c (SERAPHIM^)

' “The performances are highly

enjoyable, [with] fresh, red-blooded

vigor. , . I was bowled over by the

\ vividness and immediacy

of sound ... the atmosphere is

astonishingly real."

EDWARD GREENFIELD IN THE GRAMOPHONE

TCHAIKOVSKY

Suites From

The Nutcracker. Sleeping Beauty

SIR ADRIAN BOULT conducting The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra

Photo: David Farrell

Of all thfe great full-length ballets, three of the most popular throughout the world have music by Tchaikovsky, music so miraculously melodious, so brilliantly right for the action of the ballets, and so technically perfect that no other ballet scores have ever achieved quite the same impact.

The Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty, both heard in this Seraphim

album, and Swan Lake, are still the backbone of the repertoire of any large classical ballet company. They still attract the largest audiences, decade after decade, not only for the splendor of the stage spectacle, but for the well-known and equally well¬ loved music. And all three ballets have had their music arranged in one way or another for large orchestral

Hnwas ' s

S-60176 STEREO

i »._

cfSERAPHIMb "Angels of the highest order"

performances in the concert hall, where they continue to delight audi¬ ences who may not have experienced the works in the theater.

Tchaikovsky himself arranged as a concert suite eight of the excerpts from The Nutcracker. This suite was published separately, as Op. 71a. Tchaikovsky conducted the first per¬ formance at a St. Petersburg concert in March, 1892, about nine months before the premiere of the ballet (the same concert at which he conducted the first performance of his Romeo and Juliet.) The Nutcracker suite proved an immediate sensation. Five of the sections had to be played again before the audience would allow the rest of the music to continue.

The Suite opens, as the ballet does, with the enchanting Miniature Over¬ ture, followed by the March from Act 1, which accompanies the arrival of the children at the Christmas party. There the child heroine, Clara, sees a Nutcracker toy wantonly broken by ex¬ cited little boys. At night Clara steals downstairs and mends the toy, and then all the presents come to life. The grateful Nutcracker, transformed into a prince, carries Clara off to his king¬ dom after a great battle with maraud¬ ing mice. The final Act consists of a great display of virtuoso dancing—and equally virtuoso music.

The next excerpt is the Dance of the Sugar-Plum Fairy. Tchaikovsky was writing parts of the score while travelling across Europe on the way to conduct in America in 1891. In Paris, where he stopped off to conduct a concert, he heard the first commer¬ cially-made celesta, and, captivated by the ethereal sound, scored the dance for it. This music is, therefore, the earliest use of the dulcet celesta with orchestra, and it remains to this day one of the most effective vehicles for celesta ever composed.

There follow four colorful, exotic dances: the Russian Dance to the rhythm of the Trepak, the languorous Arabian Dance, the Chinese Dance, and the Dance of the Reed Pipes or Danse des Mirliio'ns.J.a sort of toy cardboard flute).

Tchaikovsky’s Suite ends with the swirling Waltz of the Flowers, possibly the most popular single work by the composer, and so well known that it needs no description here. But before it, for this recording, Sir Adrian Boult has inserted one of the most striking and exciting sections of the ballet score, the great Pas de deux which always brings down the house at a performance—a great upsurge of daz¬ zling music based by Tchaikovsky on a simple descending octave scale.

- EVAN SENIOR

St $ ft In the ideal ballet, the composer and choreographer work closely together. The great choreographer and ballet master Marius Petipa of the Imperial

Theater of Russia, was Tchaikovsky’s "collaborator” on both The Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty. Tchaikovsky is said to have chafed at the restrictions imposed upon him by the elaborate cuebook Petipa prepared to guide him in composing the music for The Nut¬ cracker; yet the result was a work of true sublimity. Similarly, Petipa pre¬ pared exact specifications as to the nature and length of the music needed at every point for Sleeping Beauty, and Tchaikovsky regarded this work as his finest ballet score.

Sleeping Beauty has been credited with regenerating the ballet form, in Russia and the West. Interest in the ballet had fallen into a decline. The first production of Sleeping Beauty at the Maryinsky Theater in St. Peters¬ burg, January 3, 1890, aroused among people of the theater and Rus¬ sian youth a fiery enthusiasm that gave exciting new impetus to the form. So magically evocative was Tchaikovsky’s music that it seemed literally to transport the listener into the enchanted world of the.'fairy tale, as choreographed by Petipa and danced by Carlotta Brianza, Paul Gerdt, and Enrico Cecchitti.

