Sergei PROKOFIEV (1891-1953)
Summer Night Suite, Op. 123 (1950) [20:52]
Scythian Suite, Op. 20 (1914-15) [24:09]
Aram KHACHATURIAN (1903-1978)
Masquerade Suite (1944) [18:59]
Spartacus Suite No. 1 (1955): Variation of Aegina and Bacchanalia [3:49]; Dance of Gaditanae and Victory of Spartacus [6:36]
Spartacus Suite No. 2 (1955): Adagio of Spartacus and Phrygia [9:30]
Zagreb Philharmonic Orchestra/Dmitri Kityaenko
rec. 2019, Lisinski Hall, Zagreb, Croatia
OEHMS CLASSICS OC471 [45:20 + 39:13]
Just viewing this product and then listening to the performances, I wondered who the audience is for this two-disc set. The discs are housed in a glossy bi-fold album with a photo of the conductor emblazoned on the booklet cover. The notes themselves are adequate, but rather perfunctory. The total timing is very skimpy for such a set which is advertised at full price! The performances would have to be special to justify the outlay. Unfortunately, there is nothing exceptional about them. Certainly the orchestra plays well and the sound is vivid, if rather bass-heavy and cloudy at higher volumes.
The two Prokofiev works come from opposite ends of his career and neither in my opinion represents the composer at his best. The Summer Night Suite is based on music taken from the comic opera Betrothal in a Monastery, which Prokofiev composed in 1940. He made the orchestral arrangement only in 1950. It consists of five movements and the music is reminiscent of Prokofiev’s ballets, particularly Cinderella, but nowhere as memorable. It begins with an Introduction that at least in this recording is bombastic. This is followed by a Serenade where the solo cello substitutes for the lyrical tenor of the opera. After the cello theme comes a jaunty march that recalls Romeo and Juliet. The orchestra plays well, but it is all a bit too heavy. The music finally comes to life in the third movement Minuet. However, the fourth movement, titled “Dreams,” becomes boring as it is performed here, while the final Dance could have concluded things on a better note had the tuned percussion not been buried in the texture. A lighter touch would have enhanced a work that is not out of Prokofiev’s top drawer. This is evidenced by two other recordings I sampled: Pletnev’s with the Russian National Orchestra (DG) that also includes the complete Cinderella on a two-CD set and sells for less than half the price of the current issue. Also good is an Exton disc with Ashkenazy and the St. Petersburg Philharmonic which contains other less popular works of Prokofiev.
The Scythian Suite, which Prokofiev composed near the beginning of his career, originally as music for a Diaghilev ballet Alla and Lolly, has been regarded as his response to Le sacre du printemps. It now seems rather tame, especially in this recording, though it leaves a somewhat better impression than the Summer Night Suite largely because I find the music more interesting. Nonetheless, there is nothing here to stir the blood! Again the important percussion, in particular the tuned percussion, gets buried on the recording when it should add a modicum of colour. There are many better choices for this work, including the Deutsches Symphonie Berlin/Sokhiev (Sony), Bergen Philharmonic/Litton (BIS), and Mariinsky Orchestra/Gergiev (Philips). Best of all, though, is Abbado with the Chicago Symphony on DG that also contains his London Symphony account of Alexander Nevsky and remains a library choice. Any of these is more exciting than Kitayenko.
There was a time when Khachaturian’s orchestral suites were popular show pieces on concert programmes. Now they seem rather dated. The recording I remember most fondly of the Masquerade Suite is from the RCA Victor Symphony with Kirill Kondrashin which also included Kabalevsky’s The Comedians. That is still available as a download, but sonically is showing its age. However, there is an idiomatic performance of the Masquerade Suite by the Armenian Philharmonic under Loris Tjeknavorian (ASV) reissued by Presto that also contains the Gayaneh ballet suite and four selections from Spartacus plus Ippolitov-Ivanov’s Caucasian Sketches on a single CD of 74 minutes. There is more than enough from which to choose in the Khachaturian music offered here, including accounts conducted by the composer. Kitayenko’s renditions are perfectly good with fine woodwind solos in the Spartacus music, such as the oboe in the Adagio. The question remains, though, why so little of it?
I was particularly interested in hearing these performances to learn about the state of the Zagreb Philharmonic. I remember well their terrific accounts under Milan Horvat of Shostakovich Symphonies Nos. 1 and 9 on LP. Based on these new performances, it is still in excellent shape. So the fault must lie with their conductor on this disc. Moreover, in spite of the “classy” production, there are errors in a few of the timings listed and a strange mixture of German and English in one of the titles, “Adagio of Spartacus und Phrygia.” The composers’ and conductor’s names also have German spellings. Prokofiev is rendered as is usually spelled, but Khachaturian becomes “Chatschaturjan.” Dmitri Kityaenko is given as “Dmitrij Kitajenko.”
Leslie Wright
