Cold birds

Cantus Arcticus (1972); String Quartet No. 4 (1975); Symphony No. 5 (1988); Sirius String Quartet; Leipzig Radio Symphony Orchestra; Max Pommer, conducting

I’ll be completely frank with you on this one – right from the very start. I bought this CD because of the great cover. And before anybody says, “Huh?”, hear me out. Believe, me. The image to the right doesn’t do the actual cover justice. Imagine, if you will, transparent tissue paper. Sturdy transparent tissue paper, as a matter of fact. The folks who designed the CD stapled a white section of aforementioned tissue paper at the crease of the cover of the inner sleeve.

If there was even a millimeter of space between the tissue paper and the actual cover (with the photograph) of the CD sleeve, the man walking away in the photograph looked like he was either walking in a fog thick as oyster stew or walking in a blinding snow storm. I loved the effect. I love oyster stew. And, as it turns out, I love, love, love this CD.

Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara wrote “Cantus Arcticus”, Op. 61 as a concerto for birds and orchestra. A tape recording, that partners with the score of Rautavaara’s composition, plays birdsong that Mr. Rautavaara recorded near the Arctic Circle and on the bogs of Liminka in northern Finland in 1972. The performance of the score functions in the manner of a soundtrack, making the birds sounds “extra-musical”. The composer gives the masterful piece of music form by dividing it up like so:

I. The Bog

II. Melancholy

III. Swans Migrating

The name “Cantus Arcticus” is a nod to a compositional technique called Cantus Firmus, where a portion of a generally recognized melody, usually a Gregorian chant, provided the melody in a four part vocal composition. One of the voices would sing the Cantus Firmus and the other voices would have newly composed music to sing around it. In this case, the birds take on the role of providing the Cantus Firmus and the orchestra takes on the role of accompaniment.

I lent this CD to Mr. C., the conductor of the SDSU Civic Symphony some time in the 1990's, he liked it, and programmed it immediately. He asked me to play the celeste part on the concert.

I lucked out on this one. I had never heard of the composer, nor the composition. This is gold. Seek it out. My Aunt J. loves this CD.

Credits: To Artic birds, for seeming to be willing, yet more realistically unwitting, soloists. But, hey, you’re big, big stars! You get more airplay than I do.

This is the second of my final forty-five CD's.