Adjunct
Music
Our page, "Music
Hath Charm," is devoted to recordings which you may find
of use in ritual. This page is devoted to the rich body
of music which has been composed under the inspiration of
Classical Hellas.
It is worth
noting that the birth of opera was an attempt to recreate
the tragedies and comedies of the Ancients. We routinely
use the term 'Classical Music' to refer to that music
which grew from the attempt to recapture the Classical
past.
It is also worth
noting that the attempt is not finished, nor ever likely
to be. So long as people are inspired by Classical
Hellas, there will be new 'Classical Music,' whatever the
musical idiom or language.
As with our
other page, we will number the reviews and add the newest
to the top of the list. If you want to purchase the
music, click on the underlined title and you will be
taken to Amazon. (Not everything we review may be
available, but we will try.)
*****
6: My music club
offered this recording of Gluck's "Alceste" at a bargain
price, so I got it, and I am not unhappy. Ann Sofie von
Otter is a marvelous singer, and the rest of the cast is
excellent as well. It purports to be the first recording
of the French version of the opera, and I am willing to
accept that. Later I discovered that there is a video of
this very production, but my budget does not allow for
much in the way of duplication these days, so... If you
want to see it, I will try and provide a link.
John Elliot
Gardner is a fine conductor, and his notes delineate the
difficulty of the task he faced in preparing this score.
One might think that an opera score need merely be
performed and interpreted, but that is not always the
case. French opera, in particular, seems subject to
endless fuzting about (thnk of how many versions there
are of "Tales of Hoffmann") and here the difficulty is
compounded by the composer himself. When he took his
Vienna success (in Italian) to Paris ten years after its
premier he did a rewrite, with the intention of making
the opera particular to the French public in a way that
it had been particular to the Viennese public. He made a
lot of changes, and, according to Gardner, his notation
and his instructions were fairly sloppy: he was the kind
of composer who expected to be working personally on the
project, and, like many modern musicians, he was not
thinking about people having to know his intentions long
after his death (though he was confident that the work
would continue to be performed a hundred years later, so
you would think he might have been more careful for
posterity's sake).
Berlioz admired
this score more than any other. Mozart grabbed pieces
from it for his "Don Giovanni," particularly the music of
the ghostly statue. (It was this music that George
Bernard Shaw judged the only music fit to be heard in
heaven; I wonder if Shaw had heard Gluck?) Yet Berlioz
thought the opera to be unendingly gloomy, and Gardner
makes all kinds of disparaging remarks in his notes; and
even goes so far as to side with Berlioz in changing an
imporant lyric, the most famous lyric in the opera, and
thereby alteriing the most famous aria in a way that
makes the opening barely recognizable.
Musicians are
the most wonderful species: also the most
arrogant.
Notwithstanding
all that, this is a wonderful opera and a wonderful
recording. The music is not unendingly gloomy, it has
great variety, there are wonderful musical effects and
orchestral color, and it is thoroughly pleasurable to
listen to. If the charccter of Herakles is scaled down to
plain nobility (in contrast to Euripides' orginal lout
overcome with shame at his inappropriate behavior) its
ok: he serves his dramatic function and, if we understand
the notes correctly, he wasn't there in
Vienna.
Gluck's major
innovation in this opera is his use of the chorus as an
important character in the drama, rather than just as a
commentator. (How Greek of him!) Gluck was deeply aware
of the feelings of the people as a community in this
story, and he insisted that they have their part in the
ending. This novel treatment of the chorus was later to
reach its ultimate expression in Moussorsky's "Boris
Godonov," where, it may be argued, the chorus (the people
of Russia) constitute the central character.
You can follow
this opera as drama or, unlike many operas, you can just
put it on to listen to while you are puttering around the
house or garden. Gluck's music is both beautiful and
flexible, and it is recommended.
Click
here for the CD of
Alceste
And
here is the DVD of
Alceste
5: The French
may have their faults, but one thing they do superbly
well is silliness; maybe they do it better than anybody.
They also manage a lush and indolent sound to their music
that is seldom surpassed.
