AARON COPLAND: Dance Symphony; Symphony No. 1; Short Symphony – Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra/ Marin Alsop – Naxos

by | Jan 5, 2009 | Classical CD Reviews | 0 comments

AARON COPLAND: Dance Symphony; Symphony No. 1; Short Symphony – Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra/ Marin Alsop – Naxos 8.559359 *****:
 
Audiophiles listening to this disc will delight in the musical characteristics of Aaron Copland that make his music desirable to them: clear textures, broad lyricism, repeated musical phrases (ostinato), syncopated rhythms and fanfares. In 1931 Copland re-orchestrated his Symphony for Organ and Orchestra of 1923 and called it his Symphony No. 1, thinking that it would receive more performances without organ. Ironically, the original has been performed more than the re-orchestrated version. A quiet, pensive Prelude is followed by a rollicking, brassy and upbeat Scherzo with a wistful middle section and a powerful conclusion. The final movement juxtaposes lyrical passages with brass fanfares, creating tension and drama. Alsop’s performance leaves nothing to be desired and the sound clarifies the large orchestral palette.

Copland dedicated his Short Symphony to the Mexican composer Carlos Chavez, who befriended the American and gave its world premiere in 1934. Copland’s love for Mexico and its folk-infused music inspired him to write the compositions of his ‘populist period’ – Appalachian Spring, Billy the Kid, Rodeo and El Salon Mexico. Chavez later called the Short Symphony, “one of the most beautiful and original works written in this (20th) century.” This 15-minute work, written for “an enlarged chamber ensemble rather than the full sound of the symphonic ensemble,” begins with a Stravinskian first movement that uses syncopated rhythms and irregular, changing meters. The intensely poignant middle section combines sadness with beauty and the last section reprises the mood of the first section, but somewhat subdued. Chavez was right: it’s a great work.

The Dance Symphony is a reworking of Copland’s first orchestral composition written while he was studying in Paris in the early 1920s with Nadia Boulanger. Influenced by Diaghilev, it became a composer’s rite of passage to write a ballet and Copland complied by writing Grogh, inspired by viewing Murnau’s vampire movie classic, Nosferatu. Although it was never performed as a ballet, the composer took the parts he liked and won a $5000 prize in 1929 from RCA Records with the submitted Dance Symphony. Stravinsky was impressed, calling it a “very precocious opus.” He divided the work into three parts: Dance of the Adolescent; Dance of the Girl Who Moves as if in a Dream; and Dance of Mockery. “If the first movement is thin, dainty and pointed, the second movement is songful and sustained. The third movement is characterized by violence and syncopation,” the composer wrote. I first heard The Dance Symphony on an RCA Dynagroove (LSC 2850) LP with the Chicago Symphony conducted by composer Morton Gould, and loved it from first listening. Alsop’s version is much better recorded, but the exaggerated string glissandos in the final movement break the rhythmic momentum.

That aside, this is an album of unfamiliar but wonderful Copland, superbly performed and recorded. Don’t miss it!

— Robert Moon

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