Search - Debussy, Mikko Franck :: DeBussy: Images/Printemps

RBCD: Mikko Franck, OrchPhilRadioFrance: Debussy Images (1-3

Dan Fee | Berkeley, CA USA | 10/04/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Claude Debussy, paraphrased, said something like: "Music is everywhere. It is not just alive in books."



By now we have quite a few stellar readings in the available catalog to see where doing Debussy can take us as Debussy fans. One school, neglected while being transformed after Arturo Toscanini, is in fact, obedient disciple to Toscanini's example. This type of reading emphasizes the forward force, the modernism of musical shape or structure, innate to the composer. A strong Debussy marker is stark clarity of interval, sometimes reaching nearly mathematical intellect. (Think, well, Toscanini, then Cantelli, then Szell. Evolve-transform, into Boulez?) A second school is a polar opposite, focusing on tonal colors, musical atmospheres and impressions, usually involving a bed rock foundation of an intuitive sense of form or musical structure. (Think Ansermet, Stokowski.) The third type of Debussy reading most often aims at some mix of the polar opposites otherwise competing. (Think Jean Martinon, Carlo Maria Giulini.) As Oscar Wilde can be recalled, the distinctions are all about good versus bad performances; not prizing one school of Debussy interpretation over any other. One would prefer to hear any approach played at a high musical level; than to choose a poor effort from any tradition.



Along with these different musical styles, go different approaches to recording the music. At best, the engineering matches the dominant manners of the conductor and band; at worst, the engineering amplifies the manners of the band and conductor, not always with flattering impact.



So what do we get on this disc?



Thanks partly to the engineering, based in the physical acoustics of Radio France's Studio 103 - Mikko Franck sounds as if he now stands, indebted to the Toscanini-Boulez traditions. From the very first note of Gigues, we are gripped by a burning clarity of interval, tonal sound, and etched rhythms. There is never a passing slip or retreat, from oodles of sonic definition, even in a subsidiary or counterpoint musical line. From top to bottom, the strings burn, etch, run or skip or build, nearly always fizzing like layers of fireworks display. Ditto, the famously famous French woodwinds. Ditto, brass.



The soloists are all seeming virtuosos on their respective instruments. Nobody gets self-indulgent or woozy; everybody shines bright.



In the three Iberias, the shifting rhythms and cross-rhythms are brilliantly etched, connoting any number of precious materials, if not also volatile materials - glass, silver, gold, platinum, rubidium. All high definition, whatever the passing tonal mass or basic volume of the music at hand. Rondes des Printemps is more, touched through with a slightly marked lilt and lightness. The sheer virtuosity of all the ensemble in all departments is almost scary if you pay close listener attention.



Be careful, then, if you toss this into the portable player and listen on headphones, without first acclimating somewhat to the special force of brilliant modernist-musical ascetics, involved in this reading?



The first and second sections of Printemps continue apace. The opening is quiet and subtle, still yet burning with laser lighted clarity. Some woodwinds are just a tad more touched with juicy color; some string phrasings just a tad more kissed with slouch, than not. Upper woodwind washes rise up and down, surprisingly impressionistic after all, connoting will o' the wisp breezes, blowing about ineffable as analogies to Spirit. The vigor of the second movement still has that touch of warmth, slouch that yields a deeper impression of carefree mood and will. The added warmth and relaxation is most welcome, though in retrospect it must still all be an effect of musical illusion, so keen, so athletic is the grip that Franck and the bad are keeping on this score.



Our disc wraps up with the path-breaking Prelude a l'Apres-midi d'un Faun. This is the earliest of the three orchestral works on the disc. How will the evocation of the faun and the afternoon fare? The listener's mind and ear seem to recall musical memories of Stokowski, conjuring a musical mist palpable, drenched in color and sensuality; from Martinon, the faun a strangely fabulous mythical creature, horns and hair and muscle and bone, albeit not at all ordinary or human.



Gee, folks, the Prelude is well-nigh filigree precious metals perfection. Through myriad differentiations of color and shading and musical phrasing, the spell is cast. The dovetailing of tone colors and inflections of musical line, as Debussy hands off melody and texture from one band department to another are simply stunning. This reading alone would announce loudly to the listening classical music planet that we now have a major, gifted new Debussy conductor working among us. Plus a surprisingly virtuoso band, that radio France orchestra?



Before I end with an obvious five star recommendation, I must indulge some detective imagination. A first impression is that the order on this disc gets it backwards. The Prelude would have acclimated the listening ear to the going musical manners, better than either of the other, longer works. Once initiated by a stunning early Debussy reading, a listener could probably go on to the remaining two works in historical sequence order - Printemps, then Images concluding - to better effect. The burning clarity of the reading really highlights early from later to latest Debussy, though of course it all still sounds like Debussy.



A second detective guess is that these readings probably actually had more warmth than the quite capable -even exemplary - red book sound captured? A super audio surround sound master of these readings would probably have set standards for decades to come. Sound standards, and musical standards for Debussy performance. Yes, Mikko Franck is that good; the band is really that good.



A home listener can thus rectify the sequence by re-recording the disc on a blank, changed in order.



Fans of Mikko Franck's debut Sibelius disc on Ondine can order this one, too; provided the interested party notes that Franck has changed and grown since then; involved and impacted no doubt by the forceful, virtuoso playing of the Radio France band? The atmosphere and slow-mythic qualities of Franck leading the Swedish Radio band have been replaced now, with the fire and detail of the French band. Conductor and band influence each other? I'm glad he is now playing Debussy, instead of Sibelius, with this band. The Swedes were perfect for the Sibelius; but the French Radio band is just as apt in Debussy? I have another hunch that the etched genius of the band is a strong current in modern French musical training life; compare, for example, Franck's Radio France outfit with Jun Markl's Lyon in his two discs of Debussy, released on Naxos. Contrast with Charles Dutoit's Montreal, to drive the musical etching plus fire comments home?



Hope we get more Debussy, and Ravel, too; from this band and conductor. Hope they get access to first class super audio surround high resolution. Five, all five, stars."