Two box sets in one

Georges Prêtre: The Symphonic Recordings (17 CDs)

This 17-CD set in the Warner/EMI/Erato ICON series covers two periods in Georges Prêtre’s career, from 1960 to 1965, when the conductor was in his late thirties, and from 1983 to 1990, his early sixties. The earlier period comprises mostly French and Russian composers, with a few other nationalities mixed in. The later period is all French. There is one 1970 recording of Dvořák’s New World Symphony that bridges the two periods. Prêtre died in January of 2017, age 92.

There is a spectrum of romantic to modern repertoire. Nine orchestras perform a total of 23 composers. Camille Saint-Saëns gets almost 3 hours of disc space, primarily with the Carnival of the Animals and his three symphonies (the Organ Symphony included twice). Poulenc, Landowski and Milhaud get about an hour each; the other composers supply one or two works to fill out the rest of the box.

A program of Babar the Elephant and the Story of the Little Tailor appears twice. The two CDs are virtually the same recording, with Peter Ustinov narrating first in French, then in English. For my purposes I will only count that as one CD, so the total content of the box set runs about 16 hours and 23 minutes. That’s just over an hour per disc.

The Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire plays about 30% of the material, all recorded in the early 1960s. These tracks are miked close, which gives the music an intimate sparkle. This lively band has panache; even their flaws are endearing. The early recordings from the British orchestras are captured a little grainy in a narrower stereo field. Surprisingly, it is the 1980s recordings that sound the most distant and anonymous.

For me, this collection is a grab bag. It fills some gaps in my library with the Jongen Symphonie concertante, the Milhaud suites and the Landowski symphonies, but the disparate material doesn’t inspire me to listen through from beginning to end. Of course, this lack of focus might be the point. Prêtre wasn’t imposing an agenda, his aim was to bring out the individual character of each ensemble he conducted. In that respect I’d say his earlier recordings were more successful.

It might help you to know what was recorded when, so you can decide if this package is worth your investment. I give you a list of the composers and the year they were recorded, followed by a list of he orchestras that recorded them.

The Composers

1960 - GERSHWIN: Rhapsody in Blue, Piano Concerto [Daniel Wayenberg]

1961 - JONGEN: Symphonie concertante for organ and orchestra [Virgil Fox]

1961 - POULENC: Les Biches

1961 - MILHAUD: La Création du monde

1961 - DUTILLEUX: Le Loup

1961 - RIMSKY-KORSAKOV: Capriccio espagnol

1961 - BORODIN: In the Steppes of Central Asia, Polovtsian Dances

1961 - MUSSORGSKY: Night on Bald Mountain

1962-1963 - SHOSTAKOVICH: Festival Overture, Symphony 12

1963 - BERG: Violin concerto, Kammerkonzert [Christian Ferras, Pierre Barbizet]

1964 - TCHAIKOVSKY: Symphony 5

1964-1965 - SAINT-SAËNS: Symphony 3 ‘Organ’ [Maurice Duruflé], Le Carnaval des Animaux

1965 - POULENC: Les Animaux modèles, L’Histoire de Babar, le petit éléphant

1965 - HARSÁNYI: L'Histoire du petit tailleur

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1970 - DVOŘÁK: Symphony 9 ‘From the New World’

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1983 - MILHAUD: Le Carnaval d’Aix [Michel Béroff], Suite française, Suite provençale 

1984 - ROUSSEL: Bacchus et Ariane, Le Festin de l'araignée 

1985 - CASTILLON: Piano Concerto [Aldo Ciccolini], Esquisses symphoniques

1985 - d’INDY: Poème des rivages, Diptyque méditerranéen

1985 - BERLIOZ: Symphonie fantastique

1987 - RAVEL: Pavane pour une infante défunte, La Valse

1987 - DUKAS: L’Apprenti sorcier

1987 - DEBUSSY: Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune

1987 - SATIE: Gymnopédies Nos. 1 & 3

1987 - SAINT-SAËNS: Danse macabre

1988 - LANDOWSKI: Symphonies 1, 3 & 4

1990 - SAINT-SAËNS: La Jeunesse d’Hercule, Symphonies 1 & 2, Symphony 3 ‘Organ’ [Marie-Claire Alain]

The Orchestras

Orchestre du Théâtre National de l'Opéra de Paris (1961 Jongen)

Royal Philharmonic (1961 Russian material)

Philharmonia Orchestra (1962-1963 Shostakovich)

New Philharmonia Orchestra (1964 Tchaikovsky)

Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire (1960-1965 remainder)

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Orchestre de Paris (1970 Dvořák)

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Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo (1983 Milhaud; 1985 Castillon, d’Indy)

Orchestre National de France (1984 Roussel; 1987 French showcase; 1988 Landowski)

Wiener Symphoniker (1985 Berlioz; 1990 Saint-Saëns)

Here are some details to consider: 

- The Paris Opera Orchestra’s recording of Joseph Jongen’s Symphonie concertante helped establish Georges Prêtre as a world-renowned conductor. The same ensemble played under Prêtre’s baton for the 1964 recording of Maria Callas’s Carmen (not in this box, but an event for which I am eternally grateful).

- British orchestras performed all of the Russian works in this set.

- The Conservatoire orchestra disbanded in 1967, but most of its players were chosen for the newly formed Orchestra de Paris. So the jump to Dvořák wasn’t that great a leap after all.