George ENESCU (1881-1955)
Isis - symphonic poem for female choir and orchestra (1927) [19:12]
Symphony No. 5 in D major for tenor, female choir and orchestra (1941) [41:17]
Marius Vlad (tenor), NDR Chor
Deutsche Radio Philharmonie, Saarbrucken Kaiserslautern/Peter Ruzicka
rec. KongressHalle Saarbrücken, 18-20 June 2012.
CPO 777 823-2 [60:39]
The two works on this disc were left incomplete. The dates I have given
above simply reflect those on which Enescu wrote as much of the score
as he did. Each was completed in the 1990s by Pascal Bentoiu (b. 1927).
Isis was the pet-name Enescu gave to his mistress Maruca Cantacuzini whom
he married in 1939. It is also the name given to the Egyptian goddess
of love, magic and the dead. Bantock took the Lament of Isis
as the subject of one of his songs. Enescu's Isis is refulgent,
melodic and rhapsodic yet its lyrical weave remains lucid. This is achieved
no matter how luxurious the ideas which breathe and surge through its
pages. Broadly speaking you can think of it as a companion to Szymanowski's
Third Symphony, Scriabin's Poem of Ecstasy, Miaskovsky's
Fourth and Thirteenth Symphonies and to Enescu's own Vox Maris.
The writing is tonal, mystical and impressionistic not least in its intimate
and naturally integrated threading of vocalising female voices with the
orchestral elements. The Scriabin parallel is well worth examining against
the fervid passages around 13:10-15:20. With this work now in the recorded
canon Messiaen and Silvestrov can be heard as successors to Enescu.
The big four movement Fifth - and last - Symphony is also lush but the
mystical rites of Isis are absent. The first movement is reminiscent
somewhat of the much later Korngold Symphony and is a less opaque counterpart
to Joseph Marx's gorgeous orchestral works of the 1920s. The heaped-high
strivings of the first movement do lose their way somewhat in the first
movement. Dreamily glowing pastoral idylls are the order of the day in
the second movement with some gorgeous moments along the way (3:50 onwards).
At less than five minutes the Vivace con fuoco is a needfully
fleet-pulsed counterbalance to the other movements. Enescu and Bentoiu
return to form with a groaningly serious finale which marries tragedy,
deliberation and poetic musing. The attractive-toned tenor Marius Vlad
sings caressingly the words of Michail Eminescu's poem I have
one last wish. The music more than meets half-way the melancholy
and ecstasy of the words. It is as if we are hearing an extension of Whitman
in Delius's Sea-Drift. It's very much in that atmosphere
and the female chorus intensify the effect.
The liner-notes are by Jürgen Ostmann and Peter Ruzicka. They are
in German and English. The words sung by the tenor in the finale of the
Symphony are printed in sung Rumanian, German and English. Recording quality
is very good and the performances feel impeccable.
Bentoiu has done sterling work in realising these scores from the fragments
and shreds left behind by Enescu. I suspect that there is quite a lot
of Bentoiu's own invention in this music but no harm in that. The
results are resolutely serious, well integrated and not lacking in poetic
beauty. The finale of the Fifth Symphony in particular is strongly memorable.
Fascinating. I trust that CPO, who have done no other orchestral Enescu,
will now be looking at opportunities to record Bentoiu 's completion
of the Fourth Symphony.
Rob Barnett
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