Elliott Carter: A Nonesuch Retrospective [Box set]

This is a convenient box containing a handful of Carter's best music up to 1982, from the early Piano Sonata to the Triple Duo. Many of the recordings are currently available from Nonesuch as individual releases (Nonesuch 71234, 71249, and 79248), but if you've put off buying any of these, now is your chance to get them all at a bargain price.

The clincher for this set, though, is the release of a few key recordings never available on CD or currently out of print. Paul Jacobs' 1982 recording of Night Fantasies -- Carter's largest work for piano and one of the most significant works for the instrument of the last fifty years -- has inexplicably never been released in digital format, and it's an essential addition to the discography. Jacobs was one of the four joint commissioners of the piece, and his performance is entirely as worthwhile as Oppens' and Rosen's. More deliberate than either of those, Jacobs luxuriates in the expansive chordal sections, but still flies through the more virtuosic passages with abandon. He may not have Oppens' delicate counterpoint or Rosen's architectural prowess, but it's a compelling and historically significant performance.

We also get reissues of the Triple Duo (also performed by the dedicatees, The Fires of London) and the 1981 song cycle In Sleep, In Thunder (with Martyn Hill and the London Sinfonietta, led by longtime Carter advocate Oliver Knussen), and a bonus of James Levine's fantastic performance of the Variations for Orchestra with the CSO, previously released on Deutsche Grammophon.

The other performances are well-documented and reviewed elsewhere; suffice it to say, they are all definitive recordings by seasoned Elliott Carter performers. The Composers Quartet, in my opinion, has the edge on both Arditti and Juilliard in their early recording of the first two quartets, particularly with the expansive desert landscapes of No. 1.

My only disappointment is that the Duo for violin and piano is unfortunately missing, another historic Nonesuch recording (Paul Zukofsky and Gilbert Kalish, who premiered the piece) which ought to have been included. Despite this, there's little excuse not to get this bargain set while you can. Perfect for Carter aficionados and new listeners alike, it's a fantastic selection of the breadth of his musical style in performances that can't be beat.

I've found Elliott Carter's music quite difficult over the years, and even with so much exposure to his more recent output at the 100th birthday concerts, I've had my share of problems. I decided to go back to the beginning and ordered this box, which has mainly the Nonesuch recordings of his earlier output through to the early 1970s, including the famous Composers Quartet renditions of the first two string quartets. What I heard was a revelation. I finally started to "understand," in the sense of having some musical appreciation, of this music. Nonesuch also licensed some fine recordings of early Carter works from other sources, so the box gives you a decent cross-section, including some orchestral music well performed. I can recommend this very highly for people looking for a "way into Carter."

When I opened the package I discovered in my mailbox yesterday afternoon, a tingling sensation ran down my spine. It was in anticipation of both the gorgeous musical vistas and the terrifyingly complex structures that awaited upon opening this Pandora's box of a composer's oeuvre.

The first disc opens with an exciting performance by Paul Jacobs of Carter's early Piano Sonata (1945). In general, the first disc is composed of the music Carter wrote while he was still largely under the influence of Nadia Boulanger, and writing in a comfortable, Americana-esque idiom. But even by this time, he was starting to feel constrained by an allegience to public opinion, and such feelings were audibly leaking into his music, which was taking a more overall episodic feel than originally. It is a cause for celebration to have Jacob's performance back in print, though it faces stern competition from Ursula Oppens on Cedille, whose lightness of tough is well suited to the more dance-like sections of the piece. In his ballet the Minotaur (1947) and the Elegy for String Orchestra (1952), Carter continues his more Coplandesque idiom even after he wrote such dissonant works as the First Quartet, but adds touches of chromaticism nowhere to be found in Copland's works that hint at what is to come.

The second disc is a perfect way of analyzing the gradual transformation of Carter's style towards the more difficult. It opens with the banging chords of the opening Cello Sonata (1948), which is almost certainly my personal favorite work by Carter, period. The performance perfectly captures the atmosphere of each movement, whether it be the plight of the cello against the grain of the piano in the first, the jazzy atmosphere of the second, or the song-like third. The tempo changes in the Adagio are so smooth as to render the "metric modulation" irrelevant, just a means to a jaw-dropping end. The other pieces are rather more difficult matter. The String Quartet No. 1 (1952) was a work Carter almost explicitly wrote out of spite, quite literally saying, "To hell with the populace!" Such rudeness can easily be forgiven in light of what resulted, a new style of composition derived from the drama of the Cello Sonata's opening movement, where instrumental groups are pitted against each other in a kind of group discussion. The Composers Quartet deliver the premiere recording of the work, which, understandably, can seem a little underwhelming at times compared to the Juilliard Quartet's version. But what they lack in ferocity they more than make up for in musicality, bringing out the work's more song-like aspects. The Sonata for Flute, Oboe, Cello and Harpsichord (1952) can be considered almost a look both backwards and forwards. It looks backwards with dialogue between the harpsichord and the others reminescent of the metronomic ticking of the piano, and seems to look forward to the short attention span of the Variations. At this point this is the only major recording, and there's nothing really wrong with it, so I can't really complain. o_o

The Cello Sonata's sonics are a little meh, but other than that this is pretty pristine.

The documentation is more than adequate for the early works, but the Sonata for Flute etc. and variations could use some fleshing out. But I have to admit, those works are relatively self-explanatory.

At this point, I had trouble continuing this review. This music is simply too impenetrable for my ears. On top of that, half of the time I can't tell whether it's the composer, the interpreter, the audio engineer, or yours truly's fault for this sad fact. o_o

Well I can say one thing: the Variations for Orchestra sounds absolutely horrid. This recording, made by James Levine with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as a compilation of everything you love to hate modernist music has a dynamic range that forces you to fumble with the volume almost constantly. Even if you do so, the impact of the music fails to come through. I'd take Gielen any day.

The Night Fantasies is also a spectacular piece of music. This is the work of a composer that, when he wishes to, can grab and really hold onto one's attention, but only if given the right interpretation. Happily, Paul Jacobs brings a drama to the piano part missing from so many interpretations of Carter's music. This is no bubbly scherzando.

I'm sad to say that much of the rest, due to composer or interpreter, failed to convince me. The String Quartet's supposed drama fails to take hold. The vocals seems somewhat unrelated to the music in In Sleep, in Thunder. The Triple Duo and Double Concerto fare slightly better, but the fast atonal, athematic, and unexpressive sections tend to loose me (as usual). o_o

The Bottom Line:

Simply the reissuing of these recordings is a cause for celebration; but packaged as it is (a spectacular introduction to this vital American composer) makes for a mandatory acquisition for any fan of American classical music. But if you want the Variations, definitely look elsewhere.