| Ravel
Bolero b. Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra / Herbert
von Karajan. |
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| DG The Originals (Mid price) (CD) 447
426-2GOR (75 minutes: ADD). Item marked a from SLPM138923 (3/65), b
SLPM139010 (11/66). |
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| Debussy – selected comparison: |
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| BPO, Karajan (7/86) (R) (DG) 439 008-2GHS |
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| Mussorgsky – selected comparison: |
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| BPO, Karajan (8/87) (R) (DG) 439 013-2GHS |
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| Ravel – selected comparison: |
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| BPO, Karajan (7/89) (DG) 427 250-2GGA |
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Here are examples of 'The Karajan Effect' at its
most positive, and sounding, in these new transfers, fractionally more open, focused and
fresh than before, with the billowing bass moderated and the dynamic range extended. Along
with Karajan's own imaginative deployment of orchestral colour (to take one example: the
extra gong with barely damped striker at the end of Pictures), the Berlin
Jesus-Christus Kirche acoustics of these 1964-6 recordings add their own wonderful
coloration and atmosphere (dark and cavernous at appropriate moments in Pictures).
The 1980s Berlin Philharmonic DG remakes (in their remastered 'Karajan Gold' format) offer
something closer to concert-hall reality (a cleaner more neutral sound) but, on the whole,
the imaginative daring and the excited discovery of new realms of creative and technical
possibility are missing; certainly the 1980s performances are less given to spontaneous
ignition.
For those unfamiliar with these 1960s accounts, Bolero
is slow and steady (but Karajan risks floating the early solos), and Pictures is
broader and grander than Karajan's previous and subsequent recordings (and most others).
But how does one do justice to this La mer in a single sentence? Well, you can
either be seduced by some of the most sheerly beautiful orchestral sound ever recorded, or
appreciate it for its wide-ranging imagery and its properly mobile pacing; but whichever
way you look at it, it is one of the great recorded La mers and one of the classics
of the gramophone.
JS