Bernstein: Symphonic Dances From "West Side Story"

Hello,

here I post Leonard Bernstein's Symphonic Dances from West Side Story in version for two pianos and percussion.
It was recorded at the concert on February 28 2007 in the Great Hall of Lausanne Conservatory (Switzerland); performed by Dubravka Vukalovic & Bruno Vlahek (pianos), Ami Rossier, Jan Beauge & Sébastien Aegerter (percussion).

I hope you will enjoy it!

Bruno

Bernstein - West Side Story, Symphonic Dances

 

West Side Story

Thanks for a beautiful performance. That took a lot of rehearsal to coordinate the instruments involved. I'm so happy that some people, even in Europe, still remember the late Leonard Bernstein. He was an all-around great musician. His televised Young People's Concerts were my only introduction to great orchestral music as a child. He was a great music educator.

I have no critical comments about your performance except that at times the instruments were not balanced very well. It would have to be done in a recording studio to achieve really good balance. I have downloaded this to my computer to enjoy later. I can't count the number of versions of West Side Story I have heard, and this is another new one for me to enjoy.

 

Good fun, and very well played from what I can hear. But I wonder about this arrangement. This is not by Bernstein I guess ? Somehow I don't think it works well with 2 pianos and percussion as it tends to get rather noisy in places (not the players' fault, I hasten to add). But perhaps that was the intention, WSS is mostly a raucuous piece of music of course. The unflattering acoustic/recording does not help much either. It's nice to have something diferent though !

PS - Bruno, not sure if you have followed the commotion here on PS about Setrak Setrakian, but I was amused to find among his listed recordings (on his website) a recording of your Jazz Toccata. Did you know about that ?

 

Thank you for your comments! This version is somehow a mix of existing arrangemet by John Musto (which is made just for two pianos without percussion), original percussion part taken from original Bernstein's orchestral score and a lot of improvisation and personal arrangements. We had a great opportunity to have it done under mentorship of our chamber music teacher and eminent pianist Dag Achatz who collaborated with Bernstein personally on making a recording of his own version of Symphonic Dances for solo piano.
Regarding sound balance, it is not a professional recording and as Mr. Robson pointed, the perfect balance could be achieved only in a recording studio. Maybe one day... :wink:

P.S. Yes, I knew that. I accidentally found the site with my recording of Jazz-toccata under Mr. Setrakian's name and wrote him an e-mail if that slight detail could be corrected. He kindly apologized for that mistake and changed it, so it was then listed under my name. 8)

 

Ah yes, that is how he works. Makes a lot of these mistakes.... He is no longer a member of PS.

 

Bernstein

8) Very good performance, played with a lot of jazzy spirit and good mood.

 

Thank you, Julia! It's nice to see you here 8)


P.S. Chris and Robert, just being curious, when could it be expected to have it up on the site?

 

Setrakian seems to not learn from mistakes.

This is a very accomplished performance and but for the problems in the audio quality with the auto adjusting recording level mechanism, it was very enjoyable to hear.

I put up Bernstein with his biography and some text about West Side Story and a sentence with the involved persons in the performance.

Thanks for sharing!

 

That's great. Thank you!

With best wishes,
Bruno