"spring Academy"

The four works on this album, all composed in the 1940s, embrace the lingering end of one musical tradition and the vigorous upsurge of another. Mellifluous, retrospective and playful, the Duet Concertino and Prelude to Capriccio were works of Richard Strauss’s Indian Summer – an old man’s refuge from the barbarism of war and its aftermath. What the public thought of them was incidental, even irrelevant. In the same decade, Aaron Copland and other younger American composers were reaching out, via radio, recordings and film, to a new mass audience. The European influence of Appalachian Spring and the Clarinet Concerto, though inescapable, was minimised in a populist, vernacular idiom that absorbed native folk music and jazz.

This is not strictly a compilation of what the British would term "light music," for there is music of substantial weight on these two discs: e.g., Vaughan Williams's The Lark Ascending, Butterworth's A Shropshire Lad, and Elgar's Introduction and Allegro, but for the most part, Marriner and his charges offer less weighty fare that is familiar to many classical music-lovers and certainly dear to the heart of Anglophiles like this writer. From Vaughan Williams's perennial favorites, Fantasia on Greensleeves and the English Folk Song Suite, and George Butterworth's nigh-ubiquitous The Banks of Green Willow to less familiar fare like Delius's Serenade (composed to honor the 70th birthday of Frederick Delius) and the suite from Elgar's incomplete opera The Spanish Lady, this compilation of recordings–originally made in 1968, 1972, 1976, and 1979–embodies the spirit of England and does so faultlessly. This is a well chosen and exemplarily executed collection of English orchestral miniatures proffered by a conductor and orchestra whose names have become synonymous with the repertoire.

Christopher Hogwood has found himself a dream cast here, with even the smallest roles taken by big names. There are a couple of surprises along the way, such as the underage First Sailor (sung by a slightly quavery treble) and the cross-dressing Sorceress, here taken by a bass. Still David Thomas cackles and machinates with the best of them, so don't let that put you off.

Happy the couples for whom Bach wrote wedding cantatas! BWV 202 and BWV 210 are two of his most attractive and charming works. BWV 202, the earlier and shorter of the pair, evokes the joys of both spring and true love in a succession of lively dance tunes, while BWV 210’s tongue-in-cheek account of music’s effect on lovers includes five exquisite arias, not least the teasing lullaby ‘Ruhet hie’. Emma Kirkby sings these cantatas – plus three songs from Anna Magdalena’s music-book – with a natural fluency and grace that is always engaging, despite a few uncomfortable moments in the highest registers.

Christopher Hogwood was one of the first pioneers to introduce historically informed performances in England in the 70', following Nikolaus Harnoncourt's revolution that took place in the late 50'. With the Academy of Ancient Music, he published hundreds of fine recordings from different composers, with a special focus on Vivaldi. Here he presents the famous Four Seasons. I find Hogwood's lecture of the 4 Seasons perfect.

If you want a good sampling of Copland's orchestral works, then this 2-CD compilation comes highly recommended, with excellent performances of works such as Appalachian Spring, Quiet City, El Salón México and others. (Presto Classical)