Search - Ernest Chausson, Camille Saint-Saens, Charles Munch :: Chausson - Symphony, Poeme + Saint-Saens (RCA)

A golden achievement!

Hiram Gomez Pardo | Valencia, Venezuela | 06/08/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Ernst Chausson was born in Paris in 1855. This is a remarkable fact to take into account, due his leonine intelligence made of him an untiring searcher of continuous inspiration sources. Verlaine, Maeterlinck and Samain in literature, Degas and Carriere in painting, Franck and Wagner in music (in fact he made the journey to Bayreuth).



Like Mendelssohn, he also came from a well-to-do family; so he never knew about economic penuries or monetary restrictions.



His Symphony shows a very original case in what approach concerns: the unexpected and the heroic affirmation shake hands; the principle of alternating masculine and feminine themes, though the design of each movement does not follow the basic rules of the forms of the Symphonic Poem.



It would be very interesting to approximate us with major frequency around this composer, mistakenly considered as a minor composer; he was severally self critical and underestimated his own compositions.



Munch made the supreme version ever recorded of this Symphony: The Poem is fine, but Neveu' s performance is my first choice."

A good CD, though slightly dated

Byron W. Eddy | Davenport, IA USA | 02/25/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Overall, I enjoy this CD and recommend it to anyone. The symphony has good themes that are easy to grasp and like, even upon the first listen. It's very romantic in nature, and if you're into that type of classical, you really should get some copy of the symphony - it's very good. Chausson studied under Franck - check out Franck's symphony too if you haven't yet.



The stylistic interpretation and performance of the symphony here is great. Sound quality is pretty clear, but sometimes the sound of soloists seems kind of thin, and sometimes the pianissimos aren't very audible, perhaps since it was recorded in 1962. One thing I found a little distracting with regard to performance was that the trumpet soloist uses kinda funky vibrato.



Another good recording of Chausson's symphony that I've heard is under Michel Plasson with the Toulouse Orchestra. I heard it on the 2001 EMI CD.



The recordings of Oistrakh sound good; he plays with good expression and precision. The recorded sound quality seems better than that heard with the symphony; it was recorded at a separate time (actually earlier, in 1955 - go figure)."