Glière Symphony No.3 'Ilya Murometz'

[Christopher]

I just think it's amazing how this piece gives and gives, on this forum at least.  What are unsung works have generated this amount of comment here? It would be interesting to compare them and see what commonalities they have in their impact, and of course to contrast them.

[sdtom]

You know I have Downes, Rahtkin, Stokowski, Minnesota Orchestra, and the new Naxos recording with the Buffalo/Falleta, Johanos, and Ormandy. The best is Downes. I love this work so much.

[Alan Howe]

Why is Downes the best, Tom?

[Gareth Vaughan]

Downes is good, certainly: nice attention to detail and sensible tempi (not sluggish, like Farberman) and with the benefit of Chandos' lush sound. But, for my money, Falletta is even better: brisker tempi, a really purposeful interpretation - and good sound too. That's just my opinion, of course.

[der79sebas]

In my opinion, Falletta is much too polished and not at all sounding Russian. With respect to Naxos, I prefer the older recording by Johanos (the best 2nd movement of all!).

[TerraEpon]

While I'm of the opinion that the Botstein is the best one...

(On Telarc, haven't heard the recentish one available on download/streaming)

[Justin]

Everybody is wrong. 

The best in my opinion is the 1999 radio recording featuring the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Neeme Järvi.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRpEt9FvTbU

I am generally not a fan of this conductor, due to his quick tempos on many works, but he takes this performance at just the right pace. Slow enough to bring out the limitless details of the work, while moving it along to keep the listener in complete excitement.

The acoustics are superior to many studio versions I have heard. Take the second movement, where the orchestra plays as though it is pregnant with melody, expressing the astonishing feeling that this is an enormous ensemble in another world, syncing nicely with the seduction of Murometz by Solovei's women.

Another example is the third movement, which one can imagine taking place in an elaborate, vast hall in the palace of King Vladimir. Also listen to the final chord of the first movement, and how it evanesces into the ether, with Murometz riding into the horizon of the endless Slavic landscape.

Botstein, and Falleta both sound too enclosed, which I feel cannot work with the content of this symphony. Downes is better but I feel his tempo is sometimes off in the fourth movement.

Everything about this piece is on a grand scale, and so the atmosphere must match that for the full effect to embrace the listener.

[adriano]

We compared these recordings already something like 1-2 years ago - in this same thread :-)

[Mark Thomas]

Indeed we did, Adriano, and there is little point in going back over old ground, or repeating what has already been said. There is definitely no value in just writing "X is my favourite", without giving any reasons for this judgement - Justin's post is a model contribution of how to do it, if you must.

[Christopher]

Do the moderators have access to metrics? I'd just be interested to know what other single works have generated this much discussion. 15 pages and counting! It's only a rough measure of course, but still...

[eschiss1]

imperials are fine too.

[Mark Thomas]

Metrics or imperials ( ), the short answer is no, we don't have a way as far as I can see to display a league table of topics. Even if we did, I'm not sure how much it would tell us because, despite the moderators' best efforts, many posts waver off topic during the course of discussion, particularly in long threads. I think it's fair to say, though, that I don't recall a single work which has attracted more discussion over the years than Ilya Murometz.

[sdtom]

I know that Chandos has the best sound recording far better than the Falletta which doesn't sound right to me although her conducting is good as well as the Buffalo Philharmonic. It lacks the necessary atmosphere. While Downes is slower by a few minutes I like the pace. Fabermann is too slow for my ear and the orchestra is not as good. I have not heard the Jarvi but I will soon. For now, I am happy with the Downes. I wonder who recorded it in the '40s for the Lone Ranger episodes. I too am amazed at the popularity of the thread.

[MartinH]

I'm not amazed by the popularity of this thread: Ilya Murometz is one of the most loved sonic spectaculars ever composed, and yet how many people have ever heard it performed live? It's really rather astonishing how many recordings there are, cut or not. But it's frustrating as can be that after all this time there still isn't a recording where the sound is fully up to the demands of the score. I keep hoping some young whippersnapper, like Jurowski, who really loves and understands the Russian repertoire will take it up and put it on Blu Ray in 5.1 surround sound with no cuts, no alterations in the scoring or other interventions. Maybe Gergiev doesn't like it: I was praying he'd do it in London, but no. Neeme Jarvi could still turn in a performance, although he seems to be getting more glib as time goes on. What is totally unneeded are any more stereo red book CD versions. Still one of my favorite symphonies, good to escape the many problems of the world.

[CelesteCadenza]

...and yet how many people have ever heard it performed live?

I was present at the Botstein/TON performance from December 2018 (now online) in a concert that also included Rimsky-Korsakov's First Symphony:
https://www.bard.edu/news/events/event/?eid=134335&date=1544659200
First times (and most likely one-and-only) for both works for this listener.