Netherlands Chamber Orchestra Cond. Gordan Nikoli 107
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Description
Listening to symphonies by Charles Gounod might sound like about as much fun as listening to a string quartet by Wagner, but these two works were popular in France in the middle 19th century.
This was a time when symphonies were rarely played in opera-made France, and those by French composers were even rarer. The two symphonies are quite different from one another, but they were both composed in 1855 and 1856; they thus precede most of Gounod's famous operas, but are contemporaneous with the St. Cecilia Mass.
They appear to have been inspired by Gounod's acquaintance with the German symphonic tradition during his Prix de Rome trip, when he met Fanny Hensel and through her became acquainted with the music of Mendelssohn and his illustrious forebears.
There's a certain Gallic lightness throughout, but the formally free second symphony has the virtue, or flaw depending on point of view, of sounding like a symphony written by an opera composer.
The Netherlands Chamber Orchestra under Gordan Nikolic catches the lightness, the definite Gounod quality of the music, and this is a hard-to-find repertoire oddity that will be welcomed by Gounod lovers.
Tracklisting
Markus Bronnimann
Christoph Ullrich
Evgeni Koroliov
Matthias Lingenfelder, Peter Orth
Concerto Budapest, Andras Keller
Christoph Ullrich
Ensemble Peregrina, Agnieszka Budzinska-Bennett
Concerto Budapest, Andras Keller
Tomas Vrana, Janacek Philharmonic Ostrava, Gabor Kali
The Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra|Riccardo Chailly
The Choir of Merton College, Oxford, Britten Sinfonia, Benjamin Nicholas
Tamar Halperin
Renato Criscuolo|Aldo Criscuolo
Ragna Schirmer, Hofkapelle Munchen, Rudiger Lotter
Piercarlo Sacco|Andrea Dieci
Peter Hanson (violin); Andrew Arthur (fortepiano)
