Kurtág Complete Works for Ensemble and Choir Reinbert de Leeuw
Four Capriccios to poems by
István Bálint, Op. 9
Four Songs to Poems by Janos
Pilinszky, Op. 11
Grabstein für Stephan Op.
15c
Messages of the Late Miss
R.V. Troussova, Op. 17
…quasi una fantasia…op. 27
No. 1
Doppelkonzert, Op. 27 No. 2
Samuel Beckett: What is the
word
Songs of Despair and Sorrow,
Op 18
Four Poems by Anna
Akhmatova, Op. 41
Colindă-Baladă
Brefs Message
Netherlands Radio Choir (chorus), Natalia Zagorinskaya
(soprano), Gerrie de Vries (mezzo-soprano), Yves Saelens (tenor), Harry van der
Kamp (bass), Jean-Guihen Queyras (cello), Elliott Simpson (guitar), Tamara
Stefanovich (piano), Csaba Király (pianino, spoken word)
Asko | Schoenberg Ensemble, Reinbert de Leeuw
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The new music world waits patiently for Kurtág’s long-delayed and much
anticipated first opera, Endgame,
initially commissioned by the Salzburg Festival, but now tentatively penciled in
for La Scala in 2018. Meanwhile, conductor Reinbert de Leeuw has been
documenting, with equal patience, Kurtág’s existing large-scale vocal and
instrumental works, with these recordings made in Amsterdam and Haarlem between
2013 and 2016. The composer himself was not directly involved, but the project
is only one step removed from his influence: Leeuw and his ensemble have
previously recorded all these works under the composer’s supervision, and these
new recordings also carry his blessing, albeit after the fact.
The set is entitled Complete Works
for Ensemble and Choir, but that doesn’t give much of an idea of what is
included. Song cycles predominate, with a single voice and ensemble featured in
Four Capriccios, the Pilinszky songs, Messages
of the Late Miss R.V. Troussova, and the Akhmatova settings. Vocal soloist,
choir, and ensemble are heard in the Beckett setting and Colindă-Baladă. The Songs of
Despair and Sorrow are for choir and instruments, and the remaining works, Grabstein für Stephan, …quasi una fantasia…, the Double
Concerto, and Brief Messages, are all
for instrumental ensemble.
Kurtág’s style is aphoristic, and even in these large-scale works, ideas
are brief and pithy, and phrases are short. That makes extended listening a
challenge. But it is a worthwhile one, not least for the invention and variety,
even within individual movements. Although his voice is distinctive, Kurtág has
a tendency to go back to basics with every new work, to forget everything he
has done and to start from scratch with the basic building blocks of sound.
That often means using very unusual instruments as if they were completely
mainstream. So, for example, a choral movement might be accompanied throughout
by just a cimbalom or accordion, playing delicate but inscrutably complex
harmonies.
Performances and recordings here are excellent throughout. Kurtág’s
personality shines through in the atmosphere of every work, that unnerving
dichotomy of surface stillness and underlying Angst. In the songs, the solo singers are balanced equitably with
the ensemble, but retain their clarity of diction and tone. Both the soloists
and the choir tackle the extended vocal techniques with apparent ease, giving
the impression—vital for Kurtág—that these are standard expressive devices
rather than exotic additions. The audio is studio quality, and, thankfully, ECM
has not applied its usual dreamy resonance, allowing the music a more precise
and clear sound profile. Many of the works, notably Grabstein für Stephan, are written for groups of ensembles in
specific spatial arrays, something that surround-sound could have better
conveyed, reason enough, perhaps, for another traversal of these works in the
future.
The most valuable aspect of this release is the access it offers to Kurtág’s
larger-scale works. He is well-represented in the catalog: ArkivMusic
currently lists 87 discs devoted to his music, but most of these focus on a
small number of chamber works, the music for string quartet; Signs, Games, and Messages, Játékok, and the Kafka Fragments. Nothing
on this set is a first recording, but most of the music is difficult to obtain
elsewhere. A Hänssler disc from Marcus Creed and the SWR Vokalensemble is entitled
György Kurtág:
Complete Vocal Works (93174), but, bizarrely
given the “complete” claim of both releases, shares only a single work, Songs of Despair and Sorrow—also on the
SWR release are Omaggio
a Luigi Nono, op. 16, and Eight Choruses, op. 23. Songs of Sorrow and Despair sound good
in both versions, but Reinbert de
Leeuw has the edge in terms of clarity and focus of tone. Grabstein für Stephan is also available on an excellent DG recording
from Abbado and the Berlin Philharmonic, with Jürgen Ruck the guitar soloist (0289
479 0341 3), but that recording is of the full-orchestra version, whereas this
is for a smaller ensemble. Messages of the Late Miss R. V. Troussova is available in several versions, including
recordings conducted by Boulez and Eötvös. It is a piece that relies above all on
the Pierrot-like versatility of the
soprano soloist, and Natalia Zagorinskaya here more than holds her own against
the competition.
The packaging is in the usual arty, high-concept ECM format, the discs
in separate envelopes within a card slipcase. The booklet includes some of Kurtág’s
own artwork, which is fascinating, along with essays from Reinbert de Leeuw and
Paul Griffiths, as well as an encomium from the composer himself endorsing the
project. Texts are included, in the original Romanian, Hungarian, and Russian
with parallel English translations (Russian is Cyrillic only). Finding the
track listings among all the full-page images can be tricky, and linking
performers to works requires tedious cross-referencing, but all the info is
there.
An important document then, of major works from one of the great
Modernist composers of our era. The presentation seems to encourage extended
listening, but individual works are better appreciated in isolation. So treat
it as a resource, and you’ll find yourself returning time and again.
This review appears in Fanfare magazine issue 41:3.
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