R.Strauss Ein Heldenleben; Tod und Verklärung
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Richard Strauss
Label: Valois
Magazine Review Date: 2/1997
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 75
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: V4763
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (Ein) Heldenleben, '(A) Hero's Life' |
Richard Strauss, Composer
Alain Lombard, Conductor Bordeaux-Aquitaine National Orchestra Richard Strauss, Composer |
| Tod und Verklärung |
Richard Strauss, Composer
Alain Lombard, Conductor Bordeaux-Aquitaine National Orchestra Richard Strauss, Composer |
Author:
Few discs pair these works, but when one of them is a reprocessed recoupling of Karajan’s Gramophone Award-winning Tod with his expansive, albeit synthetic-sounding, digital Heldenleben, this new Auvidis production needs to be very good indeed to compete at premium price. Alas, with just one track per piece (a throwback to the early digital era), Alain Lombard’s CD doesn’t give much help to the newcomer traversing these scores for the first time. Nor is the booklet-note especially enlightening: “[Ein Heldenleben] is also, no doubt, the finest tone poem in the series”. It is? We are also informed that “the composer demonstrates his talent for timbre in the wind section: flutes, oboes, tubas etc.” No doubt something has been lost in the translating.
What initially struck me as a fairly brisk opening tempo for Heldenleben proved misleading: at 48'02'', this is one of the slower readings on record. For those who find Barbirolli’s evident love of the score bordering on the self-indulgent, Lombard’s coolness may come as something of a relief (and the performance is arguably preferable to Sawallisch’s despite his orchestra’s smaller sonority). That said, the love scene is more robust than ardent, the solo violin treating Pauline’s music as a cadenza and attempting little in the way of characterization even if the ungainly low notes verge on comic parody. This is no match for Michel Schwalbe in Karajan’s 1959 account. Nor can the French strings really compete with the Berliners (although the orchestral playing is generally good): the post-coital glow sounds rather chilly, and the orchestra set off for the battlefield with a tangible sense of relief. Shifting sonic perspectives here reflect over-engineering rather than the vicissitudes of battle. The bittersweet coda (from 41'00'') is too literal, lacking any sense of poignancy, something which also mars the opening of Tod, where the effect is one of mere metrical accuracy. In the ensuing Allegro molto agitato, the occasional thump from the podium is retained as if to provide evidence of the conductor’s commitment, but the performance never really catches fire. And the long, high-lying phrases of the Verklarung tax the Bordeaux violins.
While this is a generous coupling, notably well prepared and often carefully recorded to maximize orchestral detail, you won’t find the authority and attack of the very best. Lombard’s unfussy, no-nonsense approach is not quite enough.'
What initially struck me as a fairly brisk opening tempo for Heldenleben proved misleading: at 48'02'', this is one of the slower readings on record. For those who find Barbirolli’s evident love of the score bordering on the self-indulgent, Lombard’s coolness may come as something of a relief (and the performance is arguably preferable to Sawallisch’s despite his orchestra’s smaller sonority). That said, the love scene is more robust than ardent, the solo violin treating Pauline’s music as a cadenza and attempting little in the way of characterization even if the ungainly low notes verge on comic parody. This is no match for Michel Schwalbe in Karajan’s 1959 account. Nor can the French strings really compete with the Berliners (although the orchestral playing is generally good): the post-coital glow sounds rather chilly, and the orchestra set off for the battlefield with a tangible sense of relief. Shifting sonic perspectives here reflect over-engineering rather than the vicissitudes of battle. The bittersweet coda (from 41'00'') is too literal, lacking any sense of poignancy, something which also mars the opening of Tod, where the effect is one of mere metrical accuracy. In the ensuing Allegro molto agitato, the occasional thump from the podium is retained as if to provide evidence of the conductor’s commitment, but the performance never really catches fire. And the long, high-lying phrases of the Verklarung tax the Bordeaux violins.
While this is a generous coupling, notably well prepared and often carefully recorded to maximize orchestral detail, you won’t find the authority and attack of the very best. Lombard’s unfussy, no-nonsense approach is not quite enough.'
R.Strauss Ein Heldenleben; Tod und Verklärung
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