Sleeping Beauty was based on the beloved children’s story by French writer Charles Perrault, about the lovely Princess Aurora, fated by a curse to sleep for a hundred years, and to awaken only when kissed by a handsome Prince. From the complete ballet, eight of the best-known ex¬ cerpts have been chosen for this re¬ cording.

The music begins with the before- the-curtain Introduction which casts a mood of regal majesty, and intro¬ duces two themes that represent the conflict between good and evil in the story. Concealed within the opening chords is the theme of Carabosse, the vindictive godmother who casts a curse upon Aurora. Heard subse¬ quently is the melody of the gentle Lilac Fairy, whose goodness mitigates the wickedness of the spell and even¬ tually triumphs over it completely.

The Grand March follows, as the courtiers enter to greet the newborn princess on her christening day. The music sweeps into *the great Waltz from Act 1. The Suite then moves to the last Act, a great wedding-party scene of divertissement dances, in¬ cluding the amusing Puss-in-Boots and the White Cat, with the two fe¬ lines faithfully imitated in the mewing sound; the dashing Polish Dance; and the lovely solo Variation of Aurora.

To conclude, we return to the finale of Act 1 for two of Aurora’s solo high¬ lights of the ballet, the Variation and the famous Rose Adagio. This last is danced by the rapturous young prin¬ cess on her birthday, and ends with the fulfillment of the curse of the Wicked Fairy as the glowing girl pricks her finger on a proffered spindle and, to the consternation of the Court, falls senseless to the ground.

SIDE ONE

SUITE FROM “THE NUTCRACKER,” Op. 71

(25:14)

Band One:

Miniature Overture • March • Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy • Russian Dance

(Trepak) • Arab Dance • Chinese Dance • Dance of the Reed Pipes

(14:54)

Band Two:

Pas de deux (No. 14a) (4:15)

Band Three:

Waltz of the Flowers (6:05)

SIDE TWO

SUITE FROM “SLEEPING BEAUTY;” Op. 66

(25:48)

Band One:

Introduction & March (5:57)

Band Two:

Waltz (No. 6) (4:14)

Band Three:

Puss-in-Boots and the White Cat • Polacca • Pas de deux: Aurora’s

Variation (No. 28) • Pas d’action: Aurora’s Variation (No. 8c) &

Adagio (No. 8) (15:37)

Raymond Cohen (solo violin)

OF SIR ADRIAN BOULT, Roger Wimbush wrote in The Gramophone: “Here is a man who learnt his art from Nikisch, whose knowledge of the repertory must be unique, who is revered by the whole profession of orchestral players, and whose essential mu- sicality is proclaimed in all he does.” It was Sir Adrian who, in his tenure as conductor of the B.B.C. Symphony from 1930 to 1950, shaped that orchestra into one of the finest ensembles in England. When the age limit dictated his retirement from the B.B.C., he was immediately appointed conductor, of the London Symphony Orchestra.

Sir Adrian is one of the few remaining pi¬ oneers of British conducting for the ballet. In 1920, he conducted one of the seasons of the Diaghilev Ballet at the old Empire Theater in London. He has often conducted the music of The Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty in the concert hall, but he had not before this record put his own stamp upon any recorded performance.

OTHER MEMORABLE PERFORMANCES ON SERAPHIM:

ELGAR: “Enigma” Variations. BRITTEN: Variations & Fugue on a Theme of Pur¬ cell (“The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra”). Sir Malcolm Sargent cond.

. the Philharmonia & the B.B.C. Symphony Orchestra. S-60173

GERSHWIN: Rhapsody in Blue & An Ameri¬ can in Paris. Leonard Pennario (piano), and Felix Slatkin cond. the Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra. S-60174

HOLST: The Planets. Leopold Stokowski cond. the Los Angeles Philharmonic Or¬ chestra & the Roger Wagner Chorale.

S-60175

DUKAS: The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. CHA- BRIER: Espaf... RAVEL: Bolero. DE¬ BUSSY: Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. SAINT-SA2NS: Danse Macabre. Pi¬ erre Dervciux cond. the Colonne Concerts Orchestra. S-60177

n

IT OMMIUTION DEDICATED

• BY C

AP

/TO

t R

EC

OR

dS

*

S-2-60176 stereo

33-1/3

iky. Sleeping Beauxi

.HIUHABMONICPRC

, ADRIAN BOULT co

Recorded in England