Ture Rangström: Symphony No. 1; Dityramb & Vårhymn [Box set]

1. Dityramb, symphonic poem
Composed by Ture Rangstrom
Performed by Norrkoping Symphony Orchestra Conducted by Michail Jurowski

2. Symphony No. 1 in C sharp minor "August Strindberg in Memoriam"
Composed by Ture Rangstrom
Performed by Norrkoping Symphony Orchestra Conducted by Michail Jurowski

3. Varhymn
Composed by Ture Rangstrom
Performed by Norrkoping Symphony Orchestra Conducted by Michail Jurowski

Ture Rangström: Symphony No. 1; Dityramb & Vårhymn,Ture Rangstrom,Michail Jurowski,Norrköping Symphony Orchestra,Cpo Records,20th/21st Century Symphony,20th/21st Century Tone Poem/Symphonic Poem,Classical,Classical Composers,Classical Music,Miscellaneous,Miscellaneous Music,Orchestral,Symphonic

Ture Rangström: Complete Symphonies (Box Set)
Average customer rating:

Far better than I expected!

Swedish Hyper-Romanticism

Ture Rangström: Complete Symphonies (Box Set)

Manufacturer: Cpo Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Tone Poems | Theatrical, Incidental & Program Music | Forms & Genres | Classical | Styles | Music
Symphonies | Forms & Genres | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music
General | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music
Modern & 20th Century | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music
General | Classical | Styles | Music
Classical | Box Sets | Stores | Music
Similar Items:

Melartin: The Six SYMPHONIES

Kurt Atterberg: The Symphonies (Box Set)

Wilhelm Peterson-Berger: Complete Symphonies [Box Set]

Ernst Toch: Complete Symphonies - Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin / Alun Francis

Ivanovs: Symphonies Nos. 8 & 20

ASIN: B00004TTK8
Release Date: 2000-06-20

Customer Reviews:

Far better than I expected!.......2005-12-22

The previous reviewer hit most of the highlights and backstory. This is excellent, compelling music-making. The fact that each symphony is more of a dramatic work than an example of hard-core symphonic development doesn't take away from Rangstrom's achievement in the slightest. If that makes these works detectably "stream-of-consciousness," so what? Spontaneity is hardly a crime if an ordering principle still rules over the soundscape, even if that ordering principle isn't conventional sonata-allegro form or multi-layered contrapuntal development.

I wasn't expecting the one-movement 3rd Symphony to come across as a satisfying entity-in-itself, but I was surprised at how well it cohered. The 1st and 2nd symphonies are outstanding as well, not to mention the set of miniatures (the intermezzi) and other miscellaneous works included to round out the package. Where I expected great things -- the orchestra-plus-organ 4th symphony with the enhanced instrumental palette -- I came away disappointed. I think it's the weakest piece in this box set. It didn't help matters any that as I listened to the 4th symphony's Toccata movement, I immediately recognized it from Segerstam's "Earquake" album, where that movement received a far more incisive, snarling interpretation. This version's Toccata appeared lackluster in comparison, compounded by the too-smooth voicings chosen for the pipe organ.

That all the works are imbued with a deeply Swedish emotive core goes without saying -- this is nationalism on a grand scale. Without a doubt, Ture Rangstrom is unjustly overlooked as a major 20th century symphonist. This box set was worth every penny, and is recommended without qualification. As I work through the Kurt Atterburg symphonies, I hope to get a comparative feel of how these two divergent near-contemporaries approached the matter of Swedish music. (I have no dog in that fight -- I'm American, of German heritage.)

