off the records

'Carmilla' brings lots of screams

By Emerson Batdorff

Some of the loudest soprano screaming on record. is to be found on "Carmilla, a Vampire Tale," a new opera. (Vanguard VSD 79322).

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The performances by members of the La Mama troupe are elegant. What isn't elegant is the fact that none of it makes much sense. It is all modern and helter-skelter with no situation arising sensibly out of a previous situation.

I don't know what made the girls scream like that. I thought for a while it was when they were getting vampired. But apparently this is not so. A closer listen brings up more of a lesbian connection than a true teeth-in-the jugular attachment.

The music is by Ben Johnson (not the movie actor; some other Ben Johnson) who, when he doesn't take the easy way out, can write compelling medieval music. When he takes the easy way out he writes rock music that is just like all other rock music.

he

OCCASIONALLY adopts, and quite successfully, some of the galloping characteristics of Orff. But he also adopts, not from Orff, a peculiar approach to almost endless dry recitative that does nothing to calm the nerves.

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It could very well be that the tale loses a lot when made into a phonograph record and that all would be crystal clear on the stage. It probably would be no less screaming, though. Why is it that modern music strives to run ice picks through your head?

As an antidote that is guaranteed to cure effects of above if taken promptly, and also a lot of other jangles of the world, let me recommend "Music of Vieenna, Vol. 2" (Angel S 36887) with Willi Bosovsky conducting the Johann Strauss Orchestra of Vien-

na.

(I think the Johann Strauss Orchestra is another name of selected members of the Vienna Philharmonic. They are very, very good.)

THE RECORD is pure grace and is good for what ails you, if what ails you is a case of the jangles. In ad-

dition to music of the Strausses ("Wine, Women and Song," "Open Track" polka, "At the Hunt") there also are "Vienna Burghers," a waltz by Carl Michael Ziehrer, of whom I never before heard, and "Baden Girls" by Karel Komaks, of whom likewise. Both are in the main stream of Viennese opera.

Record companies are particularly joyous when they can come up with a good marketable idea for using again some of the tapesthey have in their vaults, for which they have already paid. Melodiya, therefore, cheerfully is putting out a two-record set entitled "The Melodiya Album Celebrating the 50th Birthday of the Soviet Union in Music by Russia's Leading Artists and Composers" (Whew!).

This is a potpourri of the most spectacular Russian music done by the people who are best able to do it. As such it justifies its existence rather well, although it does dart from one thing to another.

For example: Glinka, Liadov, Borodin and Ippolitov-Ivanov for Russian orchestral music; Gilels, Richter and Irina Arkhipova for Russian soloists; Mussorgsky, Tchaikowski and Shastakovich for music from opera. ballet and films. and a talented bunch of balalaika and domra players and also the Russian Army chorus for folk music.

CAMARATA has transcribed Bach to make him even more resounding? It occurred to Camarata that at the time Bach wrote, musical instruments were not so far advanced as they are today, permitting the old fellow to make only minimal use of his great talents.

I had expected to hate the result. But Camarata has not corned it up at all. He has intensified the effect. The Tocatta and Fugue is simply thrilling. Oh, those grumbling low notes!

Probably the euphoria will wear off soon and then only straight Bach will suffice. But a little. of the Camarata Bach is elegant. He conducts the Kingsway Symphony Orchestra and Chorus on London SPC 21078.