Miklós Rózsa - Orchestral Works Vol. 1 (Rumon Gamba)

Information

Composer: Miklós Rózsa

• Overture to a Symphony Concert, Op. 26a
• Three Hungarian Sketches, Op. 14
• Tripartita, Op. 33
• Hungarian Serenade, Op. 25

BBC Philharmonic Orchestra

Rumon Gamba, conductor

Date: 2008

Label: Chandos

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Review

Rózsa’s list of concert works (those bearing opus numbers) amounts to under half his 95 film scores. Although Rózsa maintained a divide between his two compositional careers, Andrew Knowles’s assertion in the booklet that the composer “never incorporated music from his film scores into his concert works” needs qualification in light of the Spellbound Concerto’s popularity, even if this was never dignified with an opus number. And, of course, he reworked his Violin Concerto as the music to The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (Tadlow, 7/07).

None of the four works here has connections with the cinema although Rózsa’s Kodály-esque concert platform and silver-screen styles did not differ much. The earliest item is the Three Hungarian Sketches, a vibrant Capriccio, Pastorale and Danza which constituted the official Hungarian entry for the 1938 ISCM Festival. A major offering, it is more substantial than the slightly longer Hungarian Serenade, a post-war reworking of the Op 10 Serenade and some early piano pieces, which is essentially superior light music.

Rózsa’s Hungarian roots, which never dimmed during his long exile, were rarely expressed with as much pathos as in the Overture to a Symphony Concert, conceived during the hopeful days of the abortive 1956 Hungarian revolution. Revised in 1963, this is a bright and positive score which would grace any concert programme. Most impressive of all is the Tripartita (1971, rev 1972), its constituent Intrada, Intermezzo and rather Waltonian Finale showing Rózsa developing in a new direction late in his career. Excellent performances and superlative sound make this a most enjoyable overture to what should prove a most worthwhile enterprise.

— Guy Rickards

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Miklós Rózsa (April 18, 1907 – July 27, 1995) was a Hungarian-American composer, best known for his nearly one hundred film scores. Born in Budapest, he studied at the Leipzig Conservatory and achieved early success with both concert and film music. The latter brought him to Hollywood, and Rózsa remained in the United States, becoming an American citizen in 1946. During his Hollywood career, he received three Oscars for Spellbound (1945), A Double Life (1947), and Ben-Hur (1959), while his concert works were championed by such major artists as Jascha Heifetz, Gregor Piatigorsky, and János Starker.

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Rumon Gamba (born 24 November 1972) is a British conductor. He studied music at Durham University, and then went to the Royal Academy of Music in London. In 1998, he joined the BBC Philharmonic as its Assistant Conductor, and later became Associate Conductor. He left the orchestra in 2002. Gamba was Chief Conductor and Music Director of the Iceland Symphony Orchestra from 2002 to 2010, and chief conductor of the Aalborg Symphony Orchestra from 2011 to 2015. In January 2022, Gamba became chief conductor of the Oulu Symphony Orchestra. He has made over 50 CDs of for the Chandos Records label.

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