Search - Stravinsku, Drury, Zander :: Petrushka

2 modernist classics performed with refreshing clarity

09/23/1999

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Warm without being overly lush, precise without ever being overly analytical-- that's what every aspect of this delightful CD is. Zander's semi-pro orchestra is captured live by recording techniques that let the conductor and his forces sound rich in overall sound and clear in inner detail. He relaxes the tempos a little more than the Stravinsky does in his hairpin-curve recording of Petrushka, but he generates excitement, wit, and an air of melancholy in his own way. The Ravel begins with a clean whipcrak and surrounds the soloist with tart jazz-inflected rhythms (no blowsy muzak-jazz here) and finds real poetry in the Adagio. Oh, yes, and the soloist-- Best-kept Secret Stephen Drury strikes again. Delicate and steely as the little moments in Petrushka require, he shows what a cunning ensemble player he is. In the Ravel he's a selfless virtuoso. The first movement finds him precise and restive, the adagio opening solo quiet and straightforward in a way that lets the melody and harmony speak for themselves, the finale impeccable but never showy. In short, the band is cooking, but the piano player puts this disc over the top. I mean...we still have artists in America who can meld the heart, the mind, and the muscle? Yes."

Excellent for semi-pros, only average otherwise

Santa Fe Listener | Santa Fe, NM USA | 02/21/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"The Boston Phil. is a delight to attend live, both for Zander's imaginative conducting and the semi-pro musicians, who really give their all. But this is a recording, and it has to compete with the pros. It barely does, despite Zander's point-making throughout Pretrushka. I didn't hear enough originality to make me overlook the lower level of technique. Actually, Stravinsky doesn't leave that much room for interpretation, and Zander hasn't chosen to be overtly more savage, humorous, balletic, or in some other way strikingly different from the norm. His great itnerest seems to be in bringing out inner detail and keeping the phrasing fresh, which he does successfully. Carlton Classics gives him very good recorded sound.



This 1998 CD is filled out with the Ravel G major piano concerto, played by Stephen Drury, a prominent soloist around Boston and fellow faculty member with Zander at the New England Conservatory. Drury is romantically inclined in his Petrushka solos, and here in the Ravel he eschews the glittering, pointed, witty playing we usually expect. His softer, more yielding approach is a new idea, abetted by Zander's similar outlook, and I was glad to be exposed to it. Ravel's piano writing doesn't affect me more when it's taken slower and more inward like this, but the orchestral effects are strikingly haunted. In all, this is the more intriguing interpretation, and I will come back to it more often than to the Petrushka, which really does desreve a virtuoso ensemble."