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| Leonard Slatkin Conducting Rachmaninov |
When I first started collecting
classical music in the early 90’s, I caught the Rachmaninov bug: a piece called
The Isle of the Dead enraptured my heavy-metal heart and never let
go. It was darker, more intense, and
more exciting than any piece of music I had ever heard—and there was so much of
it: 20 minutes of brooding, spine-tingling music! Not even Iron Maiden could match that! :) I quickly began investigating everything
Rachmaninov wrote, though in the early days of CD, there really wasn’t much
available other than two of his three symphonies, the piano concertos, and a
handful of piano music. Until one day I
stumbled on a chunky three-disc set of Rachmaninov’s Orchestral Works performed
by Leonard Slatkin (a new name to me back then) and the St. Louis
Symphony. Vox Box recordings exciting in
those early days, since each one had anywhere from two to four discs, but were
economically priced and contained a thick, detailed booklet inside with a
wealth of information about the composer and the works included. This set introduced me to works I had never
heard of, many of which still remain rarities.
Besides the relatively familiar Symphonic Dances, Isle of the Dead, and
Vocalise, Slatkin included works which really stretched my understanding of
Rachmaninov’s orchestral language: the epic, powerful choral symphony, The
Bells, which should really have been called his Symphony No.3, the creepy,
Mussorgskyian choral piece Spring, the uber-Romantic, Rimsky-Korsakovian tone
poem, Prince Rostislav, and an Tchaikovskyian overture, the Caprice Boheme (Capriccio
on Gypsy Themes), among others. Where
had these works been, and why did no one else seem to bother with them? For despite the derivative nature of some of
the earlier works, I heard masterpiece after masterpiece, any one of which
could have been a concert-hall staple.
