CLASSICAL DISCS and TAPES (Mar. 1977)

Reviewed by: RICHARD FREED, DAVID HALL, GEORGE JELLINEK, PAUL KRESH, STODDARD LINCOLN, ERIC SALZMAN

BARRAUD: Symphonic Concertante for Trumpet and Orchestra (see MELHAUD) BERLIOZ: Requiem, Op. 5. Stuart Burrows (tenor); Chorus of Radio France; National Orchestra of France and Philharmonic Orchestra of Radio France, Leonard Bernstein cond. COLUMBIA M2 34202 two discs $13.98, MT 34202 $7.98.

Performance: Melodramatic

Recording: Good

BERLIOZ: Requiem, Op. 5. Robert Tear (ten or; City of Birmingham Chorus and Symphony Orchestra, Louis Fremaux cond. ANGEL D SB 3814 two discs $13.96.

Performance: Lyrical

Recording: Very good

Leonard Bernstein made his Columbia re cording in Les Invalides, site of the world première of Berlioz's noble masterwork, and Louis Fremaux's Angel recording is quadraphonic, but neither of these adds anything very substantial to a catalog that already contains recordings of the Requiem by Colin Davis, Charles Munch, and Maurice Abravanel.

The two new versions are at opposite ends of the interpretive scale. Bernstein exceeds the melodrama of Munch's approach to a considerable degree, most irritatingly in the fluctuating tempos adopted in the celebrated Dies Irae, most effectively in the Quaerens me and the Lachrymosa. Fremaux's is a restrained, classically lyric reading in which the superbly ...

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Explanation of symbols:

= reel-to-reel stereo tape

= eight-track stereo cartridge

= stereo cassette

= quadraphonic disc

= reel-to-reel quadraphonic tape

= eight-track quadraphonic tape

Monophonic recordings are indicated by the symbol __

The first listing is the one reviewed; other formats, if available, follow it.

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... trained City of Birmingham Choir contributes the best choral singing I have ever heard in this work. Bernstein's French choristers have a wonderful, characteristically Gallic timbre, but they are no match for their British counterparts in refinement of intonation and balance. Bernstein has the better of the two ten ors for the difficult solo in the Sanctus: Bur rows has to strain ever so slightly for his top notes; Robert Tear is just plain effortful in this department. But the best tenor is Robert Bressler in the Abravenel album.

As to recording, I recommend that quadraphony buffs lend an ear to Abravanel's Van guard album, which offers both a good performance and really excellent four-channel sound in the famous episodes for the four brass bands and sixteen timpani in the Dies Irae. Whether Berlioz, given today's technology, would prefer the "surround" treatment of his brass choirs to a frontal position at the four corners of the main performing body is a matter for conjecture, but the surround is certainly well and effectively defined on Vanguard's SQ disc. Fremaux settles for the original Berlioz specifications, and the Angel four-channel sound is of the comfort ably ambient type rather than overt surround.

The very spacious acoustic of the Great Hall of Birmingham University adds to the effect and enhances the choral tone, while the tighter and harder sound of Les Invalides makes for somewhat greater clarity of orchestral de tail in Bernstein's stereo performance. D.H.

BRAHMS: Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 77. Gidon Kremer (violin); Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Herbert von Karajan cond. ANGEL CI S-37226 $6.98.

Performance: Gorgeous fiddling, lacks momentum

Recording: Good

BRAHMS: Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 77. Nathan Milstein (violin); Philharmonia Orchestra, Anatole Fistoulari cond. SERAPHIM S-60265$3.98.

Performance: Fine solo playing

Recording: Good

On the jacket of Gidon Kremer's debut record Herbert von Karajan is quoted as declaring that the twenty-nine-year-old Soviet violinist-pupil of Oistrakh, winner of numerous major competitions-is "the greatest violinist in the world." Golly. Kremer is awfully good, possessed of an apparently flawless technique, a rich and vibrant tone, and some altogether noble ideas; he would seem to be too serious an artist to be saddled with such hyperbole. Karajan evidently means it, though, for he seems uncharacteristically deferential in this performance, holding his orchestra back to the point of merely "accompanying" rather frequently. What he accompanies is some exceptionally beautiful and occasionally exalted solo playing, but the partnership lacks both balance and momentum. All three move ments-the first in particular-are taken more slowly than usual, and, regrettably, the ten sion and weight that might easily have sus tained these broad tempos in this broad-scaled work are simply lacking. It's possible that Karajan wanted Kremer to have the spot light to himself, but that approach is hardly satisfactory in so symphonically conceived a work as this. The sound is good enough, though less impressive than Angel's current best. I do look forward to more interesting re cordings from this important violinist.

Kremer plays the Kreisler cadenzas; Milstein plays his own, and his performance is more crisply paced and fiery but no less suave. This recording, from the early Sixties, also focuses on the highly virtuosic solo play ing, and the orchestral support is, I'm afraid, rather undistinguished. R.F.

BRITTEN: Nocturnal, Op. 70; Songs from the Chinese, Op. 58. CASTELNUOVO-TEDES CO: Six Songs, Op. 207; Sonata in D Major, Op. 77. Marta Schele (soprano); Josef Hole C'ek (guitar). BB LP-31 $7.98 (from HNH Dis tributors, P.O. Box 222, Evanston, Ill. 60204).

Performance: Expert

Recording: Excellent

There is a remarkably ingenious program here underneath all the surface simplicity. Both composers were drawn to the guitar through close friendship with master guitarists Segovia in the case of Castelnuovo-Tedesco, Julian Bream in the case of Britten. Each is represented here by a song cycle with guitar accompaniment and an extended solo work for the guitar.

Stylistically, of course, the two composers have little in common. Castelnuovo-Tedesco was a classicist; his Six Songs from the Divan of Moses-ibn-Ezra are pleasant in a neo archaic manner, with simple chordal accompaniments, and his Sonata in D is firmly based on the classic models. Neither work seems to attempt much beyond diversion. Britten's Songs from the Chinese, on the other hand, attempt to endow textual matter of minimal poetic interest with musical substance, but the results are elusive and unmemorable. His Nocturnal is related-in mood at least-to the celebrated Serenade for Tenor, Horn, and Strings, but it is not nearly as haunting and is likely to appeal mainly to guitar specialists.

Marta Schele is a cultivated singer with a basically attractive voice. Her enunciation is not always clear, but the fault lies partially with the difficult texts. To the extent I am able to judge, Josef Holeeek is a fine guitarist. The ultra-clear recording, normally a blessing, reveals more mechanical guitar sounds than I care to hear, but the sharpness of technical detail and immaculate disc surface deserve praise in any case. G.J.

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

BRUCKNER: Symphony No. 8, in C Minor. Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Herbert von Karajan cond. DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 2707 085 two discs $16.96.

Performance: Formidable

Recording: Good

Until Bernard Haitink and the Amsterdam Concertgebouw recorded the Bruckner Eighth in 1970, Herbert von Karajan's reading, done for Angel in 1958, had the field pretty much to itself for those who wanted a truly majestic stereo realization of this colossus among the Austrian master's symphonies.

Karajan's new recording differs little in interpretive substance from his earlier one, which is to say that impressive architectural unity and awesome majesty of utterance are its major characteristics. Particularly notable in the new performance is the way it builds toward the finale, achieving the most convincing cumulative effect I have heard yet on discs. My only reservation about both the Karajan interpretations concerns a rather heavy-footed treatment of the scherzo, which always has struck me as a wind-swept, bell-obsessed affair; that effect is missed by Karajan but gloriously realized in the historic mono recordings of Furtwangler (on Unicorn) and Mravinsky (on MK).

In common with Karajan's other recent DG recordings with the Berlin Philharmonic, this one eschews the church acoustic typical of the 1960's tapings, favoring instead more de tailed musical texture and closer orchestral presence. But upon spot-checking the 1966 Karajan recording of Bruckner's Ninth, I must say that I would have preferred that particular ambiance for this music. On its own terms, however, the new recording job is first rate, and Brucknerians will be hard put to choose between this and Haitink's as the preferred stereo version. D. H.

BUXTEHUDE: Cantatas. Alles, was ihr tut; Mit Fried and Freud ich fahr dahin; Befiehl dem Engel, dass er komm. Johannes Kunzel (bass); Greif swald Cathedral Choir; Berlin Bach Orchestra, Hans Pflugbeil cond. STEF FANI: Stabat Mater. Kurt Equiluz, Rudolf Resch (tenors); Nikolaus Simkowsky (bass); Vienna Boys' Choir; Chorus Viennensis; Concentus Musicus Vienna, Nikolaus Harnoncourt cond. CMS/ORYx 3C 303 $6.98,

Performance: Intimate

Recording: Fine

BUXTEHUDE: Cantatas. Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme; Jesu, meine Freude; Hertzlich lieb hab ich dich, o Herr. Herrad Wehrung, Gundula Bernet-Klein (sopranos); Frauke Haasemann (contralto); Friedreich Melzer (countertenor); Johannes Hoefflin (tenor); Wilhelm Pommerien (bass); Westphalian Choral Ensemble; Southwest German Chamber Orchestra, Wilhelm Ehmann cond. NONE SUCH H-71332 $3.98.

Performance: Forced

Recording: Hard

We often read about how Buxtehude brought Italian warmth to the chilly atmosphere of Lubeck. Now we can actually hear it for our selves in an unusual coupling of several of Buxtehude's cantatas with. Agostino Steffani's Stabat Mater. The style of these two composers is amazingly similar; add the choral melodies to Steffani and you have Buxtehude, subtract the choral melodies from Buxtehude and you have Steffani. No matter what your arithmetical preference may be, the music of either is an exquisite example of intimate devotional church music that takes the composers above any doctrinal differences between Catholic and Protestant.

