CD SACD

Hamlet film music, op. 116.
Dmitry Yablonsky, Russian Philharmonic Orchestra.
Naxos 8.557446 CD or 6.110062 hybrid multichannel/stereo SACD/stereo CD. DDD. TT 62:28.
Recorded Studio 5, Russian State TV & Radio Company KULTURA, Moscow, 6-14 February 2003.
Premiere recording of the complete published film score.

Naxos' new recording of the Hamlet film music, often heralded as Shostakovich's greatest work in the genre, is bound to stir some excitement. This is not just another issue of the suite that has been a standard of the catalogue for the past 40 years. This is the deluxe edition: the world premiere recording of the complete published score. The fuss is well worth making.

After a few listenings to this new disc, one might argue that Lev Atovmyan, arranger of the suite, left out some of the best parts. Just think of what more the suite offers: a score of monumental sweep and emotional breadth, embodying the grandeur, pathos, and humour of its noble Shakespeare subject. One can imagine how Shostakovich might have assembled the never-written ‘Hamlet Symphony’ from its weighty and not so weighty parts: an opening movement drawn from the Overture and the 'ghost' segments, a scherzo from the Palace Ball and In the Garden, a slow movement built out of the Ophelia sequence, and a finale fashioned from Hamlet's Duel and Death. Though lacking in the kind of developmental continuity implied, there is something grand and comprehensive in this full score version that leaves a sense of having scaled music's Olympian heights. Perhaps that has something to do with the creative stakes involved. The film, made in 1962, was undertaken as a collaborative effort between composer and director Grigori Kozintsev where music and visual image were conceived as coequals. I frankly don't recall the music taking on such significance in the film. Never mind, nor do I recall so much impressive music turning up as on the current recording.

Only two past recordings have offered music outside the standard eight-part suite. The notable Chailly/Concertgebouw version (Decca 289 460 792-2; reviewed in DSCH No. 11) includes two non-standard cuts lasting less than a minute each. Likewise, a Denon release of a few years earlier (CO 18004) featuring the I Solisti Italiani taps into the original score for a few non-standard cuts. Dmitri Yablonsky, who has recorded a fair number of Shostakovich orchestral works for Naxos over the past few years, hereby offers a generous 23 tracks, encompassing all of the original score's 34 cues. Those acquainted with the suite will find it incorporated here, along with a good number of wonderful surprises.

Yablonsky's pace is a little faster, more assertive, and less monumental than one might be accustomed to in the opening Overture. But he sets Hamlet afoot with a dauntlessly advancing tempo. Ever attentive to instrumental colour and backed by the strong playing of the Russian Philharmonic Orchestra, he takes on the score with an appropriate sense of mission. One of the interesting aspects of the full score is how thematic material and action relate to each other in a larger context. The recurrence and interaction of main themes suggest a symbolic significance for each; a fate motif, a death motif, a Hamlet motif, etc. The variety of instrumental and rhythmic roles the themes take on represents a feast for the ears. For example the same theme that announces the Ghost in colossal gesture and parallel octaves is later chopped into smaller divisions, ostinato style, and squeezed into parallel minor seconds in the Scene of Poisoning. And then there's Hamlet's powerful motto theme that recurs throughout the score, with its Stepan Razin-like hammer strokes, heavy on brass, percussion and strings in the opening Overture. A curious variant appears in track 8, Hamlet's Parting from Ophelia in a very Shostakovian setting for bassoons with xylophone punctuation. Another variant, a subdued arrangement for clarinet and low strings in track 12, provides the setting for Hamlet's monologue. Yablonsky's attention to detail in these cues is exemplary.

Then there's Hamlet's potent atmospheric content. Shostakovich's mastery of orchestration is used with a supernatural vengeance in this regard. Two of the most impressive tracks on this new release involve ghostly appearances, and Yablonsky is magnificent in evoking a bone-chilling atmosphere. Making its world premiere is The Story of Horatio and the Ghost, track 5, where the combination of tremolo strings, celesta, and low harp recalls the expansive shades of the Eleventh Symphony; likewise the tuba part with bass drum thundering recalls the Fears movement of the Thirteenth Symphony. The Ghost, track 7, also receives sumptuous treatment, opening with an alarmingly grand spectre, then leading into some squirming sul ponticello sonorities and concluding with ominously hushed snare drum and timpani cross rhythms. The combination of Yablonsky's luxuriously slow tempi and Naxos' brilliantly clear engineering fairly well outdoes any previous rendition of these cues. Indeed it compares favourably to Bernard Herrmann's memorably spacious rendition of Hamlet's Ghost (Decca/London 455 156-2; deleted). The Naxos CD, incidentally, is released in two forms, regular CD format and the new SACD format, the latter with multi-channel, two-channel, and standard stereo encoding. Even on standard CD player, an enhanced richness in the lower frequencies on the SACD disc is evident.

