With the reports that Sir Simon Rattle will be taking over the London Symphony Orchestra will inevitably come a renewed surge of attention around the British maestro.
He has been prolific on record both with the Berlin Philharmonic and his previous band, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.
So, if you only have time or cash for a handful of his recordings, these five--in no particular order--give a fabulous introduction to his art.
[N.B. These are all EMI recordings, but with Warners' recent acquisition of EMI, it can be assumed that the EMI recordings will be rebranded.]
Mahler - Symphony No 9, Berlin Philharmonic
If the work of one composer defined Rattle as a conductor, it would be Mahler. Rattle's vision of the Ninth Symphony is on the grandest possible scale--life in all its multi-colored magnificence, death in all its terror, profundity and, just maybe, glory. The BPO have often played with unsurpassed beauty in Mahler, but not always with this much character.
Brahms - Ein Deutsches Requiem, Berlin Philharmonic
Some might like their Brahms on a more domestic scale than Rattle and the Berlin Phil supply, but this is loss writ large. The pain in their account of Brahms' great lament is a chasm.
Gershwin - Porgy and Bess, London Philharmonic
Rattle was the first conductor on record to truly find the opera in the Gershwins' perennial favorite. In his hands, with the LPO in step for every bar, it becomes a mighty saga of prejudice and survival. His casting is pitch-perfect, from Willard White and Cynthia Haymon, to Damon Evans' seedy Sportin' Life and another world-class bass in the late, great Bruce Hubbard. This was an iconic hit for Glyndebourne and a stylistic homecoming for what its writers always called their "folk opera."
Debussy - La Mer, etc., Berlin Philharmonic
If he's thought of more immediately for the big orchestral blockbusters, Rattle's talents as a natural colorist are sometimes overlooked. Debussy lets them shine, and the conductor's BPO album of music by the French composer is one of his finest. Any idea that the orchestra would sound outsized in this music are immediately banished. Instead of a vast scale, we get a great canvass of detail. One to savor.
Percy Grainger - In a Nutshell, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra
Which to choose for a final selection? The head says one of the contemporary British composers Rattle has made a point of championing--Thomas Adès, say, or the late Nicholas Maw. But the heart, well, the heart goes back to this 2002 recording with a choo-choo train and a picturesque cottage on the cover. Mad as a hatter Percy Grainger may have been (look it up, I can't bear to relate the details here), but he left us some of the most bracingly enjoyable music of his era. And Rattle and his Birmingham forces have a ball. And they're able to enjoy it so much because they have clearly worked on it so hard. Their control is immaculate, the style spot-on, the sense of architecture sure. Enjoy!
As a postscript, the work we'd most like Rattle still to record? His Richard Strauss is second-to-none, his work with vocalists always a treat, his sense of drama unerring. Which leads us to either Der Rosenkavalier or Elektra. We'd go for the latter. Just imagine what he'd do with those stormy textures below the title character's great cry, "Agamemnon!"
Before he leaves the Berlin Phil, please...
And before we go, let's not forget his most popular recent performance, conducting Mr. Bean and the London Symphony Orchestra--perhaps his new home team--at the London Olympics!
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