Kodaly - Solo Cello Sonata

I remembered buying a CD last year with a mixed program of solo cello works, played by Tatiana Vassilieva (Accord 476 7191). One of them is the Kodaly Sonata, op. 8. A good opportunity to listen to it in the wake of my survey of orchestral works as I didn't know the music nor had ever really heard about the soloist.

I knew its reputation as an ineluctable monument in the solo cello literature but never really sat down to listen to it.  I'm happy to acknowledge that the sonata is an impressive work. It's likely the best thing I have heard by Kodaly up to this point. Although it's a relatively early work, dating from 1915,  what strikes is the towering maturity and confidence that speaks from it. It's a long work, over half an hour long, that meshes audacious bravura and dazzling virtuosity with a sober, cohesive musical argument. It has a certain abstract quality in its limited tonal and textural bandwith, the terseness of the musical material and the long, pondering improvisatory stretches. But this is nicely counterbalanced by a mellifluous harmonic language, stretches of infectuous declamatory or peasant rhythms and stunning instrumental pyrotechnics.

Vassilieva plays it very convincingly, it seems to me, with a solid grasp of the musical structure. She modulates confidently between the different emotional registers, never putting herself too much in the spotlight.  I don't find the recording ideal (Temple du Bon Secours, Paris) as it puts the soloist in a somewhat too resonant acoustic.

I know Janos Starker has been a widely admired champion of the piece and I will certainly seek out a recording of his (there are three), either on vinyl or CD. There is a Youtube video of Vassilieva's performance of the piece, but I must say that, impressive as the video is, she sounds more restrained and convincing on CD. Also worthwhile is a video of Starker's rendering of the third movement at the occasion of a Tokyo concert

Kodaly - Peacock Variations

I had precious little time to listen to music the last couple of days. What time I had I spent on Kodaly, a composer who leads a rather peripheral existence in my collection. However, recently two very nice LPs were added, featuring the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Istvan Kertesz in well-known key works of Kodaly's output: the Hary Janos suite, the Dances from Galanta, the Peacock Variations and Psalmus Hungaricus. These are all splendidly idiomatic performances, superbly engineered to the very high Decca standards of the time. The Janos/Galanta date from 1964 (SXL 6163), the other two works from 1971 (SXL 6497). Kertesz died in a swimming accident in 1973. On Wikipedia there is a note referring to precisely these recordings:

With his renditions of Kodály's big orchestral works, and given his precise yet passionate conducting style, Kertész was particularly well-suited to get the full orchestral swoop and swoon endemic to Psalmus Hungaricus and the Peacock Variations. The sonority Kertész managed to elicit from the LSO was expertly executed. Little wonder that Barry Tuckwell, the principal hornist of the LSO spoke of the élan and enthusiasm Kertész could coax out of the orchestra, many of whom Tuckwell regarded as "old codgers not bloody likely to dance to any youngster's tune".

Another interesting factoid is that in 1972 the musicians of the Cleveland Orchestra voted 93 to 2 to request to the Board to favor Kertesz as a replacement for George Szell. The Board declined, however. So much for Szell's unassailable reputation!

The Hary Janos and Galanta pieces I knew rather well from Fricsay's highly prized recording. New to me were, however, the Peacock Variations. An intriguing piece that came relatively late in Kodaly's output (1939). It was commissioned by the Amsterdam Concertgebouw to celebrate its 50th birthday.

If I had to guess in a blind audition whose composition it was, I would have come up with perhaps a rather surprising suggestion: Ralph Vaughan Williams. Indeed, the Variations' harmonic language harks back quite precisely to the impressionistic opulence of relatively early RVW symphonic scores such as the London and Pastoral Symphony (1913 and 1921, respectively). Also the instrumentation reminds me time and again of the British composer.

But maybe this isn't so surprising if one is reminded of the fact that both of them spent a short while in Paris to study with the French masters. Kodaly studied with Widor in 1906-1907 and VW arrived barely a year later to study three months with Ravel. I believe indeed that this is the connecting element. Whilst Kodaly may not have studied with Ravel directly, he must have thoroughly absorbed his idiom. Even only the introduction to the Peacock Variations conjures up the world of Ma Mère L'Oye in an exemplary way. Another interesting tidbit is that at one point (1911) Ravel's Valses Nobles et Sentimentales were premiered anonymously. When the audience was allowed to guess who was the composer it appears that also Kodaly's name was mentioned. So perhaps it should not surprise us. On the other hand, as far as I know in 1911 Kodaly was still to compose all his major works so one wonders where his reputation was based on at that early stage.