Customer Reviews

Beatles Go Baroque

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

 

 

This is the CD for serious listeners of classical music AND serious listeners of the Beatles. Where pops orchestras have failed, Peter Breiner succeeds. His arrangements of Beatles songs, rather than being simply rock band transcriptions for orchestra, are more like unique compositions based on Beatles themes.

Don't let the "looseness" of these arrangements scare you off, however. They are a good exercise for the ear -- can YOU pick out the melody among the busy melodic textures that are integral to Baroque music? With some pieces it's easier than others. The CD kicks off with an jaunty rendition of "She Loves You" that defies all other interpretations of it, orchestral or otherwise. From this point on you know you're in for a very different sort of Beatles trip.

The songs are wisely divided between fast and slow movements -- all of them being a treat for the ear. Among the best fast movements are robust renditions of "Help," "Lady Madonna," and a witty "Yellow Submarine." On the slow end of the spectrum, "And I Love Her" is supremely beautiful on violin, and "The Long and Winding Road" comes out so elegantly that it puts the original version of the song to shame. However, the cleverest track on the album has to be "Michelle." Taking the main theme of the song, Peter Breiner's orchestra creates a perfect FOUR-PART COUNTERPOINT! Of course, this technical term means little to most listeners, but it basically means that you have to hear "Michelle" to believe it.

The grouping of the songs into "Concerto Grosso" format is a clever touch, allowing listeners to see how the Beatles' music might have fit into a Baroque framework. Some might call it pretentious, but I call it good marketing. For serious fans of classical music, it shows that the arranger really knows what he's doing. The "styles" aren't exactly anything special; the Vivaldi one IS written as a violin concerto but there isn't much else to differentiate the various Concertos. Then again, does it really matter? This isn't about the great Baroque composers -- it's about the Beatles!

*Beatles Go Baroque* is a playful CD, in the same category as the *Christmas Goes Baroque* series produced by the same people. Although the music on this disc is more than mere orchestral arrangements of Beatles tunes, it's not in any way a serious study of baroque style. It is much more a play with polyphonic texture. The forms are not strict--no strict fugues, canons, ritornelli, etc. In other words, this disc is not a cerebral "Let's see how Bach would have handled 'Michelle' as a three-part canon with a free bass" type of study--it is, after all, categorized as "Light Classics." It would be quite a feat, however, to spin some of these songs into full-scale concerti grossi, for the Beatles tunes do not seem to lend themselves very well to baroque treatments. If you were to play this disc to someone who's never heard of the Beatles but who knows classical music (not sure where to find someone like that), he would not mistaken these works for true baroque compositions. While Peter Breiner has made some ingenius amalgamations (for instance, you think you're about to hear the Bourrée from Bach's second Overture, and suddenly "We can Work It Out" turns up), he's also made quite a few stylistic compromises in his transformation of the Beatles songs. The play on Handel and Vivaldi do not work quite so well. The always recognizable Vivaldi harmonic and virtuosic flair seems to have been lost for the most part, with the exception of a vague resemblance of the "Spring" concerto for three of its movements, most recognizably the middle movement for "And I Love Her." The style of Handel seems to be playing off of parts of "Alexander's Feast" concerto, but not very strongly. Breiner seems to be most comfortable when writing without a particular composer's style in mind, such as with the fourth concerto grosso (although the notes mention it could be interpreted as Corelli's). The Bachian concerto, however, is recognizably Bach because it is almost a movement-by-movement translation of not a concerto but Bach's Overture no. 2. "She's Leaving Home," done in the style of a sarabande as one of the movements, is a beautiful, poignant work by itself. In fact, many of these pieces could by themselves be musically elegant and charming without the gimmick of Beatles tunes done in eighteenth century fashion. But while the four so-called concerti grossi here are a curious listen for both Beatles fans and baroque music fans alike, with the baroque style watered down, Beatles fans will probably get more out of hearing Beatles tunes put through the contrapuntal exercise. Serious baroque fans will just have to make do with light fun.

The Beatles had hardly been going for 5 minutes before the Liverpool chamber group led by Fritz Speigl decided to put out a Baroque piece called "Eine Kleine Beatlesmusik" plus another called "The Beatlecracker Suite" and this was before the Americans had a go via Joshua Rifkins's "Baroque Beatles Book" on the Nonesuch label (which included the "Last Night I said..." Canata.
Fact is if you plough through the Goldberg Variations of Bach you will discover one that plays the first 6 notes of "She loves you" in exactly the same rhythm!!!

This baroque take on The Beatles arranges concerto medleys in the styles of Handel, Vivaldi, Bach, and Corelli.

The Handel-style concerto is most effective in "Fool on the Hill", which has a slower and more stately pace now, winding wayward through contemplation. And the surprise pick "Honey Pie" turns the Victrola-era croon of the original into languid cello leads that suddenly spring into lively strings in alternation.

