Jacqueline du Pre; Dvorak, Cello Concerto, Chicago Symphony Orchestra EMI Classics, newly remastered. Roger Sessions, String Quartet, Canons (to the memory of Stravinsky). Naxos American Classics.
These two recordings are like the alpha and omega of my "classical" moods. One the one hand I love many of the twentieth century pieces, everything about them. The Roger Sessions is musically a joy for me. Compact ensemble, thrilling yet almost somber material, altogether concise in nature and immediate in presentation. Modern and challenging. Any competent quartet of musicians would float my boat with compositions like this.
On the other hand, the Dvorak is the sort of piece I usually cross the street to avoid. While not quite as bloated or as possessed by musical lines way too "cute" for me as most Romantic era large orchestral works are (like the Russian composers that are a staple of most "classical" programs at symphony halls), it is still for me obnoxiously both diffuse and bombastic at the same time. A perverse accomplishment, I suppose. Orchestras grew so large because before amplification there was no other way to produce volume. Even admirers of this style will have to admit the feeling and tone color were lost in the process. Also, in this as well as many/most other similar compositions, to my sensibilities dynamics takes on a role of "wow, look what we can do with all these instruments re: dynamics." Having grown up in the era of electronic amplification, I am not impressed by the technique, or its overuse. So why am I listening to it?
The performance is beyond great to my ears. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra certainly helps, but here it is the soloist. That du Pre's life was cut short by MS was a wretched, cruel personal tragedy, but the loss to music was monumental. Very few soloists, no matter how talented, were as capable of elevating an entire outstanding orchestra to such levels as she routinely did. While many cellists are so ridiculously good that you have to admire them, she directly thrills on a non intellectual level. She was so accomplished here that it would be bad taste on my part not to seek this performance out. Mind you, this is a typical performance from her, so feel free to check out anything she recorded. This is a nice recording, though, to give the technicians their due.
All that said, musically I prefer the piano trios included on Warner Classics' A Lasting Inspiration Volume Two, Jacqueline du Pre. But to be honest I could listen to du Pre playing the phone book on a poor recording. By the way, this French sounding name belonged to an English girl. I have not seen films of her performing, but I have read that she was, involuntarily, very animated when she played. Her energy was physically as well as musically palpable.