Igor Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps: poster boy for modernism, proving ground for orchestras, dinosaur spectacle for Disney. According to ArkivMusic.com, the current US-available catalog boasts 188 recordings, the most of any Stravinsky orchestral work. Only Petrushka at 120 (counting both full score and suite) and Firebird at 160 (ditto) offer meaningful competition. To put the Sacre number into perspective: it's more or less the same as the Brahms 2nd Symphony. The major Mozart symphonies trump Le Sacre, as do each of the Beethoven symphonies, but no 20th century orchestral work comes close, although Ravel's Daphnis et Chloë (counting suites as well as full ballet) is probably the nearest contender, with Debussy's La Mer running a tight third place.
No sane person could attempt a survey of all 188 recordings, even allowing that the number is probably closer to 150 or so once we cross off duplicates and re-releases. Even if the feat were attempted, I would fear for the reviewer's sanity after all was said and done, or for the reviewer's physical well-being after the neighbors had gotten out their pitchforks, tar, and feathers. Le Sacre has its virtues, but a little of the thing goes a long way. Cuddle-up music it is not.
I have to confess that, while I admire Stravinsky's ancient-Earth primitivism and stand in awe of his masterful orchestration, I don't really like The Rite of Spring all that much. I'm not even sure that liking Le Sacre is all that good of an idea. Once you like something, you start treating it as an old friend, a comfortable crony, something to be savored with the amiable familiarity of long practice. On the whole you're far better off approaching Le Sacre warily, a glint of suspicion in the eye, heartbeat elevated and some tension about the jawline. Ready to do battle, you refrain from sprawling in your favorite listening chair and pouring out a cool one; instead, you sit upright with back aligned and shoulders straight, brightly attentive and just a bit on edge. If it's a new recording, you don't have a sense of the forthcoming dynamic range, so the ceiling plaster may be at risk from an overly generous hand on the volume knob. No fair cheating by skipping forward to the Sacrificial Dance just to set levels. Give yourself a solid listenable volume for the opening bassoon solo, and take your chances with what follows. I suppose you can turn it down if somebody calls the police. But otherwise, man up.
Even my extensive record collection is inadequate to do Le Sacre justice. I own 22 recordings, a respectable number to be sure but barely making a dent in that jaw-dropping plentitude of offerings from orchestras hither and yon. (Not to mention the version from the University of Houston Wind Ensemble or the various oddball chamber arrangements from deservedly hungry little groups.) Nonetheless, 22 is a fair haul of Sacres, enough for some worthwhile comparative listening.
I'm going to cut to the chase and give you my favorites. We will avoid any quantitative words such as "best" since we're not buying transistor radios or cheesecloth or muffin tins here. These are merely the recordings I prefer to hear when my fancy steers me towards a Sacre listening, or when I notice that a house visitor is frozen, mouth agape, before the majestic Bowers & Wilkins 803D speakers that anchor my living room. Would you like to hear the stereo system, I ask politely. Oh God yes oh yes oh yes yes please oh yes. Have a seat right here in the sweet spot, middle of the couch, I reply. With that I consult my handy-dandy network audio server, and come up with:
Antal Dorati conducts the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, on Decca. Antal Dorati is my A-Numbah-One Main Man for The Rite of Spring. There is also a great deal to be said for Dorati's 1959 outing with the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra, brilliantly captured by Wilma Cozart for Mercury Living Presence. The Minneapolis recording is wilder and faster than the Detroit, but they're both hair-raising. The Mercury Living Presence album was reference audiophile grade for its day, but the Detroit recording is full-bore 1981 Decca, and as such represents audio Olympus. It was early digital but there isn't a hint of blare or thinness, twin banes of early PCM technology. The wise heads and discerning ears at Decca knew better than to skimp on sampling rates or apply indiscriminate filters. They did it right from the get-go. More to the point, they captured a superb orchestra led by a splendid conductor who, as he neared the end of his long and distinguished career, had retained the bristling energy and vibrant dynamism of a much younger man.
