Ravel: Boléro, Etc.

On this CD:

1. Boléro, ballet for orchestra (or piano)
Composed by Maurice Ravel
Performed by Ljubljana Symphony Orchestra
Conducted by Samo Hubad

2. Daphnis et Chloé, ballet for orchestra
Composed by Maurice Ravel

Conducted by Loic Bertrand

3. Le tombeau de Couperin, for orchestra Prélude
Composed by Maurice Ravel
Performed by Orf Choir and Symphony Orchestra
Conducted by Milan Horvat

4. Le tombeau de Couperin, for orchestra Forlane
Composed by Maurice Ravel
Performed by Orf Choir and Symphony Orchestra
Conducted by Milan Horvat

5. Le tombeau de Couperin, for orchestra Menuet
Composed by Maurice Ravel
Performed by Orf Choir and Symphony Orchestra
Conducted by Milan Horvat

6. Le tombeau de Couperin, for orchestra Rigaudon
Composed by Maurice Ravel
Performed by Orf Choir and Symphony Orchestra
Conducted by Milan Horvat

7. Rhapsodie espagnole for orchestra (or 2 pianos)
Composed by Maurice Ravel
Performed by Orf Choir and Symphony Orchestra
Conducted by Milan Horvat

Ravel: Boléro, Etc., Music, Maurice Ravel, Loic Bertrand, Milan Horvat, Samo Hubad, Ljubljana Symphony Orchestra, Orf Chor und Symphonieorchester, Philharmonia Slavonica, 20th/21st Century Ballet, 20th/21st Century Orchestral Music, Ballet, Classical, Orchestral, Orchestral & Symphonic, Orchestral Music

Ravel: Bolero; La Valse; etc. [Hybrid SACD]
Average customer rating:

Ravel, Minnesota, Skrowaczewski: YES: Treasures from the Past

Sheer Brilliance

Superb-Stands along Boulez!!!!

Nothing else even close!

Bravo Mobile Fidelity!

Ravel: Bolero; La Valse; etc. [Hybrid SACD]

Manufacturer: Mobile Fidelity Koch
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

Pavanes | Ballets & Dances | Classical | Styles | Music
Ravel, Maurice | ( R ) | Featured Composers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music
Suites | Forms & Genres | Classical | Styles | Music
General | Symphonies | Classical | Styles | Music
General | Classical | Styles | Music
General Contemporary | Modern, 20th, & 21st Century | Historical Periods | Classical | Styles | Music
Minnesota Orchestra | ( M ) | Featured Performers, A-Z | Classical | Styles | Music
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ASIN: B0000ADXG2
Release Date: 2003-09-23

Customer Reviews:

Ravel, Minnesota, Skrowaczewski: YES: Treasures from the Past.......2006-05-16

Remember the brief, good old days of quad? Various labels, Vox included, were experimenting with ways to get four channel sound out of the long-playing vinyl platter. I believe the old USA RCA label had a discrete four channel system that actually cut four separate channels into the otherwise 2-sided LP groove. This meant you had to have a special cartridge/needle combo to safely ride and reproduce the four tracks cut into the groove. Never took off. Others, EMI and Vox among them choose the matrixed sound path, rather like the ways FM radio was matrixing a stereo signal into its carrier waves, so that your home receiver could decode it down to two channels in your home.

A complete set of the Ravel orchestral music was recorded in Minnesota with the era's music director, Stanislav Skrowaczewski. Like the golden era recordings of the old Mercury Golden Presence label, the engineers adopted a deliberate minimalist miking strategy. Once they found what they thought was the sweet spot, they just left the microphones alone, and let Ravel and the orchestra do the rest. Then we got these wonderful performances, highly lauded from the moment they hit the streets, on vinyl with four channels of matrixed sound. You could listen in regular stereo, or if you had the matrix decoder, get four.

Now we are really well into the surround sound era, thanks mainly to how home theater got all of us to finally upgrade our hardware. Since we already have the equipment for movies, and now for HD television; we have little reason not to let our music collections into the mix. And, voila. These master tapes revive, standing up to something like their original audible stature, thanks to the new high resolution Superaudio format. Pentatone is doing something similar to what Mobil Fidelity is doing here, with those almost forgotten quad master tapes; and what a nice surprise - the sound couldn't be better.

The Minnesota Orchestra of the era wasn't particularly known for its French tradition or influences as such. If anything, the Boston Symphony had inherited that crown prince designation when Koussevitsky arrived from Paris, bringing star French players with him. Then Pierre Monteux, Charles Munch helped maintain that legacy once the big K was gone. The Jean Martinon period in Chicago never really took root, and so as time passed, the Montreal Symphony and Charles Dutoit inherited the nomination for outstanding French orchestra outside of France. Nevertheless, these are utterly superb captures of a sophisticated Ravelian orchestral fabric - replete with finesse, sheen, silver - all polished to high gloss. This will remind one perhaps of the famous Hall of Mirrors at Versailles, reflecting light in all directions. And raising almost metaphysical questions of just what is real, and what is reflection, in the cross-hatch of all the refracted light.

