Dukas OrchestrL Works
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Paul (Abraham) Dukas
Label: Red Seal
Magazine Review Date: 5/1999
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 71
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 09026 68802-2
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| Symphony |
Paul (Abraham) Dukas, Composer
French National Orchestra Leonard Slatkin, Conductor Paul (Abraham) Dukas, Composer |
| (L')Apprenti sorcier, '(The) Sorcerer's Apprentice |
Paul (Abraham) Dukas, Composer
French National Orchestra Leonard Slatkin, Conductor Paul (Abraham) Dukas, Composer |
| (La) Péri |
Paul (Abraham) Dukas, Composer
French National Orchestra Leonard Slatkin, Conductor Paul (Abraham) Dukas, Composer |
Author: John Steane
In the best Franckian tradition, Dukas’s three-movement Symphony is as abstract as his symphonic poem is vividly narrative, which is why The Sorcerer’s Apprentice (a symphonic poem in all but name) is ‘not quite imaginable as the Symphony’s missing scherzo’, as Grove neatly puts it. Both works are from the mid-1890s. And from over a decade later, the ballet La peri is something else again. A poeme dansee in which glittering Russian Nationalist orientalism, and later Salome’s Dance, merge with French late romantic impressionism, the end result hinting at, among other things, Ravel’s La valse to come. The orchestration is a wonder; Dukas himself said he wanted it to be like ‘a kind of dazzling, translucent enamel’.
Here, as always in Slatkin’s best work, structure is powerfully attended to, the texture has a beautiful sheen, and the whole disc confirms him as an exceptional stylist. The two most recent recordings of Dukas’s extrovert and eventually deliriously happy Symphony were both conducted by Frenchmen – Jean Fournet (Denon, 6/93 – nla) and Yan-Pascal Tortelier – yet in the weighting and scale of the orchestral sound, and the way lines and surface detail are projected, accentuated and articulated, Slatkin sounds marginally more French than either of them, the textures and timbres a degree more vibrant and varied. His orchestra is French, of course (theirs were Dutch and English respectively), and his recording is also less reverberant than theirs. And all of these elements enhance appreciation of the Symphony’s brilliantly active, flaring orchestration and its fundamentally classical stance. While Tortelier’s perspectives may be deeper in the shimmering landscapes and poetic melancholy of the slow movement, Slatkin’s performance on the whole – and particularly in the finale, whose sustained energy levels compare with Dvorak’s Carnival Overture – is slightly better geared and ‘gathered’.
If you have either of the earlier discs – Fournet’s coupled as here, or Tortelier’s, which is less generously coupled with Dukas’s Polyeucte Overture – there is no urgent need to acquire this new one. But if you haven’t yet investigated this intensely self-critical composer’s surviving orchestral output (in total, about an hour-and-a-half!), Slatkin’s is now the most accomplished option.'
Here, as always in Slatkin’s best work, structure is powerfully attended to, the texture has a beautiful sheen, and the whole disc confirms him as an exceptional stylist. The two most recent recordings of Dukas’s extrovert and eventually deliriously happy Symphony were both conducted by Frenchmen – Jean Fournet (Denon, 6/93 – nla) and Yan-Pascal Tortelier – yet in the weighting and scale of the orchestral sound, and the way lines and surface detail are projected, accentuated and articulated, Slatkin sounds marginally more French than either of them, the textures and timbres a degree more vibrant and varied. His orchestra is French, of course (theirs were Dutch and English respectively), and his recording is also less reverberant than theirs. And all of these elements enhance appreciation of the Symphony’s brilliantly active, flaring orchestration and its fundamentally classical stance. While Tortelier’s perspectives may be deeper in the shimmering landscapes and poetic melancholy of the slow movement, Slatkin’s performance on the whole – and particularly in the finale, whose sustained energy levels compare with Dvorak’s Carnival Overture – is slightly better geared and ‘gathered’.
If you have either of the earlier discs – Fournet’s coupled as here, or Tortelier’s, which is less generously coupled with Dukas’s Polyeucte Overture – there is no urgent need to acquire this new one. But if you haven’t yet investigated this intensely self-critical composer’s surviving orchestral output (in total, about an hour-and-a-half!), Slatkin’s is now the most accomplished option.'
Dukas OrchestrL Works
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