Customer Reviews

Stravinsky: The Rake's Progress ~ Bostridge · York · Terfel · von Otter · Howells · LSO · Gardiner

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This recording receives an interesting criticism. One of the heresies of the early music / authentic performance practice crowd is that these guys take the score reading TOO LITERALLY. Now, with this recording Gardiner takes it on the chin because some of the notes are not exactly what Stravinsky wrote.

Well, I know the score, too. And I am a Stravinsky nut. But I also love to be convinced musically and this performance is full of energy, life, and singing that seems to delight in the music and the music making. The orchestra plays like they are having FUN. One example is Tom's early aria when he sings "The world is so wide" The orchestra plays a descending run purely and cleanly yet we can hear the neighing of horses. Then Tom sings, " Come,wishes be horses; This beggar shall ride!" Great stuff!

If you want to learn to love opera and are an english speaker you can really go a long way with this wonderful opera and this wonderful recording. Don't worry about those who take severe stances on this or that point. That is purity as a vice. The point is the music and the music has a lot to do with the notes, but not EVERYTHING to do with the notes. But, by the way, they hit nearly all of them and the times they make alternative choices they aren't making mistakes, they are making choices. And the funny thing is, we know Stravinsky wanted his music performed exactly the way he wrote it, but this piece is modelled on eighteenth century opera where they would expect to make choices and the music as "necessary". Well, what does that mean for this piece? But this is too arcane an argument.

The fact is the music is a treasure and this performance is a delight.

I must confess that this is a revised review. I originally had a negative impression of this recording of The Rake's Progress because it seemed flimsy compared to the composer's own recording on Sony, with a wimpy, callow Rake (Ian Bostridge) and a technically under-equipped Anne (Deborah York). But I overlooked some absolute positives: Terfel's definitive Nick Shadow, which really has no competition on disc for charisma and imagination, Gardiner's ultra-clear conducting of detail, which again has no equal and is greatly aided by DG's completely transparent recording. In the end these virtues win out, and even though I like every ohter Anne on disc (Judith Rankin, Dawn Upshaw, and Sylvia McNair come to mind) better than York, she isn't enough of a reason to demote this performance. It's still rather cool and lightweight -- Gardiner keeps his eye on neoclassical precision at the cost of emotional depth -- but that's a perfeclty valid way to interpret Stravinsky's pastiche of 18th-century style.

Even for the most devoted Stravinsky fans his chief opera THE RAKE'S PROGRESS is too infrequently performed to satisfy the need for familiarity. Happily there are now recorded performances, both on CD and DVD, that assure that this glimmering little masterpiece will remain a staple of the opera repertoire. Having just absorbed a thoroughly engaging (if visually bizarre) production with the San Francisco Opera under the gifted baton of Donald Runnicles, the appetite is whetted enough to listen to the magic at home. And this recording is a strong one as conducted by John Eliot Gardner with the London Symphony Orchestra.

One of the reasons this recording maintains its high standing among aficionados is the diction by the entire cast: WH Auden's libretto is clearly one of the true treasures in the operatic literature and the singers here allow us to understand even those passages where lines overlap. Ian Bostridge carries his sensitively nuanced approach to lieder to the role of Tom Rakewell and his tone is rich and full and his approach makes a credible Rakewell. Bryn Terfel is probably the finest Nick Shadow on the stage today, delivering his wily role with superb singing and flawless diction. Deborah York's very clean and crisp vocal technique is well suited to the constancy of Anne Truelove. The rest of the cast is equally well equipped for their strange roles, but in the end the kudos go to Gardiner and his fine crafting of the both the orchestra and chorus, coaxing an ebullient neoclassical sound from the colorful Stravinsky score. It is a pleasure from beginning to end. Grady Harp, December 07

I've just finished listening to this wonderful recording and I can't recommend it too highly. Bostridge, Terfel, von Otter, York are all splendid, and Gardiner keeps things moving smartly along, while easing up when called for in those moments of pathos, especially the scene in Bedlam. Sound is great. Monteverdi Choir is terrific in the crowd scenes. This recording bids fare to replace Stravinsky's own stereo edition as the best of this work.

The Rake's Progress has always been an extremely difficult opera to record. Somehow the voices never seem to match one another - either they are "chamber" voices superb for the intimate moments but not up to the grand operatic phrases or vice versa. The same kinds of voice never seem to appear on the same recordings at the same time.

