The second of Czech composer Miloslav Kabeláč‘s eight symphonies has come out in a new recording by the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra under Jakub Hrůša. i got to know his symphonies a few years ago, in the excellent Supraphon box set, and found him to be a curiously inconsistent composer, dismal at his worst (No. 5), but stunning at his best (Nos. 1, 7 and 8). Symphony No. 2, completed in 1946, sits somewhere in between those poles.
It’s perhaps helpful to touch first on the other two works included on the album which, as was the case with the Elsa Barraine disc, are less impressive. Kabeláč’s first and second Overtures, composed in 1939 and 1947 respectively, share the same essential characteristic: relentlessness. Perhaps that’s not such a bad thing for concert opener works, but in the case of Overture No. 1, it’s militated (literally) against by a pervasive regularity that makes everything feel nailed down. Ostensibly it has swagger, it gallops (with very Shostakovichian dactylic rhythms), frolics even, lurches sideways into song, and gets periodically garnished with flurries. Yet over time there’s the prevailing sense as if it’s all been quantised to an inaudible click track. That doesn’t necessarily detract from enjoyment of the piece, but it does diminish its exuberance, rendering it something more mechanical and militaristic.
Overture No. 2 ploughs an adjacent furrow, to the extent that one wonders whether upbeat scurrying and occasional glancing chords are all it’s going to amount to. It is undeniably fun, particularly later on when the orchestra begins to lollop along, but the lack of meaningful contrast rather stunts its power, making it feel a touch oppressive. Or is it just implacably enthusiastic? Either way, despite their limitations, getting a concert up and running with either of these pieces would hardly be a bad thing.
Symphony No. 2 goes a lot further, and is much better; furthermore the ORF performance trumps that of the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra and Marko Ivanović in the Supraphon box. They powerfully bring alive the first movement’s potent sense of muscularity, despite Kabeláč articulating it within what is at first a trudging tempo. It doesn’t take long to break those bonds, though, and the level of excitement in the forward motion that ensues is very high. This is reinforced by periods that feel potentially climactic but are in fact simply a reflection of an increasingly heightened state. The familiar metric regularity makes its presence felt, but here it’s just about balanced by a lilting lyricality that prevents the music from seeming as if it’s about keeping going at all costs.
After that somewhat exhausting opening movement, the central Lento is a lovely expression of singing in darkness, the music seemingly pulled down by drones and bass, and held in place by underpinning timpani strokes. Yet light breaks through, the pace picks up, everything starts to flow, and there’s a superb sense of the orchestra waking up and getting interested, and in due course, excited, with Kabeláč really ramping it up toward the end. The dronal conclusion of this movement is a long way from where it began, with closing trills like shivers of residual thrill.
The finale, starting from a place of pure percussion, is a nice mess of cross rhythms. These are channelled into “marciale” music that sidesteps the regularity one might expect (both from that word in general and Kabeláč’s tendencies, as in Overture No. 1) in favour of cheeky repetitions, brash moments of triumph, extruding brass fanfares and an overall attitude of straining at the leash, as if the ORF players were mischievously trying to yank it out of Hrůša’s hands. As in the first movement, it’s impressive the way apparent climaxes are used more as a way of continually expanding the intensity rather than being ends in themselves, all the more so as these play out around passages where Kabeláč rather boldly seems like he’s cancelling out large amounts of energy. But it never truly vanishes, eventually becoming true “marciale” music, assuming a marching pace and making the orchestra sound like a platoon either heading out into battle or, more likely, returning back from victory. i’d be remiss not to mention an especially nice glut of 5:4 rhythms in the latter stages of this last movement, which ends up, via some last-minute lyrical and metrical shenanigans, in an atmosphere of immense, communal celebration.
Released this month by Capriccio, this is music that deserves to be known very much better, as does Kabeláč himself. If this whets your appetite, i’d recommend Symphonies No. 7 and No. 8 (from the Supraphon box set), both of which are spectacular.
