Customer Reviews

Stravinsky: Le sacre du printemps; Fireworks; The Firebird Suite

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

 

 

On this recording, Ozawa masterfully conducts the jarring primitivism of the Rite of Spring, a ballet so feverish and violently lush it never fails to evoke enormous emotional responses from anybody I play it for. The Firebird is similarly excellent. The finale, in particular, is infused with every ounce of the raw beauty it deserves. The modulations in volume are handled particularly well, and the tempo seems dead-on. Though by no means the best recording of Stravinsky I've ever heard, this deserves a spot in the collection of any serious modern classical music fan.

Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps is one of the greatest artistic conceptions of the 20th century. The raw, primitive feel of the musical material is legendary itself, due in large part to its role in Disney's Fantasia, but in its staged version Le Sacre also managed to completely blow the popular perception of what a ballet was supposed to be. Audiences rioted at its 1913 premiere in Paris, disgusted by its overt eroticism, a similar reaction to that which had condemned Carmen to commercial failure four decades earlier. And similarly to Bizet's masterpiece, it took years for audiences to warm to its forward-looking, ultrarealistic elements, but once they did, its place in the pantheon was cemented permanently. To this day, it remains an unsurpassed landmark in the creative use of extreme dissonance, extended instrumental technique, and ever-shifting, never-settled, barless rhythmical patterns.

Ozawa's 1968 performance of Le Sacre with the CSO is fierce, crisp, and extremely clean. The brass players are emotionally wide-ranging and bold, the woodwinds are poignant and technically acute, and the strings compete with both remarkably well on all fronts. The brisk tempi seem not to pose much difficulty for the players, and the urgency of the conception is irresistible.

The Firebird is less of an icon than Le Sacre, but it too is a masterwork from the golden period of Stravinsky's life, when his creative instincts were in full harmony with his erudition and his works were as satisfying to the public at large as they were to professors and theoreticians. This performance is of the 1945 suite (which contains more of the original ballet's material than the 1919 suite), though with the Pantomime movement seemingly omitted. The lushness and warmth of Leinsdorf's very Romantic reading provides a nice counterpoint to Ozawa's ferocity in the first half of the disc. The BSO's strings lilt as well as they scythe, and the feeling of this very large orchestra fading to a whisper in unison, then rising out of it, is magical.

I simply cannot detect the faults that other reviewers of this CD have pointed out. This is a superb disc and represents a fine value.

Seiji Ozawa's Stravinsky LE SACRE DU PRINTEMPS is a very good recording. I give this 5 stars because it has a single minded purpose behind the driving rhythms, so prevalent in Stravinsky's pivotal and forever famous ballet score. Ozawa showed alot of promise in his early years, and this recording, from 1968 when he was just 33, was made 5 years before he became music director of the Boston Symphony, (1973) succeeding outgoing conductor William Steinberg.

RCA's 1968 analog sound is very good in LE SACRE, and equally as fine in FIREWORKS (Ozawa) and FIREBIRD Suite (Erich Leinsdorf/Boston Symphony).

Ozawa's tempos in SACRE are very fast, and some may prefer a more expansive approach to parts of the score. But I found it very enjoyable, and for variety have several other recordings of LE SACRE: Colin Davis/Concertgebouw (Philips), Karel Ancerl/Czech Philharmonic (Supraphon), Claudio Abbado/London Symphony (DG), Antal Dorati/Detroit Symphony (Decca). It's hard to name just ONE preferred recording for Stravinsky's SACRE since it is such a complex, colorful, fascinating work, but Ozawa's can hold company with the best. Recommended, and a bargain, too.

The account of the Rite by Ozawa and Chicago SO seems to divide opinion a little, but I have to say my sympathies lie with those who think this is one of the truly great versions of the work (despite the slightly misbalanced sound quality). While some might, rightly, be skeptical of some of Ozawa's later work, where the shadow of Karajan is oppressively audible, this account of the Rite dates from 1968, hence from his earlier and more urgently powerful (yet restrained) period.

And it is a scintillating, white-hot account we get, more loaded with primeval force and smoldering fire and energy, and, yes, shimmering beauty than possibly any alternative account I've heard - at times it is quite simply breath-taking. Indeed, this is an account that truly demands to be heard. And of course it isn't just Ozawa; it sounds like the CSO reaches a rare level of commitment; the playing is technically brilliant, of course, but with such a range of sonorities and colors that I have rarely heard the likes of it. The brief Fireworks might not be as successful - the virtuosity of the performers is not in doubt, but despite the marvelous glitter and radiance it seems a little less fully formed - or perhaps it just seems a little bit to light after this performance of the Rite. The sound is extremely vivid and powerful, but unfortunately not always perfectly balanced - sometimes the percussion is rather too dominating in the soundscape; still I really urge anyone to make their acquaintance with this one.

