Customer Reviews

Janacek; Dvorak: Glagolitic Mass; Te Deum, Op. 103

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

 

 

The Janacek gets five stars and takes up two-thirds of the CD. If you don't mind my characterizing the Dvorak as filler, I guess I could be excused for being a little disingenuous by giving the Te Deum only three stars and not factoring it into the above rating.

For those not familiar with his music, Janacek is a unique composer. His music is full-sounding but actually relatively sparse in content, relying on repetitions of thematic fragments to build up a mood. (I wonder how many of today's minimalists bow in the direction of this Moravian composer's grave every day.) Written late in life (1926; died 1928), the Glagolitic Mass is Janacek at his boldest and most self-assured.

Shaw's realization of the Mass is de facto definitive. The chorus is never allowed to lose sight of the larger structure of the work; its phrasing is carefully molded to enhance the cumulating of tension so important to this piece. By the end you are drained, as you should be. This is precisely the kind of choral music-making that has made Robert Shaw the kind of almost mythical colossus he is.

Not so, unfortunately, with the Dvorak filler. I've become convinced over the years that the Te Deum is one of Dvorak's greatest pieces of music (hailing from Dvorak's final, American period), but I have yet to find a good, powerful recording of it, including this one. But this tepid rendition, with its frustrating lack of commitment (especially from the orchestra) and its non-stimulating, non-animated, downright boring final two pages, can nevertheless serve as a placeholder until a better one comes along.

Janacek: This isn't quite up to the Chailly standards, as I see it...but nevertheless Robert Shaw does the work justice. The accents are a problem, but not terribly so. Shaw makes it feel like more of a "mainstream" work, such as Mozart's Requuiem. Don't let this frighten you: there's all the rugged glory here, but not necessarily the bite.

Dvorak: this Te Deum of Dvorak's a real good work. Not 'great', but definitely a fine work. The only problem is with the first movement: if you have watched Spongebob Squarepants and heard the theme song, it will be hard to not think of it when you listen to this. It's just one of those freak coincidences. I haven't heard any other performance of this work, but I certainly can't name a single complaint against this one: Good choral work, the right feel of Dvorak, and an overall jubilant sound.

Robert Shaw and his Atlanta Symphony Orchetra and Chorus have done it again with the present release! Leos Janacek's Glagolithic Mass is a sadly underperformed work , but the reasons are not hard to see - first it is sung in Czech and second,its writing for both the chorus and the orchestra make this a challenge for anyone willing to try it. Also unusual in this work are the inclusions of an orchestral prelude and postlude and an solo organ toccata(more on that later). As my opening exclamation says, Shaw and his forces make a most persuasive case for this work, going through the difficult, jazzy rhythms and demanding choral/orchestral writing as if is was second nature. They have been working so long together that they can do anything they choose and come out winners as in the present recording. The Janacek Mass has received other fine performances on CD, notably the Rattle/City of Birmingham and the Bernstein/New York Philharmonic.But the Rattle is let down in my opinion by his soloists especially his soprano who verges on screechiness and Bernstein is let down by the inferior singing of the Westminster Choir and their placement in the sound picture as if they were in another room. No such problems with Shaw and the Atlantans. All the forces involved - chorus, soloists and orchestra perform as if on fire, and the sense of discovery and enthusiasm comes through brilliantly. Last but not least is Norman Mackenzies' playing of the fiendishly difficult bravura organ solo near the end of the work - bravo! The organ is that of the First Presbyterian Church in Atlanta and was dubbed into the performance which took place in Woodruff Symphony Hall. Fortunately the dubbing was done tastefully and there is to my ears no noticeable change in the acoustic of one venue vs.the other. It does raise the question though of why concert halls such as in Atlanta, New York etc. do not have pipe organs. One winds up needing them sooner or later so why not install them and put them to good use?

Back to my review. The Dvorak Te Deum is not the uninteresting bit of fluff that other reviewers have said it is - it certainly stands on its own and deserves to be heard, but the Janacek is the drawing card of this CD, and with the quality of the performances in question, this is a recording to savor time and time again. Enjoy!

I have yet to see a bad review of the Glagolitic Mass, but my introduction to it was most unfortunate: My wife and I were listening to a concert on the car radio without having any idea of which work was being performed (we missed the first two movements). After about five minutes, we both started to feel irritated, without quite knowing why, but after two more movements my wife noticed that every single phrase was repeated exactly - at least from a rhythmic point of view - and after about ten minutes, we felt that the whole work was beginning to sound entirely predictable, and we did, indeed, begin to sing ahead of the actual performance, to see if this would prove to be the case. Sadly it did prove to be the case, and after scratching my head for a few more minutes, I said to my wife, "If someone forced me to put a composer's name to this piece, I would have to say that it sounds like really bad Janacek, and the only alternatives to that which I can think of would have to be that the work is by: a) one of his worst students, b) a work by Janacek himself when he was 13 years old, or c) a work by Janacek himself when he was on his death-bed and no longer capable of rational thought". I'm sorry to have had to say this, especially in the light of the fact that I know several other works of his, including other works from the same period of his life, and I very much enjoy listening to them. But I thought the work in question was simply unusually bad for a composer with such a reputation. Perhaps the performance was atrocious, but I'm not very excited at the prospect of giving it another chance. If you'll just give me a year or two to recover...