Customer Reviews

Lutoslawski: Preludes & Fugues for 13 solo strings: Three Postludes; Fanfares

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This CD, the last in Naxos's survey, starts off with the "Three Postludes", written just after his "Funeral Music". They were composed in a transitional period, when Lutoslawski was trying to adapt the techniques used in his "Funeral Music" to a full orchestra. Lutoslawski was apparently unsatisfied with the result, and did not encourage their performance. I can understand his problems with the second and third, but the first is a fine piece that I listen to often. It has a very dramatic climax, and a variety of inventive sound effects as often found in later works.

The next work, the Preludes and Fugue for 13 solo strings, is certainly one of the most "difficult" Lutoslawski works I have yet to encounter. The first prelude is reasonable enough, but I quickly get lost in the remaining six. The fugue, clocking in at 17 minutes, lost me after about the first minute on the first several listens. It's certainly a far cry from traditional, academic fugal writing, as seen in previous eras and even Shostakovich's set in the 20th century. Basically, it appears to consist of strong, emotional statements of the "subject" (four notes and a glissando) interspersed with long "cloud" sections constructed from large note clusters. Though difficult, the fugue did grow on me after repeated listens. Like many Lutoslawski works, it rewards repeated listening.

The five remaining works are fanfares and occasional pieces lasting altogether about 7 minutes. Though some of these are as short as 30 seconds, they are all very fun, cool pieces, packing highly dramatic gestures and compelling writing. Though I certainly wouldn't recommend this as anyone's first Lutoslawski CD, Lutoslawski fans will probably want it for the fanfares if nothing else. Performances are generally good.

With this release from 2001, the seventh, Naxos completed its great cycle of Witold Lutoslawski's orchestral works performed by the Polish Radio and Television Symphony Orchestra conducted by Antoni Wit. Naxos' cycle is the best way to get acquainted with Lutoslawski's music, for these are high-quality performances at excellent prices, and though this last installment contains works that might initially seem leftovers, it too is worth acquiring.

The Preludes and Fugue for 13 solo strings (1970-72) form Lutoslawski's vastest work in terms of playing time, but it gets surprisingly little loving. Well, it doesn't deserve to be so overlooked. This is mid-period Lutoslawski in fine form, music whose textures are created by aleatorism (the conductor generally steps back from beating time), with harmonies based on twelve-tone chords. The frequent presence of fifths in the seven Preludes makes for music somewhat less "dissonant" than other works of this era, and the variety of writing for strings is very great. The Preludes are short and extroverted. The Fugue, on the other hand, is long (16 minutes) and subtle, but still rather more sunny than the slithering, dark soundworld of the then-recent Symphony No. 2. The climax of the Fugue, however is wild, especially as the string groups hit it at different times.

The "3 Postludes" (1958-60) are transitional Lutoslawski, where he had embraced total chromaticism but hadn't yet made the breakthrough into aleatorism. The first two Postludes are the sort of anonymous modernism that many composers in the Communist world wrote as they decided to embrace the avant-garde but hadn't yet found their own voices. The Postlude No. 3, however, deserves to be called mature Lutoslawski and its brash musical world, full of sudden start-stops, will appeal to fans of the composer's Symphony No. 3.

The disc is filled out with four fanfares written for various orchestras. These range from a 30-second sequence of completely anonymous brass chords to a churning, two-minute Lutoslawski in miniature. Curiously, Naxos' cycle did NOT include Lutoslawski's fanfare for the L.A. Philharmonic, which can however be heard under Salonen's baton on a Sony disc.

While not the best place to enter the series -- the Symphony No. 3 is Lutoslawski at his more popularly accessible, you'll definitely want to pick this up with the others.