Customer Reviews

Saxophone Concertos

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

 

 

This CD - like many other classical saxophone CDs - sure polarizes opinion!
Personally, I have to agree with the many other reviewers who can't stand it.
When it first appeared in its original guise, I was excited by an album of many of the saxophone favorites performed by a well-known orchestra and conductor on a major label. (the Rousseau and Savijoki discs were almost the only ones readily available prior to then.)
I had only heard Harle play previously with The Michael Nyman Band.
Unfortunately, the album just sucks!
For several reasons, mostly mentioned by other reviewers:

1. Harle's articulation - often non-existant; you'd think there wasn't a single non-legato phrase in any of the works featured.
2. Harle's musicianship - he has a distasteful habit of swelling long notes; he sounds like he's just going through the motions or, as another reviewer suggested, playing it the way his teacher did all those years ago. Also, he can't seem to play in a style other than what is appropriate for the Nyman ensemble (NOT appropriate for Debussy!).
3. The recording quality - horribly muddy; having done a masterclass with Mr. Harle I can tell you that his tone is quite brittle and strident so I suspect the engineers were doing their utmost to swathe his sound in lashings of artificial warmth.
4. The orchestra - unfortunately! I suspect Mr. Marriner and his orchestra weren't particularly enthused by the project because they lack...almost everything!

You get the idea...I won't bother with other areas of his playing, such as altissimo, correct notes, fast passages, intonation etc.

Having said all that, I don't wish to damn Mr. Harle entirely(Do you believe me?!). At least the disc brings two new works to the table (albeit not particularly inspiring ones, in my opinion). And I do quite like his work with Michael Nyman - The Draughtsman's Contract soundtrack, "Where the Bee Dances" etc.

There is one point where I may disagree with some other reviewers: alternate offerings. For an aspiring classical saxophonist, I would suggest listening to Claude Delangle and Arno Bornkamp (unfortunately, many of Arno's recordings are no longer available - they were on the Vanguard label, I believe).
Marcel Mule too, though the recordings are old and scratchy, and his playing sounds "of it's time"; he's a paragon of elegance. I always marvel at the classiness of his Ibert recordings.
I can't bring myself (and I apologize to all those who will recoil in horror at my disparaging of such a doyen of American players) to recommend Eugene Rousseau. I know he was a beloved teacher, mentor and inspiration to many - all wonderfully laudable qualities - but his recordings (I admit I've never heard a live performance) are just woeful! Personally, I wouldn't characterize his DG concerto disc as ghastly, as another reviewer did - it's the best Rousseau disc I've heard.

Anyway...
I have to agree with "Shooshie" in that saxophonists of real REAL quality seem to be quite rare and perhaps the reasons for that are as suggested in Shooshie's review. I don't know. Maybe young players need to not listen to all the mediocre recordings out there, or even the good ones (!) and listen instead to fine violinists, pianists, cellists etc. and model their approach to the saxophone on what they hear there. Maybe they shouldn't be focussing on good altissimo as the be-all-and-end-all of saxophone playing but instead allow that to come later after they can play the simplest phrase exquisitely.
Many reviewers on this site rave about certain other performers or discs that to me just don't cut it either - but hey, that's what personal taste and opinions are all about.

To reiterate: stick with Claude, Arno and Marcel...or not!

The sound quality of this CD is atrocious! It sounds as though the engineers used a single microphone plopped in the middle of the orchestra and placed Mr. Harle in the lobby. I cannot even comment on the skills of Mr. Harle as I could barely hear him.
Very disappointing. I recommend that you do not buy this CD.

I also purchased "Music for Saxophone and Orchestra" and found the sound quality to be far superior and the music very enjoyable.

This CD was an interesting attempt by John Harle to perform several works of high caliber. Unfortunately, he was not very successful. I was reading the sheet music while listening to the Glazunov concerto and was stunned at Harle's cuts of two important parts. One was a potion of the cadenza (come on, who in their right mind would dare to cut out any portion of ANY cadenza), and second was the cut of a portion near the end which leads to the all important "grand-finale". He didn't write the piece, Glazunov did. In addition, I did not like his articulations (his motto obviously being "when in doubt, slur") or his tone (being rather weak and uninterested). This is not a CD that I would recommend to many people. He should pay more attention to his tone and the music (and musicality) of the pieces, rather than solely his technique (which I will give him a hand for). Congrats to St. Martin-in-the-Fields for doing an excellent job (they were, in my humble opinion, the highlight of this cd)

I had high hopes for this CD, but indeed it does fall short. It offers a glimpse of what the saxophone can do as a solo instrument with orchestra, but the view is through a glass, darkly.

Unlike some other reviewers, I had no problems with the playing as such. However, I know little about the classical saxophone repertoire -- which is one of the reasons I wanted this CD in the first place!

