Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, Theodore Bloomfield – Debussy: Iberia; Ravel: La Valse, Rhapsodie Espagnole (1960/2013) [Official Digital Download 24bit/192kHz]

Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, Theodore Bloomfield – Debussy: Iberia; Ravel: La Valse, Rhapsodie Espagnole (1960/2013)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/192 kHz | Time – 46:53 minutes | 1,37 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Everest

With these three colorful French orchestral masterpieces, a brilliant American conductor – Theodore Bloomfield – and a great American orchestra – the Rochester Philharmonic – make their debuts on Everest Records. Thanks to the unsurpassed fidelity of Everest sound, it is possible to enjoy exact duplicates of the original live performances.

Debussy: Ibéria :: Ibéria is the second of Claude Debussy’s three Images pour Orchestre. The first of the Images – Gigues – was intended as a musical impression of England; the third – Rondes de Printemps – was meant to serve a similar role for France. The most popular of the three, Ibéria, as its name implies, evokes impressions of Spain. The eminent Spanish composer, Manuel de Falla, a recognized authority on the music of his native land, once declared that in Ibéria Debussy had captured the letter and spirit of Spanish music and had expressed it more vividly than had many a Spaniard. Yet in his entire lifetime, Debussy spent only a few hours in Spain, when he went to San Sebastian to watch a bullfight.

The three Images required about six years for completion. When Debussy first conceived them, they were to be for two pianos, in order to complement two earlier sets of Images for solo piano. But he later found that this medium would be inadequate for his purposes, so he decided to develop them into orchestral pieces. As it turned out, he never did orchestrate Gigues; that task he assigned to his pupil André Caplet. The first sketches for Ibéria date from 1906. At one point during its composition, Debussy wrote his publisher that he had in mind three different finales for Ibéria, and didn’t know whether to toss a coin in order to decide which to use or to sit down and devise a fourth ending. Ibéria finally had its first performance by the Orchestre des Concerts Colonne in Paris on February 20, 1910. The conductor on that occasion was the noted French composer, Gabriel Pierné, who once complained to Debussy that the score was too difficult for either the orchestra or the conductor.

This premiere may be said to have been quite successful, considering the fact that in those days Debussy was looked upon as an ultra-modern composer. His constituents in the audience were so vociferous in their demands for a repetition of the work that Pierné was about to signal the orchestra to play it again. It was then, however, that the anti-Debussy faction made itself heard. Its hissing protest caused the conductor to change his mind and proceed with the rest of the program. The three sections of Ibéria, which are played with out-out pause, bear these respective headings: In the Streets and Byways; Fragrances of the Night, and The Morning of a Festival Day. After the first performance, one French critic gave an appropriate description of the work, declaring that the music takes the listener right to Spain. “The bells of horses and mules are heard,” he wrote, “and the joyous sounds of wayfarers. The night falls; nature sleeps and is at rest until bells and aubades announce the dawn, and the world awakens to life.”

Ravel: La Valse :: Maurice Ravel composed his choreographic poem La Valse in 1920 at the suggestion of Sergei Diaghilev, who wished to have an “Apotheosis of the Waltz” to make into a ballet for his Russian troupe. When Ravel showed him the music, however, he did not find it to his liking, and told the composer so. As a result, a quarrel ensued, causing the permanent estrangement of the composer and the impresario. La Valse was first played in an arrangement for two pianos by Ravel and the Italian composer- conductor-pianist, Alfredo Casella, in Vienna in November, 1920. In its orchestral dress, it was first heard on December 12th of that year, at a concert of the Lamoureux Orchestra in Paris, conducted by Camille Chevillard. Ravel originally called this composition Wien (Vienna), and the score bears the indication, Movement of a Viennese Waltz. There are some who find much irony in this music, as if Ravel were painting a musical picture of nineteenth century Vienna as seen through the disillusioned eyes of the twentieth century. Included in the music is a traceable quotation from the Treasure Waltz from the younger Johann Strauss’ opera The Gypsy Baron. Casella described La Valse as “a sort of triptych: a. The Birth of the Waltz. (The poem begins with dull rumors, as in Rheingold, and from this chaos gradually takes form and development). b. The Waltz. c. The Apotheosis of the Waltz.” On the score is printed the following description, written by Ravel himself: “Whirling clouds give glimpses, through rifts, of couples waltzing. The clouds scatter, little by little. One sees an immense hall peopled with a twirling crowd. The scene is gradually illuminated. The light of the chandeliers bursts forth, fortissimo. An Imperial Court about 1855.”

