Messiaen Turangalila Symphony
Balance problems aside‚ Nagano’s colourful and exciting reading is up there with the best
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Olivier Messiaen
Genre:
Orchestral
Label: Teldec (Warner Classics)
Magazine Review Date: 9/2001
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 73
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 8573 82043-2
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Turangalîla Symphony |
Olivier Messiaen, Composer
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra Dominique Kim, Ondes martenot Kent Nagano, Conductor Olivier Messiaen, Composer Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Piano |
Author:
Turangalîla is a difficult score‚ and to record it live is risky. Even when the orchestra is the Berlin Philharmonic? Yes‚ since the work is very far from the centre of their repertoire. Whether despite or because of that risk this is a splendidly exciting performance; more surprisingly it is also for the most part a very accurate and detailed one. The excitement is reflected in fastish tempos‚ due I suspect to passionate urgency in the second movement (Nagano can be faintly heard urging his players on)‚ with less justification in the sixth‚ though here the warmth and bright light of the ‘garden of love’s slumber’ are so beautiful that I am reluctant to complain. The textures and colours of the third movement are finely balanced‚ as they are even in the headlong exuberance of its successor. Although the precision of the seventh seems to me to understate its balefulness‚ the complex textures and superimposed rhythms of the ninth are outstandingly clear and fascinating. Throughout‚ one alternates between astonishment that the Berlin Philharmonic seem to have reinvented their sound and (often in passages of massive or exciting brass sonority) gratitude that they haven’t.
The soloists are admirable; the extremes of the piano part‚ in particular‚ are just what Pierre Laurent Aimard is good at. Inevitably in a live recording there are one or two imprecisions of balance - I thought the ondes martenot slightly backward in the fourth movement‚ and some of the birds with whom Aimard converses in the sixth are rather far back in the shrubbery - but this is among the two or three best accounts of Turangalîla available. I would still give primacy to Simon Rattle’s version on EMI‚ and recommend Previn’s (also EMI) despite its rather bright sound‚ but I would place Nagano ahead of all the others.
Explore the world’s largest classical music catalogue on Apple Music Classical.
Included with an Apple Music subscription. Download now.
Gramophone Digital Club
- Digital Edition
- Digital Archive
- Reviews Database
- Events & Offers
From £9.20 / month
SubscribeGramophone Club
- Print Edition
- Digital Edition
- Digital Archive
- Reviews Database
- Events & Offers
From £11.45 / month
Subscribe
If you are a library, university or other organisation that would be interested in an institutional subscription to Gramophone please click here for further information.