Barber: Orchestral Works, Vol. 1 - Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2
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CD Details
Composer: Samuel BarberConductor: Marin Alsop
Orchestra: Royal Scottish National Orchestra
Edition: Music CD
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language)
CD Release Date: 2000-06-13
Music Label: Naxos
Soundtracks:
- The School For Scandal Ov, Op.5
- Sym No.1, Op.9 (in One Mvt): Allegro Ma Noon Troppo
- Sym No.1, Op.9 (in One Mvt): Allegro Molto
- Sym No.1, Op.9 (in One Mvt): Andante Tranquillo
- First Essay, Op.12
- Sym No.2, Op.19: Allegro Ma Non Troppo
- Sym No.2, Op.19: Andante, Un Poco Mosso
- Sym No.2, Op.19: Presto, Senza Battuto - Allegro Risoluto
Music reviews of Barber: Orchestral Works, Vol. 1 - Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2
Music Review: A New Case for Barber's Second
Rating: 5 Stars
"Unashamed musical romanticism expressed in a kind of musical water-colour technique: clear, transparent shades... This is what one finds in the best of Barber." So said Colin Wilson in "Chords and Discords" (1963) about the music of Samuel Barber (1910-1981). The mid-1960s, when Wilson wrote, probably constituted the low-point of Barber's reputation; the atonalists had risen to their intolerant ascendancy and opinion-setters tended to worship at the altar of Elliot Carter. Bear in mind, however, that Wilson was defending Barber: "The early First Symphony is a singing, tunelful work that seems to express the vitality of young America more effectively than Harris... Barber is a genuine musical talent." Barber has triumphed (posthumously and in his minor way) over the post-war reaction against him for precisely those quality that Wilson admires. He wrote in an unabashedly romantic style, with roots in Tchaikovsky and Mahler, that established an immediate connection with listeners. Not for no reason did the Adagio from the First String Quartet become the unofficial funeral music for the passing of American presidents. The emotion is clear, it is obvious, and the articulation of it wastes nothing. Barber was oddly his own most severe critic. While serving in the Army Air Force in World War Two, he received the commission (1943) to compose a Second Symphony in honor of America's airmen. A few years after its premiere (1947), however, Barber withdrew it. He had established a reputation, he explained, as the composer of highly compressed works in a neo-romantic idiom, and the three-movement symphony struck him as formally out of character. (And yet he had already written the three-movement Violin Concerto.) After the composer's death, the score, thought to have been destroyed, turned up, and conductor Andrew Schenck decided to revive it with his New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. The CD became something of a phenomenon. Since then it has been recorded a number of times. Naxos now gives us a CD containing both of Barber's symphonies along with the "School for Scandal" (1933) Overture and the First Essay for Orchestra (1938). Marin Alsop leads the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. The First Symphony (1936) is so familiar and so oft-recorded that one hardly needs to describe it. Alsop competes against a fairly large field. Slatkin, with the St. Louis Symphony, achieves a weightier effect in the opening Allegro Non Troppo, but Alsop's Allegro Molto (the scherzo of this one-movement work), has a scurrying tenseness to it that I like. In the concluding Andante Tranquillo (a passacaglia-cum-finale), I find Slatkin more convincing. Alsop's build-up could be more graduated than it is. But this is by no means to dismiss Alsop's interpretation. In the Second Symphony, Alsop faces fewer competitors - the composer himself in a long vanished performance that has never made it to CD, Schenck, and Neeme Järvi. The Second is definitely a more ambitious work than the First. It is more "modern" in sound and more combative in character. Where the First employs a passacaglia for the finale, the Second uses, not quite a fugue, but an extended fugato. In the Second, Alsop equals the competition. She makes as good a case for the work as has been made previously. The RSNO has a feel for brightly colored music (they have been recording the Bax symphonies under David Lloyd-Jones) and they know what to do with Barber's brass-dominated, percussively underlined, textures. The First Essay receives an appropriately dark interpretation. The ghost of Sibelius hovers in the background. Are there any bad performances of the "School for Scandal" Overture? If so, I haven't heard one. Whatever its failing, Barber's Second remains a considerable work. This is a painless way to get to know it. Take advantage of the budget price.
Description of Barber: Orchestral Works, Vol. 1 - Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2
All products are BRAND NEW and factory sealed. Fast shipping and 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed.As composers go, Samuel Barber's output was rather small, and of that output only a few pieces have any kind of currency. But those few are major orchestral gems. Barber's music does require an adept and sympathetic orchestra (and conductor) to get them just right, however. On this release, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, with Marin Alsop conducting, handily accomplishes that task. Their rendering of The School for Scandal Overture rivals the famous Schippers version, and Alsop's take on Symphony No. 1 easily demolishes the Järvi (on Chandos) and the Slatkin (on BMG). The underexposed and rarely performed First Essay for Orchestra has no rivals here at all. Of particular merit is Alsop's handling of the mercurial Symphony No. 2, which so troubled Barber that he later disavowed it. Barber completists will relish this sympathetic reading. --Paul Cook
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