The
immense popularity of Gustav Holst's "The Planets"
as an audiophile showpiece has blinded us to the fact that
it is a great piece of music. It has the melody, the orchestration,
the drive, and the variety that none of his other works--not
the English sunday school flavors of the "Choral Symphony"
or "Choral Fantasy" nor the pub folksy joys of the
band suites nor the hermetic eastern mysticisms of "Savitri"
or the "Rig Veda Hymns"--possess. These two recording,
both taken down closer in time to the work's composition than
I am to their recording, re-affirm for me the Planet's magic
in a way that modern recordings do not. Why that is, I do
not know. I do know that the audio restorations have afforded
me great pleasure and brought a tear to my eye more than once.
The two recording are very different and I will compare them
movement by
movement:
MARS: Boult's Mars starts out with very detailed, detache
strings and reserved brass and works up to a great crescendo;
the effect is very menacing. Sargent starts out with fairly
strong brass, with strings more in the background; the effect
is warlike, but not as menacing as Boult. Sargent has the
better sound throughout, but Boult through his tightness seems
to bring greater intensity. In the rushing quavers leading
to the hammer-blows at the end, Boult projects a crushing
sense of tragic inevitability while Sargent gives us a lot
of excitement. Even with poorer sound Boult wins, but not
by as much as I'd have imagined.
VENUS: Sargent was supposed to have a way with the fairer
sex and so he certainly does here. Even allowing for his finer
sound, Sargent's Venus is far superior to Boult's. His langorous
oboe and flute, the sensuous strings, the tempi are so gorgeous
as to make Boult's Venus someone sitting at the phone waiting
for a call from her teen-aged boyfriend.
MERCURY: Sargent's Mercury is brilliant in the percussion
area, but a little heavywight in the strings. Tempi are slow.
Boult's version is lean, very fast, somehow more forward moving
and just more (dare we say) mercurial?
JUPITER: Both Boult and Sargent play Jupiter magnificently;
neither sentimentalize nor slow up at the great Elgarish tune;
both are lean and fast. It is left to later foreign conductors
to inject avoirdupois into this piece. Sargent's finer sound
causes me to prefer his version. Neither version can capture
the magnificent subterranean billowing strings upwelling near
the end; that required future technology.
SATURN: Saturn can bring anti-climax as well as old age. Neither
is brought by Sargent. He gives the greatest performance in
either set of "The Planets" to Saturn. It is hard
to describe as it brought a tear to my eye: the power and
inevitability of the opening chords, the anguish and the warmth
and serenity of the closing I've never experienced before.
Boult in his grimness and austerity is swept away.
URANUS: Here Boult is brilliant. The central, mocking march
is made to be so arrogant and cocksure that one must chuckle.
Sargent cannot summon the same degree of cheek.
NEPTUNE: I fear that Sargent doesn't understand this music;
neither do I. But Boult does and he makes me appreciate it.
It's not just a salad of sonorities; it really conveys an
otherworldly feeling under Boult's baton.
Well,
in summary, it's almost impossible to choose between the two,
which is surprising given Boult's and Sargent's contemporary
reputations. Sargent has, in the Pristine Audio remastering,
by far the best sound. Boult wins, by a slight margin, musically.
Sargent gives the single greatest performance ("Saturn").
I intend to get them both. They have something that Bernstein
and Karajan don't.
Reviewer:
Bill Rosen |
The
1954 version... nicely remastered on the Pristine Audio label...
