AVAILABILITY
www.calarecords.com
To the canonical Mozart
Concerto Cala have constructed an Anglo-Czech
core that works rather well. It’s true
that the Vaughan Williams Concerto has
received quite a deal of discographic
exposure over the last decade or so
but the Goossens hasn’t (though there’s
a coupling of the two on ASV with Ruth
Bolister and the Elgar Chamber Orchestra)
and despite the editing and advocacy
of the great Czech player Jiři
Tancibudek neither has the Martinů,
other than a smattering of discings
over the years. So a worthwhile project
then, played by the American oboist
Nancy Ambrose King with the Janáček
Philharmonic Orchestra under her compatriot,
conductor Jeremy Swerling. The
recording, appropriately, was made in
the orchestra’s home, Ostrava.
The Mozart is attractive
though not ideal. The oboe is rather
too prominent in the balance and some
orchestral detail is obscured and so
a slightly heavy-ish feeling is engendered
which probably doesn’t accurately reflect
the performance. Things improve with
the Goossens, a work of the utmost concision
and one full of rhapsodic arabesques.
Written for the composer’s brother Leon
it’s cast in a single movement and Eugene
cleverly embodied his brother’s virtuosic
– oboistically pyrotechnic – warm-up
exercises in the Concerto’s cadenza
(where the oboe is accompanied by an
exotic orchestral tam-tam). For all
its avowed rhapsody it’s a work of twelve
minutes in length and needs to be kept
tightly cornered. Tonally Nancy Ambrose
King is less reedy than Goossens in
his classic recording – with a rounder,
almost clarinet-like tone. In the orchestra
the clarinet and violin solos are much
more part of a flatter perspective in
Ostrava than they were in London when
they leapt with charismatic audacity
and immediacy from the grooves. However
this is a good performance, accomplished
and controlled, if less rhythmically
acute and certainly less romanticised
in profile than Goossens’ own.
Vaughan Williams’ Concerto
is well represented in the catalogue
but there’s always a place for another
recording of yet another work dedicated
to Leon Goossens, who premiered it in
Liverpool in 1944. King is decidedly
airier than the dedicatee, more obviously
innocent and freshly pastoral. Things
are rather light in the orchestral bases
and they are not as securely anchored
as perhaps they might be (Susskind certainly
tied them quite heavily in his Goossens
recording) but there’s a fine reflective
rallentando later in the first movement
– elastic, pensive and slow. The Minuet
and Musette second movement is quite
patrician and elegant; some might miss
the slyly pawky humour engendered by
the dedicatee though the mercurial finale
is fleet and fluent and explores earlier
themes with distinction.
Martinů’s
1955 Concerto was written whilst the
composer was staying in the south of
France and was premiered by Tancibudek
in Sydney the following year. For this
recording the cadenza that the soloist
sent to the composer (and which was
lost in transit) has been reinstated.
Martinů’s beloved continuo piano
makes an appearance here – well caught
in the recording, neither too prominent
nor too timidly recessed – and the orchestra
responds to the rhythmic flair of the
writing with practised understanding.
Even though there are no oboes in the
chamber orchestra the texture is still
aerated and light. The grave cellistic
orchestral tone of the second movement
leads on to the upsurge of the Julietta
Theme and a feeling of intense tranquillity,
a feeling only deepened by the burnish
of the almost-Brahmsian horn writing.
The oboe flutters meanwhile over the
haze of string writing and the piano’s
insinuating chording. The splendid finale
is full of boldness and drive, an animation
reflected in
the soloist’s eventful drive. As noted
before Nimbus put out a version with
John Anderson and there is Krejči
on Supraphon.
Otherwise this is an
attractive quartet of oboe concertos
in well-played performances. The acoustic
properties of the recording militate
against a very strong recommendation
and King is certainly not quite as alluring
or convincing an interpreter as Goossens.
The repertoire and performances are
however of serious interest to many
and more than welcome.
Jonathan Woolf
see also review
by Rob Barnett when this disc was
selected as one of the RECORDINGS OF
THE MONTH for March
Nancy Ambrose King (oboe)