a better understanding of the original material in the context of its new ‘home’.” Yes, his description sounds a bit bizarre, but the end result is fascinating, hypnotic, and haunting. Electronic sounds, acoustic sounds, voices from nearly a century ago rising from the mix -- this is a recording that can be enjoyed both in casual and concentrated listening modes.

Refraction
Alexander Woods, violin; Rex Woods, piano; Aubrey Smith Woods, violin. MSR Classics MS 1689.

As you might guess from the names of the performers, this album of music for violin is a family affair, presented by violinist Alexander Woods along with his pianist father, Rex Woods, and his violinist wife, Aubrey Smith Woods. (Perhaps I am being overly sensitive, but I did find it rather odd that on both the front and back covers the three names are printed in three distinctly rank-ordered font styles: ALEXANDER WOODS, REX WOODS, Aubrey Smith Woods. Hmmmm…)  The four composers are a mix of the familiar and unfamiliar: Dvorak, Asplund, Mozart, and Thorndock. As the liner notes explain, “although the violin itself has remained virtually unchanged for centuries, music composed for the instrument has undergone numerous and vivid transformations, shaped and developed by varied circumstances, styles and innovations. Like a light beam passing through a prism. Works written for the violin have, over time, refracted into a broad stylistic array of vibrant compositional perspectives. This album mingles canonic violin works from the past with recent compositions that explore this variegated play, engaging with the rich history of violin music and performance through myriad lenses.” The album opens with Four Romantic Pieces from Dvorak for violin and piano, which are played here most romantically and enjoyably, a fine way to start the program. Unfortunately, the next composition, One Eternal Round for two violins by Canadian-American composer Christian Asplund (b. 1964), does not fall nearly as naturally on the ear as the others included in this set. Although it is not aggressively harsh or dissonant as some contemporary music can be, to these ears at least, it simply lacked any real appeal. YMMV. But then the players move back to familiar ground with Mozart’s Violin Sonata No. 26, a refreshing drink of cool, clear water after the dryness of the Asplund. The final composition, A Crust of Azure by American composer Neil Thorndock (b. 1977), is said in the liner notes to be “influenced by the impression of music coming down from the sky, ringing like reverberations from a bell tower. The evocative movement titles [I. Tremulous Whirl, II. Refraction of Sky, III. Lavender Shroud] allude to the atmospheric colors, light effects and sensations that descend from the sky’s ‘crust of azure.’”  It truly is a colorful piece, lively and imaginative, well worth an audition for fans of the violin who are seeking interesting new repertoire. With excellent engineering and helpful liner notes, MSR Classics has done a first-class job with this release.    

Max Richter: Voices 2
Max Richter, piano, keyboards, organ, synthesizer; Mari Samuelsson, solo violin; Ian Burdge, solo cello; Camilla Pay, harp; Robert Ziegler, conductor; Tenebrae Choir; various sopranos and altos plus a number of violin, viola, cello, and double bass players. Decca B00332480-02.

Although Richter’s previous release, Voices (reviewed ) spotlighted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, including spoken recitations of the text, Voices 2 is exclusively musical, with no textual recitations. According to Richter, Voices 2 “opens up a meditative instrumental musical space to consider the ideas raised by the first record. The music is less about the world we know already and more about the hope for the future we have yet to write.” Those familiar with Richter’s music will know what to expect: music that is on the one hand relatively simple and straightforward in terms of its melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic construction, yet on the other hand, rich and evocative in terms of its instrumentation, sonority, and emotional resonance. There are some striking sounds to be heard from Richter’s various keyboard instruments both acoustic and electronic, plus some particularly notable musical contributions by Mari Samuelsson on violin and Ian Burdge on cello. And no, you need not have listened to Voices to enjoy its successor, which is quite enjoyable on its own terms. 

Lento Religioso
Berg: Piano Sonata op. 1 (arr. Wijnand van Klaveren); Korngold: Lento Religioso from Symphonic Serenade; Bruckner; Adagio from String Quintet; Bridge: Lament for string orchestra (for Catherine, aged 9, “Lusitania” 1915); Lekeu: Adagio pour quatuor d’orchestre; Wagner: Prelude from Tristan und Isolde; Strauss; Prelude from Capriccio. Candida Thompson, Amsterdam Sinfonietta. Channel Classics CCS 36620.

As a glance at the titles of the works included in this generously filled (77:41) disc should suggest, this release features music from the more serious, somber pages of the classical music catalog. That is not to say, however, that listening to it is an emotional downer, as this is music of great depth and exquisite beauty, played with sensitivity by this relatively small string orchestra. Some of the selections are scaled down (e.g., the Wagner), some are scaled up (e.g., the Berg and the Bruckner), and some were originally intended for an ensemble of about this size. The engineering is first-rate, with clean string tone and a believable soundfield. All in all, an interesting program of some works a bit off the beaten path that should be especially appealing to those who appreciate music of a serious, reflective, but nonetheless aesthetically engaging nature.

Lindberg: The Waves of Wollongong
Also, Liverpool Lullabies; 2017. The New Trombone Collective; Evelyn Glennie, percussion; Christian Lindberg, trombone and conductor, Antwerp Symphony Orchestra. BIS-2148 SACD.

If I had to come up with a one-word description of this release by the Swedish composer, trombonist, and conductor Christian Lindberg (b. 1958) it would be “robust.” Or maybe “outgoing.” Or possibly even “swaggering.” It most certainly would not be “reticent” or “tentative.” The opening piece, The Waves of Wollongong (the title refers to waves the composer had experienced in Wollongong, Australia) features the nine trombones (three each alto, tenor, and bass) of The New Trombone Collective making mighty waves of sound along with the orchestra, while the second piece, Liverpool Lullabies, seems hardly the sort of music to little ones to sleep as Lindberg on trombone and the amazing Ms. Glennie on percussion give off plenty of sparks with their energetic playing. The final piece, 2017, was composed by Lindberg during that turbulent, discouraging, frightening year as a reaction to the 2016 U.S. presidential election and its disturbing aftermath, and is dedicated to the journalist Rachel Maddow. Needless to say, it is not a cheerful piece, but it is musically engaging. As per their usual standard, the BIS engineering team has captured this robust music in robust, dynamic, swaggering sound that will tickle your tweeters and waggle your woofers.

