Customer Reviews

Grofé: Orchestral Works

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From my favorite budget label, Naxos, comes a rare combination of three suites by Ferde Grofé: Grand Canyon, Mississippi, and Niagra Falls (8.559007). The first two have been paired in the past, but I have never heard the third (it is a 1961 work) and it seems by contrast with the others somewhat contrived, albeit quite enjoyable. William T. Stromberg conducts the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. Frankly I have heard "The Grand Canyon" played to better advantage, especially on the old Mercury label; but the trilogy on this single CD with the budget price makes this a very good buy indeed.

Ferde Grofé's mastery of the orchestral palette is breathtaking. Nowhere is this more apparent than in his seminal work, the GRAND CANYON SUITE. This work portrays 24 hours of contrasting moods in America's most famous natural habitat, from the stillness of morning in "The Painted Desert" to the thunder of a rare nighttime "Cloudburst." No matter what time of day, you may feel as if the sky is brighter after listening to "Sunrise." One can sense the demeanor of the donkey forced to make the journey "On the Trail." I always feel the regret of another day passing during "Sunset."

The other two orchestral suites on this CD are also great, but they simply do not compare to the majesty of the GRAND CANYON. The MISSISSIPPI SUITE is a short four-movement exploration of Americana along the great river. The NIAGARA FALLS SUITE is overwhelming in its portrayal of the power of the Falls, enhanced by the quiet sections of the inner movements.

Like me, you may be a bit leery of purchasing a CD from a budget label featuring artists and ensembles of whom you've never heard. Rest assured, this CD is a bargain that you will not regret purchasing. I have never been disappointed with a NAXOS CD, and both the Bournemouth Symphony and William T. Stromberg are excellent. Stromberg, a native Californian and only 34 years old at the time of this recording, lends a sensitivity to the quiet passages and incredible zest and energy to the dynamic passages, most notably to the NIAGARA FALLS SUITE.

Probably everyone with any familiarity with American classical composers has heard at least some of the "Grand Canyon Suite" at some point, but the other two suites on this CD (the "Mississippi" and the "Niagara Falls") may not be quite so familiar. They should be, and this version is a splendid (and inexpensive) way to own them. I bought the CD chiefly because I had heard of the "Mississippi" and wanted to find out what it was like. It is a fine piece of music, with much of the rolling expansiveness of the Big River captured in it. And the "Niagara Falls" ranges from Native motifs that will be familiar to all TV-Western buffs, to the Gershwinesque. Of course, there's no need to describe the centerpiece. I've always loved the kind of music that lifts you out of your seat, and all these pieces do.

If this is a typical Naxos product, I'm sure I'll be adding a lot more of them to my collection.

The close of the last century was a good time for the late American composer Ferde Grofe, with two never-before-recorded works popping up on CD! I refer to "Broadway at Night," recorded by the Beau Hunks, and "Niagra Falls Suite," the last and best performed of the three suites featured on this CD.

The sound quality is quite good, with a sufficiently spacious balance. While the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra's versions of the "Grand Canyon" and "Mississippi" suites are merely competent, its dramatic and robust presentation of "Niagra" is an unforgettable listening experience. The piece is great escapist fare, mild in intent but brilliantly written and orchestrated. The asking price amounts to a giveaway, so don't miss out on this one!

From the New York Times, December 1 1998, by Allan Kozinn: Reviewing: Modern American Music of Ferde Grofe, performed by The Beau Hunks (Basta 3090 832).

George Gershwin`s music has never lacked champions, and it is drawing even greater attention this season in honor of his centennial. Perhaps the occasion will lead listeners to reconsider Ferde Grofe, the composer and the arranger for the Paul Whiteman Band who orchestrated Gershwin`s "Rhapsody in Blue", transforming it from a rhythmically vital two-piano score into the atmospheric essay in symphonic jazz that has been a favorite for nearly three-quarters of a century. Little of Grofe`s own music is played today, except two panoramic suites - the "Grand Canyon" and the "Mississippi. In the Modern American Music of Ferde Grofe, the Beau Hunks, an enterprising Dutch ensemble conducted by Jan Stulen, put Grofe`s ambitions in perspective. As a classical trained musician who had held orchestral jobs before joining the Whiteman ban, he believed that the best hope for a flourishing American orchestral style lay in the combination of symphonic music and jazz. It didn`t work out quite that way, but Grofe was clearly onto something: his "Broadway at Night" (1924) paints a vivid picture of the nightlife of the theater district in its heyday, and one of its passing images - a distant muted trumpet - found an expansive echo 16 years later in Aarn Copland`s "Quiet City". There are folksy touches in the " Mississippi Suite" (1925), particularly in the "Mardi Gras" movement that are precursors of moves Copland used in his ballets of the 1940`s. The 17-minute "Metropolis: A Blue Fantasy" (1928) embraces both overt jazziness and fugal counterpoint. The "Cloudburst" movement from the "Grand Canyon Suite",offered as an encore of sortis, is as picturesque an evocation of a storm as you`ll find in the 20th-century repertory. The Beau Hunks' previous explorations have yielded remarkable collections of Raymond Scott`s quirky vignettes and LeRoy Shield`s soundtracks for classic Laurel & Hardy and Little Rascals films. They approach this music the way an early-music group approaches Handel, but with the benefit of erpiod recordings that embody information about the timbres, phrasing and ornamentation of the time. These musicians have picked up these details splendidly: the string glissandos and the grace notes in the trumpet lines in " Metropolis" and "Three Shades of Blue" (1926), the rhythmic fluidity of "Broadway at Night" and the punchy, perfectly balanced wind and brass chording in virtually every work here all create the illusion of a performance from the 1920`s, captured with the clarity and depth of modern recordings. The notes and illustrations also honour Grofe suitably