Swedish Hyper-Romanticism.......2000-12-05

Sweden has enjoyed an active and high-class musical life since the Gustavian period of the seventeenth century, when the kings indulged their taste for Handelian-style opera and drew on the talents of native composers learned in the idiom. By the late-nineteenth and early twenteth centuries, most of the major Swedish cities had acquired respectable symphony orchestras and a passel of Swedish composers had emerged who could demonstrate their expertise in the standard genres - symphony, concerto, symphonic poem, concert-suite. Among these figured prominently such names as Hugo Alfvén, Vilhelm Peterson-Berger, Vilhelm Stenhammar, and Kurt Atterberg. In the teens of the twentieth century a new name appeared, helped along by Stenhammar in his capacity as music-director of the Gothenburg Orchestra Society. The new kid was Ture Rangström (1884-1947), a protegé of the playwright August Strindberg. While Rangström did have the benefit of brief study with Hans Pfitzner and Julius Hey, he basically taught himself how to compose, first as a song-writer and then, more ambitiously, as an operatist and a symphonist. Is it Nicolas Slonimsky who describes Rangström as belonging to the school of "Swedish hyper-romanticism"? The epithet fits, whatever its origin, because of the great vital impulse in Rangström's scores; he uses the orchestra quite lavishly (he certainly did not learn this from Hans Pfitzner!), and seeks to express the Nietzschean "Yea" in the most affirmative manner possible. In this, he somewhat resembles Carl Nielsen, but he also shows an affinity with Stenhammar, whose impulsive G-Minor Symphony Rangström would have known. CPO now issues its previously à-la-carte survey of Rangström's symphonies as a three-CD set, at about half the price that collectors would have paid on a one-at-a-time basis. The performances, by the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra under Michail Jurowski, tap right into Rangström's spirit and make the case for this composer in an immediate and convincing way. Let's take it symphony by symphony. The SYMPHONY NO. 1 "In Memoriam August Strindberg" comes from 1914, two years after the death of its dedicatee. While not a program symphony, Rangström's First does try to portray the phenomena that interested Strindberg: The eternal human impulse to life and creativity in conflict with the limitations of time and place; the struggle for self-expression; the artistic battle to bring order out of chaos. Two big movements ("Jäsningstid" ["Time of Struggle"] and "Legend"), both full of Dionysiac enthusiasm and ballad-like pathos, yield to two shorter movements. Rangström avails himself much less of counterpoint than Alfvén or Peterson-Berger, perhaps for want of mastery as his critics sometimes charged; his textures tend to conform to "vertical" or theme-and-accompaniment rather than "horizontal" or polyphonic forms of organization. He cultivates mood, atmosphere, the lyric period. The SYMPHONY NO. 2 "Mitt Land" ("My Country") comes from 1919, and arranges itself in three movements rather than the conventional four, but nevertheless requires more performing-time than the First. The movements carry these names: "Sagan" ("The Tale"), "Skogen, Vågen, Sommarnatten" ("Wood, Wave, Summer Night"), and "Drömmen" ("The Dream"). Rangström does not quote folksongs, but contrives his themes to exhibit the outline of Swedish melody; the intense evocation of nature also conforms to the Swedish character. "Sagan" is by turns yearning and martial, with a tender middle section. "Skogen, Vågen, Sommarnatten" cultivates the same ecstasy of what the Scandinavians call "The Iron Nights" as in Alfven's "Midsommarvaka." "Drömmen" hearkens back to the composer's ties to Strindberg, who wrote a fantastic "Dream Play," but Rangström's fantasy is energetic and without pessimism. Rangström's one-movement SYMPHONY NO. 3 "Sång under Stjärnorna" ("Song under the Stars") comes from 1929. In the ten years since the Second Symphony, the composer had made good most of his youthful compositional deficiencies: In particular, "Song under the Stars" sees an increased exploitation of contrapuntal devices; the working-out of the material yields a greater complexity than hitherto. In fact, being based on one of Rangström's own songs, "Bön till Natten" ("Prayer to the Night"), and constituting a set of variations on the song-theme, the Third Symphony anticipates the Scandinavian technique of "metamorphosis," championed by Vagn Holmboe and Niels Viggo Bentzon and adopted in effect, if not under the name, by Swedes like Karl-Birger Blomdahl in the 1950s. (Rangström also anticipates Allan Petterson in basing a symphony on a previously written "romans," or voice-with-piano composition.) If one were looking for a known reference, it might be Sir Arnold Bax. Rangström's Third has a Baxian feel to it. The SYMPHONY NO. 4 "Invocatio" comes from 1936 and derives from an organ-piece written in 1933; the orchestration includes a fairly prominent organ part, although this is not really a concertante symphony. Despite the asymmetry of its construction (three short movements followed by a long movement followed by one more short movement), the Fourth makes a strong impression. Whether it is really a symphony or not is another matter. The program in this set includes the "Dityramb," contemporary with the First Symphony, and the "Intermezzo drammatico," contemporary with the Second. Carl Ruggles, the cranky Yankee, once said that great music must surge. At its best, Rangström's music does surge. I recommend this set.