Vaughan Williams: Symphonies Nos. 4 and 6
Sir Antonio Pappano, London Symphony Orchestra. LSO Live SACD LSO0867.

Vaughan Williams may well be the most underrated symphonic composer. For my money, his nine rank right up there with the best, and when it comes to the heart of his symphonic output, Symphonies Nos. 3, 4, 5, and 6, I can’t think of any composer whose 4-6 I would rate above RVW’s – not Mahler, not Bruckner, not Sibelius, and no, not even the immortal Beethoven. Of those four RVW symphonies, the odd-numbered are primarily lyrical and peaceful, while the two even-numbered symphonies, especially No.4, are much more brash and assertive. Pappano and the LSO hold nothing back, with the opening notes of No. 4 bursting forth with startling ferocity. This bold beginning sets the tone for the entire disc, which presents both symphonies forcefully and energetically. My only quibble is with some harshness in the upper strings; to be honest, I am not sure how much is the engineering or how much can be attributed to the vigor of the performance. My first choice in both symphonies has been the Slatkin recordings from his RCA boxed set (now distributed by Sony Music at a bargain price), but for those looking for a single disc of these two remarkable 20th century masterpieces, this new release from Pappano and the LSO is a top choice. Highly recommended.

KWN

Bizet/Shchedrin: Carmen Ballet (CD review)

Also, Shostakovich: Hamlet; Glazunov: Carnaval Overture. Arthur Fiedler, Boston Pops Orchestra. RCA HP 09026-63308-2.

This was the first recording I heard in RCA's "High Performance" audiophile series, which they launched in the late Nineties and subsequently abandoned. Their remastering process involved 24/96 bit technology, using a customized Studer transport with Cello electronics and UV22TM Super CD encoding. It all appeared quite impressive, and I'm sure the results sounded better than much of what the company usually produced. But at the time I questioned their choice of material and never fully appreciated their sonics.

Arthur Fiedler conducted the Bizet and Shostakovich pieces vivaciously, to be sure; Fiedler was a highly underrated conductor by the music critics of his day (and maybe ours today). All they could see was that he led a "pops" orchestra, and many of them doubted he could lead a suitable interpretation of anything more serious than pop material. They were generally wrong.

Arthur Fiedler

All three works on the disc get crackerjack performances from Fiedler, especially the Carmen Ballet, in Rodion Shchedrin's quirky arrangement of Bizet's music utilizing nothing but strings and forty-seven percussion instruments. Fiedler's realization is filled with all the color, creativity, irreverence, and sly wit Shchedrin no doubt intended. Likewise with the other selections.

But it was the sound I was interested in when I listened to my first disc in this series. RCA advertised it as spectacularly wide ranging in dynamics and frequency response. When I listened, I found it in a favorable light, yet not much more so than I did any normally good recording. The sound derived from 1968 and 1969 masters, not an era for which RCA was known for its greatest sonics. The music is quiet in background, smooth, and fairly natural in overall response. However, it is also very much multi-miked and flat in its depth perspective.

Frankly, I preferred then and prefer now the sound of RCA's earlier Living Stereo discs, in spite of their occasionally rougher projection and sometimes higher noise level. Nonetheless, for readers interested in the Carmen selection, in particular, one can hardly find a better release.

JJP

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click below:

Bizet: Symphony in C (CD review)

Also, L'Arlesienne Suites 1 & 2. Sir Thomas Beecham, Orchestre National de la Radiodiffusion Francaise and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. Warner Classics 0724356723122.

You've heard me ask this before, I'm sure, but it bears repeating: Who would you rather have conducting French orchestral music more than Sir Thomas Beecham? I can think of no one. Whether it's Bizet or Berlioz or Franck or Debussy or Delibes or Faure or Saint-Saens or Massenet or Chabrier or whomever, Sir Thomas's name stands out a leading contender for best conductor of French music. Not that he didn't do well conducting other music, especially English pastoral music, but he seemed to have a special affinity for French music. The Bizet Symphony in C and L'Arlesienne album under review is a good example: Recorded in 1956 and 1959 by EMI, remastered by EMI in 2000 for their "Great Recordings of the Century" series, and rereleased by Warner Classics in 2015, it remains the one to beat in this repertoire.

Anyway, the Symphony in C is a composition French composer Georges Bizet (1838-1875) wrote as a student exercise at the age of seventeen. It's a remarkable work for any age, but doubly so given the composer's youth. What's more, it's held up well, considering that Bizet thought so little of it that he filed it away and forgot about it. It lay undiscovered in the Paris Conservatoire archives for some eighty years until Bizet biographer D.C. Parker found it, the work receiving its première in 1935.

Over the years there have been any number of fine recordings made of the Symphony in C, ones from the stereo era including those of Marriner and the Academy (Decca), Bernstein and the NYPO (Sony), Ansermet and the Suisse Romande O. (Decca), Barenboim and the Paris Orchestra (EMI), Plasson and the Toulouse Orchestra (EMI), Pretre and the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra (Hanssler Classics), West and the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra (Reference Recordings), among others. But, as I said before, none of them have really topped the performance of Sir Thomas Beecham and the French National Radio Orchestra.

Beecham's performance possesses all the drive, energy, dazzling radiance, and youthful charm (though the conductor was nearing the end of his life when he recorded it) one could possibly want from this symphony. There is never a lag or a lull in the music, yet Beecham never overdrives it, either; it simply sounds "right" at all times. Thus, an Allegro vivo really does exhibit a brisk, lively manner, with more than a hint of impish enthusiasm added. The Adagio moves at a comfortable, leisurely, rhythmic, but not at all sluggish pace. The scherzo is elegant as well as energetic; and the finale is as playful and exciting as any you'll hear.

