A few years ago, Marco Polo released an interesting series of Flemish orchestral music, introducing us to names such as Gilson, De Boeck, Poot, and Meulemans, all artists worth getting to know. Unfortunately, this newcomer does not rise to the same level. Peter Benoit occupies a revered place in Flemish musical history, both as a performer and educator, but his talents as a composer, at least on evidence here, were severely limited. His suite from The Pacification of Ghent is completely uninteresting from virtually any point of view. Melodically undistinguished, harmonically tacky (sort of like a bad Liszt tone poem), shrilly orchestrated–there’s simply nothing worthy of notice happening here. And this is the best piece on the disc. Lodewijk Mortelmans’ two elegies, however sincere their inspiration (they are dedicated to the memory of the composer’s wife), lack personality and substance, while Lodewijk De Vocht’s Cello Concerto, deliberately lightweight in content, aims at humor and grace and achieves only facile superficiality. Performance quality (decent) and sound (ditto) are irrelevant: this music might have offered something meaningful to contemporary audiences, but its relevance today remains dubious at best.
