It’s good to have these
two performances joined in this way.
The cachet enjoyed by composer-conducted
performances is of course considerable
and invites a legion of comment on the
subjects of authenticity in all its
various considerations. That’s all the
more so when, as in the case of Glazunov
and Prokofiev, they left behind so few
examples of their way with their own
music. Prokofiev’s recordings as a pianist
are rather better known and his disc
recordings can be found on Naxos.
For many years the
first port of call for Glazunov’s 1929
recording of the Seasons was a Pearl
LP coupled with Konstantin Ivanov’s
splendid and much later recording of
the First Symphony. It’s still available
and is reviewed here.
Dutton has now assumed
joined the lists and I shall have a
few things to say about the transfer
further on.
The producer of the
original set was Joe Batten, a pioneer
of recording in Britain and one who
wrote admiringly of the recording in
his autobiography. Glazunov was increasingly
frail by this time but the pick-up band
did well by him. It doesn’t in fact
greatly reflect the endemic London portamento
style of the pre-Boult BBC or the pre-
Beecham LPO. The strings are warm and
quite lithe and the woodwinds are particularly
effective and impressive. Whatever his
reputation as the alcoholic saboteur
who did for Rachmaninov’s First Symphony
no less a judge than Nikolai Malko went
on record to say that it was invariably
valuable to listen to Glazunov’s conducting
as indeed, the year before the fiasco
of the Rachmaninov, Rimsky-Korsakov
had recognised his standing as a fine
conductor.
All this is borne out
by the recording, made in the Portman
Rooms in Baker Street in London. The
rhythm is wonderfully fluid in Winter’s
Hail, the principal flautist makes eloquent
work of the Winter Scene (track 2),
and there is a happily audible triangle
in Spring, itself a testament to Batten
and his team. In the Summer Waltz we
can feel a real sense of Glazunov’s
exuberance and finesse – the two harnessed
closely together to their mutual benefit
– as well as his infectious control
of corporate rhythm. There’s real verve
to Autumn’s Bacchanal and the principal
clarinet (was it one of the Drapers?)
shines throughout, not least in the
Summer Variations. The Petit Adagio
of Autumn is genuinely moving and has
a joyously lyrical urgency to it.
Which brings us to
the transfer. The warmth and rounded
quality is pleasing, though the concentration
on middle frequencies has been at some
cost to the upper treble. Dutton gives
the strings a warm homogenous sound
whereas the earlier Pearl, reflecting
the quality of the original 78 set,
gave us a slight astringency to the
violin sound. The Dutton could easily
be mistaken for a post war early LP
recording of somewhat dampened sound
perspective. It’s an attractive sound
and will be welcomed – though I hanker
after greater openness.
The Prokofiev is the
familiar Op.64b suite of 1936 in his
only genuinely conducted recorded performance
– rumours are legion and unfounded as
to the other so-called Prokofiev-conducted
traversals. The last I heard he’d recorded
his second Violin Concerto though this
is doubtless as unsubstantiated as the
other phantoms. The wartime 1943 recording
is rather raw and immediate which can
vitiate some of the drama but is an
inevitable corollary of the original
set-up. There’s some minimal residual
shellac hiss and noise suppression has
dampened it down.
It’s interesting to
hear some almost sardonically pervasive
string portamenti but one’s main impression
is of rhythmic bite and characterisation
– such as the waddle of Friar Laurence
or the Dance of the Antilles Girls –
and it’s well worth getting to know
this performance if you’ve not already
encountered it. The music is presented
with clear-sighted imagination – not
objectified but realised with imaginative
insight allied to strategic architectural
goals. Tempi are not rushed, textual
detail – as so often with composer-conductors
– frequently elucidated (try Juliet,
the little girl) and there
is a strong engagement with the visceral
emotionalism of the score, though it’s
one that is subservient to detail and
organisational strength. Prokofiev is
at pains to bring out orchestral colour
and colouristic strands – brass, piano
– and always with immaculate preparation.
The Prokofiev was most
recently harnessed to a Ravel-conducted
selection on Philips but this Dutton
brings geographic alignment to its coupling.
Both performances should be in the collections
of admirers.
Jonathan Woolf
Moscow State Philharmonic Orchestra/Sergei
Prokofiev 
