HERBERT VON KARAJAN - HIS LEGACY FOR HOME VIDEO: ANTONIN DVORAK - SYMPHONY # 9 "FROM THE NEW WORLD"

This another example of fenomenal late Karajan. He really got into the inner aspects of this symphony. My most favorite part is the intentional delay in the low string notes just before the first crescendo in the opening movement. It really gets the american indian spirit like no other version does. The performance is magnificent, almost I would like to see it with the Berliner instead of the Wiener. It seems that at the time Karajan was having problems with the Berliner because of his favoritism to a female clarinetist while the orchestra member said she didn't match (she can be seen performing some Beethoven symphonies in other DVDs of this series). But, coming back to this performance, the Wiener philharmoniker is wonderful and the sound is rich and pure. I you already know this piece, you'll rediscover it in this version. I recommend it. --Juan Keledjian Shop here

BERNSTEIN CENTURY : DVORAK NEW WORLD SYMPHONY

Dvorák's New World Symphony is one of my favorites and so I decided to try to find the best rendition based upon my personal view of the work. I was looking for a performance which included a particularly emotive Second Movement (Largo) along with an overall tight performance by the orchestra. To facilitate that end, I first garnered recommendations from participants in Amazon's Classical Music forum. The participants there gave me some terrific suggestions and I ended up with eleven CDs of the work. I played all these performances over and over, making copious notes on each, that I might be enabled to review each one here on Amazon.

I gave all these CDs five stars each chiefly because I fancy this particular symphony so much but some performances were clearly superior to others. To winnow these out so that prospective buyers would have some gauge for deciding which they might want to buy, I additionally assigned my own ranking to the respective CDs, rating them here 1 through 11, Number One being the best. Where my personal thoughts on any two symphonies equaled out, I then fell back upon the secondary material found on each the CDs as a tie-breaker, (only one CD featured the 9th Symphony by itself with no additional selections.) Finally, Amazon only permits a total of 10 links per review so you'll have to check the last ones manually. --Patric W. Crabtree "The Old Grottomaster" Listen to samples

DVORAK'S NEW World SYMPHONY AND OTHER ORCHESTRAL MASTERWORKS

RCA has a vast and incredible library of classical music recordings, particularly in its LIVING STEREO series, and over the years has re-released some of its great titles. One of the more popular and enduring recordings in this series is Fritz Reiner's recording of Dvorak's Ninth Symphony with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. People familiar with the LP version will instantly recognize it distinctive cover with a photograph of the Statue of Liberty, the same monument which would have greeted Dvorak when he first visited the United States and where he was inspired to write this great work.

The showpiece of the recording is Dvorak's 9th. Recorded in 1957, the orchestra has a hearty sound. Both Reiner and the orchestra seem familiar with the work. Reiner moves the work along, and is particularly vigorous in his conducting of the fourth movement, which may not be to everyone's liking, but works well with this recording. The CD also contains three other works that are in keeping with Dvorak's 9th. Two are overtures: a robust version of Dvorak's "Carnival Overture," and a lively recording of Smetena's overture to "The Bartered Bride." The third piece is Weinberger's Polka and Fugue from "Schwanda the Bagpiper." Interestingly, while he conducts the Dvorak's pieces with energy, the Weinberger piece is conducted a bit slower than other recordings of the work.

One bonus of the re-release of the "Living Stereo" recordings is that they contain the original liner notes from the LP. Since this CD is a compilation from two different LP's, the liner notes from both are included in this set. RCA has not re-released as many of the titles as they promised ten years ago when they first opened the vaults. Let's hope some of the other great titles will be released in the near future. Shop here

DVORAK: SYMPHONY No. 9 "FROM THE NEW WORLD"

Antonin Dvorak was born in what is now the Czech Republic. In the 1890's he visited America and developed diverse thematic material for a new symphony, which he would call "From the New World", his 9th. This recording is possibly the greatest interpretation commercially available, and certainly one of the more brand name recordings. I have heard rave reviews about the Karajan version, Bernstein version and even Eugene Ormandy version. But George Solti, no stranger to large-scale orchestral music (having conducted Wagner's Ring on studio recording) is very expert in conducting this Romantic, almost modern work that uses American themes. The opening adagio-allegro is powerful and dark, while the Largo is spiritual in its slower pace. This is where the American themes tie in. The Largo is better known as "Going Home" a Spiritual sung by African slaves in the South. On orchestra, this theme sounds far more poignant and bittersweet. The Scherzo movement is a tad reminiscent of the scherzo from Beethoven's 9th (Dvorak was of course an admirer of Beethoven and since this was his 9th, perhaps he intended to echo it a bit)Musically, it is of course appropriate to the structure of his symphony. It even paints the picture of wild horses running across the plains. The Fourth movement and finale, marked "allegro con fuoco" -Italian for "allegro with fire" is indeed fiery and fatal sounding. It has strong accents and fortissimos and conjures the image of an Indian War Dance. This music is indeed very American, though at this time it lacked jazz to make it complete. It would not be until such later American composers as Aaron Copland and Charles Ives that wrote American symphonic music. --Rudy Avila "Saint Seiya" Shop here

