Customer Reviews

Stravinsky: Violin Concerto / Rochberg: Violin Concerto / Stern / Previn

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
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1 star:		(0)

 

 

It's hard to think of the Stravinksy Concerto as a 'concerto' in the classic sense. It's several short movements and really does not exhibit the usual virtruosic displays one would normally expect. This is a very lyrical reading - well perhaps it should be because Perlman and Mutter also play this with similar affection.

The previous reviewer has remarked that the recording was done in mono in 1951. Actually, that's a typo and it should have read 1961. And it is in very much stereo. I even had the original lp to double-check with!

Enjoy!

This time around I have misgivings about the rationale of Sony's couplings in their great Isaac Stern collection. The Stravinsky (recorded in 1961, not 1951 as the booklet mistakenly has it) will be a well-known quantity for anyone interested in the composer, or just in 20th Century violin Concertos, and these are likely to have it already in Sony's mammoth, 22 CD Stravinsky collection (Igor Stravinsky: The Recorded Legacy), or only individually, paired much more coherently with Stravinsky's Concerto and Capriccio for Piano and orchestra (Stravinsky: Concertos). It is, indeed, a great recording, equalled maybe but surpassed never, still sounding stupendous today with a clarity and vividness of orchestral details and instrumental dialogues. See my review of the individual disc for more details.

Still, not only was Sony's pairing here obviously going to entail duplication for the collector, but Stravinsky's 1931 Concerto is stylistically much at odds with George Rochberg's 1976 realization. Stern famously made four significant recordings (significant works for their composers, and even more because it was Stern) of "really" contemporary music (although none was actually anything close to "avant-garde"): Dutilleux, Penderecki, Maxwell Davies and this Rochberg (hope I forget nothing). The Dutilleux was originally paired with the Maxwell Davies, and that's fine; as I write, that disc still can be found for incredibly cheap: Henri Dutilleux: L'Arbe des Songes (Concerto for Violin & Orchestra) / Sir Peter Maxwell Davies: Concerto for Violin & Orchestra - Isaac Stern. It would have been much more clever of Sony, coherent and satisfying for the collector, to pair Rochberg with Penderecki then; but no, they've mated Penderecki and Hindemith (Hindemith, Penderecki: Violin Concertos), Barber and Maxwell Davies (A Life in Music, Volume 13: Isaac Stern) and Dutilleux and Bernstein's Serenade (oh yes, I forgot Bernstein's serenade among Stern's forays in contemporary music, Isaac Stern: A Life in Music Vol. 15 - Bernstein: Serenade; Dutilleux: Violin Concerto "L'Arbre des Songes). I guess someone at Sony loves jarring contrasts, or thought that Barber would sell Maxwell Davies, Hindemith Penderecki and Bernstein Dutilleux. But wouldn't it have been great and so much more coherent to have Barber, Hindemith and Stravinsky together.

OK, well, so I'm not the artistic director of Sony Classical. In a way, George Rochberg's main claim to fame is his highly vocal rejection of serialism after an initial embrace. It's like the former communists who reneged and fled communism: reactionaries love them, and vaunt their choice as a vindication of their own reactionary stance. I personally don't care that Rochberg was a once-serialist or that he rejected it. There is good serial music (sure there is!) and there's good 20th Century tonal music (sure there is!) - and there's loads of bad music in both genres. So all that counts is: is Rochberg's Violin Concerto good music?

Although the liner notes quote Rochberg as describing his concerto as "elegiac... even romantic in spirit", those not familiar with the composer - pre- or post- rejection - should not delude themselves: this is no easy, gentle, romantic music in the manner of Barber's Concerto. In fact, it is not very "elegiac" or "romantic in spirit". Rochberg rejected serialism because he tought it didn't allow for enough expressivity. His concerto is angular, vehement, anguished; just try the beginning, it pretty much sets the tone for the rest: angrily explosive orchestra and raucous double and triple stops from the violin. This is easy stuff for anyone seasoned in contemporary music, but not for those who believe that music has ended with Barber, Walton and David Diamond. Sure, there is the occasional, brooding and romantic melody (like at 1:08 in the first movement), and big Barber-esque climaxes in the third movement; but many of those melodies are still pretty angular and anguished in mood.

