Rimsky Korsakov :Scheherazade

[Tony Halstead]

Then you haven't heard the Silvestri recording with Rodney Senior playing that trumpet part.

HS

Seconded!

[visualnickmos]

I've got two recordings of Scheherazade; Reiner and Svetlanov

After reading the comments here I'm going to try and borrow Kondrashin from my Mother.

You won't want to give it back!

Another fine version - given that this is a work I cannot get to grips with - is Ozawa and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. In fact I've just "talked" myself into giving it another bash - maybe this time I'll crack it!

[Barbirollians]

Ha ha that is what I was going to say - if I were Madame Suggia's mother I would offer to let my daughter listen to it at my house !

[Ferretfancy]

You won't want to give it back!

Another fine version - given that this is a work I cannot get to grips with - is Ozawa and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. In fact I've just "talked" myself into giving it another bash - maybe this time I'll crack it!

visual nickmos

Just what is it that you need to crack? Rimsky used his melodic and rhythmic gifts to produce a brightly coloured and enjoyable work which can either be heard as a pictorial tale, or simply for its vigour and spectacle. After all, he didn't deal in profundities here, but aimed to please. If ever there was a piece where all you need to do is go with the flow, this is it.
It's true it can sometimes seem a bit repetitive in a less than committed performance. Charles Dutoit bored the pants off me at an Albert Hall performance a few years back ( Not a Prom appearance ) Still, this might also apply to Schubert's Great C major in the wrong hands.

Perhaps you should not try so hard, it is supposed to be enjoyable after all.

[BBMmk2]

Absolutely Ferret!! I just let this ,music just come to me!! It flows like a river, with excitement, over the rapids or meandering gently as it nears journeys end to the sea! Maybe to meet up with Sinbad?

[HighlandDougie]

There's an interesting HIP performance with Midori Seiler and Jos Van Immerseel on Zig Zag....you also get the lovely Great Russian Easter Festival overture and the Borodin Polovtsian Dances.

I had forgotten about this performance and, ever ready to continue my recent infatuation with Anima Eterna/Jos van Immerseel, ordered from the tax-dodgers on reading Micky's post and received at lunchtime. While the orchestral sound lacks the heft of, say, Beecham or Kletzki, it has all the usual AE/JvI characteristics of great clarity, immaculate orchestral playing and great sound from the wonderful Bruges Concert Hall, plus Midori Seiler's beautiful solos. It's like taking an old master and removing coats of browning varnish to reveal something fresh and new underneath. OK, gushing over, it's also a very fine performance, with, if anything, the Russian Easter Festival overture being even finer. Very well worth hearing as an adjunct to the usual suspects. Thanks, Micky.

[visualnickmos]

visual nickmos

Just what is it that you need to crack?...........Perhaps you should not try so hard, it is supposed to be enjoyable after all.

I think all I meant to say was that I find it difficult to react or respond to it, in terms of how I feel on listening. But I will take your valuable advice, and give it another spin (Kondrashin) and NOT try to hard - just let myself hear the sound it makes.
Thanks, Nick

[Barbirollians]

OT I know but I was very disappointed with Immerseel's much praised Symphonie Fantastique .

[MickyD]

I had forgotten about this performance and, ever ready to continue my recent infatuation with Anima Eterna/Jos van Immerseel, ordered from the tax-dodgers on reading Micky's post and received at lunchtime. While the orchestral sound lacks the heft of, say, Beecham or Kletzki, it has all the usual AE/JvI characteristics of great clarity, immaculate orchestral playing and great sound from the wonderful Bruges Concert Hall, plus Midori Seiler's beautiful solos. It's like taking an old master and removing coats of browning varnish to reveal something fresh and new underneath. OK, gushing over, it's also a very fine performance, with, if anything, the Russian Easter Festival overture being even finer. Very well worth hearing as an adjunct to the usual suspects. Thanks, Micky.

You're welcome, Dougie. Like you, I am highly enthusiastic about Immerseel's discs, especially when he tackles romantic repertoire. One recording I haven't yet heard is his Tchaikovsky 4th and extracts from "The Nutcracker". Have you given it a listen and would you be as similarly enthusiastic? I agree about the Russian Easter Festival overture, there are some lovely colours to be savoured on the disc.

[HighlandDougie]

That Symphonie Fantastique (those Erard pianos ) equally turned me off but their Debussy made me re-listen to their Ravel (otherwise gathering dust) and then I bought their Poulenc (pretty good) and then the Beethoven cycle, which I now think of as the Cluytens cycle de nos jours (better recorded than the otherwise admirable Bruggen). In music which is masterfully orchestrated (like Scheherezade), van Immerseel's approach and the timbre of the orchestra make it well worth a listen. I'd never want to abandon the sound of the Concertgebouw in full cry but I've been getting immense pleasure from their colleagues just across the Belgian border.

[MickyD]

And don't forget the delightful disc of Johann Strauss waltzes and polkas they did just a few years ago...I wish they would do another.

[HighlandDougie]

You're welcome, Dougie. Like you, I am highly enthusiastic about Immerseel's discs, especially when he tackles romantic repertoire. One recording I haven't yet heard is his Tchaikovsky 4th and extracts from "The Nutcracker".

Not heard it but duly ordered from amazon uk (it was cheap).

[clive heath]

I've seen Gergiev conduct it three times (Philharmonia, Kirov/ Mariinsky, World Orchestra for Peace) and they were all excellent (the Philharmonia one being unforgettable, paired with an incandescent Firebird). What the Philips engineers were thinking is beyond me - there's seemingly a layer of artificial reverberation which ruins the performance. I think Andrew McGregor described it as a performance recorded in a Turkish bath! It was slightly less troublesome on SACD, I recall, than the red-book CD layer. I wonder if they'd ever consider reissuing it in a remastered form, assuming that the reverb can be removed?

referring back to #29 and#33 (from which the quote comes). This sounds as though it might just be that the two channels are out of phase which gives a disembodied effect. The Mariinsky theatre isn't particularly resonant ( we saw "Aida" there).

[PJPJ]

The only time I heard this recording it sounded far worse than being out of phase can account for, as far as I can remember.

[silvestrione]

So heartening to see Silvestri getting so much positive attention. Though that's not quite right, Waldhorn's list reminding us that great performances involve rather more than a conductor.

I heard the BSO perform this work in the Winter Gardens under Silvestri, at a very impressionable age (probably late teens): needed to go out and walk by the sea in the dark afterwards, before going home.

(Those of us who have the Disky 10 CD box, as well as other EMI CDs, will have mostly duplications if we go for the Icon box: I had rather hoped the Berlioz Symphonie Fantastique would be issued separately, never having been on CD. I'm not sure any other 'first time' material will be there)