 Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra Conductor – Gennady RozhdestvenskyJean Sibelius. The Symphonies (3 CD) Fist time on CD!
CD 1
Symphony No. 2 in D major, Op. 43
1 I. Allegretto 9.36
2 II. Tempo andante, ma rubato 15.00
3 III. Vivacissimo 5.52
4 IV. Finale. Allegro moderato 14.30
Symphony No. 3 in C major, Op. 52
5 I. Allegro moderato 9.44
6 II. Andantino con moto, quasi allegretto 7.44
7 III. Moderato. Allegro (ma non tanto) 9.31
Total playing time: 71.59
Recorded in 1969 (1–4), 1973 (5–7).
CD 2
Symphony No. 1 in E minor
1 I. Andante, ma non troppo. Allegro energico 11.19
2 II. Andante (ma non troppo lento) 9.48
3 III. Scherzo. Allegro 5.32
4 IV. Finale (Quasi una Fantasia). Andante. Allegro molto 11.46
Symphony No. 4 in A minor, Op.63
5 I. Tempo molto moderato, quasi adagio 10.02
6 II. Allegro molto vivace 4.56
7 III. Il tempo largo 10.00
8 IV. Allegro 9.00
Total playing time: 72.25
Recorded in 1973 (1–4), 1977 (5–8).
CD 3
Symphony No. 5 in E flat major, Op. 82
1 I. Tempo molto moderato 13.31
2 II. Andante mosso, quasi allegretto 7.48
3 III. Allegro molto 8.13
Symphony No. 6 in D minor, Op. 104
4 I. Allegro molto moderato 9.51
5 II. Allegretto moderato 4.46
6 III. Poco vivace 3.51
7 IV. Allegro molto 9.24
8 Symphony No. 7 in C major, Op. 105 20.51
Total playing time: 78.18
All-Union RTV Large Symphonic Orchestra
Conductor – Gennady Rozhdestvensky
Catalogue number: MEL CD 10 01669
Where to buy: Shops addresses
Jean Sibelius the eminent Finnish composer. In a conversation with his biographer, Ernst Tanzberger, Sibelius once said: “My compositions must speak for themselves.”
“ Sibelius’ symphonic cycle is one of the greatest peaks in contemporary music. Along with him come Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Nielsen, Vaughan Williams…
His most brilliant individuality attracted to itself and found a response among such different conductors as Damrosch, Muck, Toscanini, Wood, Karajan, Koussevitsky, Weingartner, Ansermet, Furtwängler, Maazel, Ormandy, Hannikainen…
How splendidly the “wide intervals” sound – the clarinets passing through over two octaves in the Seventh Symphony is a bright example of this. I remember Shostakovich and Mahler, the latter especially for the reason of his “variance of dynamics” – the first clarinet plays forte and the second (two octaves lower) plays piano – a fantastic unterton!
Pauses in Sibelius’ music. Sometimes they last for several measures (the last page of the Fifth Symphony!). These are “mute cries.”
Sibelius’ scores contain a large number of “foresights,” sagacious gazes into the future. In the Finale of the Third Symphony there is a brilliant substitution of one set of instruments with another, which would later be a favorite device of Webern; in the first movement of the Fifth Symphony a most intensely sounding bassoon, playing in the upper register, “indicates” at the dramatic bassoon monologues of Shostakovich; the split rhythmic vertical dimension in the culmination of the Seventh Symphony is closely connected with the “rules” of aleatoric
games… ”, – Gennady Rozhdestvensky.
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