SYMPHONY No.9 E MINOR, OPUS 95, “FROM THE NEW WORLD”

Antonin Dvorak

From time immemorial, the Czechs, or the Bohemians as they used to be called, have been famous as musicians as far as European music was made. In dusty chronicles from the Middle Ages, we find that their names inscribed as pipers and fiddlers to the great dukes and kings of France and Germany. In the eighteenth century, Bohemian composers settled in France; Italy, Australia and Germany, contributing richly to the new symphonic style, many years before Haydn was given his misleading title of “father of the symphony.” Thus Dvorak was following a tradition more ancient than he perhaps knew when he accepted an important musical position in a far-off land and came to teach at the National Conservatory of Music in New York. His New World Symphony became a hymn to the folk spirit of two countries: the united States and Czechoslovakia.

When Anton Seidl conducted the New York Philharmonic in the premiere of Dvorak’s Symphony (on December 16, 1893, in Carnegie Hall), there were hopes that this might prove the starting point of a style of nation American composition. Before the premiere Dvorak had made clear just what he felt the basis of an American school should be.

As a good Romantic, he was convinced that great art-music must grow, plant-like, from the healthy soil of native folk music. This he had no difficulty in identifying for us as the Negro spiritual and the songs and dances of American Indians. Furthermore, having heard Henry T. Burleigh sing spirituals and having studied “a certain number of Indian melodies, which a friend gave me.” Dvorak concluded, rather hastily perhaps, that the music of the Negroes and the music of the Indians were “practically identical.”

Dvorak’s belief in the near-identity of Negro and American Indian music is reflected in the famous English horn melody of the second movement of the New World Symphony, which to most Americans seems steeped in the character of Negro spirituals, whereas Dvorak actually had been inspired, according to his own declaration, by the scene of the forest funeral of Minnehaha in Long fellow’s epic poem, The Song of Hiawatha. The Scherzo, he explained, “was suggested by the scene at the feast in Hiawatha where the Indians dance, and is also an easy I made in the direction of imparting the local color of Indian character to music.”

The Indian peculiarities Dvorak notd seem to be chiefly the tendency to a pentatonic (five-tone) scale, which is common to folk music around the globe, and a modal scale (usually in this case a minor scale with a lowered seventh step) common to most European folk music.

The earliest sketches date from December, 1892. The full score of the Symphony was written out between February 9 and May 24, 1893. It was not given its title, Z-Noviho sveta (“From the New World”) until mid-November, just before it was delivered to Seidl. A public rehearsal aroused tremendous enthusiasm and the premiere on December 16^th was a triumph. The score was published the following year as Dvorak’s Symphony No.5. Actually, it was the ninth symphony he had composed and it is often so designated on present-day programs.

I. Adagio: Allegro Molto A slow introduction foreshadows the main Allegro theme: a bold fanfare for two horns. Flutes and oboes follow with a fetching little tune that twists and turns upon it self. The strongest contrast comes with the famous melody for solo flute irresistibly recalling “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot,” one of Dvorak’s favorite spirituals. All three themes are developed separately and together, with increasing excitement. The reprise of the opening themes it followed by a triumphant coda.

II. Largo. A solemn procession of chords leads to the celebrated melody of the slow movement. The English horn chants a strain that has been adopted in this country, almost as another spiritual.

III. Scherzo: Molto vivace. We need not be overly concerned whether the opening gaiety is of American Indians or Czech peasants. The beginning and end are fiery and excited. In between there are moments which could conceivably suggest a more relaxed village scene with dancing peasants, a tootling village band and laughing crowd

IV. Allegro con fuoco. A finale of tremendous sweep and splendor id built around the sturdy, assertive theme proclaimed by horns and trombones. Material from earlier movements, recall and combined with the new, concludes this popular score in another burst of triumph…