When I was young
I first heard Jaques Ibert's beautiful "Escales" (Ports
of Call) and it has not yet been displaced as the top of
my list of pieces to listen to when I need to go
Somewhere Else, somewhere to float in a warm ocean and be
untroubled by the world in general.
Sadly, almost
nothing else by Ibert ever gets programmed. There is a
wonderful Concerto da Camera for Saxophone, and some
years ago an opera company in Berkeley performed his
charming opera "Angelique," but otherwise his exposure is
minimal.
You must
therefore imagine my delight in discovering a new
recording of his (very) short opera "Persee et Adromede"
(Perseus and Andromeda, or, The Happiest of the Three), a
work as silly, as charming, and as purely gorgeous as one
could ask for. Moreover, his treatment of his subject is
embarrassingly close to mine own treatment of subject in
my one act opera "The Dialogue of the Dragon:" though I
hasten to add that Ibert outstrips me by far!
The Twentieth
Century excelled in deconstructing things and
mythological subjects were high on the list. (Listen, for
instance, to Peggy Glanville-Hicks' treatment of the
Homeric material in her opera "Nausicaa.") In Ibert's
version of this story Perseus is a swaggering hero with
not a lot of concentration on his (easily replaceable)
beloved, and the monster set to guard our heroine on her
desert isle is in love with her. The stage directions
tell us that the heroine, Andromeda, is a naked redhead,
which may explain why we don't see it on stage in America
more often, but which should certainly recommend it for
video.
A very easy
piece to like, and beautifully recorded in 2002 with the
talents of Annick Massis at Andromeda, Philippe Rouillon
as Cathos, the Monster, and Yann Beuron as Perseus; with
a quickie appearance by Melanie Moussay as Themis. The
Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg under the baton of
Jan Latham-Koenig provides spacious and transparent
playing, absolutely necessary in Ibert, and the whole
thing is a delight.
In addtion to
the main item on the CD (which is only 40 minutes long:
say, it would fit perfectly on commercial television!)
there is also Ibert's symphonic interpretation of Oscar
Wilde's "Ballad of Reading Gaol," and a Sarabande from
his ballet of "Don Quixote." Both well worth hearing, and
both items that ought to be heard in concert and on
broadcast far more often.
Persee
Et Andromede
4: When I was
young (long ago...centuries ago...) great violinists were
old men. One expected the talent to take years in
development, and one did not look to the man with the
violin under his chin for anything but great music. All
that has changed. We now have great violinists who are
both male and female, who are young, and who are
attractive enough to make it as film stars or in
modeling. How the world has changed: for the
better!
A case in point
is Joshua Bell. I first took note of him when the radio
started playing the beautiful Suite from West Side Story
with Bell as soloist. The suite is arranged by
Bernstein's friend William David Brohn and it is a
refreshing change from that other tuneful showcase for
the violin, the Suite from Carmen.
I love Bernstein
in all his moods, and this Suite is a welcome addition to
the many ways that one can hear the music from West Side
Story; but it was Bell's incredible performance that
caused me to send off for the CD. He has all the
technique one could ask, but in addition he has the
sensitivity and poety of performance that usually comes
only after years.
Imagine my
delight to discover that the disc also contains a
brilliant violin arrangement of "Make Our Garden Grow,"
from Candide, arranged by John Corrigliano, a couple of
arrangments by Brohn of pieces from "On the Town," and,
the piece that gets it to this page, the "Serenade After
Plato's Symposium."
The Serenade is
cast in five sections and scored for solo violin,
strings, harp and percussion; but Bernstein makes the
orchestra sound much larger, and the overall effect is a
showcase for the violin and conductor, who in the case of
this fine recording is David Zinman.
Bernstein's
daughter writes in the notes that the music does not need
a reading of Plato for appreciation, and she right: but
if you are familiar with the Symposium I am sure you will
get more out of the music. If you are not familiar with
Bernstein beyond the shows and films, this is an
excellent way into the 'serious' composer's work, which I
hold to be some of the best the United States ever
produced.
And, should Bell
ever tire of music, he can slip right into the space
currently occupied by Tom Cruise.
Joshua
Bell ~ Bernstein - West Side...
