Bartók did not live to finish his Viola Concerto, and Tibor Serly's completion from Bartók's sketches hasn't satisfied anyone except violists hungry for repertoire. This disc offers the Serly version and a new completion by the composer's son Peter and violist Paul Neubauer. Neither edition ranks among Bartók's masterpieces, although the new version seems a bit more convincing. The most striking element about this disc is the thrillingly dark tone and passionate playing of Xiao, a superb Chinese musician who now teaches in Michigan. Janós Kovacs and the orchestra also sound splendid. The Serly piece is just a brief suite of transcriptions from Bartók's For Children, but Bartók's Two Pictures is marvellous music. --Leslie Gerber Amazon.com
 |  | Everybody is fascinated by a "posthumous work" |  |
If you compare the Bartok Viola Concerto with other candidates in the same league such as Schubert No 8 , Bruckner No 9 or most famous of all, the Mozart Requiem, then it clearly doesn't quite make it. The Concerto for Orchestra and even the third Piano Concerto are better pieces. This is well played, however, and I will let the musicologists argue about which version is better.
June 29, 2007 | | Polished performance of a Bartok masterpiece | |
I am really not concerned about the controversy surrounding the Bartok viola concerto. It is simply a splendid work, with many passages marked undeniably with Bartok's stamp. (Don't listen to the editorial reviewer; it's a great piece!) It is wonderful to have both the Serly and the Peter Bartok/Paul Neubauer versions together for comparison. If anything, I like the newer version better: it has many felicitous examples of orchestration and adds fewer embellishments to the original Bartok sketches. Of course, had Bartok lived, he might have added more to his concerto (for instance, the slow movement as it stands seems rather brief - though I think it works just fine). But perhaps it is better simply to stick with what Bartok wrote and leave it at that. The performances are ideal: the violist's tone is firm and rich throughout, and the orchestra provides supple dialogue with the soloist. My only complaint is that the last movement could have gone a bit faster (when I played it in my college orchestra, the soloist really went like a whirlwind). Were they perhaps worried that this movement too would sound too short? But no matter. Naxos continues to astound with its fine issues at extraordinarily low prices. I encourage music lovers to grab the best Naxos CD's (including this one) with avidity.
June 26, 2004I am really not concerned about the controversy surrounding the Bartok viola concerto. It is simply a splendid work, with many passages marked undeniably with Bartok's stamp. (Don't listen to the editorial reviewer; it's a great piece!) It is wonderful to have both the Serly and the Peter Bartok/Paul Neubauer versions together for comparison. If anything, I like the newer version better: it has many felicitous examples of orchestration and adds fewer embellishments to the original Bartok sketches. Of course, had Bartok lived, he might have added more to his concerto (for instance, the slow movement as it stands seems rather brief - though I think it works just fine). But perhaps it is better simply to stick with what he wrote and leave it at that. The performances are ideal: the violist's tone is firm and rich throughout, and the orchestra provides supple dialogue with the soloist. My only complaint is that the last movement could have gone a bit faster (when I played it in my college orchestra, the soloist really went like a whirlwind). Were they perhaps worried that this movement too would sound too short? But no matter. Naxos continues to astound with its fine issues at extraordinarily low prices. I advise music lovers to grab the best Naxos CD's (including this one) with avidity.
June 26, 2004This disc contains excellent recordings of
"Two Pictures" and the "Viola Concerto".
I definitely prefer the version with Tibor Serly's orchestration.
Though this concerto is not in the same league as Bartok's two brilliant violin concertos, I'd say the finale qualifies as a masterpiece.
Bartok was dying when he composed the "Viola Concerto". It sounds as if his spirit were being called home to Transylvania. March 6, 2004
| | | 2 versions of unfinished concerto performed together. | |
The viola concerto, unfinished at Bartók's death, was completed by violist/composer/conductor Tibor Serly in the version familiar to listeners. Critics and musicologists have frequently criticized Serly's version, and Bartók's son supervised a new completion of the concerto, published in 1995. The casual listener will hear little difference in the 2 versions performed together here by Hong-Mei Xiao, though aficionados will enjoy the chance to compare them (Bartók's final version surely would have been better than either). Her tone is bright and violin-like, lacking some of the mellow darkness of Lars Anders Tomter's performance of the Walton "Viola Concerto" on Naxos 8.553402. She performs with virtuosity, and the Hungarian orchestra is steeped in Bartók's idiom. His "Two Pictures" are early works, showing promise, but not up to the standards of his mature orchestral masterpieces. Serly's own "Rhapsody," composed while he was revising the concerto, is a harmless virtuoso showpiece, reminiscent of Georges Enescu. As always, Naxos provides a full disc of well-recorded, polished performances by lesser-known musicians at an bargain price.
October 4, 1998More reviews at Amazon.com ...
(5 reviews)