The most intriguing new material is no doubt the Ophelia sequence in the latter part of the score, tracks 18 to 21. Here Shostakovich sketches a vivid, touching portrait of this tragic character. He restricts his palette to strings and a most unlikely solo instrument, the harpsichord, the latter representing Ophelia. As far as I know, it's the only appearance of the instrument in Shostakovich's entire oeuvre. The sequence is also notable in representing the score's only moments of pathos, the feminine counterbalance, so to speak, to the heroic-tragic material associated with Hamlet's character. Throughout these riveting cues, registral and timbral extremes are eloquently exploited. Ominous low string figures cast into sharp relief a sequence of poignant harpsichord entries, each of which introduces material that traces the successive stages of Ophelia's decline. In track 18, Ophelia's Descent into Madness, the harpsichord at first sings a courtly, if slightly off-centred gavotte; tentative material follows in the next entry. The sequence continues in track 19, Ophelia's Insanity, where the instrument takes up the harmonically vague ticking figure that returns in her death music. Only in the final section of this cue are harpsichord and strings at last heard at the same time and playing the same material, a progression of funereal chords. The music is deeply moving.

The standard suite entry of Ophelia's Death follows, a sweet, solo violin melody that quickly evaporates (‘Ophelia, we hardly knew ye’) into the ticking motif over a darkly sustained pedal. After a climax of rising trills, a roaming bass figure punctuated with chime strokes brings this blackest of cues to its conclusion. In the final track of this sequence, Hamlet at Ophelia's grave, another variant of the Hamlet theme emerges, this time on strings with harpsichord interspersions. Before concluding, the thematic roles of the instruments, symbolically enough, are reversed.

Once again, it is remarkable how Shostakovich achieves such a high degree of narrative and emotional communication with a medley-like treatment of material. Yablonsky is again superb in handling the delicate fabric of these cues and bringing out the pathos in all of its eerie darkness.

The standard final cut, depicting the Duel, Death and Funeral of Hamlet, is replete with agitated eighth notes in the low strings with broad brass overlays and percussive discharges that recall the epic melee in the finale of the Eleventh Symphony. Yablonsky again rises to the occasion.

I do have some reservations about the current performance in key places. The truth is I have yet to discern a distinct interpretive style for Yablonsky. Even though the Palace Ball is on the lighter side, I miss in Yablonsky's reading the spiky edge that makes this a jumping number in other performances. And in the track with the most developmental heft of the lot, the mighty Poisoning Scene, Yablonsky is more preoccupied with local colour and instrumental effects than with the broad sweep of climactic ascent. For a prime example of the kind of symphonic treatment this movement wants and deserves, I strongly recommend the aforementioned Chailly disc. But I hasten to add that I have yet to hear a Poisoning Scene more exciting and solidly assembled than the one led by Nikolai Rabinovich on a long-expired 10-inch Melodiya LP (C10-09508).

Among the non-standard cuts are a variety of short fanfares and snippets for small groups of instruments, a few of which deserve mention. One of particular interest is No. 17, The Flutes Play, a set of perky variants on the theme of the Palace Ball movement. Another is the second to last cue, No. 22, The Cemetery, where flute, violin and tambourine latch onto a distinctive gypsy theme that would resurface a few years later (1964) in the third movement of the Ninth Quartet. Odd how this turns up here, as the theme otherwise appears nowhere else in the score. There are also string passages in Ophelia's Descent that anticipate the sul ponticello sections of the opening movement of the Tenth Quartet. The discerning ear will no doubt find other thematic allusions.

John Riley's excellent liner notes provide the historical context and describe how each of the cues relates to the action on the screen. Yet no visual images are needed for this album, which I unofficially nominate as the Shostakovich CD of the year. Shostakovich's Hamlet sustains itself quite sufficiently as an independent musical experience. For those who have never heard any of this music, and likewise, for those who have always wondered about the treasures lying beyond the well-trodden suite, your moment has arrived.

Louis Blois
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