Ravel: Rapsodie Espagnole :: There is a close kinship between Debussy’s Ibéria and Ravel’s Rapsodie Espagnole. Both are works in the Spanish idiom by French composers; both were written about the same time, and both received their initial performances within two years of one another, by the same orchestra and under similar circumstances. But whereas Debussy was a Frenchman through and through who barely set foot in Spain, Ravel was born only a short distance from the Spanish border, at Ciboure in the Basses-Pyréneés. Besides, his mother was a Basque. Tracing through the list of his compositions, one finds that among his very first works was a Habanera for two pianos, while among his very last was the Bolero. In between lie such Spanish-style compositions as the Alborada del Graciodo, the Vocalise en forme d’Habanera, the opera L’Heure Espagnole, and the Rapsodie Espagnole.

The Rapsodie Espagnole was Ravel’s first large orchestral work. It was written in one month during the summer of 1907, in the seclusion of a friend’s yacht, and was first performed at a Colonne Concert in Paris on March 15, 1908. Its reception was quite enthusiastic, but most of that enthusiasm is said to have emanated from the upper reaches of the auditorium. After the playing of the second movement – the Malaguena – one adherent, the noted French composer Florent Schmitt, shouted to Ravel from the balcony, “Play it once again for the people downstairs who have not understood it!” The movement was duly repeated. But when the applause at the end of the Rapsodie was not vociferous enough to suit Schmitt, he yelled, “If it had been something by Wagner you would have found it very beautiful!” Actually, the Rapsodie Espagnole is a suite in four brief movements. The first, entitled Prelude a la Nuit, is a languorous nocturne, the principal motif of which makes a fleeting reappearance in the second and fourth movements. The second section is the aforementioned Malaguena, a Spanish dance in triple meter, with an improvisatory English horn solo in the middle. The third movement is none other than that early Habanera for two pianos, first written in 1895 and enlarged and orchestrated for use in the Rapsodie. The suite then concludes with the lively Feria (The Fair), in which once again we hear a contrasting solo in the middle for English horn.

The Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra has been ranked among the major symphonic groups in America ever since it was founded in 1922. It is unique among the nation’s symphonic organizations in that it is supported by the world’s largest community music group, the Rochester Civic Music Association, which has more than 13,000 subscribers. During its history, the orchestra has had only five permanent conductors: Albert Coates, Sir Eugene Goossens, José Iturbi, Erich Leinsdorf, and now Theodore Bloomfield. Appointed musical director of the Rochester Philharmonic in March, 1958, Theodore Bloomfield is the first Americanborn permanent conductor in the orchestra’s history. He had already established an international reputation as conductor of the Portland (Oregon) Symphony Orchestra and guest conductor of leading orchestras throughout the United States and Europe. Bloomfield is noted for the brilliance and excitement of his Interpretations, which now come so vividly to life in Everest recordings. –Original Liner Notes

Tracklist:
Claude Debussy (1862-1918)
Iberia
1 I. Par les rues et par les chemins 07:08
2 II. Les parfums de la nuit 08:27
3 III. Rondes de printemps 04:27

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)
4 La Valse 11:54
Rhapsodie espagnole
5 I. Prelude a la Nuit 04:21
6 II. Malaguena 02:01
7 III. Habanera 02:33
8 IV. Feria 06:03

Personnel:
Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra
Theodore Bloomfield, Conductor

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