The Vivaldi medley surges in with a strong "A Hard Days' Night", followed by the wild card "Girl", with it's lovely lead violin. "And I Love Her" is as graceful and intimate a confession as you'd want, while "Paperback Writer" sways in as an unexpected waltz. The zesty closer "Help" bursts in with driving urgency that thrills, and a lovely clavichord trills through its middle. (A nice echo of the similar move in The Beatles' "In My Life", played by producer George Martin).

The Bach section strides in with the unexpected "Eight Days a Week", then gives "She's Leaving Home" the reverent and layered formality of a rondeau, capturing the stunned and hurt parents from the original lyric. "Yellow Submarine" is of course upbeat but the sudden group shout of "Hey!" in the middle makes it even more fun.

The last medley, in modes akin to Corelli, turns "Here Comes the Sun" into a delightful dialogue of bright string sections, almost tripping over each other in excited response. To close out their ambitious 'White Album', The Beatles had written "Goodnight" as a spoof of schmaltzy string arrangements. Here, arranger Peter Breiner converts that over-the-top wink into a simple and understated beauty that honors the great lullaby melody.

The liner notes referring to original Beatles song releases are thorough but flawed: CDs get credited as LPs, reissues as first printings, and John Lennon is assumed as author of "Paperback Writer" instead of Paul McCartney. But Breiner has done a fine, thoughtful addition to the growing canon of great baroque Beatles albums.

This is one of the wittiest CDs that I have ever heard. Breiner very successfully finds baroque elements in music where a non-composer's ear would never pick them out. Would you have noticed the similarities between "Michelle" and the main subject of "Die Kunst der Fuge"?
Buy it.

I listened to the samples online and it sounded intriguing. But the actual album is kind of bland. It has none of the pop of the Beatles themselves. Good generic classical music, though.

EXCELLENT CONCEPT. The Beatles Music in the Baroque Style (1600-1750). A+ BEATLE GO BAROQUE ,UNIQUE!Super fast service and highly recommended!!!

I'm a great fan of transcriptions of old warhorses - new wine in old bottles, or a new seasoning for an old dish eaten to satiation. Besides the inevitable synthesizer reworkings of Wendy Carlos and Don Dorsey, I have wonderful recordings of Vivaldi's Four Seasons for brass ensemble, recorder quartet and as improbable as Japanese traditional harp (koto) ensemble, as well as of Bach's Goldbergs for synthesizer, accordion, organ, guitar(s), brass ensemble, string trio, string orchestra, saxophone quartet, to which you might add Jacque Loussier's and John Lewis' respective jazz versions, and Robin Holloway's recomposition for two pianos - I'm still missing the one for two cymbalums and the one for handbells, but just wait.

And, as everybody else, I am fond of the Beatles. They knew how to write a good tune.

So I was a natural candidate for this "Beatles Go Baroque", which I snatched upon in first publication, back in the mid 90s. I find it disappointing, though. What you get is neither the best of baroque nor the best of the Beatles. The baroque you get is reminiscent of how it was played in the 60s and early 70s by ensembles such as the Jean-François Paillard Orchestra or the Stuttgart Chamber Ensemble led by Karl Ristenpart, rather than of Hogwood's Academy of Ancient Music, Pinnock's English Concert, let alone Il Giardino Armonico or Fabio Biondi's Europa Galante: square, a bit straitlaced, not very lively and dynamic. And some of the arrangements by Peter Breiner sound not so much baroque as like the easy-listening, slightly lachrymose lounge jazz that might go with the singing of Frank Sinatra (try track 13). Breiner is at his best when he composes fugues, like the one on Honey Pie (Track 4) or Michelle (Track 18), but overall I don't think he lives up very well to the challenge of how would have Handel, Bach and Vivaldi composed it, had they been given a tune by the Beatles. And his orchestration limited to strings, harpsichord and flute (in Bach, no doubt in imitation of the second orchestral suite/overture) doesn't help bring much color, either.

And as for the Beatles, many of the most famous standards are missing, and you get too much obscure and (to my ears) undistinguished stuff from the early years. Actually I find myself very much in agreement with the precise and thorough analysis of Neat-o - but for those very same reasons I rate it only two-stars. Ultimately, I'm afraid this release is unlikely to appeal either to amateurs of baroque music or to fans of the Beatles. Those looking for agreeable, undemanding easy-listening with vague Baroque and Beatles reminiscences might enjoy it. But for good Beatles transcriptions, I'd recommend instead the Canadian Brass (a disc called "All You Need Is Love" on Bmg/Rca) and the King's Singers Beatles' collection (EMI). They are just transcriptions of the Beatles' songs, they don't make any pretence at mixing two musical universes that are hardly compatible - and so much for the better.