Martinu - Bouquet of Flowers

The Guardian 60

Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra/Prague Philharmonic Choir/Netopil
(Supraphon)

Bohuslav Martinů lived in Paris through the 1920s and got swept up in the city’s jazz and avant-garde scenes. Then in the early 1930s he turned his attention back to his native Moravian folk culture and wrote earthy, angular music that fused the lot – including his 1937 cantata Bouquet of Flowers. It’s for children’s chorus, soloists and orchestra and there’s no danger of missing the smell of the soil in these pungent tunes. However, between the carols and cowherds come moments of impressively stark modernism, which this account really illuminates. The voices of Kateřina Kněžíková and Michaela Kapustová are particularly rich together and Tomáš Netopil conducts with a grand sweep. At the end of the disc we get the bruisingly nostalgic Philharmonic Dances by Martinů’s student Jan Novák – music from 1956 that swaggers and rambles. Unfortunately, Jan wasn’t a patch on his teacher.