There's Nothing Wrong With Being a Little Old-Fashioned
J Scott Morrison | Middlebury VT, USA | 11/03/2004
(4 out of 5 stars)
"The First Symphony of Georges Onslow (1784-1853) had the misfortune, historically speaking, of having its première at one of the concerts of the newly-founded Société des Concerts du Conservatoire conducted by François-Joseph Habeneck just four months after the same group had premièred Berlioz's 'Symphonie fantastique' and only a couple of weeks after the Paris première of Beethoven's 'Ninth Symphony.' Those two trail-blazing works, of course, not only captured the Parisian imagination but also set a new course for music. Onslow's music, probably most similar to that of Mendelssohn or early Beethoven -- indeed he is sometimes in France referred to as the 'French Beethoven' -- is unfailingly tuneful, well-crafted, informed by a grace and lightness that one associates with French music of the period. And after a few performances over the next few years, this symphony entered total obscurity for the next 150 years or more. A shame, really, for this is a fine work whose only failing, as I see it, is a tendency to be a little long-winded; once Onslow gets a good idea, and he gets them regularly, he tends not to let them go. That, of course, is a criticism one hears about Schubert and yet we tend to excuse him his 'heavenly lengths.' I wouldn't put Onslow's melodic inspiration quite in the same category as Schubert's, but truthfully it's not far behind. And his compositional craft is unexceptionable. And perhaps that's the problem. He is probably more like Spohr than Beethoven, more like Czerny that Schubert. Top-level second-ratedness. That said, I must admit that I have been enjoying both these symphonies considerably.
The First Symphony in A Major, Op. 41, given its first performance in 1831, has the classic symphonic arrangement of movements: fast-slow-fast-fast. The texture is string-dominated (and in both symphonies recorded here, the winds are just the slightest bit recessed) and one notes Onslow's ability to write graceful, light, dancing passages for the violins. The NDR Radiophilharmonie's strings are simply superb in this respect; those passages really sparkle. Particularly fine are the Scherzo and the Finale. The latter, marked vivace, is a whirlwind of delicacy and grace. One imagines that Bizet must have known this symphony when he wrote his 'Symphony in C.'
The Third Symphony in F Minor (without opus number) was originally written as a string quintet in 1826, but rewritten with 'notables changements' in 1834. It is rather more dramatic in tone, as its minor key might suggest, and one hears late-Mozartian trombones and horns adding weight to the otherwise Mendelssohnian texture. The Scherzo comes second but is not all lightness as it is, appropriately, marked 'impetuoso.' One hears Onslow's extraordinary command of counterpoint here; my only prior exposure to his music has been some of his chamber music where the counterpoint is one of the strong points, and indeed early commentators about this music remarked about its origin as a quintet. Onslow, it might be added, wears his contrapuntal mastery lightly. The Andante third movement is notable for its beautiful and melancholy opening theme, introduced by the solo clarinet and then handed off to the other solo winds. (For some reason, the winds of the NDR orchestra sound French to me. Is that my imagination, or is it on purpose?) The Finale is another whirlwind, but this time there is a good bit more dramatic heft and if I didn't know Beethoven's symphonic movements backwards and forwards I would have guessed that it had been written by him!
These are winning performances by conductor Johannes Goritzki and his north German orchestra. They have already recorded the Onslow Symphonies Nos. 2 & 4, but I have not heard them. It appears, from perusing the catalog, that cpo is bringing out quite a bit of Onslow's music--several of his chamber works have appeared, but they'll have their work cut out for them: he wrote, according to Nicolas Slonimsky, 34 string quintets and 36 string quartets (and other sources suggest there are even more). cpo has been bringing us many treasures from the byways of 19th-century European music (Raff, Farrenc, Fibich, Rott, Ries, and Goetz to name only a few) and we should be exceedingly thankful for that.
Recommended.
TT=64:23
Scott Morrison"
Two Attractive Symphonies from France
M. C. Passarella | Lawrenceville, GA | 03/14/2006
(4 out of 5 stars)
"French composer Georges Onslow really made an impressive debut as a symphonic composer with his Opus 41. Certainly, we don't need the program notes to tell us that this music was a bit old-fashioned when it was introduced, especially since Beethoven's Ninth had just made its debut in France, and most critics from thence forward through Wagner believed the symphony had reached both its apogee and logical dead-end with this masterpiece. Tell that to Hector Berlioz, whose programmatic Symphonie Fantastique made its debut as well just months before Onslow's First. Given that these two works didn't close out the history of the symphony but rather open it up for future composers as diverse as Liszt and Mahler, Onslow's effort is obviously a throwback to at least the middle symphonies of Beethoven. Yet Onslow manages to bring something original to the work. As contemporary critics pointed out about both these Onslow symphonies, they are more lyrical, more intimate than most classical symphonies, more like chamber music. Some of this has to do with Onslow's choice of instrumentation, heavy on woodwind sonorities and with a much lighter hand on the strings than Beethoven brought to his odd-numbered symphonies, with their growling basses lending a massive underpinning to the sound.
Besides this, Onslow's melodic material is less Olympian than Beethoven's, more proto-Romantic, recalling Schubert much more than Beethoven. But in the finale, Onslow achieves something rare for a symphonist of any age, and that is he manages to really keep things going. Onslow builds the movement in such a way that it has a cumulative force and drive that are typically classical and very impressive. This is a fine achievement, especially for a first-timer (though of course Onslow was a seasoned composer by the time he tackled the symphony).
The Third Symphony has some of the same qualities as the First, but I find it generally less successful. Perhaps it's the fact that this symphony is a reworking of a string quintet, never a fully successful venture for any composer. If a composer doesn't start by conceiving his work symphonically, it probably won't be thoroughly symphonic. Understandably, then, the chamber-musical qualities of this symphony are even more evident. They result in a first movement that is kind of static--in fact, it reminds me of the late symphonies of Louis Spohr, whose works became increasingly stodgy as he crossed over from the Classical into the Romantic era. Things do improve in the later movements, a tender slow movement whose lovely clarinet solos sound like Mozart filtered through Schubert and a darkly purposeful finale that doesn't quite fit, in a dramatic sense, with what's come before. And maybe that's the problem--this symphony doesn't really project an overall sense of program, at least not as strongly as the First Symphony does. But as I suggest, the Third, too, has virtues that make it worth hearing.
Johannes Goriztki and his band turn in performances with lots of early-Romantic brio, capturing well the youthful bravura of the First Symphony's livelier parts. I sometimes feel the strings of the NDR Radiophilharmonie aren't quite as polished as the winds, or maybe that's just the nature of Onslow's writing for the orchestra, but at any rate, these are accomplished performances. CPO provides wide-ranging stereo sound, but I would prefer a little more presence. All in all, though, this is an attractive recording of some pretty attractive music.
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