Besides juxtaposing an Italian and a North German, the Oryx disc also juxtaposes authentic early instruments in one work and modern instruments in the other. Both are performed in a chamber-music manner that is appropriate to the finely wrought textures of the music. Although the sound in the Steffani (played on old instruments) is "purer," that achieved by the modern instruments in the Buxtehude is equally effective, thus proving the point that basic musicianship depends on itself, not on the instruments used. The choral sound for both is small and clear, and it is well balanced with the instruments. Especially noteworthy in the Buxtehude is the light, springy, almost dance-like quality achieved by tempo and articulation.

The Nonesuch disc will be of special interest to the Bach lover for the Buxtehude treatment of two choral melodies, Wachet auf and Jesu meine Freude, that are so well known in the Bach settings. Although the performance is on modern instruments, great care has been taken to distinguish between the concertino and tutti sections, a practice not always indicated in the score but essential to the proper and effective performance of this music. Unfortunately, the performance strives for a brilliance that is not inherent in the music, and the use of trumpets and an aggressive organ sound mar the balance between vocal and instrumental forces. Johannes Hoefflin's fine singing aside, the soloists seem to struggle, and not always too successfully at that.

Whether it is the music or the performance, the Italianate quality of the Oryx disc is entirely lacking here. S.L.

CASTELNUOVO-TEDESCO: Six Songs, Op. 207; Sonata in D Major, Op. 77 (see BRITTEN)

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

DUKAS: La Peri. ROUSSEL: Symphony No. 3, in G Minor, Op. 42. New York Philharmonic, Pierre Boulez cond. COLUMBIA M 34201 $6.98, MT 34201 $6.98.

Performance: Superb

Recording: Spectacular

In their individually respective fashions, both Dukas' poeme danse, composed in 1912, and Roussel's Third Symphony, composed in 1930 for the fiftieth anniversary of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, are quintessentially Gallic. The earlier score reflects vividly the linear sensuosity of the art nouveau decorative style that flourished at the turn of the century, while the athletic polyphony of Roussel's score (tempered by an impassioned slow movement) is a counterpart to the sharply de lineated, colorful murals of Fernand Leger.

In this recording Pierre Boulez accomplishes a feat comparable to his remarkable New York Philharmonic documentations for Columbia of Stravinsky's Firebird and Ravel's Daphnis et Chloe, which is to say that he imbues the music with the most extraordinary rhythmic vitality and color, thereby making us feel that we are hearing it for the very first time. It is an example of the conductor's re creative art at its very finest.

As with the Firebird and Daphnis recordings, Columbia's production team deserves a very large share of the credit for the simply gorgeous sonic results achieved on this disc.

As heard in both four-channel and two-channel playback, the sounds of the two scores emerge in a grandiose panoramic ambiance, but with every musical detail intact and in proper perspective. I must say that I was afraid the Roussel might suffer from this "wide-open" treatment, but, on the contrary, the overall effect of the work was enhanced, and I was less aware than usual of the dryness of the opening movement. (As indicated on the record jacket, Columbia has now gone the route of Angel and has opted for "single inventory" merchandising of its quadraphonic product, noting where applicable that the disc is "Stereo/Quadraphonic compatible.") D.H.

FURTVVANGLER: Symphony No. 2, in E Mi nor. Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Wilhelm Furtwangler cond. DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 2707 086 two discs $15.96.

Performance: Composer's own

Recording: 1951 mono

Here's an oddity: a gigantic, ultra-Romantic symphony written in Germany during World War 2 by a world-famous conductor, record ed in 1951, and now, twenty-five years later, re-released by DG. The symphony is an hour-and-twenty-minute work squarely in the Bruckner-Mahler tradition but without the di vine simplicity and piety. of the former or the vision and vulgarity of the latter. Yet, forget ting the political and historical implications of the date of composition, one can appreciate -- the strength of the music. Furtwangler, like many conductors of his generation, was originally a composer, and the creator's point of view strengthened his conducting immensely.

Certainly this dramatic symphony is as interesting and impressive as a great deal of the second-rate Romantic-revival rubbish that we're subjected to these days. The big-scale, old-fashioned performing style has an antique patina in the mono recording. E.S.

GERSHWIN: Blue Monday. Joyce Andrews (soprano), Vi; Patrick Mason (baritone), Mike; Walter Richardson (bass), Sam; Jeffrey Meyer (tenor), Tom; Thomas Bogdan (tenor), Joe; Gregg Smith Singers and Orchestra, Gregg Smith cond. the Jolly Tar and the Maid. Catherine Aks (soprano); Jeffrey Meyer (tenor). Sing of Spring. Gregg Smith Singers; Oresta Cybriwsky (piano). hi the Mandarin's Orchid Garden; By Strauss. Rosalind Rees (soprano); Oresta Cybriwsky (piano). Let 'Em Eat Cake. Thomas Bogdan (tenor); Priscilla Magdamo (alto); Gregg Smith Singers and Orchestra, Gregg Smith cond. TURNABOUT TV-S 34638 $3.98, Vox CT 2103.63 $4.98.

Performance: Good singing, bad acting

Recording: Very good

Long before there was a Porgy and Bess, back in the year 1922 when he hadn't yet composed the Rhapsody in Blue, George Gershwin pre pared his opera Blue Monday, also known as 135th Street, for the annual spectacular entertainment rite of Broadway known as the George White Scandals. Buddy De Sylva wrote the libretto, with its silly plot about a jealous woman who stabs her lover only to find the lady she thought he was about to run off with is his sister; Gershwin composed a rather ingratiating score in which can be heard strains of Porgy as well as some striking melodies, including one borrowed from the lullaby in his own early string quartet. The critics hated this experiment so much that it was dropped from the act after the Boston tryout, although Paul Whiteman later revived it in concert form in Carnegie Hall.

I have heard Blue Monday in a pirated disc made at a 1953 revival with un-credited black singers who fleshed out its thin action with glorious intensity. The Gregg Smith Singers, with Joyce Andrews as the jealous Vi and Thomas Bogdan as the gambler Joe, who gets it in the gut, sound pallid and perfunctory by contrast, although they do some lovely singing along the way. More in the line of this resourceful group are the two madrigals and art songs, welcome additions to the slim repertoire of Gershwin's serious efforts, but still not too serious-the madrigals being parodies of Gilbert and Sullivan whipped up for a movie called Damsels in Distress, and one of the art songs a clever parody of a Strauss waltz written for the musical The Show Is On. A scene from Let 'Em Eat Cake, with its choral variations on the ballad Mine, provides a perfect finale for a program of un-hackneyed Gershwiniana. The recorded sound is very fine, and the cassette is as good as if not better than the disc. P.K.

GLAZOUNOV: Chant du Menestrel, Op. 71 (see SHOSTAKOVICH)

HAYDN: Mass No. 5, in B-flat Major (see MOZART) HAYDN: Piano Sonata in F Major (Hob. XVI:23); Sonata in C Major (Hob. XVI:35); Sonata in A-flat Major (Hob. XVI:46); Sonata in D Major (Hob. XVI:51). Vasso Devetzi (piano). MONITOR MCS 2147 $5.98.

Performance: Clipped

Recording: Hard

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

HAYDN: Piano Sonata in D Major (Hob. XVI: 19); Sonata in G Minor (Hob. XVI:44); Sonata in D Major (Hob. XVI:37); Variations in F Mi nor (Hob. XVii:6). Gilbert Kalish (piano). NONESUCH H-71328 $3.98.

Performance: Sensitive

Recording: Clear

Pianists are finally turning to the long-neglect ed sonatas of Joseph Haydn and discovering their many beauties and jokes, their depth and freshness. This has become apparent to the record buyer from the many single records that are now available and from several series that will eventually bring us all these sonatas.

One of the most fascinating aspects of this revival is that performers are gradually beginning to realize that Haydn's keyboard music requires a style of its own if its unique quality is to be brought out. Until recent years, the few sonatas that were played were treated as miniatures, charming openers leading up to the meaty Romantic repertoire. This approach makes the sonatas seem silly, and they lose their breadth and scope. Other pianists, having been through the stylistic difficulties of Mozart, applied that approach to these works.

While theoretically logical, such an approach denies the pithiness of Haydn's writing (for Mozart's treatment of the piano is completely different) and frustrates the use of the entire instrument in the rich and varied textures he wanted. Of the two recordings under scrutiny, Vasso Devetzi takes the jolly-miniature approach and Gilbert Kalish takes the music for what it is. Ms. Devetzi commands a clean, crisp technique and produces a rather dry sound which is in no way alleviated by her sparse pedaling.

Apparently afraid of any Romantic over tones, she rushes through cadences in a manner that upsets the clearly constructed phrases of Classical structure. When she does indulge in a ritard, she never returns to the original tempo. Thus a single movement lacks the most important cohesive element prevalent in the music. There are also several stylistic practices she should be more careful about. For example, her trills are usually taken from the wrong note, which is a small point in itself, but placing ornaments before the beat upsets the melodic line.

Mr. Kalish's readings of Haydn come off beautifully because he enters into the music without any preconceived notions and brings out what is there. He is especially successful in the grand dimensions of the first movement of the D Major Sonata (No. 19), in which his fluid approach to tempo and the ability to re turn to the original at points of structural importance bring out the breadth of the work. In the final movement we hear the romp that Haydn intended. Some of the fast movements lack brilliance because of too sensitive an approach, but the results of this style are breath taking in the G Minor Sonata and the F Minor Variation. Of the many recordings of Haydn piano music I have heard lately, certainly Mr. Kalish's is the finest. S.L.

