Composer: Gustav Theodore Holst
Orchestra: Ulster Orchestra
Conductor: JoAnn Falletta
Audio CD
Number of Discs: 1
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Naxos
Size: 1.15 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
01. Walt Whitman, Op. 7
Symphony in F, Op. 8 ‘The Cotswolds’
02. I. Allegro con brio
03. II. Elegy: Molto adagio (In Memoriam William Morris)
04. III. Scherzo: Presto – Allegretto
05. IV. Finale: Allegro moderato
06. A Winter Idyll
Japanese Suite, Op. 33
07. I. Prelude: Song of the Fisherman
08. II. Ceremonial Dance
09. III. Dance of the Marionette
10. IV. Interlude: Song of the Fisherman
11. V. Dance under the Cherry Tree
12. VI. Finale: Dance of the Wolves
13. Indra
This disc contains a wealth of relatively unfamiliar music, although all of it has been recorded before. Holst’s “The Cotswolds” Symphony deserves credit for its untraditional approach to form: it’s basically a lively and unpretentious framework for the touching second-movement Elegy (In memoriam William Morris). The Walt Whitman Overture… [is] a lively and slightly anonymous piece that’s good, clean fun. A Winter Idyll, the earliest work on the disc, begins with a surprisingly violent gesture and then quickly calms down, but never loses focus or lacks freshness. The two major works, though, are the Japanese Suite (contemporaneous with The Planets) and the tone poem Indra. Here the mature composer is obvious, nowhere more so than in the Dance of the Marionette…with its repeated rhythms and delicate writing for the glockenspiel. The performances are first rate in all respects…JoAnn Falletta gets an enthusiastic response from the Ulster Orchestra, and her interpretive choices (tempos especially) sound unerringly right. The engineering is clean and clear; it suits the music. A fine disc. David Hurwitz