A belated thank you for your support, Antonio.

Monday, May 8, 2023

Camille Saint-Saëns - Symphonies, Vol. 1 (Jean-Jacques Kantorow)


Information

Composer: Camille Saint-Saëns
  • Symphony in A Major, R. 159
  • Symphony No. 1 in E-Flat Major, Op. 2, R. 161
  • Symphony No. 2 in A Minor, Op. 55

Orchestre Philharmonique Royal de Liège
Jean-Jacques Kantorow, conductor

Date: 2021

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Review

The more I hear Saint-Saëns’s youthful symphonies, the more impressive they seem. If the various influences he absorbed are readily apparent – Schumann, say, in the lyrical introduction to the Symphony in A (composed in 1850, when Saint-Saëns was just 15 and a student at the Paris Conservatoire), or Mendelssohn in the Second Symphony’s Italianate tarantella finale – there are myriad ingenious passages, too. For example, I don’t believe there’s a model for the playfully fluttering flute solo that concludes the A major Symphony’s first movement. And although the luminous descending motif for high strings at 3'00" in the First Symphony’s opening movement appears to echo the Prelude to La traviata, it’s highly improbable that Saint-Saëns had heard Verdi’s opera, as its Venice premiere predated the Symphony by just a few months. Indeed, what’s most consistently delightful in these scores is Saint-Saëns’s eagerness to experiment with orchestral colour and texture, whether he’s painting in fine detail (try starting at 2'42" in the First Symphony’s Marche-Scherzo) or with bolder, more sombre strokes (as in the organ-like figuration of the Second’s opening movement).

Jean-Jacques Kantorow elicits stylish playing from Liège’s RPO, although some of his startlingly brisk tempos push them to their limit (the Second’s Prestissimo finale is even faster here – and a lot less tidy – than in his 1997 account with the Tapiola Sinfonietta, also on BIS). Generally, I find more to savour in the spaciousness of Thierry Fischer’s interpretations, especially as the Utah Symphony are at the top of their game. Listen, for instance, at 1'26" in the Adagio of the First, where Kantorow focuses on the passion of the pulsing horns, while Fischer, heeding the composer’s lusingando marking, has the halting violin line sound like a caress, evoking an atmosphere of breathtaking intimacy.

Don’t get me wrong, this new BIS disc offers considerable enjoyment, but Fischer’s series – enhanced by Hyperion’s gorgeously pellucid sound – pinpoints what’s special about these long-neglected symphonies.

-- Andrew Farach-Colton, Gramophone


----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Camille Saint-Saëns (9 October 1835 – 16 December 1921) was a French composer, organist, conductor and pianist. Saint-Saëns was a musical prodigy, making his concert debut at the age of ten. He was a successful freelance pianist and composer, in demand in Europe and the Americas. His best-known works include his concertos, his 3rd symphony, Danse macabre and The Carnival of the Animals. Saint-Saëns was enthusiastic for the most modern music of the day, although his own compositions were generally within a conventional classical tradition. Saint-Saëns' students included Gabriel Fauré.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camille_Saint-Sa%C3%ABns

***

Jean-Jacques Kantorow (born 3 October 1945 in Cannes) is a French violin virtuoso and conductor. In the 1960s he won ten major international prizes, including first prizes in the Carl Flesch Competition (London), the (Genoa) Paganini Competition, and the Geneva International Competition. Since the 1970s he has been noted for his solo performances in a very wide range of repertoire, and as a chamber music performer. His recordings have won many awards. He plays a Stradivarius attributed violin, the ‘ex-Leopold Auer’, dated 1699. In the 1980s he began a separate career as conductor.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Jacques_Kantorow

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

FLAC, tracks
Links in comment
Enjoy!

2 comments:

  1. Choose one link, copy and paste it to your browser's address bar, wait a few seconds (you may need to click 'Continue' first), then click 'Free Access with Ads' / 'Get link'. Complete the steps / captchas if require.
    If you are asked to download or install anything, IGNORE, only download from file hosting site (mega.nz).
    If MEGA shows 'Bandwidth Limit Exceeded' message, try to create a free account.

    https://direct-link.net/610926/saint-saens-symphonies-v1
    or
    https://uii.io/kGBzCoFQ
    or
    https://exe.io/0tyjq99

    ReplyDelete