Sir Thomas Beecham

When Bizet wrote his incidental music to Andre Daudet's play L'Arlesienne (The Girl from Arles) in 1872, the public and critics thought it a distraction from the rest of the production. More likely, the music was probably better than the drama (which I haven't seen) and simply upstaged it. Whatever the case, neither the play nor the complete incidental music has fared all that well since then. However, the wily Bizet recognized a good thing when he heard it and extracted a suite from the work (and his friend Ernest Guiraud orchestrated a second suite after the composer's death, one that adds a little minuet from La jolle fille de Perth). These suites, of course, have gone on to become the classics that many of us prize in our collections.

As with the Symphony in C, no one in my experience has conducted the L'Arlesienne music any better than Sir Thomas. He dispatches every movement of these two suites with characteristic humor, refinement, and swagger, as the situation demands. And the orchestra plays with an assured air of authority, as though they knew that no one would ever match them in these performances. No one ever has, really.

Producers Victor Olof and Lawrence Collingwood and engineers Paul Vavasseur and Douglas Larter recorded the music at Salle Wagram, Paris, 1959 (Symphony) and Abbey Road Studio No. 2, London, 1956 (L'Arlesienne). You'd never know it. The clarity and cleanness of the recordings continue to sound impressive.

In the Symphony, the sound displays good detail, a natural room resonance, a smooth overall response, and decent orchestral depth. You would not think this a sixty-odd-year recording, particularly as the remastering engineers have so well removed any background noise from the master tape. In the L'Arlesienne suites, recorded a few years earlier in London, the sound is very similar to the later production. It's realistically warm, with a pleasant ambient glow, if maybe a touch rougher, less wide, and less clear. Still, early stereo or not, it holds up about as well as most of today's recordings.

JJP

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click here:

Bizet: Carmen, complete (SACD review)

Marilyn Horne, James McCracken, Tom Krause, Adriana Maliponte; Manhattan Chorus; Leonard Bernstein, Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and Children's Chorus. Pentatone PTC 5186 216.

It was over forty years ago that I first heard this 1972 recording from DG, and my initial response was that the sonics floored me. In general, I didn't always care for DG's sound back then, but with Bernstein's Metropolitan Opera production of Carmen, I changed my mind. It seemed so alive, so real, I saw what the DG folks were capable of doing when they put their minds to it. Unfortunately, the old vinyl-disc set became a casualty of the CD era, and when I finally got around to hearing the same recording on DG's compact discs, the sound didn't seem to have the same live presence to it I remembered. Now, in 2015 we get a new remastering by Pentatone of DG's original multichannel tapes, and the sound impresses me once again.

But first a word about the opera: French composer Georges Bizet (1838-1875) premiered his four-act opera Carmen in 1875, using a libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on a novella by Prosper Mérimée. The setting is Seville, Spain, during the early nineteenth century, the narrative concerning a beautiful and tempestuous Gypsy girl, Carmen (Horne), who lavishes her affections on a young but naive soldier, Don Jose (McCracken). He becomes so enamoured with Carmen, he spurns his former lover, deserts his regiment, and joins Carmen and a crew of smugglers. When Carmen subsequently rejects him and takes up with a bullfighter (Krause), Don Jose becomes so enraged with jealousy, he murders her.

Bizet would never know how successful his opera would eventually become because he died shortly after the premiere. After the composer's death, however, critics and audiences found enough beauty and melodrama in the piece to help transform French opera comique into the emerging Italian realism of Verdi and Puccini.

Interestingly, any number of people amended the score after Bizet died, adding, among other things, the introduction of recitative in place of the original dialogue. There exists today no standard edition of the opera, and different folks have their own ideas about which version best conveys Bizet's intentions. Maestro Bernstein here uses the original 1875 version of the opera with spoken dialogue, but with apparently some modifications for a modern stage production.

Not only do I remember DG's sound being spectacularly good on vinyl and only so-so on CD, I also remember the production itself getting mixed reviews. Critics of the day seemed more than a little perplexed by the conductor's choice of tempos (mostly slow but, then, occasionally breakneck), and never found the largely American cast particularly persuasive in their French accents. But what did I know? I've never been much of an opera connoisseur, so these things didn't and still don't bother me. Maybe time and repeated listening have mostly erased any doubts I might have had about the recording's worth.

Leonard Bernstein

Ms. Horne is in great voice, with a very wide range and pretty good dramatic force. Naturally, one's choice of a favorite or "perfect" Carmen must remain a very individual and personal matter. For me, Victoria de los Angeles seemed ideal. But there is nothing wrong with Ms. Horne's still appropriately earthy approach. Likewise, James McCracken's Don Jose may not strike you as sounding naive enough, but he, too, makes the best of it with his robust, full-blooded tenor voice. The rest of the cast sound just as good, with the chorus putting in a particularly fine show without being in any way flashy or upstaging.

Now, about those matters of tempo: Bernstein's slow pace is most apparent from the outset, during the opening Prelude. Beyond that, either Bernstein speeds up to normal, or one gets used to it. In either case, by the time you finish it, nothing seems extraordinarily out of place. The quiet interludes are tranquil and serene; the big climactic moments are impressively strong and healthy; and the entire proceedings are immensely enjoyable.

Pentatone have packaged the recording handsomely. They fitted the entire opera onto two discs of 79 and 80 minutes each; they have housed the discs in sleeves at the front and back of a CD-sized hardbound book; and they have included over 150 pages of text, photos, and libretto.

Producer Thomas Mowrey and engineer Gunter Hermans originally recorded the opera for four and eight-channel playback (although they never released it that way) at the Metropolitan Opera House, New York City in September 1972. Pentatone Music remastered the recording at Baarn, The Netherlands in October 2014 and have issued their remastered edition in hybrid SACD. That means the discs offer two-channel stereo playback from an SACD layer and a regular CD layer and multichannel playback from an SACD layer. You can listen to the CD layer on any ordinary CD player but in order to enjoy the sound of the SACD layers, you will need an SACD player; I did my listening in SACD two-channel.

