Kodály: Háry János
Soloists
London Symphony Orchestra
Istvan Kertesz
I’ve know the Háry János suite since school days - I have played it but unfortunately never with a cimbalon, But this was the first time that I had heard the complete opera. This is the famous recording with Peter Ustinov doing the narration and all of the voices. To be frank I think that the approach now seems rather dated - ‘funny foreign accents don’t really work nowadays, though there is no doubt that Ustinov was a compelling raconteur - he was always a favourite of my parents.
Hearing the opera like this made is seem more like a radio play with incidental music - I didn’t really get a sense of what it might be like as a stage work. There is no doubt that the best music is in the suite - though there was some attractive passages - particularly the chorus music towards the end. So I was quite pleased to have heard the whole thing, but I suspect that it will be the suite which I return to.
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