HOLST: The Planets. Women's Voices of the Mendelssohn Club of Philadelphia; Philadelphia Orchestra, Eugene Ormandy cond.

RCA CRL1-1921 $4.98.

Performance: Bland

Recording: Okay, but noisy surfaces

BEYOND THE SUN: An Electronic Portrait of Hoist's "The Planets." Patrick Gleeson (Eu Polyphonic Synthesizer). MERCURY SR 180000 $6.98.

Performance: Synthetic

Recording: Very good

HOLST (arr. Tomita): The Planets. Isao Tomita (electronic synthesizer). RCA ARL1-1919 $7.98.

Performance: Too long a trip

Recording: Spacious

When Gustav Hoist wrote his mammoth extraterrestrial suite The Planets, he had no idea it was going to be the work that would bring him world renown, and later he sometimes wished better attention had been paid to his more neglected efforts. But The Planets, now recorded by just about every major orchestra on the boards, continues to be one of the most spectacular pieces in the repertoire. The Philadelphia, that Rolls Royce of orchestras, would seem the perfect ensemble to offer a definitive performance of the suite in all its luxurious saturation of tonal color, yet this latest recording crosses no sound barriers.

The barbaric rhythms of Mars, the Bringer of War, forecasting the coming brutalities of World War I, are not nearly warlike enough here, Mercury, the Winged Messenger pursues his errands about the sky too pertly, and the magic of Uranus is excessively suave. Only toward the end, in Neptune, as the sombre timbres of celesta, harp, and strings drown in a sea of women's voices, does this version of The Planets seem exceptional. The recorded sound is less than startling too, and the surfaces are rather less than silent.

What Patrick Gleeson has done to The Planets while tinkering with his Eu Polyphonic Synthesizer is something else again. I was reminded, of a child who used to be brought downstairs to stand in front of a console phonograph, sway back and forth in his Dr. Dentons, and growl out Beethoven's Fifth while the record played to the embarrassed appreciation of adult guests. It was a remarkable accomplishment for an infant, but why subject the public to it? So with this. The Eu, which Gleeson prefers for his experiments over the Moog, is an electronic miracle that has enabled the arranger here (over endless hours, no doubt) to imitate the sound of the orchestra remarkably well in Mars. As the work goes on, though, Gleeson seems to be come bored with this adherence to the com poser's intent and begins to intrude himself in the sky of sound, adding the kind of twittering science-fiction noises that have become all too familiar in recent years along with effects of ocean waves and thunder he no doubt imagined could serve only to "improve" the austere majesty of Neptune. No matter how many overtime hours he puts in at his mad-scientist machines, Gleeson will never be a match for the Philadelphia Orchestra.

Tomita, whose earlier efforts, such as The Snowflakes Are Dancing, are among RCA's biggest sellers, offers another elaborate interpretation of the score on the synthesizer. In this one, more musicality is evident. There is a breathtaking spaciousness in the sound of the journey, and a more successful attempt to adhere to Hoist's own tonal palette. Tomita's prelude, placing the work in the context of a real space voyage complete with countdown, is unobjectionable fun. But, like Gleeson, Tomita cannot keep himself out of the rest of the picture and succumbs too often to the temptation to embroider the music with all sorts of sci-fi effects, some of them rather heavy-handed. Moreover, the tempos he has chosen for the slower sections, Venus and Saturn, are so slow that the trip as a whole ends up seeming excessively long, even for the hundreds of millions of miles traversed.

The two synthesized versions of The Planets are reported in Billboard to be "in sales orbit" in this country, but having difficulty "soaring into markets elsewhere in the world. . . ." Hoist's estate has protested the electronic interpretations, and the United Kingdom's Mechanical Copyright Society has sent letters to rights organizations demanding that no recording licenses be issued for such albums, arguing that the score has not been recorded "substantially" as composed. The Hoist estate may even try to get the albums withdrawn from the American market. A tragedy to the sales departments of Mercury and RCA, perhaps; a survivable loss for music. P.K.

IVES: Songs. At the River; Elegie; Ann Street; A Christmas Carol; From the "Swimmers"; West London; A Farewell to Land; Abide with Me; Where the Eagle; Disclosure; The White Gulls; The Children's Hour; Two Little Flowers; Autumn; Tom Sails Away; Ich grolle nicht; Feldeinsamkeit; Weil' auf mir; In Flanders Fields. Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (baritone); Michael Ponti (piano). DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 2530 696 $7.98.

Performance: Remarkable

Recording: Excellent

In 1922, Charles Ives rummaged through his musical attic, collected 114 songs, and published them at his own expense. For years he would send a copy gratis to anyone who took the trouble to ask for one. And now here is a Deutsche Grammophon recording by Prince Dietrich-royal honors, just as if it were Schubert or Brahms or Wolf. Wouldn't old Mr. Ives have been pleased! Deutsche Grammophon? Fischer-Dieskau and Charles Ives? Sounds like oil and water, an impossible mixture. But it is not as far fetched as one might think. Ives was, in fact, a great admirer of the great tradition. Not only did he not reject Europe, but more than a bit of Beethoven and Brahms went into the recipe for Ivesian stew. Even more surprisingly, he wrote a number of settings of French and German poetry, even audaciously reset ting the texts of some very famous lieder, including Iche grolle nicht and Feldeinsamkeit.

Fischer-Dieskau has wisely chosen to re cord those Ives songs, primarily lyric, that come closest to European tradition or that split the difference between the American hymn-tune and a European kind of harmony.

Certainly the baritone's English is at least as good as the German or French of many American singers, but there are a few places that give one pause. A touch of Central European accent and the lieder-like atmosphere some times jar with the ultra-traditional American atmosphere of some of these tunes-at least for an American listener. The singing is not beautiful, but even so this is a remarkable performance and recording. Perhaps nothing demonstrates as well as this release the entry of Ives into the category of Grand International Old Master. E.S.

LISZT: Piano Concertos Nos. 1 and 2 (see Best of the Month, page 90)

LISZT: Sonetti del Petrarca, Nos. 47, 104, and 123 (see SCHUMANN) RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT MAHLER: Symphony No. 3, in D Minor. Marilyn Horne (mezzo-soprano); Women of the Chicago Symphony Chorus; Glen Ellyn Children's Chorus; Chicago Symphony Orchestra, James Levine cond. RCA ARL2-1757 two discs $15.96, C) CRS2-1757 $14.95.

Performance: Opens windows

Recording: Excellent

The Mahler Third Symphony is among the longest, most sprawling, and, along with the Seventh, the least-known of the nine or ten. It is one of the most complex and, at the same time, one of the most appealing. And it is per haps the most ambitiously programmatic, al though, as usual, Mahler made the program heroic-philosophical, not narrative, and later played it down (it is, of course, gleefully quoted anyway by all analysts and annotators).

The symphony has six movements (originally it had seven, but the proposed finale ended up as the last movement of the Fourth) organized as a personal credo and hymn of praise to inanimate and animate creation. This conception inspired some of Mahler's most wonderful music; in spite of its length, the work is heart-felt, colorful, and tremendously appealing almost all the way through.

The Third Symphony has not been neglect ed on recordings; there are notable versions by Bernstein, Haitink, Solti, and Horenstein.

But this one can stand with its predecessors in most respects. Mahler, more than any other composer (at least before the atonal moderns), labored mightily to write his interpretations directly into his scores. Essentially, Le vine takes them at face value; he does not fuss. He is a tremendous craftsman, and he has a wonderful orchestra to work with, not to mention Marilyn Horne and a fine chorus of women's and children's voices. In a few places I miss a certain urgency. The conductor's tendency to sit back and let things take care of themselves is not ideal in the moments of greatest turmoil and passion. But the Third, Mahler's "Pastoral Symphony," is one of his least tormented and most outward-looking works. Levine succeeds in opening windows; he lets the fresh air blow in from this extraordinary panorama of forests, mountains, flowers, animals, and angels out of the landscape of Mahler's mind.

This RCA boxed set comes with a most un usual cover: a child-like visual fantasy by Maurice Sendak of an angel handing old Gustav a bouquet of wildflowers surrounded by animal musicians deep in a nocturnal fairy tale forest. Absurd and wonderful. E.S.

MASSENET: Le Cid. Placido Domingo (ten or), Rodrigo; Grace Bumbry (mezzo soprano), Chimene; Paul Plishka (bass), Don Diego; Eleanor Bergquist (soprano), Infanta; Arnold Voketaitis (bass-baritone), Count de Gormas; Jake Gardner (baritone), King. Byrne Camp Chorale; Opera Orchestra of New York, Eve Queler cond. COLUMBIA M3 34211 three discs $20.98.

Performance: Domingo steals it

Recording: Excellent

In late nineteenth-century France there was a taste for a kind of exotic realism, sweet and sensual but fitted out in the guise of high-class and moral art. The painter Gerome is a good example; the writings of Loti are another. Bizet's Carmen is also an example, but the real master of the genre in music was Massenet.

Vincent D'Indy expressed it perfectly when he referred to Massenet's "discreet and semi religious eroticism." And that, not Spanish honor, is the real subject of Massenet's Le Cid.

"Le Cid"-El Seid, the Conqueror-was the nickname of Rodrigo Diaz de Bivar, the greatest legendary Christian hero of the medieval Spanish wars against the Moors. Of this epic subject, treated many times in literature, nothing much is left except the erotic essence. Rodrigo, sworn to avenge an insult to the honor of his old father, kills the father of his fiancée, forcing her to demand his deaths so he goes off to meet a heroic end in hopeless battle against the Moors. This apparently solves the problem except for an unforeseen circumstance: he wins and comes back a hero. At the moment of truth, Rodrigo offers to kill himself. Of course the young lady can not permit such a thing, and her protestations are assumed to signify forgiveness of our hero.