Skrowaczewski knows well enough to let Ravel speak, without intruding. No mannerisms or oddities mar the music, either at the musical surfaces or in the melancholy or grotesque, subtle depths lurking beneath their polish. Tempos are consistently well chosen for the piece at hand. Some may at first hear the warhorse Bolero at too slow a pace, but comparison with the extant old version conducted by the composer in person would show that this slower, more languorous tempo is what Ravel himself adopted. There is still plenty of flash and fire in this Bolero, but also lots of that French intoxication with all things North African. Tourists are still going to far places to smoke kif and indulge in love-making with the local service industry that still knows where to find them.

Whatever you may think of French tourists smoking kif or the more hedonistic undergrounds in the North African tourist industry - As music: This is all simply marvelous to hear, especially in surround sound that finally yields up for our ears what has been sleeping on these old master tapes, all along.

Of course, this disc offers more than Bolero done with a slow, knowing hand that feels what it is reaching out to touch, namely, you. The Rhapsody, La Valse, Pavane, and Daphnis et Chloe suite no. 2 are the real point. Each of these works is simply so fine that they make Ravel's case as one of the acknowledged Great Composers of the West, all over again. What a felicity that Vox had the imagination and guts to go to Minneapolis, and get all this down, just when the other major labels had seemingly forgotten that Minnesota ever had a great orchestra. These Ravel performances will wear extremely well, no matter who else does them in surround sound and high resolution superaudio or dvd-audio. The only sad thing about this disc is when it inevitably ends, having played through. One could only have wished that Vox had been willing to get the full score of Daphnis from these sessions, the recording of the suites is so very finely done.

(You will find a second equally fine disc from these Minnesota sessions, also in surround sound superaudio from Mobile Fidelity. Plus, you can get their St. Louis sessions with Walter Susskind, which captured a very fine Smetana cycle of Ma Vlast, along with a rich and dramatic vision of Holst's Planets suite for large orchestra. Do not diss Susskind, by the way, because he was highly regarded by other musicians, including the likes of Ginette Niveau, Heifitz, Rubinstein, Milstein, Firkusny, Ricci, and Artur Schnabel. Nor is St. Louis confined to being a regional band: it is one of USA's oldest orchestras.)

Five stars. Is that enough? Hardly. This disc and its companion are simply among the true peaks in the mountain ranges of the history of recorded music. They may be equaled, but probably will never be bettered. Very highly recommended. Indeed.

Sheer Brilliance.......2005-08-12

There are not enough words in the English language to describe how good this performace is. The quality of the recording is also quite good. If you are looking for the definitive version of Ravel's masterpiece, you have just found it.

Superb-Stands along Boulez!!!!.......2005-07-31

What a tremendous SACD.
So well done. Worth every penny I paid.
Even my wife said she enjoyed it!!
Great Service!!!!

Nothing else even close!.......2005-06-14

I know you already have 3 Boleros, but you haven't heard it until you get this one, to say nothing of La Valse and over an hour of other gorgeous Ravel. Flawless in every way: exciting, beautifully recorded and totally engaging.

Bravo Mobile Fidelity!.......2003-09-29

My God! So this is how Bolero should be heard :) A remarkable and tasteful debut into the universe of classical surround sound by a traditionally rock oriented audiophile leader. At times bombastic, ominous, and spine tingling. . . & for an Encore?

Berlioz: La Marseillaise; Symphonie fantastique; Ravel: Boléro; Rapsodie espagnole; Etc.

Average customer rating:

Berlioz: La Marseillaise; Symphonie fantastique; Ravel: Boléro; Rapsodie espagnole; Etc.

Manufacturer: Teldec
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Daphnis Et Chloe: Deuxieme Ste: Lever Du Jour - Pantomine - Danse Generale - Donald Peck
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Ravel: Daphnis et Chloé Suites; Rapsodie espagnole; etc.

Average customer rating:

Ravel: Daphnis et Chloé Suites; Rapsodie espagnole; etc.

Manufacturer: RCA
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: B0002DD67E
Release Date: 2004-07-13

Tracks:

Daphnis Et Chloe Suite No. 1
Daphnis Et Chloe Suite No. 2
I. Prelude A La Nuit
II. Malaguena
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La Valse
Bolero

Average customer rating:

Ravel: Boléro, Etc.

Manufacturer: Madacy Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Tracks:

Bolero - SO Ljubljana/Samo Hubad
Daphnis And Cloe - Philharmonia Slavonica/Loic Bertrand
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Ravel: Bolero, Une Barque Sur L'ocean, etc.

Average customer rating:

Ravel: Bolero, Une Barque Sur L'ocean, etc.
Ozawa , and Boston Symphony Orchestra
Manufacturer: Eloquence/Universal
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Ravel: Daphnis et Chloe; Valses Nobles et Sentimentales; Etc. [Australia]

ASIN: B000FBHC8M
Release Date: 2006-04-17

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Ravel: Boléro, Alborada del gracioso, etc.

Average customer rating:

Definitive Performance of Ravel's Orchestral Music

Ravel: Boléro, Alborada del gracioso, etc.