After writing this review, the engineer added the following comments: "It's gratifying to read this excellent perspective on a recording that I produced 42 years ago. One small correction: It was recorded 16-track on 2-inch Scotch 202 tape. After editing, I mixed it down to 4-track quad on half-inch tape, and simultaneously I made the 2-track stereo mix to quarter-inch tape by folding the rear channels into the front at a 1-to-1 ratio." --Thomas Mowrey, New York, 4/30/15

The most realistic things about the sound are the depth and dynamics. This production actually appears as though it's in front of you on a stage, with real presence and excellent transparency to the image and impact in the sonics. The highs sparkle, the midrange is clean and clear, and the bass reaches nicely down to the depths. Moreover, voices sound natural, with a rich warmth and lifelike clarity and almost no edge. Indeed, the whole recording seems exceptionally smooth. And if I had only one criticism it is that I would have liked a better separation of orchestra and vocals. But it's a minor reservation.

I have no hesitation in saying that of the eight or ten complete recordings of this opera I've listened to over the years, this one from Bernstein, remastered by Pentatone, is the best sounding of the lot. Whether the performance suits you is another matter. I've gotten used to it and like it quite a lot.

JJP

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click here:

Alexandre Tharaud: Autograph (CD review)

Bis-Encores. Alexandre Tharaud, piano. Erato 50999 934137 2 5.

French pianist Alexandre Tharaud has an extensive discography consisting of dozens of albums covering almost every major composer for the piano, including Bach, Chopin, Grieg, Poulenc, Ravel, Satie, Schubert, and a host of others but, oddly, no Beethoven. On this 2013 album Tharaud presents twenty-three short selections by various noted composers but, again, no Beethoven. He says the album, called Autograph and which he subtitles Bis-Encores, is a collection of music that sums up his repertoire and his career. Fair enough.

So, the album comprises mostly light, airy, Romantic, ethereal piano music. Maybe Tharaud sees himself as the gentle, thoughtful, sensitive type. It’s certainly not a bad way to go; although it doesn’t make the for the most-exciting of programs, it makes for beautiful listening, and Tharaud is as good at it as anyone could be at it. The material is light, airy, Romantic, and ethereal, as is the playing.

Let me give you a few examples. Tharaud begins the program with the Prelude in B minor by Bach, in an arrangement by Alexander Siloti. It has a beautifully straightforward simplicity that Tharaud executes with care. It's contemplative music at its best.

Next is the Romance sans paroles No. 3, Op. 17 by Gabriel Faure. It is lovely in its graceful lines, which Tharaud characterizes with loving care. After that is a bit of a pick-me-up with Rameau's rondo piece Les Sauvages, one of the livelier tunes on the album. Then there's Gluck's popular Dance of the Blessed Spirits, again arranged for piano by Siloti, in which Tharaud conveys a sweet and untroubled peace.

And so it goes, each little work a shining gem and, for the most part, a quiet oasis for relaxation and thought. Of course, there are also a few things like Rachmaninov's Prelude in C sharp minor No. 2, Op. 3, which in Tharaud's hands is not only powerful and dynamic but noble and exciting.

Lots of favorites: The ones I've already mentioned and also Chopin's Minute Waltz, always welcome; Saint-Saens's The Swain, always delightful; Chabrier's Feuillet d'album and Bizet's Adagietto, both enchanting; Poulenc's aptly named Melancolie; and Satie's seductively odd little Gymnopedie No. 3.

Tharaud closes the program with piece by Bach, the Andante from his Concerto in B minor, arranged for piano by Mr. Tharaud. It has a calm, tranquil tone reminiscent of Beethoven's later Moonlight Sonata, and Tharaud’s handling of it easily points up the similarities.

The fact is, Tharaud never attempts to dazzle the listener with his technical virtuosity. I suspect it's a case of been there, done that. Here, he is only trying to reveal a part of himself in music he loves and, obviously, loves to play. It is an enjoyable package.

Erato producer and balance engineer Cecile Lenoir recorded the music at the Salle Colonne, Paris, in 2013. The piano sounds warm and cozy, with a pleasing resonant bloom on the notes. Mr. Tharaud appears to be in a spacious environment miked from a moderately close distance. The results are clear yet rounded, detailed yet smooth and natural. It's a sound that appropriately fits the nature of the music.

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click here:

JJP

Ravel: Bolero (UltraHD CD review)

Also, Borodin: Music from Kismet; Bizet: Suites from Carmen; Albeniz: Fete-dieu a Seville. Erich Kunzel, Cincinnati Pops Orchestra. FIM LIM UHD 063 LE.

Released in 2008, Telarc’s Bolero was one of the last recordings Erich Kunzel made before his death in 2009. I read someplace that Kunzel had by that time become the number-one most-recorded conductor in the world. Today, he’s undoubtedly got as many Telarc recordings to his credit as most conductors have compiled in a lifetime. Now the folks at the audiophile company FIM have remastered the Bolero album using their UltraHD 32-bit mastering process, making the sound better than ever. If you’re a fan of Maestro Kunzel, you might find the disc of interest, despite its heady price tag.

Kunzel dedicated the Bolero album to the music of Spain, though mostly written by Frenchmen. The program starts with Maurice Ravel’s celebrated piece, yet it is, for me, the least-effective reading on the disc. Ravel once said that his Bolero should take about seventeen minutes to get through; Kunzel does it up in just over thirteen minutes. I have to admit that in Kunzel’s last few Telarc recordings with the Cincinnati Pops, he seemed less than animated, but I wasn’t expecting him to fly through the Bolero quite so quickly. It may sound a bit more exhilarating than most other interpretations, but it robs the music of its sensual qualities. Plus, there was one moment in it that made me laugh out loud, something I doubt Ravel intended.

Next, Kunzel does a medley of excerpts from the music of Alexander Borodin, music that Telarc proudly announce as “popularized in the musical Kismet.” I’m not sure if Telarc or Kunzel realize that most listeners today probably no more recognize this fifty-odd-year-old musical than they recognize the name Borodin itself. In any case, we get passages from the Symphony No. 2, “In the Steppes of Central Asia,” the String Quartet No. 2, the Symphony No. 1, and the Overture and “Polovtsean Dances” from Prince Igor. Kunzel handles them in a somewhat perfunctory style.

