Here
are two works written either side of
the great divide that was the Second
World War. This war uprooted both conductor
and composer. Both moved to America,
Martinů immediately and Ancerl
eventually to Canada. Ancerl's flight
from Czechoslovakia saved his life.
The rest of his family were victims
of the Nazi Holocaust. Ancerl returned
to his homeland after the war; tragically
Martinů never did.
The Third Concerto
is brilliantly played here by Palenicek
but aside from some moments in the final
movement the work fails to move. You
can hear Beethoven in some of Martinů's
symphonies especially No. 5. Well in
this case one can hear Brahms. The work's
hair-trigger anxiety and motoric drive
have excitement but things do not ignite
at the level of emotional engagement.
The Second Concerto was premiered on
20 November 1948 at Dallas with Dorati
conducting and Firkusný as soloist.
The Czech premiere was delayed by political
machinations until nine years later.
Both Leichner (Supraphon
complete piano concertos) and Firkusný
(BMG) sound better in their competing
versions. Overall though it is the Firkusný
that merits first recommendation. It
is an added bonus that you can now get
Firkusný's versions of both concertos
as part of a bargain price twofer on
the ‘Arts and References’ French BMG
series.
The big concerto goes
well in Leichner's and Belohlavek's
hands. They make more of the Brahms
reminiscences than Firkusný and
Pesek or Palenicek and Ancerl. There
is nothing amiss with the Firkusný
reading; it is just that things go with
an even more natural flow with Leichner.
The supernatural eerieness of the second
movement is well caught. In the finale
there is the collision between the neo-classical
angularity, the airy nationalistic buoyancy
of the Fourth Symphony and a crowded
host of Brahmsian allusions.
Karl Erben's grim folk
tales fuelled Dvořák's
The Spectre's Bride and
the late tetralogy of tone poems which
includes The Noonday Witch and
The Water Goblin. The Bouquet
of Flowers sets more Erben. It is
in two parts and eight sections. The
setting is highly spiced with solos
for the voices, unison choral textures
which are often folk-naïf. The
orchestral role includes a prominent
part for the solo piano. The sequence
runs a full three quarters of an hour
and is pleasing but undemanding. One
can imagine this as a sort of Czech
analogue for Vaughan Williams' First
Nowell though without an orator
or perhaps closer to VW's Folk Songs
of the Four Seasons. Martinů
even sounds like his counterpart towards
the end of His Kind Sweetheart
(tr.9).
Martinů this in 1937 dedicating
it to the painter Jan Zrzavy. It was
premiered on Prague Radio conducted
by Otakar Jeremias. The composer never
heard the work in any other form
than as a crackly radio relay. The folk
texts are printed in full in the booklet
alongside a parallel English translation.
Folk voices were intruding into or adding
ruddy life to other music at the time
including Canteloube's Auvergne songs
and the various cycles by Karol Szymanowski,
Vitezlav Novak and Czeslaw Marek. The
style of these four composers Martinů
avoids completely. Martinů's music
is less synthesised or subject to impressionistic
treatment. The singing strings of Idyll
and
bubbling and warbling woodwind tap a
vein that Martinů remained in touch
with. This style was used all the way
through to the mid-late 1940s
when an opulent impressionism started
to gain the ascendancy. A Carol flies
along in a Carmina-like chatter
from the well drilled children's chorus.
The final movement, all 13.42 of it,
is Man and Death - a dialogue
between the rich old farmer tramping
among his crops in high harvest and
meeting Death. He argues with Death
with one excuse after another for being
spared. Finally Death loses patience
and shoots an arrow through his heart.
The sung words implore us to remember
that Death is
pitiless and to prepare for it now.
There is a Medieval Dürer-like grimness
about this. Things are not allowed to
end on an upbeat even if Martinů
does allow some contentment to soften
and sweeten the final pages as if a
Requiescat in Pace. This
folk sequence was last issued by Supraphon
on 11 1932-2901.
Supraphon
are repackaging their Martinů Ančerl
legacy. Volume 34 (SU 3694-2) will give
us the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies along
with the Lidice Memorial but
has not been issued as yet (December
2003).
Summary: A concerto
played brilliantly but overall being
rather severe. A disarming folk serenade
acting as a lode from which the style
of many later works was drawn.
Rob Barnett
Prague Philharmonic Choir 