Or perhaps I take justified pride in my home-town band and present my soon-to-be dazzled guest with:
Michael Tilson Thomas conducts the San Francisco Symphony, on RCA Red Seal. The SFS has recorded Le Sacre three times: once with Pierre Monteux back in 1945, then twice with MTT, first in 1999 on RCA and again on in-house label SFS Media in 2009, as a "companion" CD to the Keeping Score video. Both are terrific, but I'm partial to the Grammy-awarded RCA album. It's a bit weird to describe a Sacre performance as "elegant", but that's the best word here. However, it isn't elegant in the sense of being twee or prissy or laid-back. This is full-throttle, blister-raising, peel-the-paint-off orchestral playing. Yet the sheer sound of the thing is somehow beautiful, even in the most violent and raucous passages. Quite an achievement, and a Sacre that I bet Stravinsky himself would have loved.
With my guest rendered properly speechless, I just might indulge in some discographic backgrounding by treating him/her to:
William Steinberg conducts the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, on EMI (originally Capitol.) This recording could serve as a revelation to those of the younger set who associate monophonic sound with gaslight and horse-drawn buggies. That Pittsburgh band of the early 1950s was one buff crew and under Steinberg's muscular and precise leadership, this is a Sacre that positively glistens with oiled biceps and washboard abs. Capitol's ace engineers produced deep, clear, and rich monophonic sound that adds its own measure of testosterone. A contemporary 1954 Deutsche Grammophon disc, made with Fricsay and the Berlin RIAS orchestra, dramatizes the superiority of Capitol's engineering. The Fricsay is a thoroughly respectable rendition, but the audio is downright flimsy in comparison. Besides, next to those Pittsburgh studmuffins the Berliners are a bunch of pussies.
Then there are the trips back in time to the earliest recordings, made back when Le Sacre wasn't the discographic staple it has become, and back when orchestras were hard-pressed to pull it all together. Most people aren't aware that it was recorded twice way back in 1929, once with Stravinsky at the helm and once with Pierre Monteux. The latter was incomparably the better conductor so it shouldn't be surprising that Monteux's rendition beats the pants off Stravinsky's, although they were conducting more or less the same orchestra. Nevertheless, both recordings are primarily historical curiosities. Far more musically valid is Monteux's 1945 rendition with the San Francisco Symphony, a bravura performance that remains musically competitive, even if the telephone-line 1945 RCA Victor recording, on four 78 RPM shellac discs, is a far cry from modern technology. The only available contemporary remastering does the original serious dirt with overly enthusiastic noise suppression and digital enhancing. I'm fortunate in owning a vintage 78 RPM set in mint condition, from which I've made a fine digital dub free of artificial tweaking save some light click removal. Heard as originally intended, the Monteux/SFS Sacre stands among the very best of the pre-stereo bunch despite its limited, downright murky sound.
In case you're wondering, I consider Monteux's 1951 Sacre with the Boston Symphony Orchestra to be overrated. And don't even get me started on his fourth rendition, albeit his first in stereo, with the Paris Conservatoire Orchestra. I'll just say that the Paris Conservatoire Orchestra stinks and let it go at that.
For the latest thrill-ride, you just can't beat:
Iván Fischer conducts the Budapest Festival Orchestra, on Channel Classics. This brand-new 2012 recording is available in high-def downloads as well as on SACD, should that be your pleasure. But high-def or no high-def, this is a serious contender in the winner's circle of Sacre performances, butch and brawling, magnificently played and captured in downright flabbergasting audio.
And just to even things out a bit, there are a few that languish on my shelves and on my media server's hard disc. Chief among those is:
Leonard Bernstein conducts the New York Philharmonic, on Columbia. Yes, I know that Stravinsky is reported to have said "Wow!" when he heard this 1958 landmark recording of Le Sacre. But it's more "wow" than good, in my opinion. Loud, oh yes. Energetic, oh yes again. But disciplined? Not very. It grates. It irritates. It annoys. Nor has the audio held up very well—it's tinny and shrill, late-1950s Columbia at its most stridently glossy.
Then there's:
Pierre Boulez conducts the Cleveland Orchestra, on DG. Here we have the pagan sacrifice dissected, disinfected and revealed in extreme closeup through a microscope. Pickled in scented formaldehyde, precise and correct and primly perfect, this is a bloodless Sacre that honors the letter but violates the spirit. I'd rather put up with the horrid sonics and near-desperate scramble of the 1929 Stravinsky-led rendition than snooze through this clinical and soulless traversal. Should you think I'm just being catty, consider hearing two Sacrificial Dances in a row—first Dorati/Detroit, and then this one. It's like watching something die right in front of you.