MusicWeb Reviewer’s Log: July-September
2007
Reviewer: Patrick C Waller
Our summer holiday
this year took us to Canada. After visiting
Quebec and Nova Scotia we ended up in
Alberta and quite by chance were in
Banff during the triennial International
String Quartet Competition. Even
more fortunately, we were able to go
along on the penultimate night and heard
the quartets who were eventually placed
first and second, both playing late
Beethoven. The winner
was the TinAlley Quartet from Australia
who played Op.131. Second came the Zemlinsky
Quartet from the Czech Republic who
played Op.127. Both these groups were
magnificent and the judges must have
had a tough time choosing between them.
All the concerts
in this competition were streamed on
the internet by CBC and, at the time
of writing – more than three weeks later
– they were still accessible (concert
27 and concert
28 were the ones we heard).
My principal other
live music experience this summer was
a trip to the Proms for Kurt Masur’s
80th birthday celebration.
The orchestra was a combination of the
London Philharmonic and the French National
Orchestras, and the programme was Tchaikovsky’s
Serenade for Strings and Bruckner’s
seventh symphony. It was good to meet
up there with fellow Assistant Webmaster
David Barker who was over on holiday
from Newcastle, New South Wales. His
trip was beset by dreadful weather -
and they were affected by a cyclone
before they left - but at least
that couldn’t spoil the concert. Mind
you, I do remember being at the Albert
Hall about 15 years ago during a performance
of the Turangalîla symphony
when there was a big thunderstorm going
on and the roof leaked big time. I think
they have fixed it since. David and
I were both much more enthusiastic about
this concert than Jim
Pritchard who reviewed it for Seen
and Heard.
One of the discs I
have enjoyed most this summer contains
the music of a Scottish composer I had
never heard of until I read Colin Scott-Sutherland’s
review
– F.G. Scott. This disc
of 32 delightful songs is called Moonstruck
and they are splendidly performed
by Lisa Milne and Roderick Williams,
accompanied by Iain Burnside. This was
a Recording of the Month in May
and is on my short-list for one of the
discs of the year. Another disc to receive
this accolade in May was of the Hallé
Orchestra playing Debussy
under Mark Elder. Alongside La Mer
are twelve of the piano preludes recently
orchestrated by Colin Matthews. As John
Quinn said in his review, this disc
is an "out and out winner"
and it is good news that the other twelve
preludes are also being recorded.
I suspect most MusicWeb
reviewers are currently suffering from
an obsessional fixation on "Lyritas"
and I shall have to come clean and admit
that I have experienced some of the
symptoms. Top of the pile for me was
the set of George
Lloyd Symphonies (4, 5 and
8) conducted by Edward Downes. The affliction
tends to be much worse when you owned
the LPs and this version of the fourth
is one of the few LPs I still have tucked
away in the loft. Of course, the composer
subsequently recorded all these works
but Downes was by no means eclipsed
and these discs sound wonderful. Boult’s
Elgar
symphonies on Lyrita are not far behind
in my affections. Whilst I got to know
the second from this recording, I had
never heard this first before. In both
cases, Lyrita have been generous – the
Elgar is two-for-the price of one and
Lloyd three-for-the-price of two.
Not much time for reviewing
recently but I did get the easy task
of rounding up the DVDs of the complete
Barenboim
version of Wagner’s Ring
after Göran Forsling and Tony Haywood
had reviewed the individual issues.
This tremendous set is one of the biggest
bargains around at the moment and, with
Christmas looming, there could be no
better present for a Wagner lover. Another
Wagner bargain provided my first experience
of the Australian Eloquence label. Tim
Perry’s enthusiastic review
of an interesting compilation of mostly
orchestral music prompted me to take
the plunge and have some discs shipped
half way round the world. They were
so cheap (about £5-50 for two CDs) that
the shipping cost was almost as great
- but I need not have worried about
delays. Within an hour or so of ordering
from Buywell
I had a personally written e-mail back
confirming the order and the discs arrived
after about a week. As Tim says, there
is much that is splendid on the discs
although Wagner’s symphony written at
the age of 19 is basically a curiosity.
As usual, the value
offered by the Naxos catalogue has proved
irresistible. Discs I can recommend
giving a spin include Alla
Pavlova’s Symphonies Nos.
2 and 4, the symphonies of Wenzl
Pichl - an approximate contemporary
of Mozart - and the piano and organ
music of Alberto
Ginastera. Two other Naxos
discs not yet reviewed on MusicWeb are
the Piano Quintets of Martinů
(8.557861), and the Seventh and
Eight Quartets of Maxwell Davies
which were commissioned by the label
and are magnificently performed by the
Maggini Quartet (8.557399). As I mentioned
on the Bulletin Board recently, I got
a bit of a shock when I tried to access
the MaxOpus website which was dedicated
to his music and couldn’t find it. I
then came across an article
suggesting that the site has folded
in relation to suspected fraud. The
idea behind this website was good one
and I very much hope it can be resurrected.
Finally, I would like
to reflect a little on the boundaries
of musical criticism, prompted by legal
cases brought by composer Keith
Burstein who successfully sued
The Times for libel over an article
published in 1997 (see judgment)
but recently lost on appeal another
libel case against a critic who wrote
adversely about his controversial opera
Manifest Destiny. Notwithstanding
the details of these cases, it seems
obviously undesirable that musical criticism
should end in litigation. A critic
is surely entitled to say that a work
or performance - in their opinion -
is bad. On the other hand I do not think
they should say, unless there is very
clear justification, that a performer
or composer is incompetent. It is when
criticism gets personal that problems
arise – for example, the effect that
the Viennese critic Hanslick had on
Anton Bruckner was probably considerable.
In that regard, I wonder whether David
Hurwitz on Classics Today oversteps
the mark in relation to Sir Roger Norrington's
recording of Mahler’s
Resurrection symphony for Hänssler.
Incidentally this can be heard on the
Naxos Music Library. Having listened,
I don't think the vibrato-less performance
is great either but to call him a "quack"
etc. seems to me a bridge too far. But
I doubt that Mr Hurwitz will need to
worry about litigation, Sir Roger seems
far too sensible and his considerable
reputation will survive such unnecessary
comments. After all, if you don’t like
something, you don’t have to listen
to it.
Patrick C Waller
