Rossini: La scala di seta Overture (The Silken Ladder)

Rossini’s ceaseless wit and invention are best exemplified in his series of operas.

His colourful orchestration and command of both comic and tragic elements can be savoured in this second of four volumes of the complete symphonic overtures. Guillaume Tell, with its overture in four movements, includes a scene for five solo cellos. La scala di seta (The Silken Ladder), one of his most popular pieces, opens with an overture of charm and élan. Volume 1 (8570933) was described by MusicWeb International as “an admirable start to what looks like being a very desirable series”.

Witty and vital, but also darker and rather less well known, Rossini’s overtures cover a wide variety of moods and expressions. This disc includes the perennial favourite La scala di seta (The Silken Ladder), and the witty Guillaume Tell. With little known operatic overtures included, it makes for a finely balanced programme; and whilst the favourites have been multiply recorded, others are very much under represented in the catalogue.

Rossini wrote some of music’s most masterful and lovable operas. His gift for comic and tragic forms was matched by a relish for characterisation, qualities that are always evident in his overtures. La gazza ladra (The Thieving Magpie) is perhaps the most famous, one of the world’s most popular concert openers. Guillaume Tell, with its overture in four movements, includes a scene for five solo cellos. La scala di seta (The Silken Ladder) opens with an overture of charm and élan, and Le siège de Corinthe is dramatic and colourful. All of Rossini’s overtures display sparkling themes, rich lyricism and theatrical excitement.

During the 1950s, 60s and 70s, Decca recorded a number of albums with some of its key conductors of Overtures. Many of these were singled out by the press for their terrific sound quality (the fabled ‘Decca Sound’) and for their often adventurous programming. Some of them also included entr’actes and intermezzi. Prized as collectors’ items, many of the original LPs exchange hands at high prices. And most of these reissues, in Decca Eloquence’s ‘Romantic Overtures’ series appear in CD, in part or whole, for the first time.

Romantic Overtures – Volume 2 showcases the artistry of Piero Gamba, who conducted showpieces for Decca and partnered, among others, Ruggiero Ricci as well as Julius Katchen in his magnificent cycle of the Beethoven Concertos. This 2CD set includes his very first recording for Decca, of Rossini Overtures (1955). Five years later recorded another LP of Rossini Overtures, the only common item being William Tell (the stereo recording is truly thrilling, the record as a whole one of Decca’s best kept secrets!). Both recordings are included here (and both recordings of William Tell). The Egmont Overture was originally coupled with Katchen’s recording of Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto; and also included is all of the LP entitled ‘Adventures in Sound’ which included overtures and intermezzi by Verdi, Mascagni, Mancinelli, Martucci and Ponchielli. A real rarity is Stanley Black’s Overture to a Costume Comedy, recorded at the 1957 ‘Adventures in Sound’ sessions, but only included on a 45rpm EP in mono. This is its first release on CD and in stereo.

Kenneth Alwyn was a principal conductor of the Royal Ballet at Covent Garden where he shared the rostrum with such luminaries working with the company at that time as Malcolm Sargent, Ernest Ansermet, Arthur Bliss, William Walton, Hans Werner Henze and Benjamin Britten the latter nominated him as conductor of the original production of The Prince of the Pagodas. In 1958 he was invited by John Culshaw – at short notice – to make Decca’s first stereo recording to launch their new SXL series. Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, which, issued that same year (alongside other popular Tchaikovsky orchestral works) went on to become a bestseller. The next year he was invited back to the studio to make two further records from which his Grieg Peer Gynt Suite No. 1 (with one of the most beautifully-shaped accounts of ‘Morning mood’ to be committed to disc) as well as a selection of Rossini Overtures now appear on CD for the first time. The release was instigated by Alwyn himself and he provides the colourful notes for this release.

The great Russian conductor Igor Markevitch (1912–1983) was born in Kiev and spent his formative years in Switzerland. He studied piano with Cortot and composition with Boulanger, and from the late 1920s until 1939 he enjoyed a successful career as a composer. However, after this period he concentrated on conducting, making a sensational debut with the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1955. He recorded with all the major orchestras, notably the Berlin Philharmonic, Philharmonia, London Symphony Orchestra and Lamoureux, and guest conducted in all the main international centres until the mid-1970s. Markevitch left a very large discography on EMI, DG and Philips.

At the height of his powers in 1960, Markevitch returned to Russia and made a great impact with his concerts with the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra, resulting in this vibrant live and rare recording of the Verdi Requiem which preceded the studio version (no longer available). The spontaneity of the live recording is very evident in terms of both the extremely wide dynamic range of the recording and Markevitch’s fiery conducting, which never lets up.

David Patmore has written, ‘Markevitch’s repertoire during this visit included the Verdi Requiem, then a most unusual work to encounter in Russia because of its overt religious purpose and meaning. Possibly as a result, Markevitch and his Russian forces held no inhibitions in their performance, emphasising the operatic quality of the work, and performing it more as a drama than a liturgical rite.’

The recording features a young Galina Vishnevskaya, in her prime as an outstanding dramatic soprano. The bass, Ivan Petrov (of German origin), was born in Irkutsk in 1920, becoming a stalwart of the Bolshoi company – he was considered to be one of their finest basses. The mezzo-soprano and tenor of Markevitch’s quartet, Nina Isakova and Vladimir Ivanovsky, did not achieve international fame, but their contributions on this occasion were certainly whole-hearted. Markevitch’s rapport with both chorus and orchestra was clearly close, with strong attack matched by great sensitivity from both.

The Rossini Overtures, all brilliantly played, have been sourced from a mint LP to give extra bloom to the sound.

The recording features the Ambient Mastering process to widen the sound stage and create more depth.