Phonograph Monthly Review, Vol. 3, No. 8 (1929-05)

280 The Phonograph Monthly Review May, 1929 the quiet melancholy of the introduction, the grave piety of the processional hymn, and the burning sadness of Faust. The work is well liked in the concert halls; it should find favor on records as well. There is a real place for music of this kind to catch the ear of such listeners as would be baffled by greater complexities of feeling and construction. The recording here is good and the playing excellent. The composer is a conductor of note and gives his piece the right degree of naturalness in the performance to match the music’s simplicity. An American release of these disks is desirable. We are not all sophisticates . . . and even for the sophisticated La Procession Nocturne has its charm. French Columbia 11641-2 (2 D12s) Rossini: Semiramide— Overture (three parts), and Brahms: Hungarian Dance No. 5 (one part), played by Lorenzo Molajoli and the Milan Symphony Orchestra. (Imported through the New York Band Instrument Company.) One of the headliners in Molajoli’s Fonotipia operatic series. Semiramide is one of the grand old overtures; it is worth hearing again even if it were not played in a fashion that entirely eclipses all other recorded perfor- mances. Molajoli cannot be beaten, or even hardly ap- proached, with this sort of music. In the Hungarian Dance he fares considerably less well. The recording is brilliant and powerfully effective. H. M. V. D-1569-71 (3 D12s) de Falla: Nights in the Gardens of Spain (five parts), played by Mme. van Bar- entzen (piano) and a Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Piero Coppola. On the sixth side Mme. van Barentzen plays de Falla’s Andaluza for piano solo. (Im- ported through The Gramophone Shop, New York City. G. S. Album Set No. 90.) The composer terms ~Noches en los jardines de Espana “symphonic impressions” for piano and orchestra. The work is hardly a piano concerto for though the piano is prominent it is employed throughout as an integral part (frequently declamatory) of the orchestra. There are three movements: En el Generalife, evoking the poetic spirit of the Garden of the Architect, a palace of the Alhambra; Danza lejana (Dance in the Distance) ; and En los jardines de la Sierra de Cordoba (In the Gardens of the Siferra of Cordova). The thematic material of this work is built, as in La Vida Breve and in El Amor Brujo, on rhythms, modes, cadences, or forms inspired by but never directly borrowed from Andalusian folk-song” (Gilman). “De Falla is much more than a painter of Spain; he is an invoker of Spanish emotion, often the most hidden, the most re- served. Nothing is less brilliant (in the vulgar meaning of virtuosity that is attributed musically to this epithet) than these Nocturnes; but nothing is more strongly colored by the play of lights and shadows skilfully contrived. The force and the simplicity of the effects are remarkable; it is necessary to hear how the Far-off Dance based on a tango rhythm swells by a simple augmentation in a manner to attain at the end an astonishing intensity—that resolves itself into a glorious explosion” (from a biography of de Falla). Nights in the Gardens of Spain is rightfully considered de Falla’s finest achievement, and the performances by Gieseking and others with the leading symphony orchestras have invariably aroused discriminative enthusiasm. The work lends itself well to recording and Coppola and Mme. van Barentzen are splendidly fitted for the task. A delight- ful work and a delightful performance. The quiet close of the third movement attains a pure and luminous beauty that marks a new level for Spanish music. For good measure Mme. van Barentzen plays a solo, Andaluza, written some- time earlier than the larger work, but scarcely less charac- teristic of the composer and his race. An album set that should not be missing from the record library of anyone who has the interests of contemporary music—or his own genuine musical pleasure—at heart. French H. M. V. L-678 (D12) Chabrier: Espana Rhapsody, played by Piero Coppola and the Gramophone Symphony Orchestra. (Imported through the New York Band In- strument Company.) The first stabbing pizzicati of Espana give the key to the entire performance. Always in the past they have been either dull or lifeless, and the performances seldom rose above the level of the “fair at best.” Here one recognizes at once that the conductor knows Espana and exactly how it should be played—with tremendous verve and scintillating fire. And yet Coppola never permits the fleetness of the work to excuse the slightest departure from the standards of clarity and finished phrasing. The recording is a feat no less remarkable than that of the orchestral performance. In fact, one can expect unalloyed pleasure from beginning to end of this great work, containing the germs of modern orchestral technique, and now represented on records with complete satisfaction for the first time. It can be given whole-hearted recommendation. I hope it may be followed in the not too distant future by that other brilliant—if less well-known—work of Chabrier, the Marche Joyeuse. English Columbia 9562-3 (2 D12s) Frank Merrick: Two Movements in Symphonic Form (A Completion of the “Unfinished” Symphony), played by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. (Imported through The Gramophone Shop, New York City.) This work was tied with J. St. A. Johnson’s Pax Vobiscum for first prize in the British zone of the late ScHubert centennial contest. The conductor’s name is not given, but presumably the performance was under the direction of the composer either at first or second hand. Merrick has not used the sketches Schubert left for the scherzo and finale, but his two movements have a Schubertian flavor that is not unpleasantly forced. The music is pleasing to the ear, if not particularly stimulating to the mind, and is refresh- ingly free from either pedantry or pretentiousness. They do this sort of thing exceedingly well in England; Haubiel’s Karma does not fare very happily in comparison. But it is a pity that Mr. Merrick does not write and have the op- portunity to record a first and second movement to com- plete his own symphony, for it is only in intent and name that this scherzo and finale “finish the Unfinished.” They are enjoyable for their own sake; the Schubert connection is best ignored. CHAMBER MUSIC English Columbia L-2228-32 (5 D12s, Alb.) Brahms: Quintet in B minor. Op. 115, played by the Lener String Quartet (Lener, Smilovits, Roth, and Hartman), and Charles Draper (clarinet). (Imported through The Gramophone Shop, New York City.) Itjs difficult for me to speak dispassionately about this particular work of Brahms as it exerts an indescribable spell upon me, so strong that it is very hard for me to ; find flaws in any competent performance. This one seems to me as perfect as may be expected in this imperfect world. Fortunately, this impression is confirmed by the unrestrained praise of the foreign reviews. The recording is particularly fine, and while there was a highly admirable acoustical version from N. G. S. in the old days, we realize now on hearing the electrical recording how necessary the new process is to bring out the full detail and color of the work. Of the playing itself it is quite unncessary to speak, except to descant again upon the talents of Draper, the clarinetist and upon the submergence of these talents into the entire ensemble. Even in the rhapsodical solo passages in the second movement, one’s attention is never transferred from the music to the instrument. I was interested to read in a British journal that one reviewer, who had heard Miihfeld (for whom Brahms wrote the quintet) perform the clarinet part, declares Draper’s per- formance the superior. The quintet is simply and intelligently analyzed in the excellent booklet accompanying the album. It is note- worthy to point out that a roomy pocket in the cover of the album is designed to hold the pocket score of the work as well as the program note. The singular charm that this quintet possesses—and of all Brahms’ work it is inferior to none in individuality and gracious beauty—is augmented rather than dissipated by a study of the miniature score (Eulenburg edition). Until one has seen as well as heard the music, one cannot realize the infinite genius expended in the slightest musical details as well as in the noble and harmonious proportions of the whole. The claim that one knows Brahms without knowing this quintet is not unlike one’s claiming to know musical litera- ture without knowing Brahms. In the concert hall there is