Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances/Isle of the Dead/Rock
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Sergey Rachmaninov
Label: Finlandia
Magazine Review Date: 3/1998
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 71
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 0630-19091-2
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (The) Rock |
Sergey Rachmaninov, Composer
(Royal) Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra Andrew Davis, Conductor Sergey Rachmaninov, Composer |
| (The) Isle of the dead |
Sergey Rachmaninov, Composer
(Royal) Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra Andrew Davis, Conductor Sergey Rachmaninov, Composer |
| Symphonic Dances (orch) |
Sergey Rachmaninov, Composer
(Royal) Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra Andrew Davis, Conductor Sergey Rachmaninov, Composer |
Author:
Andrew Davis’s Rachmaninov is conscientious and well prepared but by no means competitive with the very best. Unless you want this particular programme I would be reluctant to recommend the disc given its premium price-tag. Davis makes things difficult for himself from the start in the Symphonic Dances with his deliberate interpretation of Rachmaninov’s Non allegro marking. He is not the only conductor to take this approach, but his orchestra does not have the weight of sonority to bring it off. There is in any case little passion below the surface: the music veers between the pallid and the cumbersome with expressive gestures carefully rationed yet sometimes seeming too emphatic. The special atmosphere of the nocturnal waltz proves elusive and, although the final dance has its attractions, less oppressive than usual with light and airy textures, its middle section lacks the proper feeling of autumnal regret. As for the final bars, the concluding stroke of the tam-tam is taken almost literally as a dotted crotchet, and its predecessors are allowed to resound just long enough to muddy the waters. Much less score-bound, Jansons’s recent version is in another class (the coupling is a very fine reading of the Third Symphony).
In the shorter pieces, Davis is again less taut than the ‘classic’ rivals listed above, eschewing his usual hell-for-leather tactics in the apparent pursuit of clean articulation. However atmospheric, the results are scarcely idiomatic and too often this cool, safety-first music-making has little more than translucent sound to commend it.'
In the shorter pieces, Davis is again less taut than the ‘classic’ rivals listed above, eschewing his usual hell-for-leather tactics in the apparent pursuit of clean articulation. However atmospheric, the results are scarcely idiomatic and too often this cool, safety-first music-making has little more than translucent sound to commend it.'
Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances/Isle of the Dead/Rock
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