3: Well into the
Nineteenth Century the name of Christoph Willibald Gluck
was held in similar esteem as those of Mozart and
Beethoven. Old European opera houses still have his bust
displayed alongside those other worthies, and he was held
in the highest regard by Berlioz and Wagner. Yet today a
performance of anything by Gluck is a rarity, and that is
a shame. His music is lovely and his concern with
Classical themes is possibly greater than that of any
other composer. The record catalgues show as high a
regard as did those other great composers, yet populalr
suppliers are not likely to have much by him
available.
For most of my
life I have been aware of Gluck as the composer of
"Orfeo," and not much else. But recently I purchased a
new recording of his "Iphigenie en Tauride," my initial
attraction clearly being a recent reading of the tragedy
(with a happy ending) by Euripides. This recording, on
the Telarc label is purported to be the premier recording
on period instruments, and I am willing to accept that,
considering how neglected Gluck usually is.
The performance
is just beautiful, under the direction of Martin Pearlman
and featuring the Boston Baroque. Christine Goerke sings
exquisitely as Iphigenie, as does Rodney Gilfrey (you
might want to catch him as Stanley Kowalski in the Previn
opera of "Streetcar Named Desire"). Vinson Cole produces
not only a tender and lustorus tone, as Pylade, but
conveys the love of the character who is not named as
Orestes eromenos but who clearly is; and it is clear that
Gluck understood it to be so. Stephen Salters is the
villanous Thoas, and by deftly throwing in some vocal
visciousness shows the characters darkness and
desperation.
From an Hellenic
point of view the problems of the piece are the very ones
we face today with every 'adaptation' that trundles down
the pike. The librettist just couldn't leave good enough
alone. He had to make changes in the light of popular
taste (which in Gluck's time was likely that of the
aristocracy patronizing the piece). And they are not
unreasonable changes, given the theater of Gluck's time;
but they do represent a totally different
dramaturgy.
Euripides moves
the play along at breakneck speed through a series of
speeches that reveal things and set the plot moving
toward its inevitable end. One harrowing act.
Gluck's audience
expected more than one act, an evening's entertainment:
the use of all the latest theatrical technology, and a
ballet as well. Oddly, though the Baroque period of music
nicely coincides with the Age of Reason, providing us
with all those very reasonable endings in Handel,
Nicolas-Francois Guillard (the librettist) throws out the
very reasonable ending that Euripides penned, with Thoas
submitting to the will of the more powerful Gods, and
replaces it with a highly unlikely rescue scene in which
Orestes returns with a Greek army (maybe a record for
fast, off-stage trips) and kills Thoas.
He also replaces
the epiphany of Athena with an epiphany of Diana (this is
in French, and our scholarly forebears equated Roman with
Greek whenever possible).
Despite the
departures from Euripides, the piece works, as it would
not have had a Baroque composer stuck to the original.
Moreover, there is great variety in the music as well as
great and simple beauty. In this context the Scythians
sound barbaric. And the beginning of Act IV features an
aria that is clearly a precurser to Mozart's 'agitated'
arias for the Queen of the Night and Donna Anna. The
finale also presages Mozart.
One can hear
clearly why Gluck was held in such high
esteem!
I liked this
well enough that I shall now be on a quest to get Gluck's
other Greek operas.
That will take
some selection, considering that there are 30 or 40
recording of Orfeo!
Gluck
- Iphigénie en Tauride / Goerke
·...
2: Darius
Milhaud was the only one of "Les Six" whom I had the
privilege of meeting (at a performance of his three level
ballet, "L'homme et son desire") and I have always been
bothered by the lack of performance of his works, a
highly varied body of marvelous and distinguished pieces
that are at once daring and assimilable. Thus I am
pleased to add to this list of adjunct pieces one of
those items which is, finally, available again and
on CD. It is, however a mixed blessing.
When first I
encountered "The Libation Bearers" of Aeschylus my
immediate reaction was to its basic musicality. All it
needs is the music to make it an opera. The wonderful
back and forth dialogue between Orestes and Elektra is
words-as-music at it is!
But Milhaud has
taken this work, and with the poet Paul Claudel, made it
shorter and more intense by ejecting half the characters
and most of the dialogue! It's barely 30 minutes
long.