Ture Rangström: Symphony No. 1; Dityramb & Vårhymn

Average customer rating:

Moody (not mood) music from Sweden
Tense music from Sweden...really 3 1/2 stars

Ture Rangström: Symphony No. 1; Dityramb & Vårhymn

Manufacturer: Cpo Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music

Modern & 20th Century | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music

General | Classical | Styles | Music
ASIN: B000001S0N
Release Date: 1996-04-23

Tracks:

Dityramb: Allegro Deciso E Con Passione
Sym No.1 in c#: Jasningstid: Allegro Entusiastico
Sym No.1 in c#: Legend: Andante Serioso
Sym No.1 in c#: Trollruna: Sostenuto. Presto Turbulento
Sym No.1 in c#: Kamp: Allegro Eroica
Varhymn: Adagio Espressivo

Customer Reviews:

Moody (not mood) music from Sweden.......2004-02-19

Rangstrom wrote his Spring Hymn in 1942 but he was remembering a day in his youth in 1912 when the great Swedish playwright August Strindberg was being borne to his grave: "...a beautiful Sunday in May, 1912, when the trees were turning a delicate green, which I witnessed from an old garden....a gawky youth who didn't want to take part in the crowded funeral procession, but he heard the bells booming from the north, and from the east the salty sea air and a thousand pictures of the skerries wafted past on the calm summer breeze." This is what Rangstrom remembered 30 years later and put into his music; perhaps we can see it too as we listen.

Ture Rangstrom was born in Stockholm in 1884. He studied music (though he was largely self-taught), became a newspaper critic, conducted the now-famous Goteborg (Gothenburg) Symphony, taught singing, and eventually began composing in earnest (although he wrote his first work at age 17). Literature was his constant inspiration: "Perhaps my interest in music was actually awakened by poetry, since it was the word, the ardent word of the poet, that first aroused my relentless desire to compose."

Rangstrom has long had an international reputation for his songs (about 250 of them), but lately his larger compositions have been coming into considerable favor as well. He wrote for the most part in a very accessible Late Romantic style. Although his idiom gradually grew more "modern," it never departed from the traditional parameters of musical discourse, and so remains appealing to the larger segment of the public.

Dithyramb, an early work (1909), seems quite domesticated by today's standards, but at the time it was severely criticized as ultra-radical, wild, and quite unbearable. Within only a few years Rangstrom was becoming more accepted, and his Symphony No. 1 had a successful premiere in 1915, going on to be performed in Berlin by 1922. It too was inspired by the writing of Strindberg, and in fact is dedicated to him In Memoriam. As Stig Jacobsson writes, "It contains ardor and magic...the musical language has a touch of mystery about it, with frequent hints of folk song and archaic elements. The orchestration is rich in contrasts."

Tense music from Sweden...really 3 1/2 stars.......2000-11-01

Another obscure composer heard from, courtesy of CPO. Rangstrom was one of the enfant terribles of early 20th century Swedish music. One can understand that description based on this recording, although it also suggests that the Swedish musical culture of that time must have been VERY conservative. All three pieces on this disc are a reflection of the composer's admiration for August Strindberg.

The major piece on the disc is Rangstrom's 1st symphony in the uncommon key of C# minor. It is a very tense piece which indulges in a bit too much Wagnerian chromaticism for my taste. Rangstrom reveals a solid ability for creating brooding atmosphere, but fails to understand that it neads to be leavened occasionally. The themes are short but not terribly memorable and he tends to let varied orchestration take the place of thematic development. The best movement is the second where Rangstrom lets his bardic tendencies break through; the weakest a rather dull scherzo.

The smaller pieces on the disc offer a better listening experience. Rangstrom's first orchestral piece was Dithyramb and it's a very effective piece. It evinces the same atmosphere as the symphony, but the thematic content is better and a more aggresive rhythmic element keeps the proceedings moving along.

The Spring Hymn is an interesting, if perhaps not wholly success ful piece. It has several nice themes which seem to break off when you really want them to continue. These are contrasted with gloomier material which reflects the "programme" of a funeral which occurs on an early spring day. There is something fascinating and frustrating about the piece and I'm sure I'll return to it often trying to figure it out.

All three pieces are played well by the orchestra, but I felt the conductor may not have lived long enough with the symphony to give the best performance of it. There is more contrast to be found there, as well as more juice to be rung from many of the phrases. Still, it's not a piece one finds on disc that often, so if you're in the mood for dark northern moods...don't let my quibbles stop you.

Music Review:

Music Review

music review

Music Review

Essence of Ambience [Import]

Loewe: Ballades

Meg & Cris at Carnegie Hall [Live]

Mingus Dynasty [Original recording remastered]

Light Fuse, Get Away [Live]

Journey to Forgiveness

New Beginning

Il Flauto Dolce

Kenny Rogers, Vol. 1 [Karaoke]

Jose Alfredo Jimenez Y Alicia Juarez

Kiss My Ass: Classic Kiss Regrooved

Kimi No Yume Wo Mitanda [Import]

Hyper Techno Museum 2001 [Import]

A Hard Core Package

God Bless Tiny Tim: The Complete Reprise Recordings