Customer Reviews

Karol Szymanowski: Violin Concertos; Concert Overture

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The brilliance of Karol Szymanowski is present in these two violin concerti. Rarely performed these works are lost gems that deserve to be recovered from their obscurity. The writing in both concerti is beyond imaginable beauty. Especially in the First Concerto, the violin writing remains in consistanly in the high tessitura, floating above the shimmering textures and wonderfully colored harmonies in the orchestra. These works do not abandon tonality but expands traditional tonality by adding chords of amazing color. Szymanowki teases us with his dramatic structure in both works toying between ideas of wonder and amazement, playful excitment, virtuosic danger, and intense passion. The first work ends quietly, simply evaporating into the air, and the second has a powerfully dramatic ending. The performance on this CD is marvelous, and the BBC Orchestra does a fine job. Mordkovitch may lack the virtuosic power that is needed for the passages of excitement but these weakness hardly detracts from her very delicate, and passionate playing in other sections of the works.

Why is it that so many more women than men have performed and recorded the Szymanowski violin concerti? Wanda Wilkomirska, Suzanne Lautenbacher, Chantal Juillet, and here, Lydia Mordkovitch. They are all very good in this repertoire, and in the case of the present recording the violinist is given ravishing accompaniment by conductor Vassily Sinaisky and the BBC Philharmonic. For anyone who likes the sound-world of composers like Scriabin, Griffes, Sorabji and Cyril Scott, you'll really like Szymanowki's style -- and it's doubly interesting in that those other composers generally devoted their efforts to the piano, not the violin.

The Concert Overture is in a completely different vein -- a younger work, written under the spell of the German/Austrian late romantics. It's the best concert overture Richard Strauss never wrote! What a curtain raiser this is. The violin concertos may be way too difficult for most performers to tackle, but there's no reason why the overture couldn't be programmed by most orchestras ... it could open a symphony concert quite effectively. I imagine a conductor like Leonard Slatkin, Neeme Jarvi or JoAnn Falletta would have a field day with it -- as Sinaisky does here. (In fact, my speakers practically bottomed out during the flourish of the final orchestral peroration and closing bass drum/timpani roll.)

This CD is a winner -- great recordings of fine music, in super sound.

Karol Szymanowski is one of those under appreciated composers from the 20th Century whose works still appear irregularly on the concert stages, at least in the USA. And one wonders why in that his music is richly melodic, inventive, massive, and accessible. But perhaps his time will come. For those looking for a viable introduction to the music of Szymanowski this CD is a fine start.

Opening appropriately enough with his Concert Overture, Opus 12 the varied contrasting layers of color and broad spectrum of orchestral sound give hints of Richard Strauss and Shostakovich in his finest moments. The two violin concerti are as elegant and beautiful (and demanding!) as any in the literature from the 20th Century period. Szymanowski overlaid floating and virtuosic violin tessitura on his orchestral fabric and in doing so reaches for a richer palette than many of his contemporaries. The soloist here is Lydia Mordkovitch and she offers insightful and arching readings of these remarkable compositions.

Vassily Sinaisky leads the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra with careful attention to pacing and inner voices and he makes fine use of the first desk players in the exposed portions. He offers Mordkovitch the proper degree of latitude to focus on her passionate playing while providing the lush supportive orchestral writing the marks Szymanowski's scores.

There are other excellent recordings of these works (especially Simon Rattle with violinists Silke Avenhaus, Thomas Zehetmair) but for beginners this recording is as lushly beautiful as any.

Grady Harp, September 05