The best section of the album, however, contains music from Georges Bizet’s Carmen Suites Nos. 1 and 2, which come off quite well--dramatic and voluptuous, exciting and sensitive in all the right places. You might want to consider the disc for these two suites alone. Then things finish up with Isaac Albeniz’s “Fete-dieu a Seville” from Iberia, which seems a bit anticlimactic after all the Carmen music, but it’s OK.

Producer Robert Woods and engineer Robert Friedrich recorded the album for Telarc in 2007 at Cincinnati Music Hall, Cincinnati, Ohio. Mr. Friedrich and FIM producer Winston Ma remastered the disc in 2013, using FIM's Ultra High Definition 32-bit mastering and PureFlection replicating processes. The "PureFlection" business is an indication of FIM's intent to reproduce on disc as nearly as possible what is on a master tape, a "pure reflection" of the original.

Understand, I still think the sound of the standard-issue Telarc is pretty good, but one of the things I noted in my review of it a few years back was a bit of dulling at the high end, making the sound appear smoother and warmer than what we might hear live. No such dulling here, though, where the highs glisten. The FIM product also seems to increase the sense of orchestral depth in the recording, while tightening up most of the transients. The response is marginally tauter, cleaner, and, therefore, clearer throughout the frequency range, with slightly improved dynamics and the usual robust bass.  In other words, FIM have made already good sonics even better, and the results are among the best I've heard, a genuine audiophile disc.

However, whether you think FIM's sound is worth the higher price (over twice the cost of the Telarc) is, of course, another story. Only buyers themselves can decide what's worth it for them. For audiophiles with excellent playback equipment, deep pockets, and a love for the music making of Maestro Erich Kunzel, it's probably well worth the extra money. For most other people, maybe not.

Commensurate with the dear cost of an audiophile product, the packaging bespeaks of the higher price. The disc comes packaged in a glossy, hardbound Digipak-type case, with a sixteen-page booklet bound to the inside, and an inner sleeve and additional static-proof envelope for the disc. It's a classy affair.

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click here:

JJP

Bizet: Symphony in C (HDCD review)

Also, Jeux d’enfants; Variations chromatiques. Martin West, San Francisco Ballet Orchestra. Reference Recordings RR-131.

The folks at Reference Recordings don't issue a whole lot of discs in any given year, sometimes only one or two, but they are always so good, musically and sonically, it makes every new release a special occasion. Thus, it is a delight to welcome this latest RR entry into the catalogue, the music of French composer Georges Bizet (1838-1875), performed by Martin West and the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra.

The first and most important item on the program is the one that starts us off, the Symphony in C, which Bizet composed as a student exercise at the age of seventeen. It's a remarkable work for any age, but doubly so given the composer's youth. And it's held up remarkably well, too, considering that Bizet thought so little of it that he filed it away and forgot it. Undiscovered in the Paris Conservatoire archives for some eighty years, it finally got its première in 1935. In terms of recordings of it, Sir Thomas Beecham probably set the benchmark with his 1959 EMI account, a performance I had in mind when listening to this new one from Maestro West.

I worried unnecessarily that West might not provide the same charm, the same light, winsome delight that Beecham had. I shouldn't have worried. West, after all, has been conducting the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra since 2005 and before that was the conductor of the English National Ballet and the Cambridge Philharmonic. He brings the light, delicate touch of the ballet conductor with him, always exercising a spring in his step, a lilt to the beat, a bounce to the melody. And what enchanting melodies they are; it seems that Bizet from his earliest attempts at musical composition was able to offer a seemingly never-ending flow of brilliant ideas. His themes and West's direction give us a joyous, spontaneous, sometimes melancholy, always sweetly flowing and pleasurable rendition of the Symphony in C.

Following the Symphony, we hear Jeux d'enfants (Children's Games), which Bizet originally wrote in 1872 as a four-hands piano suite of twelve numbers. He later orchestrated five of them, the others subsequently orchestrated for the ballet version that debuted in 1932. That's what we get here, the first recording of all twelve items, including those orchestrated by Hershey Kay and Roy Douglas. (Previous recordings included only the Petite Suite, the five items Bizet himself orchestrated.)

Again, West and his players supply the kind of lithe, animated interpretation we found in the Symphony. The different sections of the score alternate between graceful, athletic numbers and slow, lyrical ones, nicely caught by the conductor and his forces. This is ballet interpretation of the first order, light and airy, colorful and impassioned.

The final selection on the disc is Variations chromatiques, which Bizet wrote for piano in 1868. It remained forgotten until 1933 when pianist, composer, and conductor Felix Weingartner orchestrated it. Quite unlike the youthful, energetic, high-spirited Symphony and Jeux, the Variations are dark and somewhat forbidding. Nevertheless, West infuses them with a dancer's agility and a suitably atmospheric mood.

The Reference Recordings team of producers Victor and Marina Ledin, executive producer Marcia Martin, and recording engineer Keith Johnson recorded the music in 24-bit HDCD at Skywalker Sound, Marin County, California in April 2012. Skywalker has become a well-known recording venue, particularly for film music with the likes of the London Symphony Orchestra in movies by George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. How well the main sound studio suits an orchestra for audiophile purposes, however, was a question that interested me. Certainly, the studio seemed perfect for the Philharmonia Baroque in their Four Seasons recording, but that was a very small ensemble. Would a full orchestra sound as good done at Skywalker when the engineers weren’t using the venue to make a flat, forward-sounding film track meant to impress audiences when played back in a huge movie theater? The answer is yes. Reference Recordings did another fine job. Indeed, it’s among their more-transparent sounding discs, while retaining their patented dynamic range, sonic impact, ambience, and air.

