Jonathan Woolf was
surprised to see how long it had taken
Volume
1 of this ongoing series to appear,
and the sessions recorded in volume
2 were made even earlier, if only
by a couple of months. The time is
now right apparently, and while I
haven’t always been bowled over by
Hyperion’s Martinů
releases in the past, Christopher
Hogwood’s pedigree in his work with
the Czech Philharmonic on Supraphon
bodes well for this series.
The Concerto da
camera was
written as Martinů was finding
his feet after escaping occupied France
to settle in the USA. The first movement
is full of that typical Martinů
rhythmic drive, also having a nervy
edginess to it which, despite the
lyrical nature of much of the music,
to my mind pervades the whole like
a restless undercurrent. The second
movement attempts that overlapping
and layering build-up which appears
to such electrifying effect in the
Double Concerto,
but here adding up to less than the
sum of its parts, possibly indicating
Martinů’s powers at less than
100% still, in his new environment.
There is much powerful music
in the rest of this Adagio however,
with poignantly expressive, yearning
outpourings which could come from
no other composer: I still love it
to bits. Dancing syncopations characterise
the third movement, and its full impact
is brought across by Bohuslav Matoušek
and the Czech Philharmonic, with Karel
Košárek’s piano highly present
in the mix, without taking over at
climaxes. My comparison recording
of this piece is from the Amati label,
with Lydia Dubrovskaya as violin soloist
with the Sudwestdeutsches Kammerorchester
conducted by Vladislav Czarnecki.
This alternative is very respectable,
but the more intimate scale of the
chamber music forces coupled with
a smaller and rather muddy acoustic
is always going to have to struggle
against a full symphonic orchestra
in their home concert hall of the
Rudolfinum in Prague.
The Concerto for
violin, piano and orchestra has
the same instrumentation as the Concerto
da camera, but has an entirely
different feel right from the start.
The piano receives far more equal
billing in the score in relation to
the violin, and the music of the first
movement Poco allegro, has
an almost neo-classical, fresh and
open feel. Martinů
felt his work best described in terms
of light, and the results here are
radiant both in concept and execution.
There is that tug of home which Martinů
must have felt, exiled from Czechoslovakia
by the communist takeover, and the
sense of ‘woods and fields’ which
has its relationship with Smetana
and others can be smelt wafting from
the other side of the Atlantic.
The tonal directness of the opening
movement is dispersed by more questioning
progressions in opening of the central
Adagio, and the subsequent
more folk-like harmonic gestures looking
forward in a way to Copland’s famous
contributions to the orchestral repertoire.
Not content with solely wallowing
in this slow bath of mood music, Martinů
bumps up the rhythmic tension before
resolving into a rhapsodic melody
for the violin. The final Allegro
is a powerful movement, driving
forward on a rhythmic or sonic ‘perpetuum
mobile’, nonetheless filled with contrast
and surprise. The piano is given a
short cadenza after an orchestral
full stop, and the whole thing builds
to a climactic coda which ends in
the optimistic whiteness of C major.
The Czech Rhapsody
was originally written for violin
and piano, and appears here in the
now equally if not
better known orchestration by Jiří
Teml. It was the composer’s original
intention to orchestrate the piece,
and Teml used the gorgeous and contemporaneous
Rhapsody Concerto as
a point of reference. This piece is
not of course to be confused with
the work
from 1918 of the same name, which
is for baritone, mixed chorus and
orchestra. Working in this form so
many years on gave Martinů more
than a few compositional problems,
and the virtuoso violin part is certainly
a challenge for any player. Despite
appearing at the end of the
horrors of WWII, this work is full
of joy and springy rhythmic leaps
and bounds.
These recordings
are superbly engineered, and while
the remarks about forward balance
for the soloists with volume 1 of
this series might apply to the violin,
the piano is perfectly placed – mixing
like a continuo part where required,
and supporting rhythmically or rising
up as soloist to full effect. All
concerned can be congratulated on
an excellent production and a superb
programme, and this release comes
highly recommended to Martinů
fans and enthusiasts for good music
everywhere.
Dominy Clements
Bohuslav (violin) 
