Customer Reviews

Bartók: Concerto for Orchestra; Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Sometimes it takes a live performance of a composer's work to send us back to our trusty CD collection in an attempt to extend the thrill of what we have just heard. This is the case with turning to these perfomances of Bartok's two great orchestral masterworks - the Concerto for Orchestra and Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta as bountifully conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen and the LA Philharmonic. The event that started it all was hearing the LA Opera production of Bartok's "Bluebeard's Castle", a profoundly moving work in which the orchestra is the main character, albeit ably joined by Bass and Mezzo. Driving home I was left wondering if all of the lush writing for the orchestra in that opera was equalled by Bartok's other works. The answer is "most assuredly". This CD is not only wondrously performed, the sound engineering is superb. The LA Phil plays passionately and intelligently for Salonen. Bartok and Salonen make a perfect fit and we await his Miraculous Madarin performances this fall. This CD is in this listener's opinion the best recording available for finesse, for insights, and for the lush palletes of color that Bartok paints. Even on a car stero system this recording is breathtaking!

I had a recent conversation with renouned Bartok expert Ben Suchoff (check out books on Bartok--he wrote most of them), and we indeed discussed recordings of the concerto for orchestra. He expressed that his favorite was this one. I myself am very passionate about this performance of the Concerto, and I'm developing a growing respect for Salonen's work with LA. Ben, however, had not heard Slatkin's, Boulez's, or Blomstedt's. I think Slatkin's is the most intelligent interpretation, in terms of playing what Bartok would want and not what simply suits the conductor's fancy. St. Louis performs it flawlessly, as well--the best brass I've heard in a recording of the Concerto, save perhaps Mehta's with Berlin. Slatkin also includes the original ending, which is nice, and I prefer that ending. Unfortunately Slatkin's is no longer in print, so we should petition BMG. In sum, I certainly don't think you could go wrong with this performance, and your purchase would be backed by an endorsement from the top Bartok scholar.

This Sony CD contains two great pieces by Bela Bartok performed by the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen. As the first piece is an example of Bartok's personal brand of modernism and the second is very much concerned with popular and folk traditions, the disc as a whole gives a well-rounded view of Bartok's music and makes for a fine introduction to the composer.

"Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta" (1937) dates from Bartok's modernist apogee. The first movement is a fugue for strings, progressively louder as more and more voices enter, so that the listener expects a loud and crashing climax. What Bartok instead produces is a sudden slackening of the pace, diffusing all of the tension in a different way, a clever trick to play on listeners raised on classical tropes. The second and third movements feature strange mirror worlds and allusions to the Fibonacii sequence (1, 1, 2, 3, 5...)--there was Zahlenmystik between Bach and Gubaidulina, after all. In the third movement we have also the then-novel technique of timpani glissandos. And throughout, the opening fugue reappears from time to time, including as sparkling celesta tones. Even after much of Bartok's language has long since become mainstream in film music and contemporary art music, "Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta" still sounds wondrously fresh and exciting. I discovered classical music through the Darmstadt generation, and I assumed that in going back to Bartok I would find something antique, but through pieces like this I find Bartok stands as a significant innovator.

The "Concerto for Orchestra" (1943) was written in Bartok's last years, when he was living in self-imposed exile in New York. On one hand, it has all the bombast that the concert-attending American public of the time could have wishes for, but on the other hand it is rich in allusions to the folk music of Bartok's native Hungary. While he is clearly writing a crowd-pleaser, Bartok eschews common-practice tonality for a variety of games with scales, and even uses microtonal writing here and then, resulting in a work just as rigorous and original as it is accessible.

I have heard many recordings of these two pieces, and this performance by the L.A. Philharmonic conducted by Salonen is my favourite. He gives an honest reading of the score and doesn't try to play Bartok like standard Romantic repertoire, and he is one of the few who conduct the last movement of the Concerto for Orchestra at the dizzying tempo Bartok indicated. The engineering of the CD is excellent, with full and rich sound. However, the dynamic range replicated means that this is a disc meant for those with excellent home systems who do not have to worry about their neighbours getting upset.

Esa-Pekka Salonen is a great conductor and has proved himself time and time again, but there's something about this Bartok recording that, to use Santa Fe Listener's analogy, leaves me cold. Santa Fe was spot on with his critque of this recording. I bought this (very cheaply) to see what the fuss was about from the 5-star reviews and I have to say this recording is absolutely dull and lifeless.

Bartok's "Concerto For Orchestra," one of his greatest works, is served up here with no color, no passion, no life, and no fire. Sure, the LA Philharmonic play great, but as I have said in several other reviews, that a great orchestra can play with all the virtuosity in the world, but if that orchestra lack direction from the conductor than the performance is pretty much doomed and all that orchestra are left to do is rely on their own intuition. The other work "Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta" is also one of the worst I've heard. Again, there's just no emotion being exhibited whatsoever. The audio quality was okay, but not great. Sony has never had the best audio for classical recordings anyway or at least in my experience they haven't.

This is Bartok truly from the fridge. Cold, thoughtless, tasteless, and altogether two of the worst performances of these two works I've heard.

Reference recordings for "Concerto For Orchestra" and "Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celestra": Reiner/CSO, Solti/CSO, Boulez/CSO, Fischer/Budapest Festival Orchestra

Salonen is enough of a technician and such a cool modernist that this analytical, semi-frozen dissection of the Concerto for Orchestra must be intentional. If you don't think Bartok should be lusty, humorous, touching, or emotionally intense, this is the recording for you. Sony supplies ultra-detailed sound in keeping with the ssurgery being performed on stage. I don't find that the LA Phil. plays with any exceptional brilliance--listen for comparison to recordings from Solti, Bernstein, Karajan, et al. if you want to hear real brilliance.

The Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta suits Salonen's approach far better, since it is a complex puzzle piece with many overlapping lines that need untangling. He does that extremely well, and the detailed sonics give us a clear x-ray of the score. Again, there are more colorful and vibrant readings (from Reiner, Bernstein, Levine, and Harnoncourt, to mention four I happen to like a great deal), but none is as crystal clear as Salonen's--I could hear every ping of the celesta no matter how many insturments it was competing with. A fair rating would be four or five stars for this work on its own.

I was eager to give this disc a spin, having other Salonen/L.A. recordings on my shelf that I completely enjoy. This one is not going to join them unfortunately. There is somethine not quite right. Perhaps more than one thing. It is like the engineer is simply pointing a spotlight here (on the trombones) or there (on the trumpets). But there is not a very good overall flow of each individual movement. It sounds like it was put together with a different section from different orchestras.

There is no question that the Los Angeles Philharmonic has risen to new challenges under Salonen, so this recording is to me a big disappointment. At various times here, one is even reminded of mid-American orchestras where the brass so overpowers all of the rest of the musicians that there is no balance. Also, it seemed that Salonen highlighted various smaller aspects of the score at times to the detriment of the overall structure.

Yes there is incredible sonic power here. You will have to crank the volume up just to hear the opening of the first movement of the Concerto, but then your have to adjust it downward later to avoid loosing your window paines.

There is incredible virtuosity (I'm told) in the last movement of the Concerto, but the recorded sound on this CD does not really pick it up very well, it just sounds blurry. I've heard analog recordings with more clarity.