As with all of their products, RR's sonics are big and bold, with an impressive power and authority. Yet the sound accomplishes this feat without being muddy, cloudy, or overly resonant. The midrange transparency remains intact while the orchestra blooms fully in all directions. We get a quick, strong transient response; a wide frequency range; a good sense of orchestral depth and room ambience; and a strong, often visceral force behind the notes. It makes for a remarkably realistic presentation, something we have come to know and love from Reference Recordings.

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click here:

JJP

LAGQ: Latin (UltraHD CD review)

Carmen suite and others. Los Angeles Guitar Quartet. FIM LIM UHD 070 LE.

The Los Angeles Guitar Quartet (LAGQ) is probably the best guitar ensemble since the Romeros. Which isn’t hard to understand when you consider that in 1980 Pepe Romero oversaw their formation. Since then, the LAGQ have recorded a slew of albums, winning a Grammy in 2005 for Best Crossover CD, Guitar Heroes. They recorded the present album in 2001 for Telarc, and FIM remastered it to the best possible audiophile standards in 2012. If you like guitar music, you’ll like the LAGQ.

Although Matthew Greif replaced Andrew York in 2005, the group has remained pretty much the same for over thirty years, this Telarc/FIM disc featuring original quartet members John Dearman, William Kanengiser, Scott Tennant and Andrew York. The fellows generally play on guitars using nylon strings in order to reflect the sounds of numerous other instruments and effects. Indeed, on some occasions they appear to be imitating the sounds of an entire symphony orchestra.

On LAGQ: Latin the quartet performs seventeen tracks, starting with Sting’s Latin-inflected tune Fragile in an arrangement that includes Tim Timmerman on percussion. The LAGQ’s rendition is gracefully touching. Next is Eduardo Martin’s Hasta Alicia Baila (“Until Alicia Dances”), a sort of Cuban rumba with an infectious beat.

Then we get the centerpiece of the album, a suite of numbers from Bizet’s Carmen. It’s delightful and should please guitar fans as well as Bizet admirers. The opening Aragonaise shows true panache, the Habanera has a lovely lilt, Seguidilla displays a sweet gentleness, the Toreadors provides a thrilling energy, the Entr’acte is simply gorgeous, and the Gypsy Dance closes the suite in a colorfully spirited fashion.

Following the Carmen Suite, we find a whole series of Cuban, Spanish, Central, and South American numbers. One fascinating item is Leo Brouwer’s Cuban Landscape with Rain, containing--you guessed it--the sounds of rain from the guitars. There is also a delicious performance of Aaron Copland’s Paisaje Mexicano (“Mexican Landscape”) that is quite lyrical. And so it goes, each tune a little gem, each one beautifully, expertly executed by the LAGQ.

The program ends with a reimagining of the second movement from Joaquin Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez that floats softly, poetically, as on a light breeze.

Telarc Record’s producer Robert Woods and engineer Robert Friedrich made the recording at Studio A, O’Henry Studios, Burbank, California in 2001, and FIM producer Winston Ma and the recording’s original engineer Robert Friedrich remastered it in 2012 using the Ultra High Definition 32-bit mastering system and FIM’s PureFlection replication process.

The sound is, not surprisingly, sublime, one of the better guitar recordings I’ve heard. Not only is it ultra clear and ultraclean, it’s ultrasmooth as well. Each plucked or stroked note stands out transparently, with its own richness and warmth. As important, the dead-quiet spaces between the notes sets off each sound in sometimes startling contrast.

To listen to a brief excerpt from this album, click here:

JJP

Bizet: Carmen, complete (CD review)

Magdalena Kozena, Jonas Kaufmann, Genia Kuhmeier, Kostas Smoriginas; Simon Rattle, Berlin Philharmonic. EMI 50999 4 40285 2 7 (2-disc set).

Because so many people these days, particularly younger people, expect to get their music free or nearly free, and because the weak world economy has been making it hard for most orchestras to produce records, we are seeing fewer and fewer major symphony ensembles in new recordings. When we do get a few new recordings, the orchestras themselves most often release them on their own label, or they record them in front of a live audience in which instance the paying folk essentially subsidize some of the costs. So, it’s a pleasure to hear a new, 2012 recording such as this one from a big record label like EMI of one of the world’s great symphony orchestras, the Berlin Philharmonic.

French composer Georges Bizet (1838-1875) would never live to see how popular his final completed opera would become, the work seeing a poor opening in the year of the composer’s early death. Nevertheless, nowadays Carmen is among the handful of most well-known operas the world over, the epitome of opera for a lot of opera fans and non-fans alike.

Still, to compete, any new Carmen contender has to come up against formidable rivals. We have great recordings of it from conductors like Karajan (DG and RCA), Bernstein (DG), Beecham (EMI), Solti (Decca), Abbado (DG), Plasson (EMI), Petrie (EMI), Sinopoli (Teldec), and others. Does Rattle’s new recording make the cut and join the ranks of greatness, a Carmen for the ages?  Maybe, maybe not.

Set in Seville, Spain, during the early nineteenth century, the opera’s narrative concerns a beautiful and tempestuous Gypsy girl, Carmen (Magdalena Kozena), who lavishes her affections on a young, unsophisticated soldier, Don Jose (Jonas Kaufmann). He becomes so enamoured with Carmen, he spurns his former lover, deserts his regiment, and joins Carmen and a crew of smugglers. When Carmen subsequently rejects him and takes up with a bullfighter, Don Jose becomes so enraged with jealousy, he murders her. After Bizet’s own death, critics and audiences found enough drama and romance in the piece to help transform French opera comique into the emerging Italian realism of Verdi and Puccini.

Over the years there have been any number of scores used in the opera’s production, Bizet having died before he could make any absolutely final editing of it. According to a booklet note, the text used for this EMI recording “is based on Fritz Oeser’s revolutionary 1964 Barenreiter edition, which was the first to restore not only the original dialogue but virtually all of the cut material, especially in the long first act.”

