“ECHOES OF TIME’’ Lisa Batiashvili, violin Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra Esa-Pekka Salonen, conductor Deutsche Grammophon
With the Soviet Union receding further into the past, few among the rising generation of musicians have tangible lived memories of its cultural life. For the talented young Georgian violinist Lisa Batiashvili, Shostakovich’s music, performed by her father’s string quartet, was the stuff of childhood memories. She was born in 1979 and moved from Georgia when she was 11. In Germany, however, her teacher was Mark Lubotsky, a devoted former student of the great violinist David Oistrakh, for whom Shostakovich wrote both of his violin concertos.
Oistrakh’s own playing of these works cannot be surpassed, but it’s nice to see a player born after his death remain so inspired by his legacy. This thoughtfully conceived and beautifully realized disc opens with a formidable account of the First Violin Concerto, one that conveys the gravity and pathos of the majestically tragic Passacaglia and catches the sharp edges as well as the irrepressible energy of the coruscating Burlesque.
Batiashvili rounds out the disc with “V & V,’’ a haunting, contemplative work for violin and taped voice by the Georgian composer Giya Kancheli; Arvo Pärt’s mystically spare “Spiegel im Spiegel’’ (“Mirror in the Mirror’’) performed with pianist Hélène Grimaud; a short Shostakovich waltz; and a sensitively spun account of Rachmaninoff’s Vocalise (Op. 34, No. 14).
BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, CHARLES MUNCH, CONDUCTOR
One is struck by how white and male the orchestra was. There is flutist Doriot Anthony Dwyer, first woman to win a principal chair in a major US orchestra surrounded by middle-aged, portly, and Brylcreemed gentlemen, playing with exceptional vigor, precision, and unanimity. The Boston Symphony was at a high point in the late 1950s and early 1960s, when these WGBH-TV broadcasts from Sanders Theatre were made. The kinescopes have been cleaned up by Austrian engineers and released on DVD by ICA Classics, in a collaborative effort with the BSO and WGBH. These three DVDs are the first in a new set of 32 to be released over the next three seasons, and capture the BSO at a high point with Charles Munch, its music director then, in performances from 1958 to 1961. The other 29 will explore the televised legacy through PBS’s “Evening at Symphony’’ broadcasts from the late 1970s with Seiji Ozawa.
The sound is, predictably, unlovely. The camera work, however, is pretty good, with lots of canny focus on the active choirs, and of course the conductor. From looking at him, one has to wonder how Munch ever got the results he did. His gestures are choppy and vertical, as if he were being manipulated by a puppet-master. It’s his smile that tells you how much he loves the music and his musicians. Munch had already been music director for a decade, and he and the orchestra had already made many great recordings for RCA’s “Living Stereo’’ brand, including a famous 1956 “La Mer.’’ (Many have been rereleased on SACD.)
The French music is hardest to hear. The TV recording loses the soft colors and textures, and woodwind solos are distorted in pitch and tone. Still, one is amazed by the overall precision and the bold entries — the muted trumpets rat-a-tatting as the climax approaches in “La Mer,’’ for example. The steady crescendo at the end is all the more exciting because the textures are so clear — indeed everything seems to get brighter and clearer, in perfect balance.
The Beethoven disc is exciting, even with poor sound. Munch was an Alsatian, and adept in both German and French traditions. In the Fifth Symphony, he sets a tone of slow graciousness that coexists with passages of raw, peasant-dancing vigor. The tension is fascinating. The Fourth Symphony is brisk and vivid. DAVID PERKINS
BACEWICZ: PIANO QUINTETS NOS. 1 AND 2; PIANO SONATA NO. 2
Nevertheless, this is a stunningly gorgeous recording. Bacewicz, who died in 1969, had the ability to build tonal edifices (as in the First Quintet, from 1952) without sounding beholden or jaded, and then adopt avant-garde techniques (in the 1965 Second Quintet) without losing the expressivity of her dark, flinty lyricism. The performances of both the chamber music and the Piano Sonata, a soul-searching showpiece, breathe and phrase beautifully: splendid advocacy of music well worth advocating.
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