Sofia Gubaidulina: 'Stimmen... Verstummen', Symphony in 12 movements; Stufen

This Chandos disc contains two pieces by Sofia Gubaidulina performed by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Gennady Rozhdestvensky, the first being "Symphony: Stimmen ...Verstummen" (1986) and the second "Stufen" (1992). The works here are almost Gubaidulina's finest, and this disc is an essential purchase for any fan of the composer.

The 12-movement "Stimmen ...Verstummen" ("Voices ...fall dumb", also known by its Russian title meaning "I hear ...silence") is Gubaidulina's only symphony, and what a work it is! It is one of her most profoundly religious works, right up there with her JOHANNES-PASSION and JOHANNES-OSTERN in its praise of God and metaphysical heights. At the same time, it is among the most notable of her "zahlenmystik" compositions, with the Fibonacci sequence being an important basis.

The work begins with a long, vibrant D-major triad which continues for over a minute before a D-flat triad invades, thus ending the first movement. Common opinion is nearly unanimous that the D-major triad represents divine perfection, and the pattern of the music is a frequent return to this pure triad while intervening sections of opposing sounds (representing sin?) grow ever longer, with the eight being the longest and the work's climax. In the tenth movement, the work strikingly changes as the triad is taken down from D major to G major, possibly representing the Incarnation. From there, the music continues as before until the twelfth and last movement, when all the orchestra's forces are unleased and the music is made liberal through improvisatory and aleatoric writing. One element that listeners of a recording will miss out on, however, is the "conductor's solo" in the 9th movement, when the conductor moves his hands ever more greatly apart according to the Fibonacci sequence before a silent orchestra. The piece live uses a much greater use of silence, and that's why the recording here is only 36 minutes long when the work is listed as 42 minutes in duration in Gubaidulina's catalogue.

The symphony was dedicated to Gennady Rozhdestvensky, who gave the world premiere in West Berlin in 1986 with the Moscow State Symphony Orchestra. We are fortunate indeed that he was able to return for this recording. This is Gubaidulina at her best. Frankly, I cannot understand why there are three recordings out of her recent "Canticle to the Sun" and several of her "Offertorium" violin concerto, but only one take on this amazing piece in nearly two decades.

"Stufen" is a one-movement piece for a massive orchestra, with a 60-piece string section (with eight double-basses!), built on principles similar to the symphony. Here aleatoric and improvisational licence is even greater, in fact Mellers in his notes seems to see Gubaidulina approximating Cage, but that's going to far. It ends with a narrator--here Rozhdestvensky--reading a poem (by Reiner Maria Rilke, although oddly the liner notes nowhere credit him) translated into Russian, and the recording of this reading is overdubbed several times, each overdub introduced a few seconds after the last, creating interference between them. "Stufen" is not as immediately rewarding as "Stimmen ...Verstummen", and in its individual portraying of various orchestral groups is somewhat uneven. Still, it manages to not disappoint though it has to follow the symphony.

The performance here is top-notch, with superb sound quality. The liner notes are interesting, with a profile of Gubaidulina and musicological analysis by Wilfred Mellers. The poem read in "Stufen" is given in Russian, German, English, and French, though the Russian version is annoyingly transliterated into the Latin alphabet.

This is perhaps not the best introduction to the work of Sofia Gubaidulina. One should get her JOHANNES-PASSION or (an economical choice) the SEVEN WORDS disc on Naxos. However, this is a purchase you should make as soon as possible after becoming acquainted with the work of this singular composer. Very, very highly recommended.

"Stimmen ... Verstummen" (I hear ... silence) is Sofia Gubaidulina's only symphony. It's certainly quality over quantity! Superlatives fail me -- this 1986 composition is among the absolute best orchestral works of the late 20th century. The form is entirely unconventional, with 12 movements, some less than a minute long, and the longest one 11 minutes (34 minutes total). The fulcrum of the work is a trilling, shimmering D major. It opens and closes the work, and reappears several times in between. In between these sublime and mysterious moments there is development, sometimes harsh and dissonant, sometimes striving upward and culminating in great crashing blows. But always the quiet trilling returns.

Knowing that Gubaidulina is a deeply religious person, it seems only obvious that the D-major represents God. I can imagine several stories or themes that the seemingly rebellious passages would fit into, but the beauty of music is its openness to interpretation. (The eternal shimmering beauty could be the Dao... ) The second piece, the 18-minute "Stufen" (Steps -- 1992) seems to continue organically from the symphony -- it begins quietly, and then develops into sustained dissonance and development like one of its longer passages. It ends with a spoken passage of poetry, read by the conductor, Gennady Rozhdestvensky.

This is a marvelous experience. Rozhdestvensky and the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra perform wonderfully -- it is clear that he is perfectly in tune with the composer's intentions. There are many people who cannot find anything to love in modern music. This unorthodox symphony might win many such people over with the recurrent major-key tonality anchoring the brilliant excursions into post-serialist complexity.

Sofia Gubaidulina is a prolific composer, but is little-known in the U.S. These works alone should change that, and deserve to be seen as masterpieces the late 20th century music.

The Stimmen symphony is one of the great peaks of Gubaidulina's career, a looping, moody work centered around a D major triad and then slowly metamorphoses in and out of itself, moving into an inexplicable transcendence. Stufen, the other work on this disc, is very moving also, but a bit more frazzled than Stimmen. Ensemble and conductor are superb as well. One of the best CDs I've bought this year!