Search - Janacek, Mladi, Sir Charles Mackerras :: Janacek: From the House of the Dead / Mladi: Rikadla

Great Opera Recording of Authorative Edition

Franklin Au | San Diego, CA United States | 08/10/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a very important and fine recording of Janacek's final and most remarkable opera. It is done in a very authorative edition based on the copied autograph score the way Janacek left it, undoing virtually all of the changes and additions to the orchestration his disciples Chlubna and Brekala made, which unfortunately softens the power of this opera. This results in an edgier, harsher, rougher, chamber-like sound which is truer to Janacek's intentions. It also heightens the power of this work and shows the uniqueness of the composer's voice. Mackerras and John Tyrell must be commended for the tremendous amount of musicological work to restore the work to it's original intended glory.The two chamber works also serve as wonderful complement to this great work."

Please Put it in Production, Somebody

Giordano Bruno | Wherever I am, I am. | 06/13/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a stunning piece of music, a rich symphony of voices, a pleasure to sit and listen to! Not all operas bear listening to, dare I say, without the support of staging. Janacek's late style is complex and bold, but comprehensible without reference to musical theory. "From the House of the Dead" is relatively short, for an opera; I for one feel that I couldn't ask for more of such acoustical and emotional intensity. The two chamber pieces that fill out the second disc are wonderfully eccentric and original.
My real question is, why doesn't some company seize the chance to produce this great opera? The audience IS ready!"

Definitive performance of original score

Klingsor Tristan | Suffolk | 08/18/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"How do you make an uplifting opera out of a group of exhausted, demoralised, malnourished prisoners stuck in the Nineteenth Century equivalent of a Stalinist Gulag? Let Janacek show you how.



This is a piece where practically nothing happens. A new prisoner arrives, there's a bit of aimless brutality, the prisoners put on a ramshackle show, a caged eagle is given its (symbolic) freedom and...er...that's about it. The most interesting action happens in a series of long narratives, life-stories told by prisoners to while away the endless time spent in this hellhole.



Yet this is throughout edge-of-the-seat stuff. Janacek, in the last opera of his Indian Summer, uniquely captures that 'spark of humanity' to be found in even the most degenerate of men - both musically and emotionally. Just listen to the Prelude for a taste of what is to come - the chain-clanking drudge of prison life; the manic, soaring, screaming violin cadenza taken from an unfinished Violin Concerto; the brief brassy moments of uplifting hope and thoughts of freedom. And these harsh juxtapositions are clothed in a brutal, spare, blackboard-scraping instrumenation that seems to push Janacek's unique orchestration methods to its limits.



This is especially true in Mackerras's riveting performance, for he will accept none of the later attempts to smooth out Janacek's searing textures, made under the pretext that he left the work unfinished at his death. Mackerras, greatest of all Janacek conductors, presents us with the cruel unwavering truth of the composer's vision. He is abetted by a cast of top singers, Czech nationals all (including the wonderful veteran Beno Blachut), who bring the range of low-life characters vivdly to life.



This is an opera unlike any other in the repertoire and a masterpiece to boot. And Mackerras, wearing his copious research as lightly as ever, delivers a definitive performance of it.

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