After this team’s horrendous Elgar Second, it’s nice to report that Richard Hickox and crew do much better by Michael Tippett. Of course, this music is far easier to render idiomatically than is Elgar. The Rose Lake, in particular, is a late work assembled (like much Messiaen) out of a series of static sound-blocks. There’s almost no latitude for “interpretation” per se, and as long as you do what’s in the score you can’t go wrong. Hickox does, and so he doesn’t. The Ritual Dances from The Midsummer Marriage, wonderful music, sound very well here, the BBC orchestra’s rather scrawny string tone actually working to the performance’s advantage in giving plenty of prominence to the winds. Hickox also wisely omits the optional choral parts. They make no sense out of the context of the complete opera–in fact, they don’t even make much sense within the context of the complete opera. The final climax, though, could have used a bit more “oomph” from the brass and some additional rhetorical emphasis from the podium.
In stereo this sounds much better than the anemic Elgar symphony, but Chandos continues to make some of the worst-sounding SACDs in the business, with too much center channel giving the impression of mediocre mono. The rating is for the stereo track only. At 53 minutes, this recording also is an expensive proposition. You can get a decent Ritual Dances on Naxos, more appealingly coupled to an admittedly less-than-ideal version of the Piano Concerto. If Naxos can get the BBC Scottish Symphony in this music and sell it at budget price, why should you pay premium price on Chandos? Colin Davis’ The Rose Lake, the only alternative in that work, comes on Conifer (if you can find it) in tandem with the single extant recording of the loony Vision of Saint Augustine, giving you considerably more bang for your buck and arguably a more apt coupling. For some strange reason, Hickox so far has avoided the Suite for the Birthday of Prince Charles, thematically related to The Midsummer Marriage, which would have fit perfectly and greatly enhanced the appeal of this newcomer. I can recommend these performances with almost no qualms on purely musical grounds, but you will have to do your own math.
