Amazon.co.uk Review
Conceived in epic terms but for chamber-scale resources, Boulez's
Pli selon pli is a landmark of the mid/late 20th-century avant garde that remains as fresh (and elusive) as the day it was written--or so you might be tempted to say but for the fact that no such "day" exists. Like other Boulez scores, this was a work-in-progress that emerged fragmentarily and was subject to revision between 1957 and 1989. Over the years there have been several recordings that document how the piece stood at a particular moment in time. In
1969 and 1981, Boulez himself conducted it on disc with the BBC Symphony Orchestra. By then, the format was scarcely different from the way it is today: three inner and rather austere "improvisations" framed by larger, texturally richer movements to start and finish. A
1981 recording, with Phyllis Bryn-Julson as soloist, was especially fine and won a Gramophone Award.
But Boulez subsequently made one further refinement and reduced the aleatoric elements of choice allowed to the performers, leaving the music more obviously fixed to the notes on the page. And this is the version given here--once again with Boulez, but now with his own Ensemble Intercontemporain and the soprano Christine Schäfer. Whether it represents a significant advance on the 1981 version is arguable. Schäfer sings with flawless, gossamer-light beauty and agility while the Ensemble plays with a command and virtuosity beyond the reaches of the BBCSO. But there's an energy, a sense of being stretched to meet a challenge head-on, that gives both the older discs a certain edge and character that maybe this one doesn't share.--Michael White