Ferde Grofé, born in the late 19th century New York, had a varied musical career as a composer, arranger, and pianist. He was a performer and arranger for the Paul Whiteman Orchestra and later arranged Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" for orchestra. Best known as a composer for "Grand Canyon Suite," his style combined classical, jazz and Hollywood cinematic styles in a series of unique "paintings" that managed to evoke the images that his sounds represented.

This collection from Naxos includes the aforementioned "Grand Canyon Suite," as well as his lesser known "Mississippi Suite" and "Niagara Falls Suite." All are quite moving, although "Grand Canyon" is far and away his most brilliant. Niagara displays a fine range of images and moods, from the power of the waters themselves to the cinematic lyricalism of honeymooners.

The quality of the CD is excellent. I have been quite pleased with the quality of their releases. William Stromberg and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra capture the essence of these wonderful compositions.

I suggest that everyone include works by Ferde Grofe in their musical collections. Most everyone has heard some of his music, some without knowing the composer is very popular and whose music is heard and enjoyed around the world.

What a fabulous collection of the best of Grofé conducted by the composer himself. If there is a better recording of any of these selections, I have not heard it and I have heard many.

My brother went to the Grand Canyon by helicopter recently and I thought that this would bring back some nice memories for him. He isn't all that into classical music, but he liked this album very much. It's sometimes difficult to find or out of stock, but Amazon had it - and so did he in just a few days!

This is a very enjoyable disc. Ferde Grofé started out as a light music musician and composer, playing jazz improvisations and arrangements, before joining Paul Whiteman in 1917 as a pianist, assistant conductor and orchestrator and achieving fame for orchestrating Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue in 1924. Yet the works on this disc, among Grofé's most well known original compositions, are more classically oriented than his background might suggest. They are colorful, tuneful and full of humor and swagger, always inventively and imaginatively scored - touches of film music or musicals style (think Richard Rogers) abound, but the overall impression is really of a very American, lighter late-romanticism.

The Mississippi Suite dates from 1926 and is an atmospheric, charming, variegated work in four colorful movements depicting the history of the river, culminating in a sparklingly buoyant Mardi Gras; it is surely the slightest work on the disc, yet an immensely enjoyable one nonetheless. The Grand Canyon suite is probably Grofé's most famous work. It dates from 1934 and is, really, a superb work - atmospheric, colorful and containing much instantly memorable melodic material. The Niagara Falls suite is much later, dating from 1961 but written in more or less the same style to commemorate the opening of the Robert Moses Power Plant. While not as thematically memorable as the Grand Canyon Suite, it is certainly a visceral, powerful work, opening with the, well, vividly thundering and roaring `Thunder of the Waves' before moving on to the dramatically ominous `Devil's Hole Massacre'. Only the pastoral `The Honeymooners' offers some lyrical respite before the machine music of `Power of Niagara - 1961' chugs off with a merrily noisy and percussive depiction of the operating power plant.

The performances are very good; William Stromberg leads the Bournemouth symphony in idiomatic performances that smell of water and reek of power and steam in the Niagara, ferocious and wonderfully dreamlike in turns - I cannot really imagine more vivid and compelling advocacy of this thoroughly enjoyable music. Competition is tougher in the Grand Canyon suite, and here the players sound a tad less involved, sometimes coming uncomfortably close to an impression of just going through the motions. The Mississippi suite is woody and rustic and quite enjoyably played, however. They are given an excellent recorded sound, however (if a little cavernous - no real detraction in music like this, though). Firmly recommended nonetheless.