MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Ponce: Violin Concerto (with works by Galindo & Revueltas)

"A life-enhancing record. For within it two distinct fields are explored; both of them, in different ways, very rewarding. First the contribution of Szeryng and the RPO, suavely recorded in All Saints, Tooting in South West London. This is excellent, Manuel Ponce taking a rest from guitar music and contributing instead an easy-going violin concerto (not all such, today, are easy-going!) which makes continuously agreeable sounds throughout its half-hour duration; if at one point you think Szeryng has lost his place and puts in Estrellita to keep things going you are wrong: mysteriously, it is really meant to be there.

And secondly the contribution of the Mexican orchestras, brilliantly recorded in the more romantic sounding but less immediately pronounceable Nezhualcoyotl of Mexico City. Here no holds are barred, and Estrellita seems a long way away. The orchestra, probably augmented by extra batteries of percussion players, obviously enjoy themselves enormously pretending to be an outsize mariachi band (though probably without, alas, sombreros, otherwise essential-remember the Three Caballeros?). The pretence is abetted by Galindo, Revueltas and Moncayo, all providing marvellous, exciting, and presumably highly authentic scores. Galindo actually avers the mariachi association in his title; Revueltas uses the title of the parent film for which the music was written (obviously one to be seen); and Moncayo uses the generic Huapango title. Whatever the titles say, the music remains electrifying. Try it." (Gramophone)