And so it is here. Ian Bostridge, flavour of the month in the UK and beyond, brings admirable youthfulness and clarity to Tom, giving eloquent verbal point in recitative and aria. His voice sits well with Stravinsky's neoclassical lines, but is a size too small to fill them out really satisfyingly. Nowhere is this more apparent than when he sings with Bryn Terfel's Shadow, who dominates the recording with his glorious bass-baritone. Yet, whilst he can coo, yodel, bellow and whisper with the best of them, his performance does seem to lack subtlety; perhaps, with such a fabulous instrument and glorious diction, less would be more.

As far as the women are concerned, Deborah York has a small but perfectly formed soprano, technically assured, and sounds convincingly young and naive as Ann. However, she too is taxed later in the opera and whilst her big scene - "No word from Tom" - goes well, in the second and third acts she seems at a loss to bring much by way of dynamic variation and character, and Anne subsequenbtly disappears into the background rather than being a real moral force. Perhaps the most successful individual performance is the unlikeliest on paper: Anne Sofie von Otter as Baba is just perfect, playing the character dead straight and making her - of course - much funnier by so doing.

The supporting cast is terrific (Peter Bronder's Sellem deserves special mention), but the real glory of the set is the orchestral playing: John Eliot Gardiner brings all his classical expertise and more to a performance which is crisp, spirited and superbly paced. The London Voices provide a fine chorus, and the whole is very well recorded. Idiosyncracies of the casting aside, it is a set worth having.

For the uninitiated Stravinsky people, THIS is the recording to listen to, if you want to hear his operatic writing at its best. I don't give out the 5 stars normally (4 is the highest I usually give), but there are parts in this opera that continually give me chills when I hear it: Deborah York, floating stratospheric notes in "No Word from Tom" and anytime Anne Sophie von Otter singing in Baba's low-register. The rest of Gardiner's all-star cast shines: Terfel as Nick Shadow and Ian Bostridge as Tom (not since Peter Pears has a tenor made English resound so well). The sound Gardiner gets from the orchestra is crisp and clean, you can actually 'hear' the rests in the score (if you know what I mean). In general I'm not a vocal/operatic fan, but I do own several of Stravinsky's Rakes (new Craft recording, Nagano w/ Upshaw and old Columbia/Stravinsky one) and this one outshines them all.

THE RAKE'S PROGRESS is not only one of my favorite operas, but one of my favorite works of music. This may seem strange, as Stravinsky's neoclassical operatic morality fable is considered by many to be a cold, cerebral work. But quite on the contrary, THE RAKE is a jewel-like score full of lyricism (often of a Broadway-like accessibility), warmth, razor-sharp wit, and crystalline beauty - all of which John Eliot Gardiner and his forces bring out marvelously in this recording. Listen to the exquisite trio in Act II Scene 2 - perhaps the most beautiful number in the opera - and you'll see what I mean. Ian Bostridge's sensitively sung Tom Rakewell has just the right vocal personality - boyish, innocent, eager, and vulnerable. His and Deborah York's pure-toned voices are an extraordinary match: hear them blend seamlessly in their duets or the trio. Bryn Terfel's vivid, boisterous Nick Shadow and Anne-Sophie Von Otter's subtly witty Baba complete the cast. Conductor Gardiner uses his expertise in early music to emphasize THE RAKE's 18th-century roots and "chamber" texture. THE RAKE falls into the class of what I might call private favorites - works that are not universally "popular" but hold an extraordinary attraction for me personally. Both the Auden/Kallman libretto and Stravinsky's music are endlessly fascinating, and this CD has become the perfect means for me to enjoy them.

If you are looking for a more or less ideal account of this most elegant of 20th century operas then you will find one here. If not, may I suggest that you ought to be, because otherwise you are missing out sadly.

Stravinsky himself emphasised that an overly literal enactment of this libretto should be avoided, its real point being its moral. It represents his second go at a slightly lightened version of the Faust/Mephistopheles legend, the first having been The Soldier's Tale, so his instruction hardly needed even that much emphasis. Even Berlioz withholds the really frightening character of Mephistopheles until near the end, and Stravinsky and Auden leave Nick Shadow's full unveiling until after he has let Tom Rakewell escape his ensnarement, so that we end up feeling almost sorrier for Nick than for Tom. Tom's story certainly points up the moral that the devil finds work for idle hands, but the poor old junior devil who has failed in his assignment is now going to have to face Our Father Below. It all leaves the production with the issue of how to handle nearly 3 acts before we come to the real point of it all, and my vote goes emphatically to the way Gardiner and his team of celebs go about it.

