The Fourth Symphony was a high point in Riccardo Muti’s fine Tchaikovsky Symphony cycle with the Philharmonia Orchestra, recorded in the late 1970s. Muti’s Philadelphia remake of the Fourth, however, is not as good. Distant miking makes the orchestra sound less robust than diffuse. Muti here favors blended, homogenized sonorities that bear nary a trace of the sharp contours and cross-rhythmic articulation he elicited from his London musicians. As a result, Tchaikovsky’s deft contrapuntal touches bob in and out of the mix, with little help from the skewed balances. Indeed, it’s hard to ascertain what pitches lurk beneath the suave string section pizzicatos that open the Scherzo. And then you struggle to hear the soft brass tuttis in proportion to everything else. Ormandy’s Philadelphia Tchaikovsky Fourth, by contrast, shows how opulence and clarity can go hand in hand. Moreover, you’ll find much more urgency, passion, and drama by way of Mravinsky/Leningrad (DG), Monteux/Boston (RCA), or Karajan/Berlin (his 1978 DG version is his best of many!). Spacious sonics, on the other hand, impart an attractive, mysterious allure to Scriabin’s Prometheus. Muti’s curvaceous, sensual reading contrasts with the lean immediacy of the Ashkenazy/Maazel recording (Decca). Piano soloist Dmitri Alexeev darts in and out of the orchestral waterfall like the proverbial elusive butterfly. The wordless chorus emerges from out of nowhere, adjusting its massed “ahs” to blend in with the surroundings. Buy this disc if you want an inexpensive taste of Muti’s gorgeous Philadelphia Scriabin cycle.