The Concerto's architecture is slightly unusual in that it is couched in five movements, whose titles (Introduction/Intermezzo A, Fantasia, Intermezzo B, Epilogue) don't let you anticipate the character of the music: but it is a fairly traditional sequence of mostly allegro, scherzo, adagio, varied, and allegro-to-adagio finale. The second Intermezzo is the most exended movement in duration (13:45) and varied in moods and tempos. The second movement and parts of the 4th sound like a grimmer Prokofiev Violin Concerto, other parts of the 4th movement sound like a grimmer Bartok VC (and the melodic contour of the cadenza there - recurring at various points in the movement - strikingly recalls the opening arpeggio of Bartok's own first movement cadenza; at 7:35 in the same movement I thought I recognized a quote from Berg's Violin Concerto), and the cadenzas sound like Bartok's Solo violin sonata - or like Rochberg's own Caprices. All movements have extended cadenzas.

Rochberg does say that the past lives in you, "indelebly printed on our central nervous system", and has used in some of his compositions various collages or quotations, so the use of them here (if that is what they are) wouldn't be surprising, although I don't find that they add much, other than point a little too conspicuously to the composer's models and sources of inspirations. But my main problem with Rochberg's Concerto is that it doesn't sound very distinctive. I've heard and reviewed recently a number of Violin (or Viola) Concertos by American or British composers written in the second half of the 20th Century (that is indeed what brought me to this one; see my reviews of American Concertos and Rawsthorne: Violin Concertos Nos. 1 & 2; Improvisations on a Theme of Constant Lambert; Divertimento), and Rochberg's doesn't stand out in the least; it is written in the same kind of anonymous, moderately modern (not backward-looking tonal-romantic, not avant-garde), expressionist and anguished language. Some details may catch the ear, but the overall impression is rather grayish, and doesn't stick in memory.

There's something strange about the liner notes: they start describing the concerto - and stop abruptly after the second movement, jumping to the conclusive information about the work's circumstances of commission and premiere, as if the original LP liner notes (which I do not have to check) had been cut for the CD publication.

Volume 12 of the "Isaac Stern: A Life in Music" series focuses on two 20th Century Violin Concertos -- those of Igor Stravinsky and George Rochberg. As with other titles in this series, in particular the Barber/Maxwell Davies and Bernstein/Dutilleux (see my reviews), Sony has chosen to couple a brilliant vintage recording of an acknowledged masterpiece, with a more recent performance of a far lesser known work. This account of the Stravinsky VC, with the composer conducting the Columbia Symphony Orchestra from 1961, is one of the best renditions ever committed to disc. And then there's the Rochberg VC. Written in 1975, and recorded here in 1977 with Andre Previn and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, it is an enjoyable work, but definitely not essential. The music is challenging and demanding, surely to play but certainly to listen to. Considering these are the criticisms that are often (yet without warrant in my opinion) directed at the Stravinsky, most will probably not enjoy the Rochberg. However, if you are a fan of Isaac Stern's magical virtuosity, then you should pick up this CD before it goes out of print.

The Stravinsky concerto is great example of the composer's so called neo-classical style, and this recording is especially interesting in that the grand old man, Stravinskt himself is at the helm and the wonderful Isaac Stern is playing in full, warm tone.

But what I like even more is the Rochberg concerto. George Rochberg is a composer to which I know almost nothing about, but this is a very interesting work. It is unorthodox in that it is in five movements. It has the grandness of Beethoven and Brahms, the muscularity of Prokofiev and some moments of ultra-modernism that sound close to Berg. Not with standing, the concerto manages to remain as a coherenty and related whole.

No doubt, this is challenging music. In the Stravinsky, do not expect to hear those savage, exotic Russian colors that sound like "Rite of Spring". Do not expect to hear your usual fast-slow-fast concerto model in the Rochberg, and in neither case, will you experience those lush or exquisite melodies and harmonies that you may have heard in the Tchakovsky, Bruch, Mendelssohn or Mozart concertos.

This is modern music that may sound rather dissonent at first. With repeated hearings, however, one may discover some powerful and passionate moments, especially in Rochberg's excellent concerto which has become one of my favorites.