What a joy it was last week to hear Tchaikovsky's earlier thoughts on Symphony No. 1 (1868), Romeo and Juliet (1870)
and Vakula the Smith (1874)!
However, it saddens me to think of these delightful performances gathering
dust in the BBC archives, never to be heard again (or rarely, at best). I
would like to see these recordings issued on CD and made available to the
general public, and I am unanimous in that!
Does anyone know what the BBC plans to do with the works I have mentioned,
and the other rarities which were specially recorded for The Tchaikovsky
Experience?
Nicolas Krusek
Thanks to the BBC we were able to hear all of Tchaikovsky's work during
a two week period. It was certainly a sui generis. Many works were
recorded for the first time especially for this offering including all of
his student works. So now I can say I have heard all of Tchaikovsky's pieces
all 338 of them. I also would like to see them on CD or available for downloads
(the rare and unknown ones). I especially looked forward to hearing his complete
songs. Surprisingly some of his student pieces were remarkably resolute with
self confident energy.
Albert Gasparo0
There is actually a complete recording of the Songs on 5 CDs from the Conifer
label. These were performed by Nina Rautio, Ilya Levinsky and Sergei Leiferkus,
with Semyon Skigin at the piano. However, it seems that only the first 3 CDs
are widely known, while the last 2, which were released somewhat later, have
fallen into obscurity (The list of discography has yet to be updated). That
is why BBC only used the former 3 during the broadcast and had to complement
it with other recordings (ie. the three wolumes from Naxos [Lyuba Kazarnovskaya],
one from Hyperion [Joan Rogers] and so on...). A quick search on Amazon.co.uk
would reveal that the later 2 are being displayed but unavailable because
there is no seller.
Shenda Gu