New Records

Manhattan Composer Henry Brant is flute-prone. When he spots a vintage model he has never seen before, his eyes glitter with excitement and he examines the old vented tube with the fervor of a doctor hunting a symptom. "Wow," he will say in wonderment. "Look at that plumbing!" Then he places mouthpiece to lip and, if the instrument is not too leaky, ripples out a modernist roulade. One of Composer Brant's finest works is a fond flute dream called Angels and Devils, a concerto for flute and flute orchestra. Now it is on records, soloed by Frederick Wilkins, conducted by the composer and released by Composers Recordings, Inc. It is a remarkable experience, for Henry Brant knows every sonority that has ever been tried and quite a few that have not. When the 10 flutes start a massed flutter-tongue passage, it sounds as prickly as a porcupine's wedding; other fascinating moments are reminiscent of a jazz band playing at top speed, a steam calliope, a sound track for a science-fiction film--all a frothy treat to the ear.

Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 (Bayreuth Festival Chorus and Orchestra; Soloists ; conducted by Wilhelm Furtwangler; Victor, 2 LPs). A performance on a memorable occasion: the reopening of Wagner's Festspielhaus at Bayreuth in 1951. The recording has a predominantly heavy effect, partly because of foggy fidelity, and there are some sloppy attacks in the orchestra, but there are also some stunning bursts of choral sound, some impressive singing by soloists (Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Elisabeth Hongen, Hans Hopf, Otto Edelmann), and some unique French horn performances in the scherzo.

William Byrd & His Age (Alfred Deller; Basel's Wenzinger Consort of Viols; Vanguard). Music from the golden age of English music (16th-17th centuries) sung in the round, slightly hooty but flexible alto of famed Countertenor Deller. Once the listener becomes adjusted to antique shifts of harmony, the music becomes extremely poignant. But countertenors--male voices that have been trained to sing in the falsetto range, but with more than falsetto power and resonance--are less easily adjusted to. for their tones sound sexless and unsettling.

Ives: The Unanswered Question (Zimbler Sinfonietta conducted by Lukas Foss; Unicorn). A cheerfully enigmatic work by the first U.S. modernist, Charles Ives (1874-1954). Against devout, sustained strings, a quartet of flutes and a solo trumpet superimpose progressively more insistent dissonances, but finally they retire, defeated by the mellow strings.

Prokofiev: PianoConcerto No.3; Violin Concerto No. I (Emil Gilels, piano; David Oistrakh, violin; U.S.S.R. State Radio Orchestra conducted by Kiril Kondrashin; Westminster). The modern master of melodic and harmonic surprises at his popular best, played by instrumental masters who know just how every phrase should be turned. The results of Soviet recording techniques are a bit shrill, but clear.

Rossini: Sonatas for Strings (Solisti di Zagreb; Vanguard). Teen-age instrumental works by one of the world's most brilliant vocal composers. His irresistible melody is already bubbling, and there is hardly a note that does not solace the ear. The style is as neat, light and humorous as Rossini's later coloratura arias.

Rozsa: Violin Concerto (Jascha Heifetz; Dallas Symphony conducted by Walter Hendl; Victor). Miklos Rozsa, best known as a movie composer (Spellbound, A Double Life), writes music that is recognizably Hungarian--after Bartok and Kodaly made the style familiar--and also, by some strange chemistry of the ear, Hollywoodian. Its message is easygoing, its orchestration competently conservative. The concerto was written for Heifetz, who helped out with parts of it, and who plays it as if he had written it.

Sessions: Suite from "The Black Maskers" (Eastman-Rochester Symphony conducted by Howard Hanson; Mercury). A vivid and sometimes violent score, completed in 1923 for a production of Andreyev's symbolic drama and made into suite form in 1928. The music, once frighteningly "modern,'' has lost most of its terrors, is now easily accessible, occasionally beautiful, always stimulating.

Vaughan Williams: Symphony No. 8 (Halle Orchestra conducted by Sir John Barbirolli; Mercury). A sweeping, full-throated song, written with far more springtime power and heat than might be expected from an 83-year-old, but in a harmonic idiom that suits his age. Barbirolli's orchestra matches Williams' enthusiasm note for note, dyne for erg.

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