Stravinsky: Symphony in three movements; four études; pulcinella

Chicago SO/Pierre Boulez CSO Resound CSOR 901 920

DG recently issued an eight-disc Stravinsky box under Pierre Boulez. But it didn’t include Pulcinella, an example of neo-classical Stravinsky that the 85-year-old Boulez still views affectionately rather than dismissively. He likes to conduct it, he says, “because it’s like a toy within your hand”.

His approach, with robust vocal soloists (Roxana Constantinescu, Nicholas Phan, Kyle Ketelsen), sounds neutral, on-the-level, sitting on the fence in delight at the music's stylistic duplicity. The sound in the Symphony in Three Movements is drier than on DG, yet the playing finds a manner that's at once precise, casual and swaggering. The post- Rite of Spring Étudesoffer the strangest sounds on the collection, Stravinsky at his rawest, most original. See url.ie/5o3c