The classical music business is supposed to be in dire straits. With the profusion of new releases, many featuring compositions that one never dared dream to hear, one can only wonder what things would be like if they were going well. The spring issue of the Schwann/Opus Catalog, which lists available classical music recordings, is larger than the Washington, D.C., phone book. From the current bounty, here is an interesting selection of new releases for your summer delectation.
Einojuhani Rautavaara
In my recent interview with Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara (Crisis, December 1998), I asked him if he was going to continue writing in the same kind of neo-Romantic idiom that produced the gorgeous Symphony No. 7, Angel of Light. The answer has arrived on a new Ondine compact disc that features his new choral and orchestral work, On the Last Frontier, along with his much earlier tone poem, Anadyomene (Adoration of Aphrodite, 1968) and the Flute Concerto (Dances with the Winds, 1975). Of Rautavaara’s Angel of Light, I said it could have been just as aptly named Hymn to the Sea. I may have been on to something. On the Last Frontier is a sea fantasy, based upon a fantastical text of Edgar Allen Poe about an ill-fated ship. Rautavaara encountered the text as a child and was haunted by it for six decades until he placed it in this wonderfully billowing, highly evocative and Romantic orchestral setting. Both beautiful and terrifying, the last frontier is on the edge of death. Rautavaara seems to be using Poe to invoke one of his dream experiences of angels. In this case, it is a mighty, sea-borne angel of death with “the perfect whiteness of snow.” Poe’s words could not have been set more magically. They grow out of the music and are carried along to an awesome climax at the end of a slowly building, inexorably growing crescendo, in which a “shrouded figure, far larger than any dweller among men,” is revealed. I know of no higher praise than to say that Rautavaara’s music marvelously captures the mystery of this stunning encounter. The other two compositions on this disc are also fascinating, especially Anadyomene, in which Rautavaara broke free of serialism, almost against his own will. He wrote, “this music wrenched itself free (and liberated me) from the serial straitjacket and quasi-scientific thinking toward organic music-making.” And that is just the way it sounds; here in more than nascent form, is Rautavaara’s future development as a Romantic. The performances by the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra and Finnish Philharmonic Choir, under Leif Segerstam, are everything one would wish them to be.
Edmund Rubbra
Conductor Richard Hickox and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales have magnificently concluded their integral recording of Edmund Rubbra’s eleven symphonies on a new Chandos compact disc, which contains two of his very best works, Symphonies Nos. 5 & 8, as well as the premiere recording of Ode to the Queen. Rubbra’s symphonies contain some of the most broodingly beautiful, ecstatic utterances in British music since Edward Elgar. I have always been partial to the Fifth Symphony. The third movement, marked grave, is one of Rubbra’s most rapt and deeply moving; it is hard to draw a breath during it. The Eighth Symphony, subtitled, Hornmage a Teilhard de Chardin, is a gloriously mysterious and optimistic work that heralds the triumph of the spirit. The entire Rubbra series on Chandos is indispensable, but if you have yet to begin the rhapsodic musical pilgrimage with Rubbra, this compact disc is a wonderful place to start. Both sound and performances are stellar.
Roy Harris
The recording of what is reputed to be the American symphony is finally available, after an inexcusable absence of some years, on a mid-priced Sony compact disc: Leonard Bernstein’s 1961 performance of Roy Harris’s Third Symphony, with the New York Philharmonic. In the ’80s, Bernstein recorded this work again, but with less grip than here. Harris’s Third was considered by many as an American musical declaration of independence. One need not see it in that way to appreciate its many merits. I was bowled over by the work in this performance more than 25 years ago. I still am. Another work appearing in the same release, David Diamond’s Fourth Symphony, is also a contender for the title of the American symphony. It is one of the most stirring, open-hearted, richly melodic symphonies this country has produced. (From where did Diamond conjure the magical opening?) Music like this was Bernstein’s metier, and his performance of the Fourth is marvelous, though the newer one by Gerald Schwartz on Delos is also excellent, with better sound. Rounding out the program is another American symphony, Randall Thompson’s Second Symphony. This very enjoyable work is not quite on the same plane as Harris’s and Diamond’s offerings. It occasionally flirts with the Ferde Grofe school of American musical pictoralism, but it is easy to surrender to its charms, especially the languid strumming of the strings in the gentle largo. The melodies are quintessentially American. Three classics, in brilliant performances from the late ’50s through the ’60s, make this disc a must for anyone interested in American music.
