Search - Sergey Prokofiev, Theodore Kuchar, Antoni Wit :: Prokofiev: The Complete Symphonies and Concertos [Box Set]

A Super-Bargain But Variable Performances

J Scott Morrison | Middlebury VT, USA | 06/04/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This set contains not only all the symphonies and all the concerti for piano, for violin, and for cello, it also contains some ballet music (The Prodigal Son, for instance, which is rarely recorded), the Waltz Suite (delectable music rarely heard in the concert hall), and the almost-never-heard Unaccompanied Violin Sonata, among other tidbits, all on 9 fully-packed CDs.



Taking them category by category and with some attention to individual performances, I would start by saying that the five piano concerti, as well-played as they are here, are simply swamped by Vladimir Ashkenazy's set with André Previn. Further, the Naxos performances (with the excellent Korean pianist, Kun Woo Paik, with Antoni Wit and the Polish Radio Symphony) are in somewhat glassy sound; their more recent provenance does not give them improved sound over the Ashkenazy set. I did like the verve of the D Flat Concerto (No. 1) in particular, however.



The Violin Concertos fare better, both in terms of performance and particularly in sonics. Tedi Papavrami is a young Albanian violinst, erstwhile pupil of Pierre Amoyal. The first thing to say is that he does not seem be copying any of his violinistic predecessors in these concerti. Notice in particular how well he projects the top line in the double-stop passages and his affinity for the lyrical aspects of the music. He has technique to spare, generally spot-on intonation, and real musical feeling. The only competition on a single disc is that of Gil Shaham who plays these concerti with real flair. Neither of them plays the Second Concerto with the laser-like intensity of Heifetz, however. And in the First there is the still-paramount Oistrakh. Still, these are creditable performances and I'm glad I have them. The Solo Violin Sonata is given a nicely judged performance and has very little competition on CD.



The Cello Concerto is given in the revised version, now more commonly called the Symphony-Concerto, Op. 125; Prokofiev had written it in the 1930s but when Rostropovich came to the fore in the late 1940s he worked with Prokofiev to revise it into the present form. For a time it was called the Sinfonia Concertante, and then, when revised further, the Symphony-Concerto. And of course Rostropovich owns the work, having championed it around the world. He recorded it in both of the revised forms, but those performances are a bit hard to find now. A pity. Still, the present recording is quite good. It features a cellist I'd not known of before, the 40ish Russian Alexander Rudin. Both the soloist and orchestra (the Polish National Radio Symphony under Antoni Wit, who accompany all the concerti in this set) are top-notch here. The same can be said for the Cello Concertino, Op. 132, which was unfinished at Prokofiev's death in 1953, but completed by Rostropovich and Dimitri Kabalevsky. This ravishing but rarely-heard work is given an outstanding performance. And the disc is filled out by the two delectable Pushkin Waltzes, Op. 120, which are Prokofiev in his most lovably ironic manner.



We come now to the seven symphonies. This is a very uneven set. They are all played by the National Symphony of Ukraine under their regular conductor, the American Theodore Kuchar. When I put on the First Symphony (the 'Classical') my heart fell; this is a dolorous account, taken at very slow tempi until, finally, in the last movement things start moving at a faster clip. The playing is OK, but the interpretation simply won't do. The Second is better but there are some balance problems; it sounds as if half the string section didn't show up the day it was recorded. The brutalist Third Symphony (developed from music taken from his opera 'The Fiery Angel') is given a decent performance. There are better single performances out there, though, including the one, surprisingly, by Ozawa (which is also included in his budget-priced but also variable complete set of symphonies). Symphony No. 4 is coupled with the music that spawned it, the ballet music for 'The Prodigal Son.' It is nice to hear the two pieces side by side; one can hear that Prokofiev took themes from the ballet and subjected them to symphonic development. Both performances here are quite nice. Symphony No. 5 is soft-edged and sounds as if it were recorded in a cathedral-like acoustic. That, coupled with the slight mushiness of the strings, makes this a gentle but not competitive performance. One misses the bite one hears in better performances. I happen to like a no-longer-available performance by the St. Louis SO under Slatkin, but there are others out there who feel the Järvi or the Previn are better than that one. The Fifth is coupled with 'The Year 1941' symphonic suite; this is simply not top-drawer Prokofiev although it has a few creepily effective moments. Symphony No. 6 is given a generally quite good performance. It begins with a scarily peremptory brass introduction (one imagines the NKVD at the door) before the ironically tender violin theme comes in. Nicely done. The Largo is ominously effective. But in the last movement, marked Vivace and taken a little too slowly for my taste, there is a weird drop-off in aural presence that I take to be a problem with either sound engineering or the pressing. However, the filler here, the Waltz Suite, surely one of Prokofiev's happiest collections (waltzes taken from 'Cinderella,' 'War and Peace,' and from a movie score) is possibly the best thing in the whole set. Or maybe it's just that I love these waltzes inordinately no matter how they're played! To complete the set, Symphony No. 7 (which is coupled with No. 3 on CD 2), written in Prokofiev's last year, returns to the simplicity of the Classical Symphony and is one of his most tuneful and least troubled. And it is given a very nicely judged performance here, relaxed and genial.



