This is an album of some very lesser known Respighi, mostly successful, though the song cycles command the lion’s share of attention. La Sensitiva (The Sensitive Plant) is based on a text by Shelly (and translated into Italian and revised by Roberto Ascoli) that describes the eventual destruction of a mimosa plant after it endures the variant seasons of its life span. This piece is redolent of Wagner and even Strauss, and can certainly take its place among the more successful tone poems with sopranos that have been created over the years. Nevertheless, it is rarely performed, and it is good to have this recording to nicely fill the gaps in any Respighi collection.
The same might be said of Aretusa, another Shelly product that tells of the river god that falls in love with a nymph, culled from the Metamorphoses of Ovid. This piece is earlier than La Sensitiva, and is more impressionistic and melancholy than you would expect of this composer. But both of these cycles contain some lush, exquisitely rendered music that is sure to captivate many, especially diehard fans of the composer.
The one disappointment for me is the rather insipid and pedantic ballet La Pentola Magica. Respighi was no stranger to the setting of other composers’ music, and the commission from Sergey Diaghilev and his Russian Ballet led to the arrangement of Rossini’s music in the popular La Boutique fantastique. He tried again at the insistence of the company only a year after this, and commissioned three ballets. This one serves as a tribute to the Russian masters, and the composer take the music of Gretchaninov, Arensky, Rubinstein, and Rebikov as his source work. I find it unconvincing, but others will be glad to have it, if not for completeness, than for surround sound.
The forces here play this music very well, though they sound perhaps smaller than optimal. Ms. Pinti does a fine job with the songs, and the sound has excellent surround spread and good depth. Respighi aficionados will have to have this, and others may find it interesting, certainly worthy of revival, though I cannot honestly say that it ranks with the composer’s greatest, with the exception of La Sensitiva.
— Steven Ritter
