Phonograph Monthly Review, Vol. 5, No. 7 (1931-04)

April, 1931, Vol. V. No. 7 213 Sibelius’ opus 22 comprised two short orchestral pieces, sub- titled “Legends:” The Swan of Tuonela and Lemmmkamen’s Homefaring. I believe that the complete set consisted of four pieces, of which the Swan is the third. Like En Saga and many other of Sibelius’ compositions these were inspired by tales in the great Finnish epic, The Katevala. Tuonela, as a note on the flyleaf of the present score sets forth, is the King- dom of Death, the Hades of Finnish mythology. It is sur- rounded by a broad river of black water and rapid current, in which the Swan of Tuonela glides in majestic fashion and sings. Sibelius’ music is a brief Andante molto sostenuto in A minor, nine-four measure, scored lor an orchestra of very moderate size. Arthur Shepherd’s description is the finest 1 have seen: “The inherent power of Sibelius’ music cannot be truly ap- prehended without giving due consideration to his continence in instrumentation. . . . His essays in impressionism have not tempted him into an enlargement of his instrumental resourc- es. Thus, in The Swan of Tuonela, the tonal mise en scene is small, the form concise; the color-scheme almost monotone, but luminous. The point of contrast rests chiefly between the divided strings and low wood-winds, with the solo English Horn as protagonist, singing ‘the strange wild song of the bird swimming on the black waters, which separate man from Hades.’ The brass remains silent for many measures, when midway in the piece the muted horns echo the cadence of the Swan Song, with telling effect, and near the end the horns and trombones sustain the tonic harmony while all the strings take up the cantilena— con gran suona. The English Horn continues the song, while the strings—still on the tonic har- mony with a fourteen part divisi —suggest the flapping of wings, with reiterated strokes of the wooden part of the bow on the strings, col legno. The poem closes with a final lyrical out-cry in the strings, subsiding into soft diminuendo and an ascending phrase in the solo violoncello.” One surveys in the symphonies the full panorama of Si- belius’ greathearted art, but in this fleeting, nostalgic poem there is distilled the quintessence of his lyricism. Remem- bering the multitudinous and insignificant shorter composi- tions by, but not of, Sibelius, one cherishes the Swan as a rare but happy testimony that the large orchestral canvasses are not exclusively the medium of Sibelius’ most precious ut- terance. IJtk \ji Professor Kajanus has set a lofty standard for all future Sibelius recordings to measure up to, but Stokowski’s per- formance of the Swan is not found wanting. It is as matchless as the best of the Bach recordings with which he has enriched the phonographic repertory. The luminous and buoyant tone of the strings, the poetic eloquence of the English Horn, the rich blend of brass and wood wind color are an audible signa- ture that makes the printed label quite superfluous. None but the Philadelphians could lay claim to this disc. R. D. D. Moussorgsky — Ravel — Koussevitzky Moussorgsky (orch. Ravel) : Pictures at an Exhibition, 7 sides, and D<ebussy (orch. Ravel). Sarabande, 1 side, played by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Serge Koussevitzky. Victor Masterpiece Set M-102. (4 D12s, Alb., $8.00). Special Metropolitan Release. The story attending the composition of these fascinating pieces is so important that some mention of it cannot be omitted. Moussorgsky’s intimate friend Victor Hartmann, a promising architect, died in 1873. The next year, Stassov, who had made a third in the group, and to whom Mous- sorgsky eventually dedicated this set of compositions, put on an exhibition of his dead friend’s sketches and water colors. It was in the nature of a tribute that Moussorgsky, selecting ten of the pictures, undertook to transmute them into music— not in the form of impressions, but as themselves actual mu- sical ‘‘pictures.” For adding to the still very slim list of Moussorgsky’s works the Victor Company deserves the most signal and ma- terially evidenced gratitude. Apparently it is, however, an unalterable decree of fate that we shall never have any of his music in its original and un- “improved” form. Yet I must confess that it seems to me that if there ever was an ex- cuse for an orchestration it is here. It was at the sugges- tion of Koussevitzky himself