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A battle has been reaching crisis point recently
between those that believe classical music should be
reaching out to the masses (such as the ba-rock string
quartet Bond), and those that believe the state of
classical music is fine as it is, thankyou very much,
and that any attempt at expanding an audience base
will usually result in a dumbing down of quality.
This
group often cite Classic FM, who regularly broadcasts
only single movements of longer works: to the critics
it is a loss of artistic integrity and musical
cohesion, but to Classic FM it is an attempt to allow
everyone to enjoy classical music without listening to
the less famous and less popular parts of a two hour
symphony.
It is hard to see what both camps would make of
Nicola Benedetti's debut CD. In what are perhaps the
two most blatant mass-market popularisation ploys in
the history of classical music, this release, on the
famous and highly-regarded Deutsche Grammophon label,
proudly states that you can 'Get your official Nicola
Benedetti Truetones and Ringtones Now!', but perhaps
even more surprisingly provides a playalong karaoke
track of Meditation by Massenet (performed by the
London Symphony Orchestra, no less) with sheet music
downloadable from the official website.
It would be easy for many to simply denounce the
release as being a stereotypical attempt at
popularising the classical genre. But that approach
would ignore the fact that the programme content is in
fact anything but 'popular'.
The recording is opened and mainly taken up by the Szymanowski Concerto For
Violin And Orchestra. It was a challenging and
innovative idea for Benedetti to use the work in the
final BBC Young Musician Of The Year 2004 Competition
(which she won), and it is a challenging gamble to
open her debut with the same work. Far from being a
crowd-pleaser, the work is filled with colourful
discords and unexpected rhythms. Conductor Daniel
Harding brings out some wonderfully colourful timbres
in the orchestra, and throughout its three movements
the performance of this relatively un-established work
constantly suprises, amuses and delights. The
beginning of the final movement is taken up by a
violin cadenza which allows Benedetti to show off her
maturity and technique to a high degree.
In Camille Saint-Saens' work Habanera, both the
orchestra and Benedetti comply well with the
composer's request of habanera rhythms (whose melodic
idea was apparently based on the crackling of burning
wood).
The recording ends with two interesting works never
before heard on disc. The first is an arrangement of a
Brahms song by Heifetz. Orchestrated for this
recording by Julian Reynolds, Contemplation is based
on Wie Melodien, and gives a true account of the
sentiments of the song without hearing any of the
words. The orchestration is sublime and utterly in
keeping with Brahms's own accompaniment writing, and
is presided over by the calm and soaring violin
line.
Finally, John Tavener's new work Fragment For The
Virgin completes the disc. The piece features close
counterpoint reminiscent of his choral piece The
Lamb, although is much more discordant than its
predecessor. Loud and intense passages feature
glissando violin playing, and the work ends with a
quiet coda. Although some may not like the work
because of its discordance, it is nevertheless
indicative of the way Benedetti is unafraid to
commence and end her debut recording with challenging
modern writing, and she should be congratulated for
that. Primarily, however, this disc should be bought
for the Szymanowski.
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