Arthur Fagen — Martinů: Symphonies Nos. 2 and 4, Naxos (Audio CD)

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Product Details

• UPC: 43476600370
• Catalogue Number: 8.553349
• Product Type: Audio CD
• Label: Naxos
• Composer: Bohuslav Martinů (1890–1959)
• Conductor: Arthur Fagen
• Orchestra: National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine
• Release Year: 2000
• Genre: Classical, Orchestral
• Country of Producing: European Union (EU)

Product Features

• Format: Compact Disc, DDD
• Playing Time: 60:58 (Symphony No. 2: 24:56, Symphony No. 4: 36:02)
• Recorded: 15–18 March 1995, Grand Concert Studio of the National Radio Company of Ukraine, Kiev
• Sealed / factory-wrapped

Overview

Martinů wrote all six of his symphonies in American exile, having fled Czechoslovakia after the 1939 annexation, and the two on this disc show him at his most lyrical. Symphony No. 2, compact and warm, was written in 1943 for the Czech community of Cleveland — you can hear the homesickness in it, folk-inflected melodies filtered through a composer who never stopped thinking in Czech even while living in New York. Symphony No. 4, from 1945, is bigger in scope but no less tuneful, written right as the war was ending and carrying something of that release in its energy.

This is the second instalment in Naxos's complete Martinů symphony cycle with the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine under Arthur Fagen, recorded in the same Kiev sessions that produced the label's other volumes in the set. Martinů's orchestral voice is a distinctive one — rhythmically loose, melodically generous, never quite settling into any single European tradition — and these two symphonies, less austere than some of his later work, make an approachable way into his catalogue.

Interesting Facts

• Martinů composed all six of his symphonies after settling in the United States, having fled Europe following the Nazi annexation of Czechoslovakia in 1939 — he was in his late forties before writing his first.
• Symphony No. 2 was commissioned by the Czech community of Cleveland, Ohio, and premiered there in 1943 under George Szell.
• Symphony No. 4 followed in 1945 and quickly became one of Martinů's most performed and recorded orchestral works.
• The cover artwork, The Quarry at Branik, is by Czech painter Bohumil Kubišta (1884–1918), a leading figure of Czech Cubism.
• This recording is part of Naxos's complete Martinů symphony cycle, all performed by the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine under Arthur Fagen.
• Producer Alexander Hornostai and annotator Keith Anderson worked across multiple entries in this Naxos Martinů series.

Track Listing

Symphony No. 2: 1. Allegro moderato (7:16) / 2. Andante moderato (7:29) / 3. Poco allegro (4:53) / 4. Allegro (5:18)

Symphony No. 4: 5. Poco moderato – Poco allegro (7:52) / 6. Allegro vivo – Moderato – Allegro vivo (9:23) / 7. Largo (10:59) / 8. Poco allegro (7:48)

Publishers

Naxos, catalogue 8.553349. Manufactured in the EU. © & ℗ 2000 HNH International Ltd.

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