It might have been good to have another version of the Dance of the Gnomes (also called “Ballad”) to set beside those of Geoffrey Simon (Cala) and Edward Downes (Chandos), but for the fact that Eiji Oue’s is duller than both. Part of the problem stems from the dark sonority that he cultivates in his orchestra, which makes it marvelous in Bruckner’s Ninth or Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde (both for this same label), but lacking in the brilliance that Respighi’s scoring ideally demands. This doesn’t mean that the orchestra can’t play it, of course. It plays very well. But it’s up to the conductor to encourage the band to make the kinds of sounds the music requires. And so Belkis, Queen of Sheba lacks energy in its final Orgiastic Dance and could use more guts in the War Dance. Oue also plays the movements of this suite in Respighi’s published order, a mistake in that it front-loads all of the slow, quiet music.
The Pines of Rome similarly suffers from a lack of excitement: the opening theme is cautiously played and poorly articulated, and the second movement is simply too slow with amorphous lower strings and percussion. In his recent review of DePriest’s new recording for Delos, my colleague Victor Carr asked a pertinent question: If you’re not going to go for broke in the finale, why bother? Why doesn’t Oue insist that the percussion cut through the welter of sound at the final climax? It’s that march-ostinato on timpani and bass drum and those powerful crashes from cymbals and tam-tam that must be clearly heard as the music grows increasingly powerful, and not the throbbing bass of the organ pedals (as here).
If Reiner’s classic RCA recording can accomplish this, or Kempe’s (on Chesky), or Bernstein’s (Sony), or hell, even Toscanini’s mono version (RCA again), then why can’t Telarc, Delos, or Reference Recordings get it right in their recent releases? Ultimately, it’s the conductor’s job to see that the technology serves the music, and in this sleepy performance Oue just doesn’t seem to be terribly interested. And however “audiophile” the sound as such, it simply doesn’t support or clarify Respighi’s musical vision as it should. For a truly spectacular recording that does just that, turn to Eduardo Mata’s fabulous (and hugely underrated) performance with the Dallas Symphony on Dorian. You won’t believe the difference.
