Page 196 - Alison Balsom Quiet City FULL BOOK

Mozart’s complete music for winds fills seven CDs; for many years, the NWE’s recordings were
the only ones readily available. De Waart recalls the group spending a fortnight in isolation, “just
rehearsing… working hard on unanimity of intonation and tone as well as ensemble.” Ensemble
and intonation are as close to perfection as you’d expect, and the group make a distinctive,
unhomogenised sound. If you’re a fan of Haitink’s first Mahler cycle with the Concertgebouw,
you’ll know what to expect, sonority-wise. Big works like the KV361 Serenade in B flat (with
double bass instead of contrabassoon) are predictably good, and there’s plenty more to enjoy. A
brace of divertimenti, plus some fiendish horn duets, (allegedly written while Mozart was playing
billiards), and works for basset horns – all are marvellous. There’s also a disc of wind
arrangements of numbers from Don Giovanni and Il Seraglio, and a delightful album of Rossini
opera excerpts.

Dvořák’s gorgeous Serenade and Gounod’s Petite Symphonie were coupled on the NWE’s first
LP. The former’s slow movement really moves, and the finale is riotous. Little Marches by Great
Composers, released in 1972, is full of earworms, as is a disc collecting three large scale octets
by Franz Krommer. Two discs of Strauss place the early Serenade and Suite alongside the
late Sonatina “From an Invalid’s Workshop” and the Symphony “The Happy Workshop”, both, in
my limited experience, more fun to play than to listen to. They’re all conducted by De Waart,
whose dry, pungent accounts of Stravinsky’s Ebony Concerto, Octet and Symphonies of Wind
Instruments are still among the best available. The final disc is a curio: newly remastered live
recordings of George Antheil’s Ballet Mécanique and Jazz Symphony, the former including
wooshy “aeroplane noises”. Exactly how they were realised here isn’t revealed; an internet
search will reveal some scary-looking propellers positioned in various orchestral percussion
sections. Peter Quantrill’s entertaining booklet notes usefully explain the historical and cultural
context behind the group’s foundation, and Decca Eloquence reproduce the original LPs’ quirky
sleeve art. The analogue Philips engineering has aged well. You need this box.
• Netherlands Wind Ensemble on Amazon