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-IStravinsky: An Unusual CollectionStravinsky: Conducts ChoralMusic, various ensembles and performers; (Columbia).It is difficult to give complete approval to the oddly titled (it’s not all choral music!) Columbia album, the latest addition to their “Stravinsky Conducts Stravinsky” series. One can hardly question the value of five new Stravinsky premieres: the Peasant Songs, Ave Maria, Credo, and Pater Noster, as well as the 1941 arrangement of the Star Spangled Banner have never before been documented on records. Several old friends are back, as well, including Babel, Von Himmel Hoch (after Bach), Renard, and Zvez-doliki which have been rescued from the mail order depths of the Columbia Special Products catalog, the haven reserved for weil-con-ceived records that just don’t Veil.The one selection on this album which seems wholly inexplicable is the Four Russian Songs, already available in the same performance on Columbia. This piece-shuffling can be somewhat disconcerting. IsColumbia trying to tell us that Stravinsky is just not marketable enough, that they are rearranging and re-releasing these pieces in different forms in order to find one that people will buy? Or is it possible that they are sitting on their hot little unreleased I.S. tapes, waiting to feed them to a ravenous public, not in pure form, but rather cut with more previously released performances? And while I’m ragging on Columbia, I think that Adrienne Albert, who sing£ the Four Russian Songs (all by herself), should be offended by the implication that she alone constitutes a chorus.Conceptually, this album is slightly schizoid. It purports to be a choral record, yet it contains several works which are not even vaguely for chorus; it is in some ways a new album, yet the major portion of it is comprised of previously released recordings. Quality-wise, however, there is no such dichotomy. All of the pieces are given the definitive treatment par for this series. The Gregg Smith Singers give a nimbleand rhythmically graceful performance of the Peasant Songs, the three religious pieces are delivered with poignant reserve, which suits their folksy, plaintive style. The Zvezdoliki is cool and ordered, and this Renard, re-released after being coupled with a somewhat unsuccessful English-speaking version of Les Noces (the one with the four superstar pianists), is still the quickest, snappiest version ever—as well as being the only English-speaking performance in memory where one could understand half the words.If one is not particularly disturbed by the fact that these pieces are not all choral works, and that, if a dedicated Igorphile, he will have to bear some doubling up in his record collection, this album should provide no problem at all. These are all well-crafted recordings against which (with the possible exception of the Star Spangled Banner,) one willhave a difficult time building0resistance.—PHILIP LEROY KLINE
Newspaper Details
New York Columbia Spectator
New York, New York, US
Thu, Sep 28, 1972
Page 4
Full Page
Clipped by
Wikipedia U.
USA 02 Dec 2022
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