Search - Sergey Prokofiev, Neeme Järvi, Scottish National Orchestra :: Prokofiev: Suite From 'The Buffoon'; Waltz Suite

'Chout', 'The Love for Three Oranges' and the Complete Waltz

J Scott Morrison | Middlebury VT, USA | 09/13/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Here is another of the mid-price reissues on Chandos from the marvelous multi-CD series of Prokofiev orchestral pieces with Neeme Järvi leading the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, recordings that initially appeared in the mid-1980s and early 1990s. This CD is a recombination of pieces that originally appeared on several different discs back then, mainly because the Waltz Suite, Op. 110, was presented, three movements each, on two different CDs as filler for some of the symphonies. It makes much better sense to have all six movements together. And, boy, do they get lush and lovely performances here by the RSNO! The suite consists of three waltzes from the Cinderella ballet, two from the opera 'War and Peace', and the 'Mephisto Waltz' from the 1941 film, 'Lermontov'. Each of them is gorgeous and as a whole they will have you whirling around the room for nearly thirty minutes.



The longest work here is the Suite from 'Chout' ('The Buffoon'), Prokofiev's 1921 ballet written for Diaghilev while both were living in Paris. It is the tale of a sly peasant trickster who cons seven village worthies into buying his 'wonder whip' which will revive dead people. Each kills his wife and then is stumped as to why the whip doesn't bring her back to life. To escape their fury, the Buffoon disguises himself as his sister, works his wiles with them and then tricks them further by managing to get them to marry off their seven daughters to seven soldiers whom he has hired to demand money from the men. The music is descriptive in the extreme. There is much orchestral sarcasm -- blatting brass, sarcastic clarinet, biting percussion -- as well as the sinuous allure of the 'sister', and in the Final Dance a growing furious violence that is capped off by the Buffoon's final trick. This is perhaps not Prokofiev's strongest score but it has retained a place, barely, in the orchestral repertoire and is given the finest recorded performance I can recall.



'The Love for Three Oranges' was premiered at the Chicago Opera (where Scottish diva Mary Garden was the 'impresaria') in 1921. Based on a Carlo Gozzi commedia dell'arte fairy tale, it has retained a place in the repertoire and the whole opera is given a delightful performance -- in French, as it is usually performed in the West -- on a CD with Kent Nagano and the Opera de Lyon Prokofiev: L'Amour des Trois Oranges (Love For Three Oranges) - Catherine Dubosc, Jean-Luc Viala, Kent Nagano, National Opera Orchestra & Chorus, Lyon; there is also a good recording, in Russian, led by Valery Gergiev Prokofiev: Love for Three Oranges. But this performance of the orchestral suite from the opera - consisting of six movements including the familiar 'March' and 'Scherzo' - is about as good as it gets. There is no question that Järvi has a golden touch with Prokofiev, as his large series on Chandos attests.



An easy recommendation, particularly at mid-price.



Scott Morrison"