César Franck; Igor Stravinsky - Symphony; Pétrouchka (Pierre Monteux)

Information

Composer: César Franck; Igor Stravinsky

• Franck - Symphony in D minor, M. 48
• Stravinsky - Pétrouchka

Chicago Symphony Orchestra

Boston Symphony Orchestra

Pierre Monteux, conductor

Date: 1961; 1959 / 2005

Label: RCA

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Review

RCA's Living Stereo recordings were always legendary for their high fidelity sound.  In this new DSD remastering - heard as a stereo disc rather than as an SACD - these recordings sound better than ever. There’s a real top-to-bottom clarity that belies the age of the master tapes.  According to the liner notes, the SACD adds a centre channel to the stereo left and right, which should enhance the perspective of instrumental entries, but you should not be deterred from buying this disc if you will hear it in stereo only.

Monteux's Franck D Minor with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra is one of his best ever recordings of any repertoire with any orchestra.  This is a reading to make you forget any faults in the work's form or thematic material as it sweeps you away with its energy and enthusiasm.  Not that Monteux's is a rabble-rousing, hell-for-leather affair like Munch's Boston recording: also for RCA and recently re-released at mid-price.  Monteux is more subtle, more French.  He knows when to let the music simmer, as with the very opening of the first movement, and when to pull out the stops and let the big organ-like sonority of this symphony rip; Franck, like Bruckner, was an organist of renown.  His tempo fluctuations seem perfect and he plays the music - especially the difficult adagio/scherzo central movement - with charm, turning corners with elegance.  Throughout, Reiner's Chicago Symphony Orchestra give Monteux their full attention and the benefit of their considerable skill.  Like their dour Hungarian chief, Monteux was one of the great stick technicians of the last century.  This orchestra made many fine recordings for Reiner, but they clearly enjoy playing for Monteux and there is a warmth in their playing as well as the expected pin-point accuracy.

There are other ways to play this symphony.  Munch blazes throughout.  Maazel is more incisive in his conception.  The better of his two recordings, made with the Cleveland Orchestra for Decca, is now available on Australian Eloquence.  If you love this piece, you will probably want one or both of those recordings, but you must have Monteux's.  If you do not know this piece yet, then you should let Monteux introduce you.  For Franckophiles young and old, Monteux's reading is essential.

After the Franck, it would be easy to view Petrouchka as merely a generous coupling, but this recording too has much to recommend it.

Monteux has a special authority in Petrouchka.  It was, after all, one of a glut of masterpieces of the early 20th century which Monteux premiered as house conductor of the Ballets Russes.  Monteux retained a special affection for this score and in his hands it emerges here fresh and imbued with Gallic charm.  The opening is more relaxed than has become the fashion, and the music smiles in a way that will surprise listeners more accustomed to the whip-lash, powerhouse readings that have latterly become so popular.  That said, Monteux does not let the music slacken – he substitutes dramatic for visceral tension.  The piece remains a narrative for him and he allows the characters to breathe and live.  Nowhere will you hear the tragi-comic puppet more sensitively portrayed.

The playing has sparkle and snap.  With the benevolent Frenchman at the rostrum, the individual players have room to characterise and phrase – the interplay between bassoon, flute and trumpet in the Valse movement is a case in point.  Monteux's divided violins also bring the string writing through clearly.  The difficult transitions are despatched so easily that you do not even notice them.

This Petrouchka will make you smile, and if you prefer to think of the score as a hard-driven virtuoso work for orchestra, Monteux's sensitive, balletic reading will take you by surprise.

In sum, an unsurpassed Franck D Minor and an excellent Petrouchka into the bargain.  Highly recommended.

— Tim Perry

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César Franck (10 December 1822 – 8 November 1890) was a composer, pianist, organist, and music teacher who worked in Paris during his adult life. As an organist he was particularly noted for his skill in improvisation. Franck is considered by many the greatest composer of organ music after Bach. Franck exerted a significant influence on music. He helped to renew and reinvigorate chamber music and developed the use of cyclic form. He became professor at the Paris Conservatoire in 1872, his pupils included Vincent d'Indy, Ernest Chausson, Louis Vierne, Charles Tournemire, Guillaume Lekeu and Henri Duparc.

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Igor Stravinsky (June 17, 1882 – April 6, 1971) was a Russian composer. Son of an operatic bass, he studied privately with Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov from 1902 to 1908. Soon after the impresario Sergei Diaghilev commissioned Stravinsky to write three ballets for the Ballets Russes: Firebird (1910), Petrushka (1911) and The Rite of Spring (1913). The last of which, with its shifting and audacious rhythms, was a landmark in music history. Later Stravinsky also adopted Neoclassicism and serialism in his composition. His major Neoclassical works include Oedipus rex (1927) and the Symphony of Psalms (1930).

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Pierre Monteux (4 April 1875 – 1 July 1964) was a French-American conductor. Trained at the Paris Conservatoire, he began his career as a violist, and rose to international prominence through his work with Ballets Russes, conducting premieres of Petrushka, Daphnis et Chloé, and The Rite of Spring. He later led major orchestras in Boston, Amsterdam, San Francisco and London, earning admiration for his interpretations of both French and German repertoire. Monteux was also an influential teacher who established conducting schools in France and Maine, mentoring conductors such as Lorin Maazel, Seiji Ozawa and André Previn.

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