Album Reviews

Another sonic spectacular from the Everest catalog, this pairing of Shostakovich’s 9th Symphony, completed in 1945, with Prokofiev’s score for the 1933 film “Lieutenant Kije,” offers rich, warm orchestral colors, remarkable transparency and air, and dynamic contrasts that mimic what one hears in a good concert hall.

The transfer, using the original 35MM magnetic tape played back on a refurbished Westrex 1551 outfitted with all new vacuum tube electronics, produces a vast, wide and deep soundstage and room-filling hall acoustics. Despite the somewhat distant perspective, images are well-defined, round and rich.

The Shostakovich, a relatively short piece in five movements, opens with a spirited, playful movement accented with brass and woodwinds, somewhat uncharacteristic of Russian orchestral music, though those familiar with the “..Kije” will hear reflections of it in the Shostakovich. The second movement delivers more typical Russian romanticism coupled with Shostakovich’s well-honed sense of the absurd in the form of a serpentine melodic line carried by the woodwinds and violins and accented by rumbling brass and violas, which add a cataclysmic, off-kilter feel to the piece. And if you don’t think I’m not way out of my element here writing about classical music and not talking out of my ass, you’re seriously deluded. I’m doing the best that I can.

The “Lieutenant Kije,” arranged into an orchestral suite by Prokofiev from the film score, follows the birth to death adventures of a war hero invented by courtiers of Czar Nicholas I, to cover for their ruler’s misreading of the name of a war hero whose exploits he admired.

This piece, pleasingly laden with hummable tunes, will be familiar to most listeners, even if they don’t know it by name. Woody Allen used one section in his film “Love And Death” along with segments of Prokofiev’s other well-known film score, “Alexander Nevsky.”

The recording and the performance by the LSO conducted by Sir Malcolm Sargent, are both darker and richer than the 1958 Reiner/CSO “Lt. Kije Suite,” backed by Stravinsky’s “Song of the Nightingale” (RCA “Living Stereo LSC-2150), and while not quite as spectacular or dramatic, probably better reflect the dark Russian sensibility. But again, I’m not a classical music critic, so I’m doing some butt-talking. But it’s my website and I’ll talk from my ass if I so choose!

Back to my mouth, the recorded sound here is a constant pleasure: warm, transparent, spacious and relaxing. I can’t think of a better entré into orchestral classical music than this nicely packaged, superb sounding Everest reissue from Classic Records. Musically and sonically it’s a treasure you’ll come back to repeatedly. No CD, including Classic’s of this same recording, will get you close to what this LP delivers.