Ferdinand Ries
If there were a sequel to Beethoven—Beethoven: Part Two, or Son of Beethoven—it would be Ferdinand Ries (1784-1838). Ries is another virtually forgotten epigone of Beethoven. Ries’s father, Franz, had taught Beethoven in Bonn. So when young Ferdinand came to Vienna in 1801, he was well received by Beethoven, who taught him for the next few years. Ries also served as a sort of personal secretary to Beethoven until 1805, when Ries was summoned for military duty. In the March issue of Crisis, I reviewed a recording of two symphonies by Carl Czerny, another Beethoven students. Czerny’s symphonies were fascinating for their only partially successful assimilation of Beethoven’s influence. Ries was only too successful in learning from the Master. His fate calls to mind the old saying about a foreign correspondent: He goes to cover a country and the country covers him. Beethoven covered Ries. Beethoven even complained about it. He is reported to have said, “He imitates me too much.” This may have been a liability in Ries’s time, but today it is a fascinating attraction. Sequels are rarely as good as the originals, but Ries is very good, second-rate Beethoven. This is meant as a compliment. The two Ries works offered on a new CPO compact disc, Symphonies Nos. 3 and 5, played by the Zurich Chamber Orchestra under Howard Griffiths, are considerably better than the symphonies of Czerny, Spohr, Onslow, or Lachner to mention a few contemporaries who also had to struggle with Beethoven’s impact. The opening allegro of Symphony No. 5 virtually screams Beethoven at you, as does the following scherzo. Both of these high quality symphonies are great fun, especially in the invigorating performances by the Zurich forces. I hope CPO records all eight of Ries’s symphonies.
Christian Cannabich
Christian Cannabich (1731-1798) was renowned as the leader of the Mannheim Orchestra at the height of its fame in the last half of the 18th century. No one less than Mozart reported, in July 1778, that “Cannabich, who is the best director that I have ever seen, has the love and awe of those under him.” Cannabich was also a noted and prolific composer, producing more than 70 symphonies. Naxos has issued a budget compact disc featuring Symphonies Nos. 59, 63, 64, 67, & 68, alertly played by the Lukas Consort, under Viktor Lukas. Mozart was less kind when commenting on Cannabich’s music. He complained that the symphonies all began alike—in unison with long note values and large leaps. At the same time, he praised the elegant instrumentation. (Can one imagine a more hellish master class than one in which Mozart himself grades the compositions?) Compared with Haydn or Mozart, these symphonies will seem short-winded. Nonetheless, they are exhilarating works, full of wit and sparkle. It has been said that the bubbling vitality of opera buffo had an influence on Cannabich. I think that is right. In fact, what I hear is an uncanny premonition of Rossini in some of the presto movements. This is an immensely enjoyable recording.
Joseph Martin Kraus
Last summer, I raved over the budget Naxos release of Joseph Martin Kraus’s orchestral works. That compact disc (Naxos 8.553734) subsequently won the 1999 Cannes Classical Award for recordings of 18th-century orchestral music. Now, Naxos has released Volume 2. It contains four more Kraus symphonies, three of which are recording premieres, with the same excellent performers, the Swedish Chamber Orchestra under Petter Sundkvist. The music on this compact disc is less striking because three of the four works are products of Kraus’s extreme youth, the earliest of which is from the dawn of his teen years. They are far more conventional than his later efforts, but occasionally presage future greatness. They are nonetheless enjoyable. Naxos deserves great praise for this series, which will include all of Kraus’s great symphonies.
Luigi Cherubini
During his old age, after his operas had fallen out of favor, Luigi Cherubini (1760-1842) made one of the greatest musical comebacks in history by turning to liturgical composition. At the same time he was composing some of the most magnificent Masses of the first part of the 19th century, Cherubini was also amusing himself by writing string quartets. He produced six in all, the first in 1814, the rest after 1834, when he was 74. The last was written in 1837. The DG label once offered a beautiful set of the complete quartets played by the Melos Quartet. But in one of those marketing decisions fully understood only by the corporate “suits,” it was deleted. Now Hausmusik London, a period instrument quartet, comes to the rescue with lovely performances of Quartets Nos. 1 & 6, on the CPO label. One can only hope this is the start of a complete traversal by the excellent Hausmusik. The music is the quintessence of the Classical. The spirit of balance and order reigns. Cherubini seems to be looking back, not in a nostalgic way, but with reflective clarity, on a style of music that had disappeared by the time he wrote these pieces. The transparency of Cherubini’s contrapuntal writing is a joy to hear. This is civilized discourse of a high order.
 Liturgical Music
Of all the compact discs I receive for review, few come from parish musical groups, for which, generally speaking, I am grateful. The exception to the rule arrived from The Assumption Grotto Church Choir and Orchestra, in Detroit, Michigan. I was already aware of this church’s ambitious musical programs. Pastor and musical director Fr. Eduard Perrone offers his lucky parishioners the kind of liturgical musical treasures one usually has to travel to the Brompton Oratory in London to hear performed during a Mass. The main work on this Grotto Productions compact disc is the wonderful Mass for the 500th Anniversary of the Death ofJoan of Arc, composed by Paul Paray in 1931. What immediately impressive is that something this good could have been pulled off by a parish. The love for the music (Fr. Perrone personally knew Paray) and its liturgical use is evident in the fervor of this performance. It must have been an overwhelming experience for Fr. Perrone’s lucky parishioners. There are the normal glitches one would expect to hear in any live performance. The brass is occasionally unsteady, and, for some reason, the sound turns a bit harsh in the Sanctus, but one soon forgets these shortcomings. The next time you feel like smashing a guitar over the head of your parish music director, hand him this compact disc instead.