Around this material, Massenet has draped his lightly sensuous music-like certain fash ions, designed to reveal as much it hides. The technique is the cliché. All the old operatic cliches are here: the stirring martial air, the air larmoyant, the jolly dancing peasants, the colorful religious ceremony, the chorus of townspeople, sword-play and oaths of vengeance, the celestial vision, the soldiers marching out to battle, and the victory celebrations. Massenet even manages to make the Wagnerian leitmotiv principle into a gold-mine of cliches; he even invents them. How ironic that, amidst all this, it is the silly ballet music for dancing peasants that has survived the best.

What really killed this kind of operatic sensuality-and-spectacle was Hollywood. It is hard for us to take anything but a camp attitude now toward ancient tales of Spanish honor with fairy-tale trimmings and loud singing (at least Rodrigo could have killed his girl friend's father over something serious-say, violating his sister). And, of course, the revival of French grand opera is never an easy task; the tradition simply expired half a century ago. And yet, here it is back again, not just Le Cid, but Esclarmonde, and La Navarraise, and Thais, and Therese, and Lord knows what's waiting in the wings.

Eve Queler directed the Carnegie Hall performance in the spring of 1976 from which this recording derives. She has put together an orchestra that plays remarkably well and with real spirit and a good but quintessentially non-French cast. The focus in Massenet's op era is always the heroine, and, in spite of the title, the situation is no different here. Le Cid is titillating bourgeois entertainment of the most middle-brow sort, but a great Chimene can raise it up to an almost tragic-dramatic level. Grace Bumbry, although she touches a few musical heights, does not reach that kind of musico-dramatic level, and she is not helped by the fact that a major dramatic scene at the beginning of Act IV has been cut.

Placido Domingo, on the other hand, makes the most of a juicy tenor part. Rodrigo is your typical one-dimensional tenor role, but there are two big arias and some dramatic scenes, all of which Domingo delivers with a hearty, Italianate (not French), good-singing vigor that is wonderful to listen to and becomes virtually the whole point of the enterprise. Paul Plishka is an outstanding Don Diego; the other members of the supporting cast are basically good team players. The ensemble, choral, and orchestral work are very good, and, except for the sad necessity of keep-it-to-three-discs cuts, the production earns good marks.

The notes are meager, but text and translation are included. The live recording is particularly successful. How, I would like to know, did they keep the audience from breaking things up with applause? Mercifully, there is not a whisper until the end. E.S.

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David Bean: Awfully Impressive

DAVID BEAN is surely among the most un LP der-appreciated pianists in the world to day, something I can put down only to insufficient exposure of his artistry to the musical public. Certainly there is nothing in his playing that one can fault. He projects a musical personality of great virtuosity coupled with intellect, not the most immediately ingratiating combination, perhaps, but awfully impressive and in the respected tradition of Egon Petri and Edward Steuermann (with whom he studied). His recorded repertoire has been scanty thus far, but it includes a superlative coupling of Busoni and Villa-Lobos for RCA and an equally fine disc of Scriabin, Liszt, and Ginastera for Westminster.

Liszt's Armies de Pelerinage contain some of his very best music and, in the case of the three Sonetti del Petrarca from the Deuxieme Annie, possibly his finest music of all. Bean's performance of the three sonnets, as well as of the remainder of Italie, is consistently admirable, beautifully clean and reserved technically (he avoids flashiness), romantic in feeling but without prettiness, broad in dynamics, and noble in tone. He is aided by a particularly fine-sounding Steinway and an extraordinary job of recording by producer Marc Aubort.

WITH full knowledge of impending complete sets of the Annees by both Gyorgy Czi fira and Lazar Berman and also remembering well Wilhelm Kempff's marvelously poetic account of selected pieces (the mono recording currently on Turnabout, not the later DG), I still feel that anyone who hears David Bean's recording will not want to be without it.

-James Goodfriend

LISZT: Annees de Pelerinage--Deuxieme Année: Italie. Sposalizio; Il Pensieroso; Can zonetta del Salvator Rosa; Sonetti del Petrar ca Nos. 47, 104, and 123; Apres une Lecture de Dante. David Bean (piano). WESTMINSTER WGS 8339 $3.49.

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Frederick Delius in a 1920 lithograph by Edvard Munch

Frederick Delius' "`Fennimore and Qerda"

THOUGH Angel surely does not expect that galloping droves of music lovers will be battering down record-store doors to obtain their copies of Frederick Delius' Fennimore and Gerda, the album is certain to delight the hearts of many opera lovers. With the release of this splendid recording, Angel now offers three of the Delius operas (Koanga and A Village Romeo and Juliet are the others) in superb performances.

Fennimore and Gerda was the composer's last opera, but when it was completed in 1910, the collection of "short, strong emotional impressions given in a series of terse scenes," as the composer himself described it, failed to enthrall Sir Thomas Beecham, still flushed with the success of his Covent Garden production of A Village Romeo and Juliet. The series of eleven stage "pictures" based on the Danish writer Jens Peter Jacobsen's novel Niels Lyhne apparently struck Sir Thomas as too realistic, and Fennimore and Gerda was not to receive its premiere performance until 1919 in Frankfurt.

Today, the work shimmers timelessly in its impressionistic setting with a formal strength that belies and transcends the evanescent subtlety of the score. The story of how the writer Niels Lyhne and his friend the painter Erik Ref strup vie for the love of the shallow, rest less Fennimore is clothed in so much affecting music and framed by such exquisite interludes evoking the moods of nature that even the news of Erik's death, for example, is a perfunctory event compared to the atmospheric, wordless singing of the harvest hands at twilight.

The final episodes, in which the composer tampered with the novel's gloomy Nietzschean denouement to offer Niels the solace of a new love in the adolescent Gerda, may be bad theater, but they inspired the composer to some of his most memorable orchestral writing-all we have usually heard of this opera.

There are, to be sure, some silly, stilted pas sages in the libretto of Fennimore and Gerda-almost every text Delius ever tackled seems to hover tremulously on the borderline of the ridiculous-yet the music makes even the most fatuous exchanges sound emotionally convincing.

DELIUS succeeded in Fennimore and Gerda in proving that an opera could be based on the lives of ordinary people, on conflicts confined largely to conversation, and some day the operatic public may catch up with him. Mean while, this flawless production is superbly sung in Philip Heseltine's English version of the composer's own German libretto with Elisabeth Soderstrom as the bored, wistful Fennimore (she also doubles as the smitten young Gerda), Robert Tear as the writer who weds Fennimore, and Brian Rayner Cook as the painter who loves and loses her. The Danish Radio Chorus and Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra under Meredith Davies are responsive to every nuance in a work made up largely of nuances. In SQ quadraphonic the results are especially radiant. A complete text is supplied.-Paul Kresh

DELIUS: Fennimore and Gerda. Elisabeth So derstrom, Fennimore, Gerda; Brian Rayner Cook, Niels Lyhne; Robert Tear, Erik Ref strup; Birger Brandt, Consul Claudi; Hedvig Rummel, Mrs. Claudi; Anthony Rolfe John son, a Voice Across the Water; Kirsten Buhl-Moller, Lady Visitor, Marit; Mogens Berg, Sportsman; Peter Fog, Town Councillor, Dis tiller; Michael W. Hansen, Tutor; Hans Christian Hansen, Councillor Skinnerup; Bodil Kongsted, Ingrid; Ingeborg Junghans, Lila; Eva Tamulenas, Maidservant. Danish Radio Chorus and Symphony Orchestra, Meredith Davies cond. ANGEL Ei SBLX-3835 two discs; $15.96.

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ALFONS AND ALOYS KONTARSKY: invariably brilliant and insightful

MILHAUD: Saudades do Brasil.

BARRAUD: Symphonic Concertante for Trumpet and Or chestra. Roger Delmotte (trumpet, in Bar raud); Orchestre National de I'ORTF, Manuel Rosenthal cond. INEDrrs 995 034 $7.98 (from HNH Distributors, P.O. Box 222, Evanston, Ill. 60204).

Performance: Alive

Recording: Very good

In the mid-Fifties, when Capitol released a re cording of the Saudades do Brasil conducted by Milhaud himself, the composer wrote: "Although you don't expect from a composer the technique of professionals of the baton, I think it is worth while to have the composer's tempi and interpretation." His own tempo for the Overture was markedly different from Rosenthal's here-much more deliberate and heavily accented, with a more insinuating effect. That point aside, Rosenthal, a still un der-acknowledged master among "professionals of the baton," does bring the music to life with an abundance of sparkle, panache, and overall evocativeness. The performance is sheer delight, and no matter that the title is misspelled on the jacket. The Symphonic Concertante composed by Henry Barraud (whom some of us tend to confuse with Henri Rabaud) in 1965, at age sixty-five, is one of the more substantial works of its kind to come from French composers in the last few decades, and certainly an accessible one. In the two outer movements the trumpet declaims in quasi-recitative style while all sorts of colorful events take place in the large orchestra;

the slow movement is a mysterious, nocturnal Aria cantabile. This too is given a most sym pathetic and polished performance, and it stands up well in repeated hearings. Very good sound, quiet surfaces. R.F.

MOZART: Sonata in D Major for Two Pianos (K. 448); Fugue in C Minor for Two Pianos (K. 426); Sonata in C Major for Piano Duet (K. 521). Alfons Kontarsky, Aloys Kontarsky (pianos). CMS/ORYx 3C-322 $6.98.