The problem is the sound quality. Words like "muddy" describe it in part, but really the best explanation I can give is that it sounds like it was recorded in a huge tile bathroom. That kind of echo you get in an indoor swimming pool area, especially at a spa or thermal bath kind of a place with lots of tile on the walls. The impression I get is that I'm not hearing the music as much as I am hearing the room the music was recorded in.

A disappointing disc, which to me appeared quite promising from the playing. Too bad the sound didn't work out -- and even worse that these aren't going for very much used on Amazon Marketplace. I'll be looking to find a buyer for mine somewhere -- anywhere.

Poor sound quality, lousy musical interpretation, and other problems make this album a horrible set of saxophone concertos. Harle almost never uses vibrato, plays outlandish cadenzas, and even skips entire phrases he doesn't want to play on some occasions. The expressiveness in his playing is almost non-existant, not to mention some technical problems, too. For example, at the end of the Glazounov concerto, instead of playing low C - middle C - altissimo C quarter notes, Harle starts on a low C and plays a *very* sloppy, uneven scale ascension to the altissimo C. His playing is generally pisspoor and his overall performance subpar. Try listening to interpretations by Eugene Rousseau, Dale Underwood, Donald Sinta, or other saxophonists. Just stay away from John Harle. FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS GOOD IN THIS WORLD, DO NOT BUY ANYTHING BY JOHN HARLE!

Not a well recorded album. Murky sound throughout and a lack of sonic clarity. The sax and ensemble fight each other to emerge from te mix. Bad job of balancing by the engineer! The playing is OK, but not great. There are better saxophone with orchestra CDs out there.

I have to give credit to the Orchestra of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields. This is a fine presentation of some pieces that are often more demanding on the orchestra than the saxophonist. However, there are some key reasons why I would not recommend this recording to anyone. #1 Balance--the saxophone is quite often drowned out or difficult to hear over the orchestra. #2 When you can hear the saxophone, the excessively live acoustics mask what is a rather brittle and weak tone. #3 Musical cuts, particularly in the Glazounov aren't neccessary or effective. #4 Though John Harle is a skilled saxophonist, this recording comes nowhere near the caliber--both musically and technically--that is demanded of modern concert saxophonists. If you must have a saxophone recording to add to your collection, I would look elsewhere.

I just picked up the CD locally on a whim, expecting much improvement since the old days of Eugene Rousseau's ghastly Deutsche Grammophon LP. I was a little disappointed. Harle is obviously a fine player, but just not the caliber I was hoping for. One wants to hear the saxophone played by a James Galway, Itzhak Perlman, Rostropovitch, Rubinstein, etc., and enter the hall of the musical immortals. It sounds like they're still teaching it as a technical axe, and nobody has learned how to exploit the phrasing and expression of the musical masters, which could be so utterly owned by this instrument.

Until that day comes, Harle's entry is a good try, and at least keeps reminding us that the saxophone is still awaiting its 2nd coming since its first fabulous virtuoso: Marcel Mule, who also left much room for improvement, but was at least exciting to listen to. I can't say anything on this album is "exciting," and yet I know the music itself bears the capacity to be rendered on that level. Let's face it, saxophonists have a tradition of stubborn resistance to dropping the old naive phrasings of their teachers and starting fresh with a work, as if it's never been played before. That's what it will take. Good luck, you guys and girls.

I would characterize Harle's playing as "solid," and it's worth buying for that reason. I'm not familiar with all the sax recordings out there, so if the big one has arrived, forgive me, but meanwhile I would recommend this recording to sax students as a standard of technique, but learn your musicianship from the masters of other instruments; you won't find it on sax recordings that I know of.

Shooshie

Perhaps the highlight of this disk is the Ibert and its wonderful cadenza certainly highlights Harle's abilities adequately. However, his vibrato and tempi are uneven and he is never able to quite capture the polish of Mule. Some sixty years after the recordings were made, Marcel Mule's brilliance continues to remains unmatched.

First off, I should say that I have pretty atypical taste for saxophone, being a saxophonist myself. I happen to like an interesting tone, and usually vibrato pretty much impedes that. This may have something to do with the fact that I love the minimalist movement (though John Adams lovers can still be capable of loving Elliott Carter!) and really think that tone is what is most important in a work. I have to disagree with many reviewers, and say that this is an amazing performance, and the romantic, yet minimalist way in which he interprets these, not overdoing the cadenzas, and yet having a wonderfully playful way of doing things in the Debussy is impeccable. I have heard many recordings of these works, and this is by far my favorite. I have heard Arno Bornkamp, and I HATE his tone and, you guessed it, his overuse of vibrato. I have also heard the recordings with better saxophonists than Bornkamp such as Eugene Rousseau and Claude Delangle, the latter managing to mesmerize me with his tone enough to force me to forgive his vibrato use, and the former's sheer technical capacity is overwhelming. But still, this remains my cd of choice if I was ever asked what good tone is. But really, good tone is just plain what makes the music express itself best, and this is definitely that, as opposed to some guy trying to show off his Kenny G vibrato....