Stravinsky - Apollo, The Rite Of Spring (City Of Birmingham Symphony Orch/Rattle, 1989)

Picked up this cracking little 80s recording recently for a couple of reasons: I like Rattle's Stravinsky in general, and also here was a work of Igor's that I hadn't heard before.  Apollo, or Apollon Musagète in its full original title, is a two-tableaux ballet dating to the late 1920s and centred around the Muses of Greek mythology.  The recording here by the Birmingham Symphony under Rattle is Stravinsky's 1947 revision of Apollo.  In contrast to the strident, outrageous in its time Rite, Apollo is gentle, lyrical and almost Romantically lush, making it a great fit for Rattle, with a great sounding orchestra.  The Rite Of Spring that accompanies Apollo on this disc is also the 1947 version, and doesn't go for over-the-top fireworks but brings out lots of nice subtleties.  A really enjoyable collection overall.

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Igor Stravinsky at SGTG:

Agon (plus bonus post: Firebird, Petroushka & Rite, Rattle 2017)

Aldous Huxley In Memoriam/Pribaoutki (live 2022)

Olivier Messiaen - Éclairs Sur L’Au-Delà... (2019)

A spellbinding rendering of Messiaen's final work, recorded last September in the Barbican, London.  Sir Simon Rattle starts by talking about how moving he found the work on first encounter, before leading the 128-strong LSO through the 11 movements of Messiaen's glimpse of eternity ("flashes over the beyond" is one translation of the title).

It's powerful, hallucinatory stuff, especially when the massed ranks of percussion come to the fore in the sixth section and the eighth, and just wonderously beautiful in the sections where Messiaen's trademark birdsong take the lead.  Éclairs definitely comes across as the work of a composer aware of his imminent mortality (he wouldn't live to see the premiere), but facing it down with the faith of someone who saw death as the raising of "the great curtain" that he visualised in this music.

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Previously posted at SGTG:
Quatre Études De Rythme
Des Canyons Aux Étoiles
Turangalîla Symphony / Quatour Pour La Fin Du Temps (EMI recordings cond. by Rattle)
Turangalîla Symphony / L'ascension (Naxos recording cond. by Wit)
Et Exspecto Ressurrectionem (Philips recording cond. by Haitink)
Et Exspecto Resurrectionem (Erato recording cond. by Boulez), etc

Olivier Messiaen - Turangalîla Symphonie / Quatuor Pour La Fin Du Temps (1987)

This classic double-disc release from the 80s came up in the comments last time I posted Messiaen, so about time I got around to posting it.  The pairing of Turangalîla with Quartet For The End Of Time brings together two of Messiaen's most celebrated masterpieces, and this set is also essential because it sounds so great, with world-class musicians all round.

Simon Rattle's take on Turangalîla is one of typically lush attention to detail, and makes for interesting side-by-side comparison with my personal favourite rendering under Antoni Wit (see links below), where everything is a bit more in-your-face.  The ondes Martenot does blend better with the orchestra in the Rattle version, I reckon - it's played here by Tristan Murail.

After such mind-meltingly colourful music comes the stark contrast of Quatour Pour La Fin Du Temps.  Famously written and premiered in a prisoner of war camp, the four players effortlessly evoke Messiaen's sombre but spiritually hopeful apocalypse.  The cello (Siegfried Palm) and piano (Aloys Kontarsky) duet sounds particularly affecting.  More Messiaen/Rattle next week.

Disc 1 link
Disc 2 link
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Previously posted at SGTG:
Quatre Études De Rythme
Des Canyons Aux Étoiles
Turangalîla Symphony / L'ascension (Naxos recording cond. by Wit)
Et Exspecto Ressurrectionem (Philips recording cond. by Haitink)
Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum (Erato recording cond. by Boulez), etc

Stravinsky - Agon / Schuller - 7 Studies On Themes Of Paul Klee (1966)

Been having a bit of a Stravinsky week, following a recent re-broadcast of the concert below.  But first, here's a great little record by the Boston Symphony Orchestra, which features one of the composer's later works.  Agon, completed in 1957, is a single-act ballet that dates from Stravinsky's late period when he started getting into twelve-tone rows.  It still features his flair for bold rhythms, loads of wild colour in the strings and brass, and has neat little solos for mandolin.  Reminded me of orchestral Zappa more than once, and really shows Stravinsky's influence on him.

Agon is paired on this album with Seven Studies On Themes Of Paul Klee (1959) by Gunter Schuller (1925-2015).  As well as a composer, Schuller was a jazz musician, playing on one of the Birth Of The Cool sessions, and doing occasional conducting of Mingus' work; Schuller is credited with coining the term "third stream" for the confluence of jazz and classical music, even if the concept itself dated back to Gershwin's time.

Schuller's seven representations of Klee paintings in music range from dense, dramatic orchestration in Antique Harmonies and An Eerie Moment, to outright jazz stylings in Little Blue Devil, to plain weirdness - The Twittering Machine sounds like an avant-garde cut-up of a Woody Woodpecker cartoon soundtrack.  Lots of fun.

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bonus Stravinsky - conducted by Simon Rattle
 
A concert broadcast from September 2017 at the Barbican, London, in which Sir Simon Rattle took the LSO through Stravinsky's legendary breakthrough ballets Firebird, Petrushka and Rite Of Spring in a single evening.  Exhilarating stuff, expertly executed.

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