Many general musical histories give the impression that after
Rossini’s retirement from writing operas in 1829 he wrote only
minor works apart from the two large sacred works – the Stabat
Mater and the Petite Messe Solennelle. Certainly the
majority of the music contained in his two main collections of
music written after that date – Les Soirées Musicales and
Péchés de Vieillesse consist of relatively short pieces.
Despite their titles as a whole they are not trivial or unenjoyable.
Respighi made an astute decision in choosing to orchestrate a
number of them for Le Boutique Fantasque and Rossiniana.
Anyone who enjoys those arrangements is likely to want to get
to know the remainder of the collections from which Respighi made
his selection.
The
present disc contains the majority of Volume VI. No 11 –“Étude
asthmatique” – will apparently be included in a later disc in
Naxos’s intended complete Rossini piano music. The music we
have here is full of variety, invention and wit. The longest
piece, for instance, is entitled “Un petit train de plaisir,
comique-imitatif”. It describes a train journey made by the
composer, starting with the bell announcing the arrival of the
train, getting aboard, the journey, and a satanic whistle before
arriving at a station where “Les Lions Parisiens offrant la
main aux Biches pour descendre du Wagon”. The journey continues
but is stopped with a terrible derailment in which two people
are mortally wounded, one going to Paradise and the other to
Hell. A funeral march is followed by a cheery dance for their
heirs. Like so much of this composer’s music there is a very
knowing uncertainty over how it should be taken, but that it
is a piece of real music and no mere joke I am in no doubts.
However
this is perhaps not so obvious from this recording. Alessandro
Marangoni was born in Italy in 1970 and has had a varied career
since he graduated in music and philosophy. He can certainly
play the notes, but unfortunately is reluctant to follow all
of Rossini’s directions, especially as regards dynamics, and
has an irritating way of varying speeds without any direction
to that effect in a way that is more than can be legitimately
be described as rubato. The result is that the music
lacks the sharpness of focus that is surely an essential part
of the character of this composer’s music. Similar comments
apply throughout the disc, for instance to the very lovely Une
caresse à ma femme – one of those used by Respighi in La
Boutique Fantasque. Here Rossini asks for two tempi – Andantino
at the start and end, and Allegretto moderatissimo for
the central section. Marangoni makes little difference between
them and this blurs the overall character and form of the piece.
I
am sorry to have to be negative about a disc containing music
which is still relatively little known and which deserves the
wider currency that this disc is likely to have. It is well
recorded and is probably still worth having for the sake of
the music itself, but it is really little more than a stopgap
until a more idiomatic version becomes available.
John
Sheppard
