Cala continues to preach the Gospel according to Stokowski
and does so here with this eclectic French concert (allowing for the
geographical inconvenience of Franck’s Belgian birth and Chopin’s Polish).
As everywhere Stokowski is a convinced and convincing interpreter but
some quirks and idiosyncrasies do co-exist with passionate intensity
in the Franck, which is played by the so-called Hilversum Radio Philharmonic
Orchestra, rather better known by its real name, the Netherlands Radio
Orchestra. For all its faults – of execution, of exaggeration and of
effect – I still found it a compelling traversal by the ninety-year-old
conductor, though not a centrally necessary addition to the Stokowski
Discography.
There is a real sense of convulsed involvement in the
Messiaen, of which Stokowski had himself made the first recording, in
1947, with the New York Philharmonic. That the work’s appeal was not
one of simply generalized proselytising can easily be ascertained listening
to this superlatively played and superbly conducted, rather spotlit,
performance. Beyond its intensity lies a kind of devotion not easy to
define but nevertheless palpable in every bar.
The three small pieces that make up the mosaic of this
disc are imbued variously with Stokowski’s flair, drive and impressionistic
impulse. Fine transfers and notes up to the by now expected Edward Johnson
standard.
Jonathan Woolf
Leopold Stokowski conductor