[1/30/2011] Concluding our walking tour through Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition" (continued)

READY? OKAY, HERE WE GO!

Again, our performers (for notes on the performances, see last week's post) are:

piano version: Byron Janis, piano. Mercury, recorded September 1961
Ravel orchestration: Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Fritz Reiner, cond. RCA/BMG, recorded Dec. 7, 1957
Stokowski orchestration: BBC Philharmonic, Matthias Bamert, cond. Chandos/MHS, recorded June 28-29, 1995

No. 6, Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle
(Two Polish Jews -- One Rich, the Other Poor)

Hartmann, we're always told, had a thing about the medieval city of Sandomir ("Sandomierz" in Polish; "one of the oldest and historically most significant cities in Poland," on a cliff overlooking the Vistula River near the junction of the San, in what's now southeastern Poland -- bear in mind how movable national boundaries in this region have been through the centuries of "modern" European history), in particular for the Jewish ghetto.

The pencil drawings of the two Sandomir Jews on which this "picture" is based were apparently actually owned by Mussorgsky. In his musicalization, which we've already heard in last night's preview, he imagined this unharmonious encounter between the haughty, portly rich Jew and the whining beggar.

piano version -- Byron Janis, piano

Ravel orchestration -- Fritz Reiner, cond.

Stokowski orchestration -- Matthias Bamert, cond.

THE "MISSING" PROMENADE BETWEEN NOS. 6 AND 7

This is the "walking" connector between Nos. 6 and 7, omitted by Ravel in his orchestral edition, and also by many (most?) pianists performing Mussorgsky's own version. I thought we'd hear it first by itself -- as you'll hear, it doesn't really add anything to what we've already heard -- and then as the link between "Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle" and "Limoges -- The Marketplace." (I'm not necessarily endorsing this performance by the then-25-year-old Michel Béroff. I just happen to have it. Probably we should also hear at the very least Béroff's handling of the opening Promenade, so we can hear how he relates this one to the earlier ones, but even I have limits to my openness to digression. Really!)

The "missing" Promenade by itself

No. 6, Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle
Promenade
No. 7, Limoges -- The Marketplace

Michel Béroff, piano. EMI, recorded c 1975

No. 7, Limoges -- The Marketplace

This is apparently a musical composite of numerous sketches Hartmann made of Limoges. Clearly, as with the other "French" picture, "Tuileries" (No. 3), the bustling marketplace affords Mussorgsky some welcome up-tempo musical contrast with the surrounding "pictures." Note that this picture is written to lead directly into the next, "Catacombs."

piano version -- Byron Janis, piano

Ravel orchestration -- Fritz Reiner, cond.

omitted by Stokowski


No. 8, Catacombs (Sepulcrum romanum)
Cum mortuis in lingua mortua

In his Angel liner note for the Béroff Pictures from which we heard the "missing" promenade, Rory Guy offers this background for the pair of pictures combined here:

Hartmann himself, a friend, and a guide holding a lantern visit the interior of the Paris catacombs. The second part of the piece is the "Promenade" music transfigured. It bears a marginal note: "Latin text: With the dead in a dead language. The creative spirit of the dead Harmann leads me toward the skulls and speaks to them. They begin to glow from within with a gentle luminescence."

piano version -- Byron Janis, piano

Ravel orchestration -- Fritz Reiner, cond.

Stokowski orchestration -- Matthias Bamert, cond.



No. 9, The Hut on Fowl's Legs (Baba Yaga)

Of course "The Great Gate of Kiev" makes for a grand climax to Pictures, but I'm not sure the most dramatic "picture" isn't this one. Baba Yaga is a folkloric Russian witch famous for dining on crushed-up human bones, and she indeed lived in a hut perched on fowl's legs. (Note that Hartmann's rendering is as a clock!) Rory Guy ventures that the music "seems also to suggest the witch's flight through the night sky in search of mortal prey." Again, this picture is written to run directly into the climactic final one.

piano version -- Byron Janis, piano

Ravel orchestration -- Fritz Reiner, cond.

Stokowski orchestration -- Matthias Bamert, cond.