Not the way I
would have approached it, but then, I am not French and I
am not rebelling against the conventions of
post-Wagnerian music at a time when there was no money
for production.
"Les Choephores"
is not an opera but a concert piece for soloists and
chorus. The focus is on ideas rather than drama, and the
center of the work is the idea of Justice, with a
particularly French slant. The music itself is
astonishing, moving from a driving freneticism at the
beginning into an even more remarkable frenzy of rhythmic
speech at the end. I guess you could think of it as early
Twentieth Century French Rap for soloists and chorus.
It's a cool piece, rhythmically wonderful and with great
textures. But it does leave the field still open for the
play to be set as an opera. Though Elektra and Orestes
are present, Clytemesta and Aegisthes never appear, and
the action therefore takes place even further offstage
than usual.
There is only
one recording, to the best of my knowledge, and it is in
mono; but the sound is remarkably good, having been
re-engineered digitally.
Albert Roussel
was generally the Bad Boy of French music, which
listening to his stuff today seems odd, for it is melodic
and rich in orchestral color; not the least bit shocking.
On the same recording as the Milhaud piece above one will
find the Second Suite from Roussel's ballet "Bacchus et
Ariane," music drawn from the second act where Bachus
(Dionysos) saves Ariane (Ariadne) from suicide and (in
this version of the story) makes her immortal with a
kiss. This not only shortens the stage time of the myth,
but leads into a fine and wild Bacchanal as a finale. It
would be nice to have the whole ballet, but this suite
comes with the Milhaud, and it is delightful
music.
The third item
on the CD is Honegger's 5th Symphony, a piece of
beautiful contruction, tragic substance and great
brevity.
Igor Markevich
is the conductor, and his performance explains why it is
worthwhile listening to older, mono recordings, when
there are newer ones available in stereo by less
brilliant and exciting artists.
Milhaud:
Les Choéphores, Honegger,...
1: Sir Granville
Bantock was, in his time, as important and as popular as
Sir Edward Elgar. Like Elgar he was subjected to a long
period of neglect after he died, which is odd, because at
the time of his death (1946) the Bantock Society was
founded by no less a luminary than Jean Sibelius. As the
Twentieth Century rusted to a close, interest in Elgar
once again blossomed; and now, as the Twenty-First
Century begins to flower, an interest in Bantock is also
blossoming.
Bantock's music
enfolds subject matter that is wide ranging, from Ancient
Egypt through the Bible, thorugh Shakespear through the
Celtic Twilight: but for our purposes, the most
interesting stuff is that inspired by Ancient Hellas: and
there is a good deal of it, some of it among his most
inspired composition.
His "Pagan
Symphony" is quite clear in its conception of what
'Pagan' means: He prefaces the work with a quote from
Horace, translated roughly as "Bacchus I have seen on
far-off rocks -- if posterity will believe me -- teaching
his songs divine to the listening Nymphs and to the
goat-footed Satyrs with their pointed ears." His note
continues: "The music may be described as a vision of the
past, when the Greek God Dionysos was worshipped as the
bestower of happiness and plenty, the lover of truth and
beauty, the victor over the powers of evil.
"Immortal
Aphrodite of the broidered throne appears for a brief
moment as the Goddess of Love, to remind the world of her
supreme power and glorius beauty."
The symphony is
cast in a single rapturous movement, but you will have no
trouble hearing Bantock's vision of Aphrodite or his
Dance of the Satyrs.
Bantock:
Pagan Symphony / Handley
His Third
Symphony is titled "The Cyprian Goddess," or 'Aphrodite
of Cyprus." Enough said! It is contained on the following
CD:
Bantock:
Variations; Dante and Beatrice
He composed as
well a setting of Songs of Sappho, and a lot of
incidental music for the Plays. The Sappho songs, and a
Sapphic Poem (played on this recording by Julian
Lloyd-Webber) are on the CD listed below. These three
items should be a good start as to seeing what you might
like. He is unabashedly English Romantic, perhaps
somewhere between Elgar and Vaughn-Williams, and very
easy on the ears.
Bantock:
Sappho; Sapphic Poem