Gorecki Report: New Follow-Up, Strong Challenger

The popular success of Polish composer Henryk Gorecki’s Third Symphony may be less a product of delayed reaction to the 1976 score than the shrewd manner in which Elektra Nonesuch has marketed this “Symphony of Sorrowful Songs” for a general audience.

A follow-up was inevitable. But it doesn’t come from Elektra, which, no doubt, wouldn’t allow self-competition while the Third Symphony still tops the charts. It comes, rather, from London’s enterprising Argo subsidiary.

Perhaps the cash registers will ring for Argo, too. But it’s unlikely that they’ll do so beyond the first expectant rush of enthusiasm of those hoping to relive an earlier experience. For there are few traces of the Third Symphony’s mollifying lyricism in Argo’s handsomely executed program (436 835), which has John Nelson leading the Czech Philharmonic and Prague Philharmonic Choir.

Its centerpiece is “Beatus Vir,” commissioned in 1979 by Karol Wojtyla, now Pope John Paul II, when he was Bishop of Krakow.

In its air of introspection, its reliance on medieval church modes and its rhythmic stasis it may suggest the Third Symphony. But it is a uniformly glum work, without the uplifting progression from doubt to affirmation that marks the symphony.

And although the symphony may be long-winded--the sizable first movement could stand on its own--”Beatus Vir” withdraws the welcome mat immediately after the dramatic opening choral pronouncement.

The most interesting component of Argo’s collection is the purely instrumental “Old Polish Music,” written in 1969, before the composer had evolved his “benign” style.

There’s a medieval feel here, too, but of brassy tower music, with some references to choral organum. An appealing piece, better executed by Czech trumpets and trombones than by their Polish counterparts in a competing version (Olympia 385).

Where Gorecki currently rules the American classical charts single-handedly, in the U.K. he has hot competition from John Tavener (b. 1944), a recording of whose “The Protecting Veil” (Virgin 59052) has occupied a position analogous to that of the Gorecki Third for the past year.

Tavener’s more recent “We Shall See Him as He Is” is another example of his dynamic, incantatory minimalism, not to be confused with the rhythmically repetitious sort practiced by his American cousins.

The hourlong piece for chorus, a small orchestra of trumpets, timpani, organ and strings, with a trio of vocal soloists, was composed in 1990 to mark the 900th anniversary of Chester Cathedral. It evokes the composer’s credo: “In everything I do, I aspire to the sacred . . . music is a form of prayer, a mystery,” rooted in his Russian Orthodox faith.

The composer’s “friend and spiritual adviser” (his words), Mother Thekla, abbess of an Orthodox monastery in Yorkshire, created the libretto for the present work.

Tavener is a master manipulator of his forces, creating effects that shimmer, jolt and soothe, particularly when he combines the muezzin-like tenor solo (the excellent John Mark Ainsley) with the chorus’s syncopated riffs.

The performance (Chandos 9128), in which Richard Hickox directs the BBC Welsh Symphony and a splendidly alert choral ensemble, sounds like the fulfillment of a composer’s dream.

An even longer Tavener work in the same vein, again with text by Mother Thekla, is his “Mary of Egypt” (Collins 70232, 2 CDs), a ritual drama dealing with the sinful life and ultimate redemption in Christ of the Whore of Alexandria.

The piece rather goes on, but Tavener’s sonic inventiveness and gift for creating dramatic images--the spirit of the Middle East is again evoked in the vocal melismas and percussion-rich chamber ensemble (there are passing resemblances to Hovhaness’ stylizations)--keeps the ear occupied and, from what one reads about the 1992 Aldeburgh Festival premiere (recorded here), the eye as well.

The brilliant choral, solo vocal and instrumental forces are conducted by Lionel Friend, with the cruelly demanding title role spectacularly sung by soprano Patricia Rozario.

Tavener’s is an interesting, honest new voice--quite likely capable of finding as wide an audience in this country as he has attracted in his native Britain.