Search - Igor Stravisnky, Robert Craft, Orchestra of St. Luke's :: Perséphone (Igor Stravinsky - The Composer, Volume III)

A Perverse Performance of a Masterpiece

Nicholas A. Deutsch | New York, NY USA | 12/28/2009

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Stravinsky's "Persephone" is one of his most beautiful scores, and one of the least known of his major works. True, without its dance element, the combination of speech, song and orchestral passages can seem odd and even confusing at first, particularly stripped of the elaborate scenario which Andre Gide provided with his text. But time and repeated listenings have convinced me that this is a very special work, the feminine counterpart to "Oedipus Rex" (and with links to IS's other Greek myths, "Apollo" and Orpheus" as well).

In recent years "Persephone" on CD has attracted such top-notch conductors as Michael Tilson Thomas, Kent Nagano, Kurt Masur and Andrew Davis, in addition to two versions under the composer (one studio, one live). All of these are worth hearing. This version by Robert Craft is currently in limbo, presumably awaiting reissue on Naxos. Its major attraction is tenor John Aler, who not only sings the difficult role of Eumolpe beautifully but gives the most idiomatically Francophone interpretation of the text on disc. Orchestra and choruses - the latter very important - are good, but MTT, Nagano, Masur and Davis have set the bar high. And Robert Craft's conducting is a real head-scratcher: deliberately ignoring the composer's tempo markings, he takes almost everything unbelievably fast, and in the process trivializes long stretches of the score. I'm not kidding, it's that perverse and insensitive. And I should add that I've enjoyed, and own, quite a few of Craft's Stravinsky performances. So my advice is: avoid.

While the MTT and Nagano versions are both excellent, my personal favorite is Andrew Davis's live version from the Proms a few years back (available from amazon.co.uk). Davis takes the composer's tempo markings seriously, though not literally. He understands that contrasts between stasis and sudden movement are fundamental to "Persephone," and consequently his reading has both rhythmic vitality and weight. The BBC Symphony Orchestra and the various choirs can stand comparison with the best, Paul Groves is a fine tenor soloist, and speaker Nicole Tibbels gives an outstanding performance of the tricky title role, the finest I've ever heard.

















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