Fritz Reiner – Respighi: Pines of Rome & Fountains of Rome

Rome as a changing orchestral image

Ottorino Respighi’s Pines of Rome and Fountains of Rome approach the same city from different perspectives. The pines stand above children’s games, catacombs, a nocturnal landscape and an ancient road; the fountains are associated with particular times of day. These are not musical guidebooks. Respighi uses places as starting points for movement, memory and light. A group of trees or a fountain becomes a musical situation whose scale can change, from a single call through a suspended texture to the resources of a large orchestra.

Fritz Reiner and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra recorded both works on October 24, 1959, at Orchestra Hall in Chicago. RCA released the coupling in 1960, with Richard Mohr credited as producer and Lewis Layton as recording engineer. The eight movements thus come from a single recording day, although the compositions are separated by several years: Fountains of Rome dates from 1916 and Pines of Rome from 1924. On the album, the later pines precede the earlier fountains. The sequence follows the programme’s musical design rather than the composer’s chronology.

The two tone poems can also be understood as different ways of turning time into music. The fountains trace a day from first light to evening. The pines connect present-day activity, nocturnal nature and the imagined presence of a distant past. Respighi needs no sung narrative to make those connections. His titles open a door; what follows is carried by the instrumentation and the construction of each movement. Keeping those contrasting directions in mind provides a useful starting point before simply allowing the orchestra to tell its story.

Four places beneath the pines

The Villa Borghese opens Pines of Rome in a world quite different from the catacomb that follows. Respighi then moves to the Janiculum before concluding on the Appian Way. Volume and tempo are not the only things that change between these places. The impression of distance also shifts. What seems close, and what appears to come from another space? Which voice moves forward, and which remains within a larger texture? These questions offer a way into the four movements even without personal familiarity with their Roman locations.

An especially unusual detail is written into the score itself: in the Janiculum movement, Respighi requires recorded nightingale song to be played from a gramophone record. A recording medium therefore becomes part of the orchestral composition. The specific bird recording used at Reiner’s session is not securely identified, and should be distinguished from the composer’s documented instruction. This meeting of an actual sound document and a composed environment is revealing. Respighi’s city is not created solely through instrumental imitation; at this point, it also incorporates a previously recorded voice from nature.

Between the games at the Villa Borghese and the conclusion on the Appian Way, there is a remarkable change of scale. The four movements encourage attention to small gestures as well as to the growth of a large musical process. Volume alone does not create the effect. A change of instrumental group, a newly prominent voice or a passage of restraint can transform the imagined location just as strongly. If you already know the work, a return visit can focus on those transitions instead of waiting principally for the famous conclusion.

The score extends the conventional orchestral resources through such elements as organ and spatially separated brass effects. These belong to the compositional design and should not be understood merely as incidental studio effects. They do not, however, establish a complete named list of the Chicago players responsible for each solo contribution. The musical idea and the particular individual at an instrument are different levels of information. Distance matters to this work even where the surviving documentation does not answer every question about its execution.

The fountains and the passing day

Fountains of Rome connects Valle Giulia with dawn, the Triton Fountain with morning, Trevi with midday and the Villa Medici with sunset. Its four movements turn places and times of day into a progression of their own. You can approach the music through changing light without treating that association as a fixed set of sonic rules. What matters is Respighi’s ability to reorganise similar orchestral resources. Water does not suggest the same movement everywhere, and a large fountain does not require the full ensemble at every instant of its musical depiction.

Reiner and the orchestra must connect those details with the direction of the complete work. An individual wind line may define a passage, but its effect also depends on what surrounds it. The orchestra’s archive associates its principal trumpet player Adolph Herseth with Pines of Rome; this does not securely identify the player of a particular part, such as the offstage trumpet. Other individual personnel are not comprehensively established. What is certain is the participation of Reiner’s Chicago ensemble in two works that repeatedly move between a recognisable image and a much larger symphonic form.

The coupling is consequently more than a collection of spectacular orchestral moments. Between the beginning and end of each work lies a carefully shaped succession of perspectives. You might follow a woodwind colour, attend to the movement of the strings or notice how several layers combine into a larger image. The titles offer orientation without restricting the music to a single imagined scene. Quiet passages and connecting moments give the larger episodes their context, allowing a return visit to reveal something beyond the immediately impressive gestures.

For a classical collection, the album also provides a clearly defined encounter with Reiner’s work in Chicago. Two related compositions, the same orchestra and a single session make comparisons within the programme especially meaningful. Rather than looking only for the most imposing climax, it can be rewarding to follow the route towards it. Respighi’s Rome may then begin somewhere different on each visit: in the opening movement, with the nightingale, or at a transition that had previously slipped past almost unnoticed.

Reiner’s Rome on the 33⅓ RPM Living Stereo LP

This edition is the single Analogue Productions LP AAPC 2436 in the RCA Living Stereo series. Ryan K. Smith cut it at Sterling Sound for playback at 33⅓ RPM, with the publisher specifying the original master tapes as the source. Quality Record Pressings manufactured the record, and Gary Salstrom is credited with plating. The programme is stereo. The original three-track recording and the LP’s two stereo channels are distinct matters: this record does not provide three-channel playback and is not a reel-to-reel tape edition.

Pines of Rome and Fountains of Rome each fit as a complete work on one side. That gives this 33 RPM presentation a practical attraction: the four movements of each tone poem can remain together without an additional side change. The succession of places and moods within a work is not interrupted by turning over another record. Listeners particularly interested in the compositional transitions can appreciate that uncomplicated division without treating it as a universal verdict on other playback speeds.

Analogue Productions currently lists the edition at 180 grams, while older documentation for the series also contains 200-gram specifications. The documented release of this LP dates to November 2013. References to the first 250 numbered copies describe a limited part of the initial issue and do not promise a numbered example today. Catalogue number, speed, stereo programme and Ryan K. Smith’s cut remain the defining information. Together they distinguish this offering from the double 45 RPM LP, SACD and Ultra Tape editions of the same recording.

The musical invitation is refreshingly direct: two four-movement orchestral works whose images are accessible without specialist knowledge and whose details can sustain attention over many visits. Reiner, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the Mohr/Layton recording team belong to this record’s story just as much as Respighi’s Roman locations. The combination offers a concentrated introduction to the programme as a complete album rather than a handful of isolated demonstration passages. You order from Michael 45 in Germany. We arrange the US import and dispatch from Hilden.

Also on SACD: Respighi: Pines of Rome & Fountains of Rome

Also in another edition: Respighi: Pines Of Rome & Fountains Of Rome

More by Fritz Reiner: Richard Strauss: Also Sprach Zarathustra · Bartok: Concerto For Orchestra

Artist page: All titles by Fritz Reiner

Customer question: Buying Analogue Productions records in Europe

Musicians

Participants and documented credit status. Track references correspond to the tracklist.

• Fritz ReinerconductorParticipation: Both works
• Chicago Symphony OrchestraorchestraParticipation: Both works

Reiner and the orchestra are documented. No further soloists assigned by name. Side allocation is derived from work order and matrices; movement durations for this LP are not documented.