October 2005Both Marc
Minkowski and Philippe Beausaant, in their brief notes for this disc, quote Michel-Guy de
Chabanons obituary remark that "as a writer of operatic symphonies Rameau
never had a model or a rival." He is still widely regarded as the most imaginative
French composer for the orchestra before Berlioz. As Rameau never wrote a work for
orchestra without voices, however, Minkowski has assembled this "imaginary
symphony," which is not a symphony based on Rameaus tunes, but simply an
imaginative selection of 16 attractive numbers taken from Rameaus operas and
opera-ballets -- Zaïs, Platée, Les Boréades, Castor et Pollux, Les Fêtes
dHébé, Le Temple de la Gloire, Dardanus, Les Indes galantes, Naïs, La Naissance
dOsiris, Hyppolyte et Aricie. Theres also the familiar keyboard piece La
Poule, "The Hen", which the composer himself revised as a piece of chamber
music and so highly regarded an orchestrator as Ottorino Respighi included in his
orchestral suite The Birds.
One might say there was no need for such a compilation, as
concert suites of dances from Rameaus stage works have been in circulation since his
own time, but Minkowski and his original-instruments players (tuned to alt Kammerton pitch,
A=415) perform this music with such grand style and obvious affection that any such
reservations are beside the point.
This is a release that really defines its own terms, though
Harmonia Mundi, in its earlier recordings of Minkowski and others in similar material, has
given us a bit more or both sparkle and mellowness than Archiv conveys in its good but
hardly exceptional sonic frame. The program is also available as a hybrid multichannel
SACD.
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