that Ravel made the present version for performance, in 1923. For some time, the pub- lishers Bessel refused permission to play them to any but Koussevitzky, but fairly recently that prohibition has evi- dently been relaxed, and their performance by the New York Philharmonic produced a decided sensation. Ravel’s is not the only orchestral setting, however; one was made in Rus- sia as early as 1891, Sir Henry Wood did another, and final- ly one was produced in Paris under the auspices of the pub- lishers themselves. But none of these can be worth con- sidering after this masterpiece by Ravel, who should certain- ly be an experienced hand at such a job, since oddly enough, almost everyone of his important works has started as a piano piece, and only later been arranged by him for orchestra. Cecil Gray, who, to be sure, is not an especial admirer of this composer, even goes so far as to say that this present or- chestration is in many ways his most satisfactory work. Never having heard the original piano pieces played, I can- not say how well they sound on that instrument, but it is almost impossible to dissassociate the music from its supreme- ly brilliant orchestration, which, nevertheless, never impress- es for itself alone, but always manages to convey the impres- sion that the musical idea and its orchestral setting were born simultaneously. While the work is perhaps most remarkable as an example of Moussorgsky’s supreme genius for the realistic delineation of characters and situations, this fact should not lead one to overlook the excellence of its structure from a purely mu- sical standpoint. It is scarcely necessary to lay any stress on the perfect vividness of the “Gnomes,” “Bydlo,” “Goldenburg and Schmuyle,” “The Market-place,” or in fact any and all of them, but the artistic unity achieved by the “Promenades” is unusual in such a series of pictures. Moussorgsky himself expressed his pride in the “Promenade” there, and well he might,—once heard, it continues for a long time, to fascinate one by its splendidly rhythmic nature. In varied forms, it is interspersed between several of the numbers “portraying,” as Stassov says, “the composer walking now right, now left, now as an idle person, now urged to go near a pic- ture,” furthermore besides appearing by chance here and there in the substance of the pictures themselves, it serves, in a de-rhythmed form as the basis of number VII, “The Catacombs,” and is finally developed into a splendid perora- tion to the whole in the “Grande Porte de Kiev.” From every standpoint, this seems to me perhaps the most perfect of the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s releases. Kous- sevitzky makes an ideal choice as conductor of this music, the orchestration of which was a result of his admiration. We find the same genius for strongly parked and essentially Russian rhythms which makes his conducting of Petrouchka so unapproachable. On the other hand, he is equally effec- tive in the skimming lightness of the “Tuileries” or the “Li- moges.” In addition, the “Grande Porte de Kiev” is en- dowed with unbelievable breadth and sonority, which make it in the highest degree effective; although for this very reason one must not try to experience this effectiveness too fre- quently, or one will find that his emotions will no longer rise to meet it. Finally, one must praise the fidelity of the recording which enables us to appreciate the admirable play- ing of the orchestra. It is true to the most delicate timbres of the trumpet or to the massed splendours of the whole brass choir. The Debussy number is the second of three pieces “Pour le Piano,” dated 1901. The delicacy and lack of variety of the music itself make one more conscious of this version as a study in orchestral colouring than in the case of the Mous- sorsky; moreover, the extreme felicity of Debussy’s usual writing for the piano, make it seem rather tasteless to or- chestrate where he did not himself see fit to do so. Kous- sevitzky plays the dance with an appropriate delicate grav- ity. Robert H. S. Phillips Errata Two errors appearing in the March P. M. R. should be corrected. The Christian name of Vines, the French pianist recording for French Columbia, is properly Ricardo—not Richard, as it appeared in several places. The Kochel number of the Mozart Mass in C minor (from which Hedwig von Debicka’s record of “Et Incarnatus Est” was reviewed by K. B. M.) is correctly K. 427.