(++++) SYMPHONISTS

Haydn: Symphony No. 6, “Le matin”; Symphony No. 7, “Le midi”; Symphony No. 8, “Le soir.” Handel and Haydn Society conducted by Harry Christophers. CORO. $19.99. 

Poul Ruders: Symphonies Nos. 1-6. Danish National Symphony Orchestra and Odense Symphony Orchestra conducted by Leif Segerstam, Michael Schønwandt, Scott Yoo, Roberto Minczuk, Olari Elts, and Christopher Lichtenstein. Bridge Records. $50.99 (3 CDs). 

     It is about time that CORO re-released the exemplary Handel and Haydn Society recordings of Haydn’s morning-noon-and-night symphonic trilogy, which originally came out in 2017 and consist of live performances from 2013, 2015 and 2016. The rather quixotic initial presentation of these performances, all of which are carefully shaped by Harry Christophers, paired each of these symphonies with one of the six-symphony “Paris” set and a violin concerto, thereby ignoring Haydn’s intention to have Nos. 6, 7 and 8 presented in interrelated form to Prince Paul Anton Esterházy in 1761 – and, for that matter, cutting the “Paris” grouping in half for no discernible reason. Haydn was a young man, age 29, when he wrote Nos, 6, 7 and 8, not the “Papa Haydn” of later years and certainly not yet established as an eminent composer. He needed to prove himself to his new employer, and he did so in elegantly harmonious fashion with this symphonic trilogy: many members of the prince’s orchestra were Haydn’s friends from the composer’s own days as a freelance musician in Vienna, and Haydn found ways to showcase their individual talents while also demonstrating his own already finely honed skill at orchestration. Thus, Nos. 6, 7 and 8 require considerable displays of virtuosity from the entire ensemble and also feature extended solo passages for performers on the horn, winds (even bassoon), and strings (even double-bass). Add a modicum of tone painting – primarily in the first movement of No. 6 and the “storm” finale of No. 8 – and the result is music that is engagingly delightful in its own right while also showing quite clearly that Haydn was amply qualified to be an important musical member of the Esterházy household. Christophers and the Handel and Haydn Society are finely attuned to period style and the subtleties of Haydn’s compositional manner even in his comparatively early works. Thus, to cite a few examples among many, the balance of solo flute and oboe in co-presenting the first theme of the first movement of No. 6 is clear and clean, and the horn’s “intrusive” pre-announcement of the recapitulation neatly anticipates Beethoven’s similar musical joke in his “Eroica.” The extended cadenza for violin and cello in the second movement of No. 7 nicely prefigures Haydn’s later forays into opera. And the sheer grace of the second movement of No. 8, with its solo-bassoon passages, is as elegantly handled as the “lightning” from the flute in the finale. Details matter a great deal in Haydn and can all too easily be obscured when his works are played by a large orchestra. But the 30 or so members of the Handel and Haydn Society function as a kind of expanded chamber group, with the result that the lightness and delicacy of these symphonies come through as clearly as their cleverness, resulting in a CD that is a charmer from start to finish. 

