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Manuel de FALLA (1876-1946) CD 1 [78:07] El Sombrero de tres picos (1919) [39:27] El Amor Brujo (1915) [26:03] Siete Canciones populares españolas (1922) [12:19]
Victoria de los Angeles (soprano)
Philharmonia/Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos. rec. 28-30 October, 2 December
1964, No 1 Studio, Abbey Road, London (Sombrero); Philharmonia/Carlo
Maria Giulini 16-17 October 1961, 10 April 1964, Kingsway Hall (Brujo);
Gonzalo Soriano (piano), 4-6, 8 December 1961, 2-5 January 1962,
Barcelona (Canciones). CD 2 [79:10] Noches en los jardines de España for piano and orchestra (1909-1915)
[25:11] Concerto in D major for Harpsichord,
Flute, Oboe, Clarinet, Violin and Cello (1923-26) [15:12] Psyché (1924) [5:20] Soneto a Córdoba (1927) [2:25] Quatre Pièces espagnoles (1906-09) [16:29] Fantasía bética (1919) [14:08]
Gonzalo Soriano (piano), Orchestra de la Société des Concerts du
Conservatoire/Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos 3-4, 8 January 1963, Salle
Wagram, Paris (Noches); Gonzalo Soriano
(harpsichord), Michel Debost (flute); Robert Kasler (oboe); André
Boutard (clarinet); Pierre Nerini (violin); Robert Cordier (cello),
8 January 1963, Salle Wagram (Concerto); Victoria
de los Angeles (soprano); Annie Challan (harp); Jean-Claude Gérard
(flute); Trio à Cordes Francais; Victoria de los Angeles (soprano);
Annie Challan (harp), 17-20 February 1969, Paris; Gonzalo Soriano
(piano) 27-30 November 1964, No 1 Studio, Abbey Road, London. ADD
EMI CLASSICS 2375952
[78:07 + 79:10]
These are great recordings and deserve their prime place in EMI's
Great Recordings of the Century series (see
review). Yet here they are as a 20th Century Classics
double.
Dating from 1961-64
– one item is from 1969 - and recorded by EMI’s engineering
aristocracy, these recordings remain nothing short of sensational.
Frühbeck de Burgos's full-length El sombrero ballet with
its gritty Olés!, sensuous de Los Angeles and
the thrilling and rapturously poetic Philharmonia, has not been
bettered – though Dutoit
and before him, Ansermet,
came close. The recording by Victor Olof and Christopher Parker
is stunning still. Those serried ranks of castanets rattle the
walls to this day. The hiss inherent in analogue stock is lower
than that on the recently issued EMI Encore Janáček-Mackerras
disc whose recordings were made a couple of years before these.
The final strutting exuberant community march has not been excelled
in terms of precision, sheer passion and edge-of-seat eagerness.
Get it while it is still going.
Giulini can be heard
in El Amor Brujo - over a slightly more assertive hiss
- with the same orchestra but this time in the fabled Kingsway
Hall. Tenderness and mystery are a large part of the key to
success in El Amor Brujo and this can be glimpsed in
El circulo magico. De Los
Angeles is steady, vibrant
and fully identified with what she sings. The enamoured and
bell-bedecked Las campanas de amanecer, despite its obvious
indebtedness to Petrushka, remains a thing of breath-taking
beauty. I have heard an even more passionate version in barbed-wire
sound but it has long gone and has never been reissued on CD:
Classics for Pleasure CFP 40234. It’s electric, gaudy and visceral
- from Irina Arkhipova, the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra
and Arvid Jansons. The same LP included another vivid 1960s
performance: Nights in the Gardens of Spain with the
Moscow Phil conducted by Rozhdestvensky and the pianist Alexander
Iokheles.
Frühbeck de Burgos
and Soriano ensured that their Salle Wagram Noches en los
jardines de España (1915) was in the same illustrious company
as the conductor's El sombrero. Such a pity they did
not record Joseph Marx's Castelli Romana at the same
time. It would have made an adroit companion but I suspect that
Marx - still alive in 1963 - would have been persona non
grata in Paris at the
time this recording was set down. At the other extreme from
Noches is the Harpsichord Concerto - all dry, busy textures
and redolent of the Parisian years of Stravinsky and Martinů.
Away from the orchestra,
but remaining with de Los
Angeles, we can also enjoy
the Siete canciones populares españolas with pianist
Soriano recorded by Victor Olof - brother of violinist Theo
Olof - in Barcelona this time. What a lovely cradling song is Nana with
its Arabian sultriness and fragrance. Speaking of which the
Mediterranean heat of Psyché is here suffused with a
decidedly gallic lushness of harmony and melody. De Los
Angeles was still in good vocal heart in 1969 as we hear in
her dignified Soneto de Cordoba. Soriano leads us reliably
and with vision through the colourful Piezas Españolas and
the substantial Lisztian Fantasia Betica.
The discs could hardly
be better packed - slightly over and under 79 minutes in each
case. The brief and to-the-point note is by EMI regular Julian
Haylock.
Get this while it is
still going.
Rob Barnett
Full details of re-mastering history:
Manuel de FALLA (1876-1946) CD 1 El Sombrero de tres picos
(1996 Digital Remaster) [39:27] El Amor Brujo (1987 Digital Remaster) [26:03] Siete Canciones populares españolas (2001 Digital Remaster) [12:19] CD 2 Noches en los jardines de
España
(1987 Digital Remaster) [25:11] Concerto in D major for Harpsichord,
Flute, Oboe, Clarinet, Violin and Cello (1996 Digital Remaster)
[15:12] Psyché (2001 Digital Remaster) [5:20] Soneto a Córdoba (2001 Digital Remaster) [2:25] Quatre Pièces espagnoles (2009 Digital Remaster) [16:29] Fantasía bética (2009 Digital Remaster) [14:08] EMI CLASSICS 50999
2 37595 2 7 [78:07 +
79:10]
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