Fantastical Tales

This month's BBC Music magazine cover disk goes under the title of An Enchanted Christmas with music by Ravel, Prokofiev and Suk. In truth, there isn't much that is inherantly Christmassy about the pieces, it is just that they are based on folk / fairy tales that for some reason are looked upon as being seasonal. The Ravel and Prokofiev pieces are familiar enough and I have both in other commercial recordings. They both get perfectly serviceable workouts; Ravel's Mother Goose Suite from the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra under Ilan Volkov and Prokofiev's The Love For Three Oranges ( Symphonic Suite )from the BBC Philharmonic under Sir Edward Downes. Incidentally, the accompanying notes claim that the march from the Three Oranges suite is Prokofiev's most famous melody. Really ? The troika from Lt Kije ? The Montagues and Capulets ? Peter and the Wolf ? Whatever, the work which I didn't know is the one by Suk, Pohadka - A Fairy Tale. This is championed here by the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Jakub Hrusa. It is a symphonic poem telling the tale of an ill starred love affair, powerful curses and unfortunate transformations and ultimate redemption and happy ending. Because of his family connection it is easy to think of Suk in terms of his father in law Dvorak but the melodic and folk influenced writing and orchestration prefigures Strauss and has more in common with the 19th century Russian school.