Elvis Costello: Il Sogno
London Symphony Orchestra; Michael Tilson Thomas,
conductor.
Deutsche Grammophon B0003284-02
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 In 1977, I met Elvis Costello after a concert with The Attractions in Eugene,
Oregon. His PR guy invited a bunch of us record-store clerks over to Elvis’s table
and bought us drinks. Costello was intently watching the band that was playing in the bar
-- a group so forgettable that I’ve forgotten everything about them, except that
Costello showed interest and respect for a bunch of journeymen musicians.
I’d like to report that I waited until a break and
told Elvis (yeah, like I’m on a first-name basis with the man) that he was going to
be huge -- that in 20 years’ time he would collaborate with everybody who was anybody
and would write pop, country, jazz standard, and classical music, including song cycles,
chamber music, and orchestral pieces. Instead, silver-tongued devil that I am, I believe I
stammered out something like, "You rock!"
I continued to think that over the years -- even when
Costello did write chamber music, song cycles, and suchlike. I was impressed by The
Juliet Letters, his collaboration with the Brodsky Quartet, but I didn’t like it
much. Yes, it was clever; yes, it was ambitious. However, unlike any number of his rock
efforts, it didn’t move me.
Last year’s North forced me to reconsider my
antipathy toward Costello’s more "serious" work. (I put in the quotes
because, despite their use of the rock idiom, I consider such albums as My Aim Is True,
This Year’s Model, and Blood & Chocolate about as serious as you
can get.) I still didn’t love it, but the craft was undeniable and the lyrics
were clever, literate, and in places even moving. I don’t love Schumann, but you
won’t find me dismissing him, either.
Even so, I was sure that Il Sogno would be a bust.
After all, one constant in all of Costello’s "serious," ummm,
"classical" work so far has been that it’s had words, and he is, of course,
best known as a lyricist. Il Sogno is a ballet suite -- written to accompany
choreography based on Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream by
Aterballetto, an Italian dance company. That means Il Sogno (The Dream) has no
words, just music.
However, unlike other rock musicians who have
"composed" classical, umm, serious works (oh heck, let’s just say
classical), Costello actually writes his orchestral music, without leaning on
computer software or an orchestrator such as Eric Fenby to fill out his ideas -- and the
great thing about Il Sogno is that it is so full of really great ideas.
What makes Il Sogno work so well is precisely what
makes Costello’s popular music work so well -- his mastery of a broad spectrum of
styles. From the beginning of his career, Costello refused to stay in any genre for long. My
Aim Is True was a concentrated blast of venom, but he was so busy releasing singles
during his first few years on the scene that we fans could barely keep up with him -- and
in his singles, Costello dabbled in everything from hard-core country to the Great
American Songbook. His grasp of the classical idiom is just as broad.
Il Sogno’s structure -- like most ballet
suites, it’s a series of vignettes -- is what makes it perfectly suited for
Costello’s eclecticism. In places, it has the lush orchestral lyricism of
Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet; in others, the blare of Bernstein’s
Broadway scores; in still others, the strutting swagger of Duke Ellington’s hybrids
of classical and jazz.
If I seem to be comparing Costello to three of the canniest
orchestral colorists who ever put pen to lined paper, well, yeah! To my amazement, Il
Sogno doesn’t have a pompous or self-conscious bone in its body -- it’s a
solid orchestral score that can stand up to scrutiny with those of the big guns.
Will it last for the ages? Perhaps not, but I find myself
charmed by it (especially the vignette titled "The Face of Bottom," which would
not have been out of place in a collection of Vaughan Williams’ incidental music) and
stirred by it ("The Wedding") -- and ain’t that enough for any piece of
music?
Lest I forget I’m an audiophile in the midst of all
this music stuff, DG gives Il Sogno great sound, too. It is crisp and articulate,
with impressive dynamic range.
Elvis Costello still rocks -- but, it turns out,
that’s not all he does well. Il Sogno is the real thing. This one you’ve got
to hear.
...Wes Phillips
wes@onhifi.com
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