Customer Reviews

Rimsky-Korsakov: Scherherazade; Tchaikovsky: The Nutcracker Suite

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This Cala CD features 1947 performances by Stokowski, with "His Symphony Orchestra," of Liszt's tone poem "Les Preludes," the Sibelius "Swan of Tuonela" (with Mitch Miller on Cor Anglais), and selections from Tchaikovsky's ballet "Sleeping Beauty." The transfers are slightly disappointing: my RCA LP of the Tchaikovsky has better sound than what is heard here.

The Liszt is a fine performance, though in stereo I prefer Scherchen (DG Westminster) and Silvestri (Disky). To my taste, the finest mono accounts are the Weingartner (IMG) and, best of all, the incomparable Mengelberg (Andante or Pearl). If memory serves, Stoky also conducted part of "Les Preludes" in the delightfully campy Hollywood film "100 Men and a Girl," staring Deanna Durbin.

Stokowski always delivered an eloquent Swan of Tuonela, though here I don't find soloist Mitch Miller all that expressive. All in all, Stoky's earlier Philadelphia account (best heard on a multi-disc Stokowski set on Andante) remains the ONE to own.

The Tchaikovsky here is fascinating. Some of it is rather poker-faced (the Pas' d'Action on track 8 misses the wonderfully buoyant lyricism of the classic Desormiere reading on Testament - but them so does everybody else's). But if you're a Stoky fan like me, you really HAVE to hear track 18 (the Pas de Quatre from Act III). Stoky stretches and teases the rubatos here in such a mannered fashion that any ballerina would have to defy the physical laws of gravity while attempting to dance with it. It is, in a word, OUTRAGEOUS!

Perhaps needless to say, all the playing is absolutely first-class and endlessly entertaining.

Recommended.

Jeff Lipscomb

The sense of color tonal, astonishing sense of imagination, and distinctive creative ethos of Tchaikovski's ballets have never found a best musical Ambassador than Stokowski, in Aurora we feel and aware that nobody but him could mirror with such conviction power and insurmountable expressive refinement those little insights without losing the whole meaning of the score.

Many generations of conductors, notable ensembles have performed this core since then but nobody has been capable to decipher with such splendid figurative lexicon this primitive vitality and penetrating fantasy.