If the work is new to you, may I earnestly recommend reading the libretto carefully before you play the music. The libretto is by WH Auden and also by Chester Kallman, about whom the liner note is silent although it has a great deal to say about the cordial interaction between the composer and Auden. If you don't think much of the libretto as `writing' or as `literature' neither do I, but that is to miss the point. Great poetry and great writing just do not go very well to music in most cases, and what Auden has done is to turn out a not-overdone pastiche of the 18th century idiom, the sort of thing that the Rev Morell turned out so expertly for several of Handel's oratorios. In fact the best versifying probably comes (intermittently) in the last act when Auden changes from the 18th century manner to the rhyme-scheme of The Ancient Mariner; and I wonder whether this is a deliberate allusion to that great epic of spiritual disgrace and subsequent redemption.

This whole dramatisation of Hogarth is treated by poet and composer as picturesque and stylised, but as no more than a good yarn, building up the evidence until Nick's final judgment when he inexplicably fumbles that and spares our emotions. Bostridge is lightweight, Deborah York as Anne is lightweight, the formidable von Otter who has bowled me over before now in Schumann Respighi and Chaminade goes lightweight as the bearded bride, the other male parts are neither here nor there - they are all lightweight except for Nick, and Bryn Terfel holds everything in reserve until his own final undoing, when we realise what he had led Tom into, only Tom has got off more easily than he might have done. Terfel is simply terrific at this moment, and I can only hope that from his own Elysium the composer feels that his exhortation regarding the point of it all has been properly followed. Do you agree with the liner note writer that this opera is dominated by the title role? The view makes no sense to me, and it would have been the wrong sense if it had done. Bostridge is a great artist, and he knows better than to try to make Tom any kind of equal contender with Terfel's Nick.

Auden's book keeps its eye on being what it ought to be, namely a good opera libretto. In my own opinion it is a superb libretto, pacing the action magnificently and delineating the characters with the kind of clarity that fits Stravinsky's musical idiom like a glove. From the conductor's point of view this may make it all as easy and natural as it is made to sound, but I wouldn't put any money on that. This musical direction is the art that conceals art, and in this most Mozartian of modern music dramas that is exactly what we want.

The recording (1997) is absolutely excellent in my own opinion. Joseph Kerman's liner note is bitty and piecey, requiring more concentration from the reader than it rewards. There are resumes of the principal artists, and I can think of no reason why we could not have had similar short sketches of all of them. I love this composer, and I love this opera, and this is my own idea of how to do it. It even ends with a vaudeville in which the singers step out of costume and remind us of the moral of the tale, as in Verdi's Falstaff. I don't really know why Stravinsky was so worried that this might be underplayed, but I like the company he keeps.

The music of Stravinsky's wonderful opera THE RAKE'S PROGRESS is a surreal juxtaposition. While it is unmistakably 20th-century, it also hearkens back to 18th-century opera. But the 18th-century references and motifs are often presented in a distorted, ironic light, as if viewed through an acerbic modern lens. In this recording, John Eliot Gardiner conducts the score little differently than he would conduct Handel or Mozart. He draws crisp, clean playing from the orchestra, with livlier tempos, classical-style phrasing, and the lean, spare sound that we associate with "period" performance. The result is that the music sounds both classical and bitingly modern - the perfect combination for this quintessential work of Neoclassicism. I will not elaborate on the soloists, who are all excellent and stylistically match the orchestral playing. This is an essential version of this Stravinsky masterpiece to own.

I have never been a fan of opera in English. However, I am a fan of Stravinsky and my favorite operas are those by Mozart. After hearing that Stravinsky used Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte, Le nozze di Figaro, and Die Zauberflote (four of my favorite operas) as inspiration, I couldn't resist.

The Rake's Progress is very "Mozartean", and the influences of Don Giovanni and Cosi fan tutte are plain as day. The score is light, fun, and beautifully played, sung and conducted. I have all the other available recordings of The Rake and this is hands down the best one. It's so vibrant and wonderful. The casting is exceptionally.

If you want a great recording of a great English language opera, snatch it up!