No. 10, The Great Gate of Kiev

The music itself hardly needs much comment, but for background here's Rory Guy: "A massive gate at Kiev was proposed to commemorate the escape from assassination of Tsar Alexander II, in 1866. It was never built, but Hartmann's six designs for it stimulated Mussorgsky to conceive an even more imposing edifice in music, quoting an ancient liturgical theme, and suggesting a procession, bells, chanting, and triumphant celebration."

piano version -- Byron Janis, piano

Ravel orchestration -- Fritz Reiner, cond.

Stokowski orchestration -- Matthias Bamert, cond.



SUMMING UP TODAY'S PROMENADE:
OUR SECOND "HALF-PICTURES"

Last week we heard what I called a "half-Pictures," gathering the portion of the exhibition we had traversed thus far, in the performances we've been using for our previews: Byron Janis at the keyboard, and George Szell conducting the Ravel orchestral version, plus -- since, again, I don't own a third recording of the Stokowski version -- the master's own 1965 recording of it, split in half. It seems only logical to complete this portion of our program with the second "half-Pictures." At the same time, it seems silly to make you click back to last week's post if, quite reasonably, you happen to want to hear the the first half of these performances as well. So don't tell anybody, but I've discreetly slipped in the first-half files for each.

Promenade
No. 1, Gnomus
Promenade; No. 2, Il vecchio castello (The Old Castle)
Promenade; No. 3, Tuileries (Children's Dispute After Playing)
[omitted by Stokowski]
No. 4, Bydło (Oxen)
Promenade; No. 5, Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks

No. 6, Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle
(Two Polish Jews -- One Rich, the Other Poor)
No. 7, Limoges -- The Marketplace
[(a) omitted by Stokowski]
[(b) preceded by a "Promenade" omitted by Ravel and by many pianists, but included by William Kapell]
No. 8, Catacombs (Sepulcrum romanum)
Cum mortuis in lingua mortua
No. 9, The Hut on Fowl's Legs (Baba Yaga)
No. 10, The Great Gate of Kiev

MUSSORGSKY: Pictures at an Exhibition
(first half)
(second half)
William Kapell, piano. RCA/BMG, private recording of a live broadcast from Melbourne (Australia) Town Hall, July 21, 1953, with the conclusion of "The Great Gate at Kiev" patched in from a recital at the Frick Collection (New York), March 1, 1953

MUSSORGSKY-RAVEL: Pictures at an Exhibition
(first half)
(second half)

Cleveland Orchestra, George Szell, cond. Epic/Columbia/CBS/Sony, recorded Oct. 30, 1963

MUSSORGSKY-STOKOWSKI: Pictures at an Exhibition
(first half -- "Tuileries" omitted)
(second half -- "Limoges -- The Marketplace" omitted)
New Philharmonia Orchestra, Leopold Stokowski, cond. Decca, recorded 1965


NOW, ALL TOGETHER, LET'S WALK THROUGH
THE WHOLE EXHIBITION -- THREE TIMES!

Promenade
No. 1, Gnomus
Promenade; No. 2, Il vecchio castello (The Old Castle)
Promenade; No. 3, Tuileries (Children's Dispute After Playing)
[omitted by Stokowski]
No. 4, Bydło (Oxen)
Promenade; No. 5, Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks
No. 6, Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle
(Two Polish Jews -- One Rich, the Other Poor)
No. 7, Limoges -- The Marketplace [omitted by Stokowski]
No. 8, Catacombs (Sepulcrum romanum)
Cum mortuis in lingua mortua
No. 9, The Hut on Fowl's Legs (Baba Yaga)
No. 10, The Great Gate of Kiev

MUSSORGSKY: Pictures at an Exhibition
Sviatoslav Richter, piano. Columbia/Philips, recorded live in Sofia, 1958

MUSSORGSKY-RAVEL: Pictures at an Exhibition
Philharmonia Orchestra, Herbert von Karajan, cond. EMI, recorded Oct. 1955 and June 1956

MUSSORGSKY-STOKOWSKI: Pictures at an Exhibition
New Philharmonia Orchestra, Leopold Stokowski, cond. Decca, recorded 1965


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