Scott Morrison"

Great price, but out of tune Ukrainian brass

Joshua E. Caplan | Seattle, WA, United States | 10/03/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I love this collection simply because there's so much music in it. Yet I find that Kuchar struggles to maintain the driving pace, and wrest the fortissimo out of the orchestra, demanded by the more brutal symphonies. Most disturbing to me, though, is the fairly common occurrence of high-profile brass notes, and somewhat less often, woodwinds, that are just out of tune. I realize the 2nd and 3rd symphonies are chromatic, and fairly dissonant, but you can still clearly hear intonation problems. Check out the counterpoint line at 0:17 in Variation I of Symphony No. 2's Theme and Variations, the ending of Symphony No. 3's Allegro agitato - Allegretto, 1:29-1:36 of Symphony No. 5's Andante, or the woodwind intro of Symphony No. 6's Largo."

A very fine set, but with sound issues

Neil Ford | Sydney, Australia | 08/14/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Having heard most of the available sets of Prokofiev's symphonies, I have come to the surprising conclusion that the Naxos set, conducted by Kuchar, is the most recommendable. These recordings do have various technical issues, but in terms of performance and interpretation they are the best complete option.



For symphonies 3 and 4, you won't find better. In 3, no-one else gets the blasting quality required for the opening bars (perhaps representing the beating wings of a fiery angel). The rest of the performance is up with the best, well chosen tempos and playing both stalwart and sensitive. In 4, no other performance makes enough of the eerie woodblock towards the end of the opening movement. Either it is inaudible or it is miked too closely, or the moment is glided over as though it doesn't exist. Only in this recording does the woodblock resound eerily over the orchestra, as it should. The beautiful opening of the second movement is also exemplary.



I haven't yet heard a completely satisfying recording of the 5th symphony, which is odd considering it's the probably best-known. Kuchar does well, not as fierce (or affected) as some, but hampered by some odd reverberation. For the elusive 6th, the best is Rozhdestvensky, who really brings out the fear and cynicism of this piece. Sadly, that recording has rough playing and typically 1960s Soviet production, and is anyway difficult to obtain. Kuchar is near the fore of the pack, powerful and heavy but perhaps not as nuanced as ideally required.



Symphony 2 was acknowledged by Prokofiev as a failure - he said "Even I couldn't understand it". He planned to revise it, clarifying its lines and introducing an extra movement, but unfortunately died before he could do so. As it stands, no conductor is completely successful in dealing with the structural problems. Rozhdestvensky is terrific in the first movement, but falls apart midway through the second movement. Kuchar binds both movements together well, his only real failing being a lack of emphasis at the climactic moments of both movements. Despite their faults, these two recordings surmount all the competition.



In symphonies 1 and 7, Kuchar is too heavy and slow (this being a common problem with the 7th, less so with the 1st), but really, whichever complete set you choose, you will need to supplement it with Malko's classic recordings of these two symphonies. Most conductors slow down and try to squeeze maximum emotion out of the 7th, but classical restraint serves the elegant nostalgia of this piece better. Malko gives these symphonies as a pair of neo-classical bookends to the Modern/Russian hybrids of the middle works (and the disc is very cheap!).



Sonically, these recordings are troubled by a greater or lesser degree of hall reverberation, which, in the 5th for instance, can rather blur the sound image, especially for headphone listening. Even apart from this, the sound lacks some of the colour and clarity we expect from modern recordings. If fidelity is an issue for you, you could try Ashkenazy's 2-disc set, supplemented perhaps with Jarvi's recordings of symphonies 3 and 4.



Of the concerto works included here, I know that Paik/Wit has been widely praised, but I haven't had the opportunity to hear those recordings. The cello works are played by Rudin, in what I believe are top-rank performances. Rudin is eloquent and sensitive, and the orchestra isn't as quiet as in some concerto recordings, which is an advantage. The rare Concertino is a terrific inclusion. The violin concertos on Naxos are truly excellent, my first choice in fact (though this may change when I finally hear the Oistrakh recordings - don't ask me why I've been putting it off).



(EDIT: What I've heard of the Kitajenko set seems over-molded and not powerful enough for my tastes, so my recommendation for the Naxos set still stands.)"