This is the repertoire for which Sir Thomas Beecham
was especially famous. These extracts are rated as favourites by most
of this conductor’s many admirers. With the benefit of a new digital
re-mastering, these recordings have come up as bright as a new button.
It is hard to believe that all were made more than forty years ago.
The dances from Le Roi s’amuse, a play by Victor Hugo
are seldom played. They are written in a slightly neo-classical style
and like most of Delibes’ music are tuneful and well crafted. The highlight
of this collection is the famous faun so sensuously depicted by Debussy.
Here the superb woodwind adds subtle warmth and evoke a hot French summer
afternoon to great effect.
The little interlude from Debussy’s Prodigal Son is
a real rarity and like the two extracts from The Damnation of Faust
by Berlioz are, strictly speaking, not ballet. All three are played
with characteristic élan and all were featured in the Beecham
‘Lollipops’ CD (CDM 7 63412 2). That disc also contained the two famous
dances from Samson and Dalila by Saint-Saëns. They are played here
with verve and excitement.
Another rarity is the waltz from Cinderella by Massenet,
a work of quirky charm delightfully presented on this disc. All the
recordings are stereo with the exception of the Cinderella waltz and
the Ballet Music from Gounod’s Faust. The Faust re-mastering is a specially
noticeable improvement over the sound of the original LP. Although this
performance of the Faust ballet music has been much praised and is well
executed, many of the tempi are unusually slow and the emphasis on charm
is to the detriment of the action depicted in this scene of the opera.
The big disappointment is that Beecham’s famous recording
of music from Grétry’s ‘Zémire et Azor’ was not included.
This has been unavailable for a long time and a modern re-mastering
is greatly missed.
Throughout the disc, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
plays as if inspired - as they undoubtedly were by this great English
conductor. This represents a shining example of the lighter side of
Beecham: strongly recommended.
Arthur Baker
Great
Recordings of the Century