A stellar CD from Tanglewood orchestra
The Boston Symphony Orchestra is in the midst of launching new ventures to put itself before a broader audience . As the Globe recently reported, these include forthcoming CD releases of the orchestra and Internet video broadcasts of the BSO and the Boston Pops.
Beating all of that to the punch, though, was an entry from a somewhat lower-profile member of the BSO organization: the first commercial recording by the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, the collection of young instrumentalists who attend Tanglewood's prestigious summer academy .
Released last week, the two-disc set offers three live recordings drawn from last year's festival, each with a different conductor at the helm: Beethoven's Fourth Symphony under Herbert Blomstedt; the second suite from Ravel's "Daphnis and Chloe" with Stefan Asbury; and Shostakovich's Tenth Symphony under the BSO's venerated conductor emeritus, Bernard Haitink. The recording, available at Symphony Hall and Tanglewood as well as at bso.org, sells for the very reasonable price of $12.50.
While the TMCO release may garner less notice than the others, it's an equally worthwhile project, and its value can be assessed from a few different angles. The first thing to be said is that all three performances are superb, with the orchestra playing at a very high level throughout. The Beethoven is brisk and propulsive, the Ravel atmospheric but with an amazing sense of detail. As for the Shostakovich, the Tenth is something of a Haitink specialty, and it sounds as if the orchestra's youthful energy gave his reading an extra jolt of intensity . Perhaps the highest compliment to be paid is that many listeners wouldn't guess that this isn't the work of an established professional orchestra. (It sounds great, too.)
That's one of the reasons for making the recording available, according to Ellen Highstein, the Music Center's director and the executive producer of the CD. "It's always seemed a bit sad that we're a kind of Brigadoon -- we come together for a summer, we work hard, and then we disappear," she says by phone from Tanglewood. "We wanted to document the hard work that the orchestra members do every year, and the sometimes exalted results they achieve."
The recording can also serve as a useful calling card for those unfamiliar with the TMCO, which is often (and understandably) overshadowed by the BSO. "There are people who come to Tanglewood and don't even know we exist," Highstein says. "We're very proud of what we do, but we're a little bit hidden from sight."
All proceeds from sales of the CD will benefit the Center's activities, and while artistic excellence is the main justification for its existence, Highstein notes that "every dollar helps when it comes to running an educational institution. That's sort of the icing on the cake."
Given its modest price, and the fact that fees won't be paid to the orchestra, or to the conductors (who waived them), she's optimistic that "we can probably do a little better than breaking even."
Youth orchestras have been making inroads into the musical scene lately. Two of the most visible are the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela, whose conductor, Gustavo Dudamel, is the hottest property in classical music right now; and the European-based Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra, which has done some outstanding work under Claudio Abbado.
The demographics vary from group to group -- the average age of the TMCO is 24, while the members of the Bolivar orchestra range from 16 to 20 -- but all of them contribute to a growing sense that young musicians, properly nurtured, can achieve amazing results before taking on their first "real" orchestra job.
It's tantalizing to wonder how many more ensembles at this level we've yet to hear.
For information go to meetthe composer.org. 