Sir Simon Rattle’s interpretation overall sounds quite refined, smooth, and elegant, yet it seems to lack a little something in sheer earthiness, in rawness and swagger. In other words, it sounds a mite too pat, too polished, too safe, at least for my taste, even though his tempos are on the moderately quick side. This is not surprising to me, though, as I have found the conductor’s performances getting progressively more sedate ever since he took over the principal conductorship of the Berlin Philharmonic in 2002.

The choruses--the choir and children’s choir of the German State Opera, Berlin--sound most cultured, letter perfect in their execution. The children, markedly, sing in charmingly sweet voice.

When Czech mezzo-soprano Kozena enters as the seductress Carmen, we hear a beautifully dramatic reading of the role, without being quite as sensual as some fans may like. The Habanera flows in wonderfully lyrical fashion, yet neither the singer nor conductor quite manages to wring from it the last ounce of lusty sinuousness.

Tenor Kaufmann as the naive, ill-fated Don Jose seems well suited to his part. When he and Kozena finally get to sing together, they make a good pair. However, I still don’t hear some of the sexy allure of competing versions. That is, this Carmen may not be as overtly melodramatic as it could be. Rattle and his players perhaps try too hard to tame it.

The celebrated Toreador tune, featuring baritone Kostas Smoriginas, comes off well, with a full-bodied tone and authoritative air. Indeed, it is one of the highlights of the set, not counting a few lifelike stage effects.

Nevertheless, things get more exciting as Rattle finally warms to the project and the closing action commences. It’s almost as if the conductor were holding everything back for a big finish. I suppose it’s as the Bard wrote in his famous play of the same name: “All’s well that ends well.”

The recording, which EMI made at the Philharmonie, Berlin, in 2012, is slightly more distant and veiled than I would have expected--not excessively so but noticeably. Individual instruments like castanets come over with excellent clarity and attack, but the full orchestra seems less than transparent. There is a relatively narrow stereo spread, too. I mean, half a century ago EMI made a more open recording for Beecham and his crew, so it’s hard to convince me that the state-of-the-art in audio recording has advanced that much over the years. Anyway, the sound is dynamic, with a wide range; and voices, all-important in an opera recording, are fairly natural. It helps a bit to play this one a tad louder than usual in order to nudge it into coming alive. Then it’s fine, and you’ll enjoy it.

EMI managed to get the opera onto just two discs, which they package in a hardbound Digipak-type container. It’s most handsome, with the discs inserted into sleeves on the inside front and back covers. Bound within the covers are more than sixty pages of text and pictures. However, the company do not include a libretto; for that, you have to go to EMI’s Web site and download it. This appears to me a massive inconvenience, not only to download but to store afterwards. Oh, well, the package is attractive in any case.

JJP

Bizet: Carmen Suites (UltraHD CD)

Also, Grieg: Suite from Peer Gynt. Leonard Slatkin, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra. LIM UHD 059.

There is little doubt that for the past hundred-odd years people have found the opera Carmen and the suites derived from it charming. Yet French composer Georges Bizet (1838-1875) would never live to see exactly how popular his final completed opera would become, the work seeing a poor reception in the year of the composer’s early death. Sometimes, life is unfair.

Bizet set the opera in Seville, Spain, during the early nineteenth century, the narrative involving a beautiful and tempestuous Gypsy girl, Carmen, who lavishes her affections on a young but naive soldier, Don Jose. He becomes so enamoured with Carmen, he spurns his former lover, deserts his regiment, and joins Carmen and a crew of smugglers. When Carmen subsequently rejects him and takes up with a bullfighter, Don Jose becomes so enraged with jealousy that he murders her. How’s that for melodrama! Here, on this 1979 Telarc release remastered by LIM, we get two orchestral suites from the opera, containing most of the famous music.

LIM (Lasting Impression Music), if you remember, is an affiliate label of FIM (First Impression Music), a company that for the better part of a decade has been remastering classic older material, using the original master tapes and state-of-the-art processing. These days, they are using a new Ultra High Definition technology utilizing 32-bit mastering. They are also working with a number of recordings from the Telarc catalogue, Telarc being one of the companies that pioneered the digital revolution in recording.

Anyway, Telarc Records, conductor Leonard Slatkin, and the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra chose to do two orchestral suites from Carmen, the first containing six items, the second two. Suite No. 1 contains the Prelude to Act I, Aragonaise (Prelude to Act II), Intermezzo (Prelude to Act III), Seguidilla, Les Dragoons d’Alcala, and Les Toreadors (Introduction to Act I). Suite No. 2 contains only two numbers, La Garde Montante and Danse Boheme, but they are individually longer than those of the first suite.

In Slatkin’s readings we get sturdy, straightforward interpretations of the score, without too much characterization from the conductor. If you want more color in these suites, I would suggest you look to Sir Thomas Beecham (EMI), Paul Paray (Mercury), Leopold Stokowski (Sony), or Herbert von Karajan (DG). While these are much older recordings than the Telarc, they still sound pretty good, and the realizations are more creative. With these Slatkin renderings, it’s the sound that’s king.

Still, Slatkin’s version of the Intermezzo does come across beautifully, and Les Toreadors, which Slatkin takes at a rapid pace, is wonderfully exciting, especially with Telarc’s big bass drum pounding away in the background. Nevertheless, it hasn’t quite the swagger we hear from the aforementioned conductors. The Suite No. 2 has fewer but longer entries, as I say, and Slatkin gives them a fair amount of spontaneity, closing the show with a huge burst of energy.

Coupled with the Bizet sets is a six-movement suite from Peer Gynt by Edvard Grieg (1843-1907), taken from the incidental music Grieg wrote in 1875 to accompany Henrik Ibsen’s play of the same name. I liked these selections from Slatkin rather more than I did the Bizet because there seems to be more life, more vitality, to them. Here, I found a more convincing depiction of the events in the play. The “however” is that recordings from Oivin Fjeldstad (Decca) and Raymond Leppard (Philips) can be even more imaginative, and while they don’t sound as good as these from Telarc/LIM, they are a lot cheaper.

