Sergei Ivanovich Taneyev (1856-1915)
At the Reading of a Psalm (Cantata no. 2 Op. 36) (1914-1915)
Lolita Semenina (soprano), Marianna Tarassova (alto), Mikhail Gubsky (tenor), Andrei Baturkin (bass)
St. Petersburg State Academic Cappella Choir/Vladislav Tchernushenko
Boys Choir of the Glinka Choral College/Vladimir Begletsov
Russian National Orchestra/Mikhail Pletnev
rec. 2003, St Petersburg, Russia
Texts not supplied
ALTO ALC1445 [68]
Composed in the midst of the Great War and at the violent setting of the sun on Imperial Russia, At the Reading of a Psalm is a major piece. It was also Taneyev’s last work. The composer was to die shortly after the death of his more celebrated pupil, Skryabin.
For obvious reasons to do with its devotional subject matter, this score was neglected in its then Soviet homeland and has only emerged since the fall of the Soviet Union. This recording, which originally came out on Pentatone PTC 5186038, is ferociously eager and has both moment and mordancy. It has about it nothing of the calculated studio re-creation and more of a perilously volatile live event. The text is by Aleksey Khomyakov and the work itself is said to be modelled on the Missa Solemnis.
Marianna Tarrasova took masterclasses from Galina Vishnevskaya and has been recorded by Philips in Gergiev’s Rimsky opera Sadko. I did not recognise the names of the other solo singers - not that the others contribute in anything less than glorious passion. In any event, At the Reading of a Psalm places the choir in dominance front and centre.
Its nine sections - here separately tracked - have fairly anonymous titles such as: ‘Chorus’; ‘Double Chorus’; ‘Triple Fugue’; ‘Interlude’ and ‘Aria’. Pletnev’s fervour is not stifled by this rather academic schema. He makes of the Cantata a major event and the recording is neither cerebral nor passively spiritual. I should add that this work has also been recorded by Svetlanov but Pentatone’s recording quality is superior to that Melodiya inscription.
The first movement tempestuously embodies a storm. The second is commanding and the choir blazes with defiant conviction. We return to drama in movements 3 and 4. Everything is in fact played with bubbling excitement and it is remarkable that Pletnev has the stamina to keep this up across a work running to much more than an hour. These things are comparative but there is something in play here which was pretty much absent from Pletnev’s DG Tchaikovsky cycle where the routine and the civilised are in the ascendant. He is closer to Ovchinnikov and Mravinsky.
Even the quiet movements, such as the fifth, maintain a poetic grip supported by a plenitude of engaging detail. Tchaikovsky-like solo singing in movement 6 has the voices emerge with all the earthly passion of Eugene Onegin; listen out also for some the glorious horn tone. The Seventh is a gaunt interlude. It’s all remarkably exhausting. The final section (tr. 9) which is a Double Chorus complete with imaginative solo violin filigree. There’s a turbulent Brucknerian majesty at work in this finale.
I should no longer be surprised by the virtues of Taneyev’s music. His symphonies are excellent including the brave of CDs recorded for Chandos with a fiery grip by Valery Polyansky (whatever happened to him?).
If you’re curious, the First Cantata, which is John of Damascus, came out on a recent Naxos 4-disc Taneyev set (8.504060) which does not include the present work.
The notes are more than useful and are by Alto regular Gavin Dixon. Even so, some sacrifice must be made; actually, only one, in that the words sung in Russian are not supplied and there is no translation either. A pity, that.
This is thoroughly gripping stuff which evinces remarkable commitment and rare ardour. Pletnev has the measure of this piece and “blazes away with both barrels”.
Rob Barnett
