Mermaid at the Sinfonietta: the metamorphoses of Alexander Z.

The time Zemlinsky (Vienna, 1871, New York, 1942), always pursued by bad luck, he would eventually come? No doubt the very nature of his music that it will never really the tsunami. Recordings of his music, in any case, are quite nombreuxSymphonies, Lieder, String Quartets (Volume 2), and it is certainly not complain sen in view of merits that are measured, not the volume of sales or always limited to a reputation.

The program for this disc has already been one dun dun Naxos disc and the disc Chandos led by Thomas DausgaardDie Seejungfrau; Sinfonietta; Sarema. It brings together two important works of the composer, different in style and uneven in the degree of success: the Siren, a symphonic poem created along the Pelleas Schoenberg in January 1905, and the Sinfonietta op. 23, created in Prague in 1935.

Zemlinsky, composer chameleon which absorbed all the trends of his time, is at its post-romantic in the Mermaid while quon in the Sinfonietta wry irony and distancing characteristics of Zeitgeist spirit of the 30s is not quun But Zemlinsky blotter : under its appearance of lightness and with its modest proportions, lop. 23 as opera Circle of CraieDer Kreidekreis is LOEUVRE of a master, more inventive as Korngold, Hindemith subtler, more variety in his writing as Kurt Weill, probably more leads that Krenek. This is almost a second for the Schoenberg Chamber Symphony, which was much appreciated oeuvre by his former mentor Dimitri Mitropoulos was when the program in the United States. Impossible to forget linquiétude welling of the center pane, poignant and deeply ambiguous, which can not not read between the lines the perils of the hour.

A word about the expression "First world records" which is promoted by the publisher of this disk: the timing difference of the recording of the Siren with the version of Dausgaard sexplique by the return of a pass deleted by Zemlinsky in the second movement: a interesting music. However, in the case of the Sinfonietta, not else revelation check-dune version of "arranged" for chamber orchestra that is not the hand of the composer. We understand quon wants expand the repertoire of chamber orchestras. But the disc, is it a good idea to record here the result of this alteration, when you know the hand of the composer safety of Symphony lyriqueZemlinsky: Lyric Symphony Op. 18?

The siren will still not compare to Pelleas to SchoenbergSchoenberg: Transfigured Night - Pelleas et Melisande, despite superficial similarities: neither breath nor expressive power, and Zemlinsky was lucid enough to know. Nevertheless LOEUVRE is above the all-comers from the same 1900s, and it is understandable that leaders like Vladimir Jurowski sy interested: one retains the beginning, magical, really seems to open a large storybook, the refinement of the orchestra treatment a naively Jugendstil mind which one can be sensitive, the "stormy sea sound" side of many passages that can talk to the listener without any narrative pretext (Korngold na-seems he not worked with Zemlinsky for nothing, and cinema of adventure, in places, seems close)

If this is the Mermaid quon research, this new version of John Storgards with the Philharmonic dHelsinki, sensitive and spectacular in its uptake by SACD, will be a good choice. If sintéresse particularly the Sinfonietta, I suggest rather stay in den Thomas Dausgaard, that is, he is faithful to the original. Anyway, no lover ever so slightly open to music written after Wagner and Verdi can ignore this Sinfonietta, which has not yet found quite the audience. And again it is recommended to read lhommage Zemlinsky signed by Adorno in Quasi una musical fantasiaÉcrits, II: Quasi una fantasia, which contains a brief analysis of this work.