BRUCH: Scottish Fantasy, Op. 46; MASSENET: Meditation from Thais – Michael Ludwig, violin/Virginia Symphony/JoAnn Falletta – Hampton Roads Classics

by | May 26, 2008 | Classical CD Reviews | 0 comments

BRUCH: Scottish Fantasy, Op. 46; MASSENET: Meditation from Thais – Michael Ludwig, violin/Virginia Symphony/JoAnn Falletta – Hampton Roads Classics, 36: 10 [www.MichaelLudwig.org] ***:

Michael Ludwig and JoAnn Falletta are captured in concert for this eminently loving rendition of the Bruch Scottish Fantasy; and, as an interpretation it easily surpasses the oft-played Midori/Mehta version that clutters our airwaves. Though Ludwig sports a lovely-toned Cremona violin by Lorenzo Storioni, however, does not mean we are going to discard the Oistrakh/Horenstein or Heifetz/Sargent versions that have fed our souls on Bruch while granting my dollar equal access to other worthy music, like the concertos of Hindemith and Vieuxtemps.  Only those who attended this January, 2007 concert or Mr. Ludwig’s relatives are likely to purchase a 37-minute CD in today’s marketplace.

If Ludwig reminds me of anyone else’s playing, it is that of Joseph Silverstein, whom Ludwig openly admires. The Virginia Symphony, too, makes pretty sounds, as in the love-ballade third movement of the Fantasy. Kudos to harp principal Barbara Chapman, tympanist John Lindberg, and principal French horn, David Wick.  Falletta tries for the lush side of orchestral Romanticism, a la Ormandy, and she elicits a clear, homogeneous, warm sound. The last movement of the Fantasy, a good old war-cry worthy of Mel Gibson’s William Wallace, with Ludwig’s raking his instrument for a rich, viola sonority that communicates manly girth and feral passion. The bouncing march rhythm permeates literally every bar, the harp adding the lyric call of the minstrel boy. Wha Hae yourself!

The Meditation from Thais seems tailor made for Ludwig’s slick treatment, a rival to the Schwalbe/Karajan silken bubble. If they re-make the movie Humoresque, this version is ripe for picking.  Several timely coughs from the audience do not mar this elegant moment, a rarified distillation of French melos at its best. So, why not add Rimsky-Korsakov’s Fantasy on Russian Themes, Arensky’s lovely concerto, or the totally neglected D Major Concerto of Reynaldo Hahn?

— Gary Lemco
 

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