
It’s learning time at MPL. Let’s talk about the term “classical music.” That term probably has some meaning to you that covers most Christian and art music from the earliest chants of monks up through that of the present day, or at least the early part of the 20th century, excluding modern Christian folk and rock. You’ve probably got composers Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Mahler, and maybe even Bartók, performers like Pavarotti and conductors like Bernstein all lumped into that grouping. Well, that’s one, and probably the most frequently-used, meaning of the term.
But let me tell you about music history or appreciation classes (concerned, of course, with “classical music”), most of which proceed as follows. They start off with some hand waving about Gregorian chants and the Middle Ages by way of introduction, then basically really start in on the meat of the class with the Renaissance, at whose beginning we had the Baroque period. This is represented by Bach and Handel and typified by extravagant ornamentation and complex structure, just like Baroque architecture. Then we get the Classical period, which is where things really start to get confusing, because now we’re referring to the music composed during this period, a subset of “classical music,” as “Classical music.” Mozart and Haydn are the archetypes of this period, and it is characterized by clean lines and balance, just like Classical architecture. Then we get the Romantic period. Beethoven bridges us from Classical into Romantic, where we get florid, dramatic works, as in Romantic literature, by composers like Chopin, Grieg, Liszt, Brahms, Puccini, Wagner, Debussy, and so on. These classes typically finish their survey of these three main periods (Baroque, Classical, and Romantic) with Mahler, who is kind of like Beethoven in that he kind of bridges us to the next period, where the classes typically end with some hand waving over the poorly defined period from 1910-2008, usually referred to as the 20th Century period, or Modern period, which is, of course, a horribly suited name that lumps way too much disparate music under one ill-fitting umbrella.
All of which is a long way of introducing what will be a series of reviews to come of “20th Century music.” I didn’t have to put that in quotes, because I will be most definitely listening to music composed in the 20th century, but that’s 98% of what I review on here anyway. Now, though, I’m reading Alex Ross’ The Rest Is Noise: Listening To The 20th Century (out in paperback this month), and so I’m listening to this “20th Century” subcategory of “classical music.” Clear as mud, I’m sure, so if you care and I haven’t been clear, ask a question in the comments and I’ll do my best to clarify.
Anyway, I’m starting my journey through this varied, ignored landscape with the canonical recording of one of my favorite composers, Hungary’s Béla Bartók. Summaries of Bartók’s career must mention that he visisted Hungarian and Bulgarian villages, notated and recorded the folk music there, and incorporated elements from it, such as shifting time signatures and non-Western (another crazy-confusing term) modalities (kind of like keys, if you’re familiar with that musical term) along with traditional Western elements into his composistions.
This CD begins with his Concerto For Orchestra, written near the end of his life in New York, where he emigrated to from Hungary in World War II, and debuted in 1944 in Boston. Concerti typically involve a solo instrument such as flute, piano, or violin playing the bulk of the melodic development while an orchestra helps out with harmony and the bold statements of the main themes, so this is a bit of an oddly-named duck. Once you listen, though, you realize there’s no other name that would work, as he spends five movements creating a near-symphonic work that gives extensive solos to a wide variety of different instruments throughout.
The Concerto is a marvelous piece, easily one of my new favorite “classical” works. In the space of 37 minutes, Bartók lays the foundation for the music of film for the last 50 years with quivering strings, a bevy of slowly emerging and retreating motifs, and an emphasis on tuned percussion, presents some of the most lusciously gorgeous melodies this side of Barber’s Adagio For Strings, pays tribute to Gershwin with a few near quotes of Rhapsody In Blue, interrupts his own work in an ”interrupted intermezzo” with a light-hearted quote of the contemporaneous Leningrad Symphony by Shostakovich, and closes by working the orchestra into a fit of virtuosically brilliant pyrotechnics. This piece is probably the best synthesis of Bartók’s career into a single piece.
Three years after recording the Concerto with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Reiner did the same for what was originally a separate release with two more pieces of Bartók’s: Music For Strings, Percussion, And Celesta (written in 1937) and Hungarian Sketches (1931).
I had to look up what a celesta was:
The celesta…is a struck idiophone operated by a keyboard. Its appearance is similar to that of an upright piano… or of a large wooden music box…. The keys are connected to hammers which strike a graduated set of metal (usually steel) plates suspended over wooden resonators. …. One of the most well-known works that makes use of the celesta is Tchaikovsky’s “Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy” from The Nutcracker.
And what is an idiophone?
An idiophone is any musical instrument which creates sound primarily by way of the instrument vibrating itself, without the use of strings or membranes.
This piece is quite highbrow, with its time signatures shifting rapidly and even more in the way of themes emerging out of and quickly fading back into the ether. The second movement is particularly enjoyable and, along with the fourth, a bit more accessible than the first and third movements, which have little in the way of themes you can easily grab on to to guide you through the piece’s 28 minutes. It’s quite good, but it’s far less readily emotionally available, and thus much harder to connect to.
Speaking of “harder,” I should mention that this is all somewhat challenging music, as you would expect, but in a much different way than that of Bach, which I’ve reviewed often here. I rarely write about Bach without somehow working in some mention of how his work is cognitive and a mental exercise. This music of Bartók’s is challenging in the sense that it won’t serve you as background music, however all that’s required to feel what it offers is to pay attention. Once you focus your attention on what’s being “said,” everything will be clear and you can enjoy the music without smelling the smoke from your brain’s gears crunching hard like they do on tough math problems.
The CD flows well from the folk-influenced fourth movement of Music For Strings, Percussion, And Celesta to the lighter Hungarian Sketches, a collection of five songs that, as the title suggests, are inspired from Bartók’s work with Hungarian folk music. About one-and-a-half to two-and-a-half minutes each, with colorful names like “Bear Dance,” “Slightly Tipsy,” and “Swineherd’s Dance,” and with a folk style and evocation of nature similar to Grieg’s Lyric Pieces, they give a concentrated view on the music from that time and place that, in this world of massively distributed media, is a refreshing bit of time travel.
It’s a wonderful way to wrap up this introduction to Bartók, and emphasizes why this is so often the starting point to exploring his work. I should have more Bartók, given how much I’ve enjoyed what I’ve heard and played on the piano, but I’m at least very happy I finally took the time to get this disc. Finally, I have to give props to BMG Classics for pricing this SACD/CD hybrid at the reasonable price of $12.99. It seems some record companies are slowly coming around to more closely understanding the value of their product.
Rating:

Mixers: Hungarian Sketches: “An Evening In The Village,” “Bear Dance,” “Swineherd’s Dance”
Non-keepers: Music For Strings, Percussion, And Celesta: “Movement 1 – Andante Tranquillo,” “Movement 4 – Allergro Molto,” Hungarian Sketches: “Slightly Tipsy”
Filed Between: Bartók’s Mikrokosmos and Bauhaus (1979-1983, Volume One)