The coupling here is a performance of the Boston SO under Erich Leinsdorf of an extended suite from The Firebird, and - at least compared to Ozawa's Rite - it sounds a little lackluster and under-characterized. The performance is indeed finely shaped and paced and I think Leinsdorf is an effective advocate of the music in general. The problem lies rather with the sound quality which is a little dull and muddily resonant, blurring details and colors. Still, it is a version worth hearing, and given the Ozawa Rite, this disc (or some other issue of that interpretation) is really a must for any music lover.

This is the best Rite I've heard, and I don't think that anyone could do it better. The CSO performes with superb balance and power, the ensemble is perfect. Ozawa's interpretation is flawless, driving, raw and beautiful. Especially in the last movement, which is very hard to pull off, Ozawa and his orchestra perform it with savage brilliance, it pulls you in and makes you feel what the ensemble must have been experiencing when they performed.
THIS it what it's supposed to sound like, this recording is incredible.

This was one of the first Sacres that I listened to while reading from the score. This recording is great for music students, in my opinion, because of the great clarity and rythmic exactness that one has come to expect from the Chicago Symphony. Every line on the score can be virtually "seen" while listening to the music, especially in the winds. The great price and the clarity of the recording make it ideal if you want to really understand the orchestration and other technical aspects of this complex piece. However, I found that these merits can also be interpretive pitfalls. I suppose it depends on what kind of piece you expect from Stravinsky. Do you look at Le Sacre as an outgrowth from the impressionism of Debussy, or as a clean, pre-serialist piece? Judging by the orchestration, rythms, and thematic material, its exact place in music history is rather obscure (though no one would argue that it is not extremely powerful and important!). I suppose that is part of the magic of this piece that is lacking from this recording. I just can't seem to find the character in it that I find in other recordings. You want a monumental piece like this to be treated as such! The other Rite by the same conductor is really much better.

This was one of the first Sacres that I listened to while reading from the score. This recording is great for music students, in my opinion, because of the great clarity and rythmic exactness that one has come to expect from the Chicago Symphony. Every line on the score can be virtually "seen" while listening to the music, especially in the winds. The great price and the clarity of the recording make it ideal if you want to really understand the orchestration and other technical aspects of this complex piece. However, I found that these merits can also be interpretive pitfalls. I suppose it depends on what kind of piece you expect from Stravinsky. Do you look at Le Sacre as an outgrowth from the impressionism of Debussy, or as a clean, pre-serialist piece? Judging by the orchestration, rythms, and thematic material, its exact place in music history is rather obscure (though no one would argue that it is not extremely powerful and important!). I suppose that is part of the magic of this piece that is lacking from this recording. I just can't seem to find the character in it that I find in other recordings. You want a monumental piece like this to be treated as such! The other Rite by the same conductor is really much better.

A milky sun rising above a lush pre-cambrian landscape where out-sized dragonflies flit and strange trees, the gigantic cousins of horsetails, creek and quake in the simmering ooze - to the accompaniment of a lone flute whose simple pallette of notes meander in melancholy, and soon fade Fasten your seat belts! This is only the beginning of a joy ride soon to erupt into muscular spasms of primal energy. You may recognize the scene described above if you saw Disney's Fantasia. Of

course, the locale of Stravinsky's ballet is dated, in geologic time, quite a bit later, when humans roamed the prehistoric forests and planes shared by beasts more primitive than themselves. A time when thunder must have been the clearest speech of the Gods and the spoken word resonated in the cosmos, magically invoking the referent itself. I've seen grainy black-and-white silent film clips of the ballet, shot sometime in the 1920s, the dancers arrayed in styalized skins and antler head gear, gesticulating wildly, lumbering across the stage with raised vessels of fire and slumped specimens of human sacrifice. You can't help thinking: what an ambitious project this ballet must have been! Stravinsky's work is definitely "advanced music appreciation" if your ear won't tolerate anything but 4 beats to the measure, but give him the benefit of the doubt - the effort will be well worth it. Be ready for stretches of disconcerting dissonance, several tempos playing against each other at one time, ponderous doldrums rent suddenly by shrill brass. After an hour with Stravinsky you get the feeling that there aren't many notes, chords or tempos left in the musical vocabulary for other composers to use - Stravinsky said it all.

This recording just doesn't do it for me. Stravinsky's Rite of Spring is such an emotional ride because of it's strong rhythmic qualities. The first time you hear it done right, you feel wrong. It's freakishly piercing at a primal level, which would explain why its the most famous piece of Primitivism. Those qualities are dumbed down to a measure that makes the piece seem more annoying than involving. This recording gets its 2 stars instead of what would be one because I cannot be too hard on the Firebird Suite, as this is the first I've heard it.

This recording just doesn't do it for me. Stravinsky's Rite of Spring is such an emotional ride because of it's strong rhythmic qualities. The first time you hear it done right, you feel wrong. It's freakishly piercing at a primal level, which would explain why its the most famous piece of Primitivism. Those qualities are dumbed down to a measure that makes the piece seem more annoying than involving. This recording gets its 2 stars instead of what would be one because I cannot be too hard on the Firebird Suite, as this is the first I've heard it.