Vivaldi Four Seasons Kremer

It's a bit depressing how many new releases from the "major" classical labels these days consist of recycled old recordings, but give Deutsche Grammophon credit for the thinking that obviously went into this four-CD box entitled The Four Seasons: A Musical Calendar of Favourite Classics. In a way, this is yet another milking of the perennially salable Vivaldi Four Seasons; each of the four discs (Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter) opens with a complete performance of its respective concerto from that set, in the Gil Shaham recording with the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra.

In April 1981 violinist Gidon Kremer performed Vivaldi's Four Seasons leading the English Chamber Orchestra recorded in the baroque library of the monastery in Polling, near Munich. It is, as one would expect from a master violinist, a superbly insightful performance. The sound is resonant and satisfying although surely not true 5.1, and those who wish to have this music on video might well investigate it.

Latvian violinist Gidon Kremer's 2000 release Eight Seasons is a conceptual masterwork. Kremer, long known for his skillful interpretations of Astor Piazzolla's Argentinean tangos, had the brilliant idea of matching four of the Latin master's tone poems of the seasons in his native Buenos Aires with Antonio Vivaldi's conceptually similar masterpiece "The Four Seasons," alternating seasons between the two works. Besides the conceptual perfection of the idea, the performances are exquisite. Kremer and his conservatory orchestra, the Kremerata Baltica, do a particularly masterful job with the Vivaldi, avoiding the ornate bloat that affects so many recordings of this work. Their performances are brisk and to-the-point, with bright tempos that add a vitality not often found in this rather shopworn old standard. As always, Kremer's solos in the Piazzolla works are absolutely superb, with the dramatic flourishes of the massed string section providing startling counterpoint, especially on the breathtaking "Verano Porteno". Eight Seasons is a truly remarkable work by an underrated performer.

The New Seasons referred to in the title here are the so-called American Four Seasons, the Violin Concerto No. 2 of Philip Glass, which has even less of a connection to Vivaldi's model than do Astor Piazzolla's Buenos Aires Four Seasons and other works that take Vivaldi as a point of reference. The work is in eight sections, but which ones are supposed to represent which season is left up to the listener. It's really a typical but unusually effective example of late-period Glass, with the composer's usual textures intact but lots of harmonic motion. Part of the interest here lies in hearing Latvian violinist and conductor Gidon Kremer and his Kremerata Baltica, long champions of minimalism's Baltic branch, tackle a work by one of the leaders of Western minimalism. The American Four Seasons get a treatment that's a bit rougher than usual, but then Kremer turns around (after a Pärt girls' choir interlude) and delivers pristinely smooth, glassy textures in Giya Kancheli's Ex contrario. The program closes with a fascinating little melody by Japanese rock musician and film composer Shigeru Umebayashi, a daring and effective choice.