Composer: Ottorino Respighi
Orchestra: London Symphony Orchestra, Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Antal Doráti
Audio CD
Number of Discs: 1
Format: APE (image+cue)
Label: Mercury
Size: 344 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
01. Respighi: The Birds (Gli uccelli), P. 154 – 1. Prelude
02. Respighi: The Birds (Gli uccelli), P. 154 – 2. The Dove (La colomba)
03. Respighi: The Birds (Gli uccelli), P. 154 – 3. The Hen (La gallina)
04. Respighi: The Birds (Gli uccelli), P. 154 – 4. The Nightingale (L’usignolo)
05. Respighi: The Birds (Gli uccelli), P. 154 – 5. The Cuckoo (Il cuccù)
06. Respighi: Brazilian Impressions, P. 153 – 1. Tropical Night
07. Respighi: Brazilian Impressions, P. 153 – 2. Butantan
08. Respighi: Brazilian Impressions, P. 153 – 3. Song and Dance
09. Respighi: Fountains of Rome, P. 106 – The Fountain of Valle Giulia (La fontana di Valle Giulia all’alba)
10. Respighi: Fountains of Rome, P. 106 – The Triton Fountain (La fontana di Tritone al mattino)
11. Respighi: Fountains of Rome, P. 106 – The Fountain of Trevi (La fontana di Trevi al meriggio)
12. Respighi: Fountains of Rome, P. 106 – The Villa Medici Fountain (La fontana di Villa Medici al tramonto)
13. Respighi: Pines of Rome, P. 141 – The Pines of Villa Borghese (I pini di Villa Borghese)
14. Respighi: Pines of Rome, P. 141 – The Pines near a Catacomb (Pini presso una catacomba)
15. Respighi: Pines of Rome, P. 141 – The Pines of the Janiculum (I pini del Gianicolo)
16. Respighi: Pines of Rome, P. 141 – The Pines of the Appian Way (I pini della Via Appia)
The Italian Neo Classicism and his major musical Ambassador!
Joined even by the musical language and taste, Respighi develops a different estheticism respect to Ildebrand Pizzetti, more polished and mystic. The excessive instrumental decoration and affection for the dense color and, in the meantime, refined are derived directly substantially from Rimsky Korsakov and Richard Strauss, despite the generous discursiveness of the architectonic lines is very close to the great German musical tradition. Respighi is more inclined to naturalism and the return of the great orchestral masses with special emphasis in the search of new expressive elements based in the use of the color and the history or, in other words, in the preservation of the memory.
The Birds is a suite for reduced orchestra. Once more the pantheist gaze of this composer points out the influence of the Italian Neo classicism leaded by Casella. Five clavichordists fragments of the XVII inspired by the song of several birds (about pages of Pasquini, Phillipe Rameau and Jacques de Gallot and a British anonym ).It can feel the deliberated hedonistic avidity so typical of this Century as a clear response to the Rationalism Age: the triumph of the triviality over the reason empire.
Brazil has been always a radiant beacon in the febrile imagination of Europe: From Julio Verne to Alexander von Humboldt; from Darwin to Darius Milhaud, the search for the most essential sample of virginal nature has inflamed and nourished the ancestral landscapes of Europe: the wild Amazon river, the intricate, compact and dense jungles; the visible attraction for the mystery of unknown, touched the soul of Respighi composing a fabulous biographical sketch.
The fountains of Rome have in Toscanini a serious and hard to beat rival and the pines of Rome have found in Victor de Sabata. Nevertheles, Dorati makes a vibrant and emotional performance that, even it does not reach the colossal heights of these named conductors. Here you have a remarkable of what Respighi signified for the Italians. After Verdi ‘s death, the musical horizon experienced a notable lack of inspiration; despite the fact many Italian composers were seduced for the new musical proposals, Toscanini and De Sabata were not exactly fervent or devoted fans of the new musical forms, specially Toscanini, and both pages Pines and Fountains are works which talks about the Grandness and monumentality of Rome: once more Respighi goes in search of tradition conceived as the human form of measuring the time.
A magnificent choice and one of my beloved albums in Dorati ‘s discography.