Performance: Very good

Recording: Good enough

The brothers Kontarsky are superb musicians, invariably brilliant and insightful, either solo or paired, whether playing avant garde works, Debussy and Ravel, or what appears to be their first phonographic venture in the realm of the Viennese classics. The performances here, though, while more than satisfying in their own right (and a good deal more appealing than those of Christoph Eschenbach and Justus Frantz on Deutsche Grammophon 2530.285), do not breathe with quite the degree of Mozartian spontaneity and charm found in those of Jorg Demus and Paul Badura-Skoda in their far more brightly re corded set of all of Mozart's works for two pianists (Musical Heritage Society MHS 1293/1296). And both teams are surpassed by Alfred Brendel and Walter Klien in the two piano works on Turnabout. The sound of the Turnabout disc is beginning to show its age, but it is still more than competitive with that of the Oryx (dated 1972). R.F.

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

MOZART: Trinitas Mass (K. 167).

HAYDN: Mass No. 5, in B-flat Major ("Little Organ"). Elly Ameling (soprano); Peter Planyaysky (organ); Vienna State Opera Chorus; Vienna Philharmonic, Karl Munchinger cond. LONDON OS 26443 $6.98.

Performance: Festive

Recording: Resonant

Although the Trinitas Mass lacks the elaborate operatic solo writing we have come to expect in Mozart's religious music, the chorus in it, when not used for massive declamation and fugal writing, indulges itself in many march- and minuet-like passages that add great charm to this festive work. The Haydn Mass, in contrast, is a miniature written in a chamber style. Despite its brevity, the music commands our attention through its simplicity and direct language.

Munchinger employs a large battery of orchestral and choral resources, but the performance is a model of clarity. The choral sound is sumptuous in the chordally conceived declamatory passages, while in the fugal sections the individual parts take on a lucidity that enables us to follow Mozart's youthful contrapuntal skills. M unchinger also helps keep the fugal sections clear by carefully marking the entries of the various thematic subjects employed. Besides these two contrasting styles, there is a third one of lightness and grace that brings out the composer's irrepressible joy and good spirit. Especially fine is the balance between orchestra and chorus.

The busy string parts, so often lost in a kind of mush in many performances, are right there, creating a sparkling aura around the chorus.

The Haydn work is treated more in the style of chamber music, which is certainly appropriate to this little charmer. Again clarity is the password. Elly Ameling's lovely singing of the Benedictus makes one wish that both composers had written more for her sort of voice. This record is superb in every respect. S.L.

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

NIELSEN: Symphony No. 1, in G Minor, Op. 7; Symphony No. 2, Op. 16 ("The Four Tem peraments"); Symphony No. 3, Op. 27 (Sinfonia Espansiva); Helios Overture, Op. 17; Andante Lamentoso; Bohemian-Danish. Folk Melody. Kirsten Schultz (soprano, in Symphony No. 3); Peter Rasmussen (baritone, in Sym phony No. 3); Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Herbert Blomstedt cond. SERAPHIM SIC-6097 three discs $11.98.

Performance: Distinguished

Recording: Quite good

Shortly after a group of Danish sponsors enabled the Danish conductor Ole Schmidt to record all the Nielsen symphonies with the London Symphony Orchestra for Unicorn (RHS 324/30), EMI went back to Copenhagen to tape all of Nielsen's orchestral works with the Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra-the orchestra that had first introduced this music to us in the early 1950's-under its current Swedish conductor Herbert Blomstedt. As is sued in England in 1975, the Blomstedt set runs to eight records and includes the three concertos and seven shorter works in addition to the six symphonies; the first segment to reach us is a three-disc set comprising the first three symphonies and three shorter works, an especially attractive proposition at the Seraphim price. The sound, in two-channel or four-channel playback, more than holds its own with Unicorn's, and so do the performances, which are fervent of spirit and musically quite distinguished.

It happens that the only recordings of the First Symphony available now are those in the two "integral" sets. Schmidt's is probably the least successful component of his cycle, disfigured by excessive gear-shifting and occasional quirkiness in phrasing, while Blomstedt is superbly unfussy, conveying a grand sense of cumulative power. His reading is more compelling than the excellent Previn version deleted by RCA a few years ago, and stands comparison with that of the authoritative Thomas Jensen, whose old London/Dec ca recording has remained definitive all these years.

In the Second Symphony Schmidt-shows greater flexibility in the first two movements, giving him a slight edge over Blomstedt's relative rigidity in the first and what some will consider over-deliberate pacing for the "phlegmatic" second. The two are about equally persuasive in the slow movement, and Blomstedt pulls ahead magnificently in the finale. Blomstedt may be a shade less effective than Schmidt and some other conductors in evoking the atmosphere of enchantment in the Espansiva's pastoral movement (with the two vocal soloists), but, again, his forceful handling of the outer movements is just the way one wants this music to go, and in his hands the finale is a thoroughly convincing climax to the work.

Since there is no other recording of Helios available now, that work's appearance in the Seraphim set is a further incentive to investment; Blomstedt is splendid here and in the less consequential fillers for string orchestra as well. If the remainder of his series is as fine as this set, the whole will represent not only the most convenient and economical, but simply the best way for anyone to acquire Nielsen's orchestral. works. R.F.

ORFF: Carmina Burana. Celestina Casapietra (soprano); Horst Hiestermann (tenor); Karl-Heinz Stryczek (baritone); Leipzig Radio Chorus; Dresden Boys' Choir; Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra, Herbert Kegel cond. PHILIPS 9500 040 $7.98, 7300 444 $7.98.

Performance: Forceful, lively

Recording: Good

ORFF: Veni Creator Spiritus; Der Cute Mensch; Concento di Voci;Nanie und Dithyramhe; Vom Fruhjahr, Oltank und vom Eliegen. Czech Philharmonic Chorus; instrumental ensemble, Viclav Smetae'ek cond. SuPRAPHON 1 12 1137 $6.98.

Performance: Well–drilled

Recording: Okay

Orff is much performed in Eastern Europe, undoubtedly because of the populist qualities of his ultra-simple style. This is at least the second recording released here of the Carmina Burana by Herbert Kegel and the Chorus and Orchestra of Radio Leipzig in East Germany, and, from the vivid style of the singing and playing here, it is obvious they are enjoying themselves,. The solo singing is fair to middling; otherwise, though, this is a spirit ed and engaging performance.

I am not an Orff fan, and I always thought the Carmina Burana something of a kitschy mish-mash. Having changed (I like to say "evolved") my musical ideas over the years, I approached these recordings with an open mind, ready perhaps to re-evaluate Orff. Well, Carmina is still a kitschy mish-mash by any standards, but, if your defenses are down, it's a lot of good Bavarian fun. Unfortunately, the same is not true of Orff's choral music as represented on a Supraphon disc from Prague. Orff developed a famous teaching method for children based on singing and playing percussion instruments, and his own music for this combination should be of more than passing interest. Most of the music here is pre-Carmina: the two cantatas on texts of Werfel and three settings of wonderful, ironic poetry of Brecht are from the early 1930's; in between are recent settings of Catullus and Schiller. Simplistic phrases in endless repetition, disregard for the essentials or the subtle ties of the texts (which are both fragmented and run-on), and a tremendously limited tonal palette make for boredom. I didn't detect much enthusiasm on the part of the performers either. The germs of the Carmina style are here, and there are even connections with later movements towards simplicity, Orientalism, minimalism, and so forth. But this is after-the-fact historical hindsight and it makes the music not one whit more listenable. E.S.

RACHMANINOFF: The Bells, Op. 35; Vocalise, Op. 34, No. 14. Robert Tear (tenor); Sheila Armstrong (soprano); John Shirley-Quirk (baritone); London Symphony Chorus and Orchestra, Andre Previn cond. ANGEL S-37169 $6.98.

Performance: Good

Recording: Excellent

RACHMANINOFF: The Isle of the Dead, Op. 29; Symphonic Dances, Op. 45. London Symphony Orchestra, Andre Previn cond. ANGEL S-37158 $6.98.

Performance: Variable

Recording: Mostly good

Of the three major works recorded here, The Bells fares best, mainly because of the fine work of the vocal soloists; John Shirley-

Quirk, in particular, makes a most moving experience of the final and funereal "Iron Bells" movement. But the London Symphony Chorus, while very fine in its projection of Poe-Balmont-Rachmaninoff, does not match the shattering power brought to bear by the Russian forces in Kyril Kondrashin's 1966 re cording issued by Melodiya/Angel. Despite the less than elegant solo singers, that is the version to own. If Previn had chosen to do the work in English, though, this performance would have rated a special recommendation on that score, since in my book it is definitely better than the Ormandy effort on all points.

Exceptionally lovely is Previn's way with the much-played Vocalise, in which he handles the inner counterpoint with tender loving care. But I don't see why this wasn't added to side two of the orchestral disc rather than being tacked onto the end of The Bells, where it becomes a meaningless anticlimax.

--------Jose CARRERAS AND MONTSERRAT CABALLE: a confident Leicester, a regal Elisabetta

The orchestral record is less successful. There is some uncomfortable overbalancing of horns midway through the exposition of The Isle of the Dead, and the opening bars of the Symphonic Dances seem slightly indecisive, as though the tempo were being worked into rather than firmly stated. In fact, there are somewhat unconvincing tempos and tempo fluctuations in several places in both performances. Rachmaninoff's own historic re cording of The Isle of the Dead, with the Philadelphia Orchestra, is still available, and I strongly recommend the recent RCA reissue of the 1958 Fritz Reiner/Chicago Symphony performance-a great reading with still excel lent sound. By the same token, I recommend above all others the Goossens/London Symphony version of the Symphonic Dances in the Everest issue (if you can find a good pressing).