Manufacturer: Philips
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Tracks:

Alborada Del Gracioso
Le tombeau de Couperin: Prelude
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Le tombeau de Couperin: Menuet
Le tombeau de Couperin: Rigaudon
Valses nobles et sentimentales: Modere
Valses nobles et sentimentales: Assez Lent
Valses nobles et sentimentales: Modere
Valses nobles et sentimentales: Assez Anime
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Bolero

Customer Reviews:

Definitive Performance of Ravel's Orchestral Music.......2001-04-16

It's a pity Bernard Haitink and the Boston Symphony Orchestra have not recorded more music together. I own several other recordings of theirs and all have been performances of the highest caliber. The Boston Symphony Orchestra plays with greater warmth and technical skill under Haitink's baton than it does under Ozawa's. And Haitink's subtle, no nonsense conducting has yielded results as good as any he's attained with his beloved Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra or the philharmonic orchestras of Berlin, Vienna and London. Indeed, some music critics have written that his recent recordings with the Boston Symphony Orchestra are among the finest in his career.

One of these great recordings is unquestionably this CD, one of two he recorded of Ravel's orchestral music with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Haitink conducts with restrained passion as well as insight, producing a lush, brilliant sound from the Boston Symphony. Only at the end of "Bolero" does he let the orchestra loose in one final sonic explosion, but otherwise he keeps his and the orchestra's exuberance in check. Of course the tempi in all of these works feel right, not excessively fast, nor excessively slow. For example, his "Bolero" is nearly a minute faster than most conductors, but it sounds just right.

Tracks:

Fanfare
Prelude
Forlane
Menuet
Rigaudon
Menuet Antique
Alborada Del Grazioso
Pavane Pour Une Infante Defunte
Bolero

Average customer rating:

Excellent performance!
One of the great unknowns!
The CSO's brass section really outdid itself

Bolèro/Le Sacre Du Printemps, etc.
Stravinsky , Ravel , Debussy , Sir Georg Solti , and Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Manufacturer: Polygram Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD
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Customer Reviews:

Excellent performance!.......2007-03-27

I own two recordings of the Rite of Spring and both are simply excellent: Riccardo Muti/Philadelphia Orchestra (trust me, they are good) and this one Georg Solti/Chicago Symphony. Both are a must have.
Now, I WON'T spend my time (like others) raving on how the mics should have been set, or how the balance should have been; I'll just tell you what you'll hear (I'm an orchestral player).
As another reviewer stated, this recording of The Rite DOES have a more symphonic sound to it, but don't let this discourage you from buying this CD. The CSO gives you exactly what you expect from it; excellent sound and clarity. And for all Solti detractors (saying that he always interprets music in hyper-speed mode), these performances are very accurate with the tempi markings in the score. Of course, the CSO does have brass, but nothing is overdone, simply a solid, powerful sound. This recording is from 1974, when the CSO brass was at its peak (not that it has declined) so rest assured that every penny you spend on this CD will give you quality.
Now, this recording must be paired with Muti's with the Philadelphia Orchestra, please, believe me, that the Philadelphia brass delivers equally as well as the CSO brass, oh no!(Have to play devil's advocate). Now, if you want a really cool primitivistic sound, then get Muti's Rite with the Philadelphia Orchestra (the recording's from the '70s).
I still have to get two more recordings of the Rite; Bernstein with New York Phil. and Karajan's with Berlin Phil, but overall, if you can get this recording then do it! This CD is rare and a true gem.

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One of the great unknowns!.......2004-12-25

This album is a remastered re-release of 3 of the great masterworks of the early 20th century being performed by one of the great symphonies conducted by one of the truly great conductors. So...commercial finished, critique starting. The Ravel is an outstanding representation of work; all the soloists are strong (for the saxophonists, I do believe that these soloists are among the best I've ever heard), the energy and pacing are just about perfect. The Rite is outstanding, start to finish. Note: this recording of the Rite has a more symphonic sound, not so much the aggressive "primitivist" sound. The Debussy is truly touching; the best I've yet heard. The flutist is truly outstanding. Of course it goes without saying that if you buy recordings for brass sections, this album is a must-have.

The CSO's brass section really outdid itself.......2004-11-29

Congratulations to George Solti & The CSO for doing the best extant version of THE RITE. Unfortunately, I can't vouch for the sound quality of this CD. Because I haven't heard it. I heard the old analog version.

Collection Piero Coppola Volume 2 - Conducts Ravel (recorded 1927-1934) - Introduction & Allegro; Scheherazade; Rhapsodie Espagnole; Pavane pour Une Infante Defunte; Valses Nobles et Sentimentales; Alborada del Gracioso; Tombeau de Couperin; Bolero; etc.

Average customer rating:

Collection Piero Coppola Volume 2 - Conducts Ravel (recorded 1927-1934) - Introduction & Allegro; Scheherazade; Rhapsodie Espagnole; Pavane pour Une Infante Defunte; Valses Nobles et Sentimentales; Alborada del Gracioso; Tombeau de Couperin; Bolero; etc.

Manufacturer: L.Y.S.
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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