     “Charming” is scarcely the word that comes to mind when considering the six symphonies of Danish composer Poul Ruders (born 1949). Ruders does look back to Haydn’s time and earlier in some works: his first violin concerto (1981) is a Vivaldi pastiche and his Concerto in Pieces (1985) is based on Purcell. And Ruders has a good sense of the capabilities of solo instruments, notably the guitar, having written multiple guitar works (solo and with orchestra) for David Starobin. But Ruders’ symphonies – now available as a three-CD set from the company that Starobin founded, Bridge Records – partake of sensibilities quite different from those of Haydn and other earlier composers, and are very much of Ruders’ own time period. No. 1 (1989) is called Himmelhoch jauchzend - zum Tode betrübt, which translates as "Heavenly joyful - deathly sorrowful” and clearly points to a piece of strong and dramatic contrasts. Ruders delivers those with exactly the sort of late-20^th-century intensity and harmonic approach that would be expected based on the work’s date. The second movement does showcase Ruders’ lyrical bona fides, but the overall impression is one of darkness and (to a lesser extent) light, with somewhat overdone orchestration and repetitive textures (especially in the finale) that pass for a kind of melancholic brooding. Interestingly, No. 1, although it runs not much more than half an hour, is Ruders’ longest symphony: his other five are all at lengths comparable to those of Haydn’s symphonies, for all the enormous differences of style and sound. Ruders’ one-elaborate-movement No. 2 is called “Symphony and Transformation” and dates to 1995-1996. It explores many of the same themes (experiential, not musical) as No. 1, but is more tightly organized and somewhat more interestingly orchestrated. Yet this is no Richard Strauss Tod und Verklärung despite the similarity of titles and analogous tone-poem structure: Ruders opts for orchestral monumentality without Straussian lushness, and there is an underlying harshness of sound in Ruders that makes the symphony more edgy than apocalyptic right through to its conclusion. Ruders’ No. 3, labeled “Dreamcatcher,” is a two-movement work written in 2005-2006 and revised in 2009. It is a somewhat uneasy mixture of Native American inspiration with a theme reused from Ruders’ 2004 Serenade for Accordion and Strings. The symphony is deeply unsettled and is dominated by fast tempos, from its brisk opening (succeeded by slower but darker material) to a second movement emphatically designated Scherzo prestissimo and featuring even harsher dissonances than Ruders has heretofore employed. Symphony No. 4 (2008-2009) showcases Ruders’ approach to solo instruments. Called “An Organ Symphony,” it focuses on the instrument on which Ruders himself trained, and is as interesting for what it does not do as for what it does. It is not a virtuoso showpiece for the organ but one in which the instrument is texturally incorporated into the overall soundscape: sometimes the organ and orchestra challenge each other, sometimes they complement each other, but never is there a sense of subservience of either to the other one. Comparisons with Saint-Saëns “Organ” Symphony (his No. 3) are probably inevitable but not especially useful: Saint-Saëns is mellifluous and elegant throughout, with the organ becoming assertive only in the finale, while Ruders’ tonal language is a great deal more acerbic and his manner far more proclamatory. Ruders ends each of this symphony’s four movements rather oddly, the first three abruptly (especially surprisingly in the short and scurrying third-movement Etude) and the final Chaconne with a chord that is more gestural than conclusive. No. 4 is the last Ruders symphony with a subtitle: No. 5 (2012-2013) and No. 6 (2021) stand on their own without them. No. 5, in three movements, was at one point going to be called “Ring of Fire” – reflecting the Pacific geographical region with calm in the middle surrounded by explosive volcanic activity. The title may be gone, but it does provide a clue to this work’s structure: the outer movements (the first opening with a reused fanfare from Ruders’ 2011 Sonatas) are dramatic, the central one serene almost to the point of minimalism. This symphony has Ruders’ most-refined orchestration to date, using the ensemble largely as small groups rather than as a totality producing great gouts of sound. This approach lends the work a sophistication generally missing in the four previous symphonies, which are often on the obvious side no matter how well-crafted they are. The quietude that opens the second movement of No. 5 is quite unlike anything in Ruders’ previous symphonies, and its persistence throughout a 10+-minute movement creates a stasis that, although somewhat too persistent, certainly lends additional force and piquancy to the finale’s forceful drama. This is the most successful of Ruders’ symphonies and the one that best encapsulates the many elements, original and derivative, of his style. Ruders’ single-movement No. 6 is his shortest symphony. Returning to the tone-poem-like structure of No. 2, it features some interestingly conceived orchestral touches, notably the use of two pianos with one tuned a quarter-tone off from the other. The work has a feeling of intellectual experimentation about it rather than emotive communicativeness, and is easier to admire than to react to emotionally and expressively despite a long, slow concluding fade that seems to be insisting on meaningfulness. Like all the Ruders symphonies, No. 6 is very well-made and evinces a sense of careful craftsmanship even when it – again like the other symphonies – has stretches in which it is pretty much devoid of communicative power. Ruders is a composer whose careful attentiveness to matters of orchestration fits the 21^st century much as Haydn’s fit the 18^th, but Ruders is certainly something of an acquired taste – which means this release, with first-rate playing by two orchestras led in a highly understanding manner by six different conductors, will be a (+++) niche offering for most audiences. For those already enamored of Ruders’ music and in particular his way with full-orchestra material, though, this will be a (++++) recording and, indeed, a must-have.