Josep Pons, Orquesta Ciudad de Granada, Josep Colom - Falla: El Sombrero de tres picos; Noches en los jardines de España (2003) [SACD]

Review by Ted Libbey, author of The NPR Guide to Building a Classical CD Collection.
The Spanish style of playing this music differs appreciably from the Ravelian opulence we are used to hearing when our big orchestras tackle it. The Spanish approach may not be plush, but it is exhilarating in its own way. It emphasizes line and edge, the scintillating spikiness of Falla’s orchestration, the vigor of his rhythms. It is lean, but in no sense mean. Just how lean can be judged not only from the Harmonia Mundi recording, in which the sound of the band and the hall is captured to perfection, but from the liner notes, which include a list of the ensemble’s personnel. The Orquesta Ciudad de Granada is a smallish one (with a string complement of 11-7-7-6-5), precisely the size one would find in the pit. They may not all be world-class instrumentalists, but they are good, and conductor Josep Pons had clearly rehearsed them within an inch of their lives for the recording. Most important, they have a sound: witness the coruscating trumpets, and, in The Three-Cornered Hat, the wonderfully clangorous orchestral piano that cuts right through the texture and sounds like a cembalom. The solos for mezzo-soprano in The Three-Cornered Hat are superbly sung by Itxaro Mentxaka, with an earthy realism that’s on a different plane from any other performance, while pianist Josep Colom delivers a caressingly beautiful account of the solo part in Nights in the Gardens of Spain. – Ted Libbey, author of The NPR Guide to Building a Classical CD Collection.

The main reason to buy this SACD was the release of Oedipus Rex, since as far as I know; no other release on SACD does exist of this work.
Lucky enough for me the qualifications I listed for Les Noces do not apply to the recording of Oedipus Rex. There are a few interesting moments created by the soloists and Gergiev and the Mariinsky orchestra. Evgeny Nikitin copes well with his difficult role as Creon and the Messenger and from all the Soloists he seems to have the best handle on the Latin language used in this score. The other good note needs to go to the Mariisky Chorus that keeps this performance going.
Still, this portion of Stravinsky’s oeuvre does not seem to be Gergiev’s cup of tea. A solid performance but in no way very entertaining or special.

The recording of this Oedipus has good low frequency sound (percussion) and some instrumental details come over very real, but the overall soundstage is narrow as if no surround channels are active. The acoustical space in which this performance is recorded is not clear at all.

Last but not least, Gerard Depardieu as Narrator seems to have an off day too, as if he wants to warn the listener for a very dull performance to come. This performance is no match for Haitink on DVD or Davis/Norman on Orfeo or Bernstein on CBS, but all these mentioned recordings are technically outdated and a new Oedipus Rex on SACD is very much needed.