Except for the problem with horn balance, the recording work-pleasingly ambient, quadraphony and all-is excellent throughout all four sides of the Previn recordings, but their superiority in this department is not enough to override my interpretive objections to them. D.H.

ROMAN: Drottningholm Musk; Sinfonia in D Major; Sinfonia in E Minor. Drottningholm Chamber Orchestra, Stig Westerberg cond.

SWEDISH SOCIETY DISCOFIL SLT 33140 $7.98 (from HNH Distributors, P.O. Box 222, Evanston, Ill. 60204).

Performance: Energetic

Recording: Could be better

Johan Helmich Roman, considered "The Father of Swedish Music," speaks the language of the high Baroque with a heavy Handelian accent. Considering that he studied in Eng land with that master, this is not at all odd or bad. Actually, he is akin to William Boyce but lacks his English lilt. Regardless of his nation al and stylistic origins, this is good, solid mu sic well worth acquiring.

The performance is as solid as the music, and Stig Westerberg chooses convincing tem pos and inspires his ensemble to a fine rhythmic verve. At times the sound is a bit scruffy, and there are a few ragged edges here and there, but certainly not enough of them to keep the listener from enjoying Roman's vibrant message. S.L.

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

ROSSINI: Elisabetta, Regina d'Inghilterra. Montserrat Caballe (soprano), Elisabetta; Jose Carreras (tenor), Leicester; Valerie Masterson (soprano), Matilde; Rosanne Creffield (mezzo-soprano), Enrico; Ugo Benelli (tenor), Norfolk; Neil Jenkins (tenor), Guglielmo. Ambrosian Singers; London Symphony Orchestra, Gianfranco Masini cond. PHILIPS 6703 067 three discs $23.94.

Performance: Very good

Recording: Excellent

For more than a century, Elisabetta, Regina d'Inghilterra was known merely as the opera whose overture Rossini conveniently borrowed when he was too lazy to write a new one for his Il Barbiere di Siviglia. (Actually, the original source was an even earlier opera, Aureliano in Palmira, so this is a twice-borrowed overture.) Now that we can hear all of Elisabetta, we can discover that the overture's crescendo section is used quite effectively in the opera's first-act finale. Those familiar with the music of The Barber will be amused to discover several precedents in this earlier score, among them the Queen's en trance aria, on which Rossini drew generously for Rosina's "Una voce poco fa." Elisabetta was Rossini's first opera for Naples; its success there proved auspicious for the composer's spiraling career. He was only twenty-three at the time (1815), but he was no longer a beginner. No less than thirteen op eras had come from his facile pen during the preceding five years, including La Cambiale di Matrimonio, Il Signor Bruschino, Tancredi, L Tatiana in Algeri, and Il Turco in Italia. It should surprise no one, therefore, that this newly discovered work is skillful, theatrical, and full of happy melodic invention. What is perhaps a bit disconcerting is the way Rossini's familiar buffo style is adapted to the needs of a "serious" opera. For example, the scene in which the evil Norfolk plans his nefarious action to destroy his rival Leicester is set to music very similar to that used in The Barber's highly comic ensemble where Figaro reassures the police that every thing is normal in the Bartolo household.

Elisabetta is not a violent opera on the or der of the Donizetti "English" tragedies. In its historically dubious plot, Queen Elizabeth is infatuated with Leicester, but follows her noble instincts and allows him to return to his wife, Matilde. The music is free of bombast and quite Mozartian in its texture, and it is given an elegant performance by the London Symphony under Masini's direction.

Without access to the score I cannot vouch for the faithfulness with which the singers follow Rossini's vocal writing, but the embellishments we do hear-and they are plentiful are executed very capably by the uniformly good cast. Montserrat Caballe is a somewhat aloof-sounding Elisabetta, but then a queen is entitled to sound distant from her subjects, and, in any case, she is in sumptuous form vo cally. Valerie Masterson (formerly one of the main ornaments of the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company) is a pure-toned, altogether admirable Matilde. Jose Carreras sings the role of Leicester with confidence, elegance, and re fulgent top notes, while Ugo Benelli brings an exceptionally fluent florid technique as well as a freely produced light tenor to the role of Norfolk. All things considered, Elisabetta may not be topflight Rossini, but it is an important and highly enjoyable discovery.

By way of a footnote I might add that Leicester's triumphant return from the Scot tish wars bears a strong resemblence to the way the King and Amneris receive Radames in Aida. And such salient phrases in both librettos as "giovan'eroe" and "Quanto mi costi" suggest that Verdi and librettist Ghis lanzoni may have been familiar with this opera. G.J.

ROUSSEL: Symphony No. 3, in G Minor, Op. 42 (see DUKAS) SCHUMANN: Symphonic Etudes, Op. 13.

LISZT: Sonetti del Petrarca, Nos. 123, 104, and 47. Alexis Weissenberg (piano). CoNNOISSEUR SOCIETY CS-2109 $6.98.

Performance: Stimulating

Recording: Very good

Weissenberg's Schumann has almost always been stimulating, and so it is here. Like Sviatoslav Richter and Claudio Arrau in their recordings of the Symphonic Etudes, he gives us the five posthumously published variations as well as the standard set of twelve. Richter played these five "extra" variations after Var. V of the standard sequence; Weissenberg plays them after Var. IX; Arrau did not lump them together, but scattered them at various points in the work. This is worth mentioning, I think, because it seems to reflect a somewhat more thoughtful approach on Arrau's part, one which makes his Philips re cording (6500.130) the most satisfying of all.

Weissenberg's performance is, in its own right, an extremely fine and persuasive one, with great dramatic sweep and yet a fine sense of organization. There is some conspicuous pre-echo at the start of side two, which bothers me less than the occasionally hard tone Weissenberg seems to favor. Arrau's warmer tone and more expansive approach, in my admittedly personal view, suit this music particularly well. His fill-up is a masterly account of Schumann' s Abegg Variations, Op. 1; Liszt' s Petrarch Sonnets may be more interesting musically, though, and Weissenberg presents them with a good deal of poetry. The encyclopedically oriented and/or duplication-conscious collector, however, may be more attracted to the equally distinguished performances available within the context of the Armies de Pelerinage-by Arrau, Brendel, Kempff, or Jerome Rose. R.F.

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

SHOSTAKOVICH: Concerto for Cello and Orchestra No. 2, Op. 126.

GLAZOUNOV: Chant du Menestrel, Op. 71. Mstislav Rostropovich (cello); Boston Symphony Orchestra, Seiji Ozawa cond. DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 2530 653 $7.98, 3300 653 $7.98.

Performance: Eloquent

Recording: Excellent

Shostakovich's oddly haunting, yet wryly humorous Second Cello Concerto is the real business of this recording, Glazounov's rather innocuous four-minute Chant du Menestrel serving as an incongruous prelude. Composed for Mstislav Rostropovich and first performed by him in Moscow, September 25, 1966, on the occasion of Shostakovich's sixtieth birth day, the Second Concerto is a considerably more somber piece than the essentially ebullient First Cello Concerto (1959), also dedicated to Rostropovich. The work strikes me as a kind of expanded chamber music, bearing the familiar hallmarks of Shostakovich's musical palette: broodingly lyrical discourse combined with jocular commentary, woven together in a two-part contrapuntal fabric, and dotted with arresting brass, woodwind, and percussion punctuation. In common with much of Shostakovich's late work, the concerto makes reference-mostly indirect-to his earlier work and the music of others.

Some critics find this music dour. I do not. For me, the Second Cello Concerto ranks high in the canon of the composer's creative accomplishments, not only in terms of its fascinating combination and recombination of seemingly disparate ideas, but in the superbly resourceful scoring and brilliant writing for the solo instrument.

As for this recorded performance, I can hardly imagine a finer one. One must hark back to the achievements of Casals for an adequate comparison with the eloquence displayed here by Rostropovich. Ozawa and the Boston Symphony players clearly give their all and are accorded topnotch recorded sound by DG's production staff. D. H.

SOUSA: Semper Fidelis; The Bells of Chicago; The Crusader; The Diplomat; The Beau Ideal; On Parade; The Stars and Stripes Forever; The Bride-Elect; The Directorate; The Gladiator; The Guide Right; The National Fencibles; The Occidental. Eastman Wind Ensemble, Donald Hunsberger cond. PHILIPS 9500 151 $7.98.

Performance: Powerful

Recording: Excellent

SOUSA: The Bride Elect; The Summer Girl; Mother Hubbard; La Reine de la Mer; The Charlatan; Nymphalin; The Red Man; Coquette; The Triumph of Time. Antonin Kubalek (piano). ANTILLES AN-7015 $4.98.

Performance: Pretty

Recording: Very good

Parade lovers who can never get their fill of the works of John Philip Sousa, the "March King," are bound to have a high old time with Philips' "Strike Up the Band," a brand-new collection containing a dozen spruce selections from the 140 marches Sousa left on pa per at his death in 1932. In his liner notes, W. A. Chislett obligingly clears up the rumor that the March King hailed from Europe; his father was born in Spain (of Portuguese parents) and his mother was Bavarian, but John Philip's birthplace was our own nation's capital. For years he was director of music for the U.S. Marines, but he started his own band in 1892 and was never at a loss to supply it with a new item for the repertoire, from The Beau Ideal of 1893 to The Diplomat of 1904, a march dedicated officially to the Secretary of State at the time. but secretly composed in gratitude to a cook who had served a tender loin steak Sousa thought was the best one he had ever tasted.

