Smetana - Ma Vlast - Harnoncourt, Vienna Philharmonic

 

Release Date: October 21, 2003 Label: RCA Number of discs: 2 Composer: Bedrich Smetana Performer: Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra cd info/ buy

Review:

Like so many German stage directors working today, Nikolaus Harnoncourt does nothing without a "concept". Sometimes these work and yield fascinating insights into music we thought that we knew; sometimes they don't and the result is just plain weird. Happily this performance belongs to the former category, and we can be very grateful that RCA rescued it from discographic oblivion (actually, it was pressed by Teldec, then all copies were destroyed when that label cancelled Harnoncourt's "lifetime" contract; some promos of that earlier pressing survive). If you thought you knew Ma Vlast, you're in for a shock. Still, the most interesting thing about Harnoncourt's view is that many of his insights come simply from following the score as Smetana wrote it, even if the results come up sounding about as "un-Czech" as humanly possible. Read more

 

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