Telarc’s producer, Robert Woods, and engineer Jack Renner recorded the music at Powell Symphony Hall, St. Louis, in 1979, and LIM’s Winston Ma and Robert Friedrich remastered it using their Ultra High Definition 32-bit processing in 2011, releasing the remaster in 2012. The sound they obtain is better than anything else you’ll find in Bizet or Grieg. The definition is rock steady, firmer on the LIM remaster than on the original Telarc disc, and the bass and dynamic contrasts are slightly tauter. What’s more, the LIM brings out the imaging and depth better, too. Now, we’re not talking about night-and-day differences, you understand, but listening carefully and comparing, you’ll hear the improvements. Whether the LIM remastering is wroth the extra money, of course, is up to one’s ears and one’s pocketbook.

As icing on the cake (or to seal the deal, so to speak), the folks at LIM also provide an attractive, high-gloss, hardcover package, a twenty-page bound booklet, and a static-proof inner sleeve. For a complete listing of FIM/LIM products, you can visit their Web site at http://www.firstimpressionmusic.com/.

JJP

Bizet: Carmen, complete (CD review)

Victoria de los Angeles, Nicolai Gedda, Janine Micheau, Ernest Blanc; Sir Thomas Beecham, French Radio Chorus and Orchestra. EMI Classics 50999 9 48215 2 9 (3-disc set, plus bonus CD-ROM with libretto and synopsis).

Was there ever a more charming or more well-loved opera than Carmen, by French composer Georges Bizet (1838-1875)? Yet poor Bizet would never live to see just how popular his final completed opera would become, the work seeing a poor opening in the year of the composer's early death.

Today, we have at least a half a dozen great recordings of it from conductors like Karajan (DG and RCA), Bernstein (DG), Solti (Decca), Abbado (DG), Plasson (EMI), Petrie (EMI), Sinopoli (Teldec), and others. But at the top of my own list of favorites has long been the one under consideration here, with Sir Thomas Beecham and stars Victoria de los Angeles and Nicolai Gedda, recorded over six decades ago and appropriately reissued by EMI yet again in 2011. I believe it marks the set's third time on CD alone, and it can't be enough.

Set in Seville, Spain, during the early nineteenth century, the narrative concerns a beautiful and tempestuous Gypsy girl, Carmen (De los Angeles), who lavishes her affections on a young but naive soldier, Don Jose (Gedda). He becomes so enamoured with Carmen, he spurns his former lover, deserts his regiment, and joins Carmen and a crew of smugglers. When Carmen subsequently rejects him and takes up with a bullfighter, Don Jose becomes so enraged with jealousy, he murders her. After Bizet's death, critics and audiences found enough melodrama in the piece to help transform French opera comique into the emerging Italian realism of Verdi and Puccini.

Beecham establishes his credentials from the outset with an Act I Prelude that is light and charming, appropriate to the romance of the opening scene. When things get serious, Beecham makes the proper adjustments, adding genuine color, texture, and excitement to the story without exaggerating the tempos too much.

De los Angeles has not just an attractive, flexible voice for the role but one that projects unquestionable passion and seduction. If there is any concern with the production, it's that De los Angeles tends to overpower everyone else. Nevertheless, Gedda and the others are more than adequate, if a trifle foursquare compared to the star. Fortunately, Beecham injects such high spirits into the affair that every singer comes away looking good.

Recorded by EMI in the Salle Wagram, Paris, in various sessions between 1958 and 1959, the sonics are as good as or better than anything produced today. The acoustic is spacious, with a fine sense of air around the instruments, a realistic depth to the orchestra, an expansive stereo spread, and plenty of transparency in the midrange. Distant sounds and voices really do sound distant and closer objects closer. It's a lifelike, multidimensional effect. A solid bass, extended highs, and wide dynamics complete the picture; and unlike so many competing versions, this one is neither too close or bright nor too distant or dull. Voices and orchestra appear perfectly balanced, too, so when we first hear the chorus enter, we know we're in for an aural treat.

Incidentally, EMI use the same 2000 remastering for this rerelease that they made for their earlier "Great Recordings of the Century" edition. So if you already own that set, you pretty much own this one. The big difference is that where before EMI included a printed synopsis and libretto, they now offer these items on a separate, bonus CD-ROM. Of course, you must have a CD-ROM drive in your computer and Adobe Acrobat 6.0 or higher to access the contents and a printer to print out the results. I can only guess that it was cheaper for EMI to provide the bonus disc than to print up an entire booklet. I dunno.

JJP

Bizet: L'Arlesienne, incidental music (CD review)

Michel Plasson, Orchestre du Capitole de Toulouse. EMI Classics 0946 3 55671 2.

When French composer Georges Bizet (1838-1875) wrote his incidental music to Andre Daudet's play L'Arlesienne (The Girl from Arles) in 1872, the public and critics thought it distracted from the rest of the production. The fact is, it was probably better than the drama and simply upstaged it. Neither the play nor the complete incidental music have fared well ever since in their original form. But the sly Bizet recognized a good thing when he heard it and extracted two suites of music from his work, which have, of course, gone on to become classic warhorses that many of us prize in our collections.

Anyway, in 1982 Michel Plasson recorded the complete incidental music for EMI, pretty much as Bizet first intended it, and EMI reissued it at budget price a few years ago. It is a bargain for those looking for something different from the usual suites. Plasson's performance is delicate and nuanced, filled with sweetness and passion in equal amounts, but it's characterized mostly by the suaveness of Plasson's direction. Oh, you'll recognize all the familiar bits, to be sure, but it's the additional twenty minutes or so that are fascinating. It's also interesting, if not entirely better, to hear the music in its initial dramatic order rather than in the order of the suites.

EMI's sound is fine, too, smooth and spacious, with plenty of bloom and ambient air. However, and here's the rub, when you compare it as I did to Paul Paray's 1956 recording of the suites for Mercury, you find the old Mercury sounding much firmer, much more transparent, and much more authoritative all the way around. Think of that: A recording thirty years older sounding thirty years better than the newer one. Nevertheless, I wouldn't let that deter one from listening to the Passon disc, especially at its super-cheap cost.

JJP