--------- SEIJI OZAWA AND MSTISLAV ROSTROPOVICH: an eloquent performance of Shostakovich's Second Cello Concerto.

Although it's sometimes an effort of will, despite such stories, to distinguish one bristling Sousa march from another, such stirring examples of the genre as Semper Fidelis and The Stars and Stripes Forever have more than earned their status as musical symbols of ...

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Wagner's “Ring" Complete on Cassettes--A Harbinger of Things to Come?

THERE was a year, in college, when I heard the final scene from the Solti recording of Wagner's Das Rheingold at least once a month. I was co-proprietor of the loudest (al though certainly not the best) stereo system on campus, and the tremendous din it was capable of making drew Wagnerites from all directions. The first Nibelung-haunted petitioner appeared like a specter one Sunday after noon bearing records. He begged five minutes with the "SYSTEM," got his Donner call, hammer smash, and thunder machine, and left with a grin of ecstasy on his face. So did the many others who followed him.

I don't mean to make light of Wagner, Wagner recordings, or Wagner enthusiasts like my sonophile visitor. On the contrary, that first glimpse of Rheingold traumatized my roommate and me with some of the most impressive things we had ever heard from a phonograph record. Under normal circum stances, we would certainly have bought the album. Luckily, with so many copies walking in the door, we never had to.

Comparing the newly released London cassettes of the Solti Ring with the original disc version has brought back those memories vividly. It also brought the perspective of John Culshaw's book, Ring Resounding, which comes packaged with the cassettes when you buy the Ring cycle. Culshaw, who was the producer of this entire effort, documents at some length the troubles, the triumphs, and the techniques used in bringing his personal vision of the Ring to the home listener, and he does so with great enthusiasm and specificity (I'd recommend the book even if I couldn't recommend the cassettes-which I can).

According to Culshaw, the Solti Ring is meant to be the ideal (within technology's lim its) sonic representation of Wagner's stage craft. In other words, the vocal, orchestral, and special effects are supposed to resemble the sound you'd hear if a resurrected Wagner were able to mount a no-compromise production of his work today. What this amounts to in aural terms is a cast and orchestra of which no member seems ever to be more than ten paces away from your ear, except. when he is dissolving into the mist, the gloom, or the plumbless depths of Nibelheim. Stereo, which was brand new at the time of Rheingold (1958) and somewhat more mature when Walk ure was completed (1965), is used with purpose, consistency, and considerable understanding. Tonal and reverberant qualities are monitored and shaped, from moment to moment, with manifest taste. The outcome is a recording that sounds-on a good or even moderately good sound system-richer, more vivid, more glamorous, and above all bigger than almost anything else I could name on records. True, it comes about as close to a live opera-house experience as a Cinerama production comes to a stage play viewed from the second tier. But evidently that was the whole idea.

So much for my general reaction; but how did the cassettes compare in individual details with the distinguished disc originals? Brilliantly! In fact, if it weren't for my persistent pickiness, I'd be inclined to say there are no significant differences between the cassettes and the discs. But of course there are, even though they are minor. Dynamic-range com pression has been used judiciously on the cassettes; when listening to them you'd hardly expect that the discs could get any louder, but then you make the switchover and, sure enough, they do. Also, the cassettes are a trifle hissier, but the Ring was, after all, a pre-Dolby recording, and the dominant hiss you hear from cassettes and discs is from the master tape. I did note some equalization differ ences, but these have no meaning in terms of recording quality. At one point in Rheingold, right after a side change, the differences re versed themselves, with the disc suddenly be coming slightly brighter than the cassette in stead of the other way around.

. . . a package hardly heavier and no bulkier than a basketball . . .

I compared disc-cassette versions of Rheingold and Das Walk ure, and had I thought of it in time I would have requested also a disc copy of Gotterdammerung, which has a multitude of cymbal crashes of the sort that was the nemesis of other cassettes. As it was, I

.had to sample the final scene on cassette with no standard for comparison. The cymbals did not provide quite the bright blast of treble energy that is becoming common on the most modern recordings, but they were more than potent enough to make their point.

So, cassettes continue to stride along smartly, and perhaps their special advantages show up best in large-scale works such as these. This Ring (twelve cassettes plus the book) comes in a package hardly heavier and certainly no bulkier (5 1/4 inches wide, 9 1/2 inches high, 6% inches deep) than a basket ball; contrast this with the alternative towering stack of nineteen discs that anyone with even a slight back problem would hesitate to lift. One cassette is roughly the equivalent of two discs, and when you open the handsome package and view an entire Walk ure on a mere three cassettes the opera actually seems short-a fiendish deception.

IDID miss the helpful analysis of Rheingold leitmotifs that the cut-down cassette libretto omits; perhaps London feels nobody cares any more. And, of course, with cassettes it's harder to locate those anvil crashes that all the hi-fi freaks want to hear. But, quibbles aside, if you like Wagner and you like cassettes, buy these. You'll like both even more.

-Ralph Hodges

WAGNER: Der Ring des Nibelungen. Birgit Nilsson (soprano); Kirsten Flagstad (soprano); Regine Crespin (soprano); Christa Ludwig (mezzo-soprano); Set Svanholm (ten or); Wolfgang Windgassen (tenor); George London (baritone); Hans Hotter (baritone); Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (baritone); Gottlob Frick (bass); other soloists. Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Georg Solti cond. LON DON RING S 5-1 twelve cassettes $135.

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cont.

... American power over the decades, and they are all given exceptionally rousing, spirited treatment here, in the tradition set by Frederick Fennell, by the Eastman Wind Ensemble under Donald Hunsberger.

In addition to his marches, Sousa also man aged to jot down the scores of ten operettas, fifteen concert suites, seventy songs, twenty dances, and four overtures. This is the sort of material Antonin Kubalek plays on the piano, in his own transcriptions, on the Antilles record called "Other Sides of Sousa." Some of the pieces, like The Bride Elect and The Charlatan, are also marches but smack more of the ballroom than the parade ground. Devotees of Sousa's style may find more charm than did this listener in such relatively gentle period pieces as The Summer Girl, Nymphalin, Co quette, and a suite of rather starchy waltzes called La Reine de la Mer. Everything is sparklingly played, however, and it's almost a relief to know that the March King had these other sides to his musical nature. P. K .

STEFFANI: Stabat Mater (see BUXTEHUDE)

JOHANN STRAUSS: Die Fledermaus. Hermann Prey (baritone), Eisenstein; Julia Varady (soprano), Rosalinde; Benno Kusche (bass), Frank; Rene Kollo (tenor), Alfred; Bernd Weikl (baritone), Falke; Lucia Popp (soprano), Adele; Ivan Rebroff (?), Prince Orlofsky; Ferry Gruber (tenor), Dr. Blind; Franz Muxeneder (speaker), Frosch. Bavarian State Opera Chorus and Orchestra, Carlos Kleiber cond. DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON 2707 088 two discs $15.96.

Performance: Very good, with one serious flaw

Recording: Excellent

There are many admirable things in this new Fledermaus. Carlos Kleiber conducts it with an irresistible bounce and elicits an orchestral performance that is elegant in tone, light in texture, and transparent in detail, with tem pos that may not always sound "traditional" but are invariably effective. He works well with the singers, too, securing precise ensembles and insisting on a lightness of touch to match his own mercurial approach.

Hermann Prey has fun with the role of Eisenstein and communicates his enjoyment effectively. The part lies much too high for a baritone, but Prey has less trouble with the tessitura than most of his colleagues. Bernd Weikl is a strong and amusing Falke, Rene Kollo an expert if not particularly seductive-sounding Alfred. Benno Kusche, entertaining but no longer in prime voice, rounds out the male contingent.

Both ladies are excellent. Julia Varady--a soprano with a distinguished string of stage appearances to her credit but relatively new on records-has not yet grafted a personal profile on Rosalinde, but vocally she is a de light, and so is Lucia Popp as Adele.

Unfortunately, the role of Orlofsky was given to Ivan Rebroff, the well-known per former endowed with a phenomenal extension. He could have done the part using the sepulchral low range of his compass and brought it off amusingly. Instead, he chose to do it as a female impersonator with results that are vulgar, hopelessly unfunny, and downright unpleasant to listen to. There are always people who find such gimmicks entertaining (otherwise, how could they find their way into a production?), but for me the effect is lethal.

More Bavarian than Viennese in character, the performance observes the traditional cuts in the dialogues, and the role of Frosch is radically reduced (though ably performed by Franz Muxeneder). The recorded sound is excellent. G.J.

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

VAUGHAN WILLIAMS: Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis; Concerto Grosso; Partita for Double String Orchestra. London Symphony Orchestra, Sir Adrian Boult cond. ANGEL CI S-37211 $6.98.

Performance: Definitive

Recording: Rich

This is at least the fifth recording of the Tallis Fantasia by Sir Adrian Boult, whose authority as an interpreter of Vaughan Williams' music remains unique and yet, in this work especially, continues to deepen. There is nothing to be said about the performance except that it is possibly even more exalted and assuredly more richly recorded than its four predecessors. The two companion works, also for strings alone, are a good deal slighter but quite attractive in their own right. The Concerto Grosso, which is not otherwise record ed, proves to be of greater substance than one might expect for a work written for the Rural Music Schools Association's variously skilled string players in 1950. In the partita Sir Adrian's tempo for the opening movement is somewhat brisker here than in his earlier recording, and quite agreeably so; Angel's creamy sonic frame, however, tends to be a bit "homogenizing," leaving little of the immediacy that gave the third and fourth movements in particular such lively impact in the 1959 recording. In all, though, this is a most distinguished release, surely as close as we shall come to a definitive statement of these works. R . F .

