Here is an old friend
that I hadn’t heard for a very long
time. It has been around from time to
time in different disguises, on LPs,
then some ten years ago when most of
the Mercury catalogue was released on
two-channel CDs and now, finally, it
comes on SACD in the original three-channel
version.
Mercury’s recordings
were always famous for the excellence
of the sound, even back in the mono
period in the 1950s, when they used
a single microphone, positioned to give
the most truthful recreation of the
music, the orchestra and the hall ambience.
With the advent of stereo they added
another two microphones but stuck to
the basic concept with the package of
microphones so to speak in the best
seat in the hall. There was no real
technical wizardry with filtering and
equalizing, just a keen ear and a sensible
choice of recording venue. Recording
sometimes on 35 mm magnetic film (as
in the case of The Nutcracker)
gave extra dynamics and frequency range.
It was a method that has stood the test
of time.
Listening now to the
three-channel version and remembering
the impact the stereo LPs made back
in the distant past, the Mercury ‘signature’
is easily recognizable: characterised
by immediacy of the sound, fairly close
but not spot-lit. Mercury avoided the
excesses of the Decca Phase 4 sound
with its multi-microphone technique
that, as it were, zoomed in on the individual
instruments and thus gave a thrilling
feeling of presence but at the expense
of the integrated sound picture that
Mercury achieved. The added centre-channel
gives an extra clarity in separating
the instruments – solo instruments are
pin-pointed and easy to locate – and
also, in concerted passages, there’s
an extra depth to the orchestra. One
can hear fuller, rounder sound on some
other recordings, but the somewhat leaner
picture that Watford Town Hall produces
fits Dorati’s interpretation of the
music as the proverbial glove.
Hungarian, born in
1906, he became more or less a ballet
specialist from 1933, when he was appointed
musical director of the Ballet Russe
de Monte Carlo. All through his life
he had a special liking for ballet,
which can be seen also in his extensive
discography - few conductors have actually
recorded more than Dorati. As late as
c. 1980, when the digital recording
technique took over, he re-recorded
some of his favourite scores, among
them a brilliant Petrushka, on
a par with his rightly celebrated Mercury
version. And this Nutcracker
is in the same mould. The buzz-word
is precision! With a virtuoso LSO on
their toes he chisels every phrase to
perfection. One could object that it
might be too perfect, too engineer like.
Add to this his preference for fastish
tempos and there is a risk of mechanical
and charmless readings. In the main
they are not, however, for Dorati can
relax. He can give those gorgeous yearning
melodies their full due, and there isn’t
a dull moment during the close to eighty
minutes the ballet lasts.
The overture sets the
tone: this is filigree work, a piece
of embroidery, transparent, airy, almost
murmuring as if sharing the expectancy
with the children in the audience, before
the curtain rises. The march (CD1 track
3) is played at jogging tempo and the
scene with the children’s presents (track
5), with its jagged, jazzy rhythms,
is executed with real swing. In the
second act the Spanish dance (CD2 track
3) gets a certain thrill through the
exactly located but not over-blown castanets,
and the trepak (track 6) is a marvel
of precision in spite of the break-neck
tempo. All of these numbers, although
– or maybe thanks to –faster than we
are used to, contribute to the feeling
of joy and celebration. I prefer this
to the heavier, more ponderous approach
of some. On the other hand, the most
famous piece, Waltz of the Flowers
(CD2 track 9) although light and airy
to begin with, in the last resort becomes
too energetic, too lacking in charm.
There is a relentlessness in Dorati’s
conducting that contradicts the "fairy
tale" setting of the ballet, especially
since the textbook follows the George
Balanchine staging for the New York
City Ballet, where "flowers, the
most beautiful of candy flowers, led
by a shimmering dewdrop, waltz for Clara
and her Prince". I’m afraid that
in Dorati’s waltz the dew has turned
into sturdy rain.
But this is very much
the exception. On the whole there is
such a lot of wonderfully atmospheric
music-making. The Waltz of the Snowflakes
in the second tableau of act 1, is a
real gem with its surging rhythms and
the wordless singing of the ladies of
the LSO Chorus (CD1 track 10). Competition
is keen, but provided one can accept
a swifter-than-usual approach to this
ever-appealing score, Dorati’s rendering
can be safely recommended, now in better
sound than ever.
The Serenade for
Strings finds the conductor in more
relaxed mood, and whether this is due
to the warmer ambience of the Vienna
Concert Hall or if this venue was chosen
because of Dorati’s approach, I don’t
know. Anyway, the recording was made
in 1958 and Vienna was the home ground
for the orchestra, which was formed
by Hungarian émigrés having
fled to Austria upon the Soviet invasion
in 1956. The strings produce a fine,
tight sound, not quite as homogeneous
as the LSO strings perhaps, but well
suited to the mostly elegiac mood of
the music. This is Tchaikovsky’s feeling
presented heart-on-the-sleeve but tempered
by the classicistic use of only a body
of strings. There is a nervous eagerness
about the Allegro moderato of
the first movement; the Waltz – marked
Moderato. Tempo di Valse – has
that lilt I missed in the Waltz of
the Flowers. The Elegy, Larghetto
elegiaco, is intimate and sad –
but without tears. The finale with its
contrapuntal Allegro con spirito
has all the precision of the Nutcracker
– and the added warmth.
The booklet (24 pages)
reproduces the original cover art and
includes a long cued synopsis based,
as I said, on the Balanchine production,
a "History of The Nutcracker",
a page about the recording and a long
essay about the Serenade for Strings.
Exemplary!
Göran Forsling
MERCURY
LIVING PRESENCE 475 6623 (SACD) [41:01 + 78:00]
