Phonograph Monthly Review, Vol. 5, No. 4 (1931-01)

116 the second, are developed with great ingenuity, working into a sonorous peoration on the brass which forms the climax of the movement, for the recapitulation immediately begins and summarizes more briefly—with some changes in the or- chestration—the material of the exposition, ending quietly with the rustling accompaniment figure of the beginning. Here are all the externals of the sonata form, yet conformity to the letter of the law implies no constriction of spirit for Sibelius. For all its classical qualities, the music is essentially of our day and of the composer’s self. It is ironic that the youngsters of the International Society for Contemporary Music (of which Sibelius has remained quite innocent) are today struggling with the solution of the same problems that Sibelius mastered as far back as 1902. The second movement is gloomier and more intense, be- ginning (part 3) with sinister timpani rolls and pizzicati as background for the somber theme on the bassoons. But Si- belius never abandons himself to unrelieved Tchaikowskian melancholy. The basses become more agitated; the brasses shout bizarre imprecations. The moods shift from that of diabolical scherzando to a fantastic grandeur. I think for a moment of Poe’s City in the Sea: While from a proud tower in the town Death looks gigantically down. Ts it inconsistent to think now of Hamsun, now of Poe, just as others have found pastoral or patriotic qualities? “If I contradict myself, very well, I contradict myself I” Sibelius’ music—like all great art—is all things to all men.) Part 4 introduces a compassionate almost ecclesiastical in- troduction to the second theme, which appears after consid- erable preluding in F sharp major (but with raised sub-dom- inant, suggesting the Lydian mode). The serene mood is broken by agitated and swirling figures, sharply accented passages, and blasts from the blast, shaking the whole tonal structure with their violence, as toward the end of part 3 and again in part 5. This last section of the slow movement begins, with the second theme predominating and surcharged with feeling—in some ways the most moving pages of the entire symphony. The strings buzz busily again and the basses hint at their Moussorgskian declamation of the earlier agitatos, but the ending comes suddenly with one last with- drawing melancholy outburst from the brasses. The scherzo (part 6) is nimbler, but less boisterous than that of the first symphony. The strings dart nervously about, vivacissimo, until five pianissimo strokes on the timpani in- terrupt the tonal turmoil of the scherzo, and make way for the penetrating sweetness of oboe, clarinet, flute, and elo- quently responsive ’cello. But the trio scarcely expands to greater breadths, before the theme of the scherzo, now more savage and insistent, rudely returns. The Lento e soave trio comes back once more at the beginning of Part 7, but quickly expands and increases in pace and intensity, until the main theme of the finale bursts out with robust breadth. The theme is amazingly simple. The melodic material of the most inane street song, yet handled so richly and with such sincere heartfulness that there is no withholding oneself from joining unreservedly its triumphant paean. Sibelius has been accused of presenting his best thematic material at the very outset and so mitigating the effectiveness of its later and more climactic return. Yet the spaciousness of this first statement sets the broad canvas for the entire movement: a first sud- den glimpse of the peaks towards which the music progresses, up hill and down dale, with charming excursions into a hun- dred bypaths. Even the piquant second theme (near the end of part 7) retains the bracing air of the lofty opening, and marches the movement unhesitantly forward. Part 8 begins with a long crescendo on bustling scale passages and quickening snatches of the main theme, ascending gradually and inevitably into the sunny breadths of its full statement. This heightening anticipation and sonorous fulfillment is a device that has been abused so often (cf. Strauss’ Alpine Sym- phony, Bloch’s America, and a hundred other works), that it is reasonably viewed with very considerable suspicion. Yet The Phonograph Monthly Review Sibelius is as calmly unafraid of the obvious as he is of the enigmatic. He writes so straight from the heart that when it overflows, his music can do no less. Perhaps the coda and its apotheosis of the theme aspires to heights not within the grasp of even the most sonorous stream of tone, yet its dig- nity and nobility are unquestionable. Even here Sibelius under rather than over-states. It is too genuinely big in conception to savour of bombast. One is convinced not mere- ly of the man’s sincerity (a negative virtue at best), but of the tremendous breadth of his feeling, swelling to encompass at one stroke everything that he has to express. Quite pos- sibly he fails, and he himself wisely learned greater economy of means. The sparing use of the full orchestra in his later symphonies achieves flights more securely sublime. Yet—no one whose heart has once swelled with the glorious songful abundance of the second symphony would have a note in it changed. The excerpts from the Karelia suite, Op. 11, are slighter fare, although sufficiently distantly removed from the salon indistinction of his smaller works to merit place as “fillers” in the symphony albums. The Karelia overture, Op. 10, and the suite form a single work, memento of a sojourn in the Karelia province of Finland, a southern, sunnier, and more lighthearted district, as can be surmised from the music. The Intermezzo (on the tenth record side of the second symphony) is the first movement of the suite, and utilizes the chief theme of the overture, to which it is very similar in character. It is a genial dance-like, melodic work, beginning quietly with felicitous use of horn and echo passages, and working up into a robust climax before dying away to the mood of the opening. The Alla Marcia (10th record side of the first sym- phony) is the third and last movement of the suite (separated from the Intermezzo by an unrecorded Ballade). It is one of the most irresistible and pleasing of Sibelius’ smaller works,—a light-hearted scherzo-like march of great joviality, that begins immediately with the breezy, exceedingly catchy main theme, contrasted only with an even jauntier second, swinging along to a wholesome climax. I have left little space to dilate on the sturdy merits of the performance and the abounding recording excellencies with which the Columbia engineers have endowed both sets. But Professor Kajanus,—a valiant battler for Sibelius for many years—and the technicians have so sincerely devoted their talents to the glorification of that of Sibelius, that to praise the music is to acknowledge the worthiness of their exposition of it. As Finland honors itself in honoring Sibelius, so the Columbia Company and the participating musicians shine in the reflected light of the music itself. Yet such praise is per- haps too general. As I wrote in the November issue after first hearing these records, and as I can repeat with deepened conviction after a thorough study of the discs,—this is as effective orchestral recording as has yet been achieved by the phonograph. The broad rhythmical surge of Kajanus’ muscular and yet sensitive readings, the characteristic deep or biting colors of the orchestration, and the spacious breadths of the music’s most, expansive moments (and there are many), are all accurately transferred from the performances in the Central Hall, Westminster, London, to the discs in these albums.