WAGNER: Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg (see Best of the Month, page 89)

WEILL: Three Penny Opera (see Popular Reviews, page 124)

COLLECTIONS

EARLY MUSIC AT WIK. Senfl: Mit Lust; Quodlibet; In Maien; Ich hab' mich redlich g'halten; Ich weiss nit; Es hett ein Bieder mann. Heintz: Da trunken Sie. Muset: Quant je voi. Rugen: Loybere risen. Dunstable: O rosa bella. Paumann: Ellend du halt umbfan gen mich. Encina: Todos los bienes. Susato: Ronde ii: Bergeret. Phalese: Pavane sur la bataille; Branle. Anon: Estampie; Sumer is icu men in; Trotto; Maria Muoter; Ich sachz eyns Mols; Dindirin; Pase el agoa. Joculatores Up salienses, Sven Berger cond. This LP-3 $7.98 (from HNH Distributors Ltd., P.O. Box 222, Evanston, Ill. 60204).

Performance. Consciously natural

Recording: Blurred

Sweden is entering the early music scene more and more with Baroque music from Drottningholm and medieval and Renaissance music emanating from the castle at Wik. The a fine group with promise, as can be heard from this fine disc which dwells largely on the German repertoire with a smattering of other nationalities. The instrumental performances come off best, and the full ensemble of ancient instruments makes a splendid showing in such works as the Battle Pavanne from the Phalese collection of 1572. A novel and intriguing sound is offered by the use of a jew's harp in the English Estampie. The vocalists, however, have not only pursued the current trend of using a natural voice production (as opposed to the bel canto approach of earlier groups) but have carried it to such an extreme that it comes out sounding like a parody of early music making. Although the performances are lively, there is an overall lack of rhythmic thrust caused by fuzzy articulation and perhaps aggravated by the acoustics of Wik Castle. Still, this group should be watched. Time will, I believe, iron out some of these sticky problems, which all ensembles of ancient instruments face at one time or another. And anyway, the cover picture of medieval laundry drying on lines outside the castle is a joy. - S.L .

RECORDINGS OF SPECIAL MERIT

INSTRUMENTS OF THE MIDDLE AGES AND RENAISSANCE: Sixty-one Compositions by Machaut, Dufay, Jacopo da Bologna, and Others. Early Music Consort of London, David Munrow cond. ANGEL SBZ-3810 two discs $14.96.

Performance: Stunning

Recording: Excellent

THE MEDIAEVAL SOUND: Early Woodwind Instruments-Fifteen Medieval and Renaissance Dances, Songs, and Other Pieces; Music at Henry VIH's Court; Elizabethan Popular Tunes; Suite of Renaissance Dances. David Munrow (woodwinds); Christopher Hogwood (keyboards); Gillian Reid (percussion). CMS/ ORYX EXP46 $6.98.

SIR ADRIAN BOULT An authority that continues to deepen.

Performance: Excellent

Recording. Good

THE PLEASURES OF THE ROYAL COURTS: Music of Trouveres and from the Burgundian Court of Philip the Good, the Court of Emperor Maximilian I, the Medici Court, and the Spanish Courts in the Early Sixteenth Century. James Bowman (countertenor); Early Music Consort of London, David Munrow cond. NONESUCH H-71326 $3.98.

Performance: Elegant

Recording: Clear

The sudden death of David Munrow last May dealt a bitter blow to the world of early music.

Admittedly, this world still has some excel lent performers, ensembles, and scholars left, but this young Englishman combined in one miraculous person the finest qualities of scholar and musician. Perhaps his most amazing talent was his ability to take any wind instrument into his hands and perform flawlessly upon it. His artistry is certainly borne out by this cache of records in which his playing is not only technically perfect but also imbued with a compelling sense of rhythm, lucid articulation, and, above all, an imaginative flair for ornamentation that lends life and breath to the simplest melody.

Of the three albums listed here, the two-record "Instruments of the Middle Ages and Renaissance" is a monumental achievement and will undoubtedly become the bible of organ-ologists interested in actual sound and performance. Demonstrating some ninety instruments in over sixty pieces, the set is divided into two basic sections, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, each with subdivisions of woodwinds, keyboard, brass, and strings.

There is no separate section devoted to percussion instruments, but their sparkling sound is scattered throughout the album. Just about every obsolete and exotic music-making ma chine imaginable is represented here in various combinations, and each minute band contains an exquisite performance of a perfectly chosen work. Thanks to the cooperation of the Oxford University Press, the album includes a stunning book of about a hundred pages by Mr. Munrow, which is geared to the album in such a way that one can follow the musical examples with it and simultaneously see and hear the instruments involved. This album, then, is an absolute must for anyone with a taste for early music no matter what his level or approach.

The Oryx album, "The Mediaeval Sound," is a more modest affair (probably a forerunner of the above) devoted exclusively to medieval woodwinds. The repertoire is different, well worth having, and, as usual, exquisitely per formed. The first side includes Mr. Munrow's commentary on each instrument and will probably become something of a collector's item.

"The Pleasures of the Royal Courts" is a more traditional type of grouping which makes a brief but delightful survey of aristocratic music-making in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. The tone of the record is intimate, and the credit really belongs to James Bowman. Singing almost entirely at sotto voce, he blends his fine countertenor sound beautifully with the old instruments. Certain ly his interpretation of Dufay's Vergine Bella is one of the most moving I've ever heard, and in general his diction is so clear that the words are easily understood.

These three sets, a fine tribute to the memory of David Munrow, give rise to the hope that he left more tapes, and that they will be released so we can continue profiting from and enjoying his remarkable contribution to the world of music. S.L.

MARTA SCHELE:, Song Recital. Three Songs. Werle: Nocturnal Chase. Lidholm: Six Songs. Nystroem: Three Songs. Debussy: Trois Chansons de Bilitis. Milhaud: Catalogue de Fleurs. Ravel: Cinq Melodies Populaires Grecques. Marta Schele (soprano); Elsif Lunden-Bergfelt (piano). Bis LP-34 $7.98 (from HNH Distributors Ltd., P.O. Box 222, Evanston, Ill. 60204).

Performance: Good or better

Recording: Very good

Bored by Brahms? Sated with Schumann? Weary of Wolf? Try a song recital that mixes the French and Swedish repertoires and offers Debussy's Trois Chansons de Bilitis as its most "popular" entry. Based on such a casual impression, the songs of neo-Romantic Gosta Nystroem (1890-1966) do not seem too far removed from those by two much younger composers, Hilding Hallnas and Ingvar Lidholm. A lyrical impulse-and perhaps the Grieg influence-pervades them all. All three composers favor clarity and brevity; the songs of Lidholm are almost folk-like. (One of them is a setting of the original Lope de Vega Cradle Song of the Virgin, the source of one of Brahms' Viola Songs.) Lars Johan Werle (b. 1926) is modern and experimental.

His Nocturnal Chase makes little sense to me, but it is brief and quite enjoyable in a puzzling sort of way. The whole "Swedish" side is a refreshing experience, and the songs are sung with lovely tone and great sensitivity.

Neither the Debussy nor the Ravel songs can be said to be over-recorded these days; the Milhaud-a witty and terse setting of poetry masquerading as an un-poetic trade catalog-is agreeable nonsense. Miss Schele's limpid tones are just as enjoyable in the French repertoire as in the Swedish, but her renditions of the Debussy and Ravel cannot match the stylistic rightness of such predecessors as Jennie Tourel or Regine Crespin. The piano accompaniments are first-rate, disc surfaces are amazingly silent, and texts are sup plied-a pleasing little package, all told, and I recommend it. G.J.

RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT

BARRY TUCKWELL and VLADIMIR ASHKENAZY : Musk for Horn and Piano. Beethoven: Sonata in F Major, Op. 17. Schumann: Adagio and Allegro in A-flat Major, Op. 70. Danzi: Sonata in E-flat Major, Op. 28. Saint-Sans: Romance, Op. 67. Barry Tuckwell (horn); Vladimir Ashkenazy (piano). LONDON CS-6938 $6.98.

Performance: Superb

Recording: Excellent

All the works on this record exist in alternative versions for cello, the Saint-Satins being the composer's adaptation of a movement from a suite for that instrument published as Op. 16. All but the Danzi have been recorded before in one form or another, and I have especially enjoyed the performance of the Beethoven by Hermann Baumann and Stanley Hoogland, but it is doubtful that any of this music has ever sounded so downright irresistible as it all does here. Without knowing the circumstances behind the recording, I would be willing to bet that Tuckwell and Ashkenazy did not just get together in the studio and start playing, but must have played these works together many times for their own pleasure; in any event, that is the impression these technically superb and warmheartedly expressive performances convey-that and a sunny sense of discovery in the case of the Danzi sonata, a work of considerable sub stance and charm in the Classical mold which more than holds its own in the company of the more familiar Beethoven and Schumann pieces. The recording itself is excellent, though close-focused. -R.F.

---------- VLADIMIR ASHKENAZY AND BARRY TUCKWELL: downright irresistible music for horn and piano

Also see:

TECHNICAL TALK--Tape Recorder Progress--1958 to 1977, JULIAN D. HIRSCH

POPULAR DISCS and TAPES: Melanie's Back with "Photograph" Paul McCartney and Wings: Live and Flying Joni Mitchell's "Hejira": A Little Travelin' Music The Streisand Version: A Star Is Born Ballad for Americans Kurt Weill's Three Penny Opera

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