L'oiseau De Feu (Jansons, Royal Concertgebouw Orch.)

PRODUCT DESCRIPTION
RCO 08002; RCO LIVE - Olanda; Classica Orchestrale

REVIEW
If you pull up to a respectable-looking couple at the traffic lights and see them banging their heads like something out of Wayne s World , they will probably be listening to Mariss Jansons s recording of Le sacre du printemps with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. This visceral account confirms that Jansons and the RCO enjoy the most thrilling conductor-orchestra partnership around. Flawless tuning, searing articulation, unflagging energy and sumptuous sound combine to devastating effect. Together with a seductive reading of L Oiseau de feu , this is Stravinsky to make the most venerable heads bang. --Anna Picard, Independent on Sunday, 29 June 2008

The Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra has always traded on the subtleties of its instrumental sounds, which has made it ideal for interpreting such widely diverse music as Bruckner and Ravel.

It puts this distinctive colour to good use in Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, reminding us that there is far more to the work than the crash, bang and wallop of its climactic dances.

Mariss Jansons has obviously gone to some care to realise the detail of the composer's orchestral picture, so that in the famous melee in Part 1, for example, where numerous different metres are set against each other, you feel you can hear every one of them. And the gradually massing counterpoint of melodic ideas that leads off from the opening bassoon solo is expertly balanced.

If this suggests an over-crafted performance, the result is far from the case: while it might not have the edge-of-seat danger that some accounts can still convey, nearly a century after the score's infamous premiere, it still has plenty of visceral power and rhythmic bite.

The orchestra's sound is also ideal for the more Romantic sound-world of The Firebird. But the one bone of contention with this release is that nowhere, apart from buried deep in the booklet note, does it spell out that it is the 1919 suite being played, rather than the full-length ballet. But this slip can almost be forgiven by the sheer quality of the music-making. Even more than in the Rite, the textures have wonderful luminosity and the playing itself is remarkably opulent - in the limpid phrasing of the "Ronde des princesses", for instance - and rhythmically vital in the "Danse infernale".

In both works, the Amsterdam Concertgebouw's famous acoustics, magically caught by the engineering team, illuminate and enhance the orchestra's playing. --Matthew Rye, Daily Telegraph, 12 July 2008

Number of Discs: 1

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