A dream come true

 

Last night I dreamt someone had commissioned me to write a piece for an upmarket magazine on my recommendations for recordings readers might add to their collections.

On waking up it seemed so real I couldn't tell if it was genuine or not so I began listing all the recordings I have found essential to my mind by composer from A - Z. In no way is this meant to be a 'building a library' kind of survey; just recordings I couldn't live without.

I wrote a little Forward:

People have described studio recordings as Electronic Music. I think there is some truth in that. Recordings of live performances are fundamentally different. They are witnesses to an event whereas studio recordings are an attempt to re-create a live event without any blemishes or imperfections. They also tend to take place in fundamentally different acoustics and so lack atmosphere. It is hard to re-create the atmosphere and excitement of a live performance in the studio and many studio recordings turn out to be cold in comparison I would say. 

The best example I know to illustrate why studio recordings can be said to be electronic music comes from a Klemperer story. 

Klemperer was recording a symphony one day and at the end of a take, the record producer said 'Thank you very much. It's a wrap' or something to that effect. At this Klemperer said 'No, we are nor finished. We haven't recorded the repeat in the third movement.' The producer replied that they would use the take from the first time round. At this Klemperer exclaimed;

'But that is a Schwindel!'

Looking at studio recordings that way I have included far more live recordings in my list.

A

B Bach. Anything by Gustav Leonhardt, the harpsichordists' harpsichordist and director of many choral and instrumental performances and recordings. Interestingly his live performances were much freer than his studio recordings. In fact he never allowed his live performances to be recorded. He explained that a studio recording would be heard multiple times and so should be less 'free.'

Leonhardt is not as well known as he should be because he never courted publicity. He also never smiled on stage when taking applause. Only after he died did I discover thet he spent months hidden under floorboards as a teenager in the Netherlands during the war to avoid being conscripted by the Wehrmacht. No wonder he loved fast cars.

His 'Goldberg Variations' is a monument in recorded sound.

Beethoven. Symphony No. 7 - Beecham. There are at least two recordings of Beecham conducting this symphony towards the end of his life. People may not think of him as a Beethoven conductor first and formost but the performance recorded at the Pallestra delle Scuole with the RPO as part of the Ascona Festival on October 20th 1957 (not the RFH performance in 1959, great as that is) is unbeatable.

On that 1959 recording Dave Hurwitz says 'I would unambiguously maintain it's one of the greatest recordings ever...one of the greatest recordings ever made.'  I don't follow Dave Hurwitz often but I was delighted to come across this review. It shows there is some good in Dave after all.

Fidelio - Klemperer ROH. 1963. The recording is the last word in the performance of this opera. I can't listen to Klemperer's studio recording which pales by comparison. Stephen Brook quotes Bernard Levin in his Penguin Anthology of Opera including the following statements inspired by this performance; 

"...the production...gave many in the audience the illusion that they were watching. indeed participating in, one of the climactic moments of a world in transition...Beethoven's most important lessons, that evil has to be conquered again and again, and that there is nothing but the good in human beings to conquer it with...were driven home with irresistable force."

Brook himself writes "No one who heard it will ever forget the complete silence that preceded Otto Klemperer's conducting of the Leonore No. 3 overture in the middle of the final act,,,"

NB. It was Mahler who initiated the tradition of playing the overture at this point. Mahler conducted 'Fidelio' at Covent Garden in 1892 in his last visit to London. Shaw wrote that 'the gallery applauded wildly' and Paul Dukas who was a critic as well as composer and teacher noted that Mahler was 'a conductor of genius.' Later he referred to Mahler's interpretation of Fidelio as one of the greatest musical memories of his life. He had made the journey to London as critic for the Revue Hebdomadaire. 

Of course Klemperer knew Mahler although he may not have heard him conduct Fidelio. He was Mahler's assistant at the premiere of his 8th Symphony and conducted the off-stage band when Mahler conducted his 2nd Symphony. He made a piano reduction of his the scherzo of that symphony and presented it to Mahler. It was Mahler who set him on his career with a letter of recommendation. he knew Mahler's conducting and later claimed that Mahler was by far a greater coductor than Toscanini.  

So I would like to think that this recording by Klemperer of 'Fidelio' owes something to Mahler as a conductor.

Berlioz. Symphonie Fantastique - 

Brahms. Violin Concerto. Heifetz, Reiner, Chicago Symphony Orchestra. The answer to those who think of Heifetz as more display than music.

Bruckner. Symphony No. 7 - Celibidache. I'm not a Brucknerian but with Celibidache it is beautifully played and you don't lose the thread.

 C Cherubini. Medea. Live recording from Covent Garden with Maria Callas and Jon Vickers as Giasone. A dream cast. The first time Vickers was to sing with Callas he arrived at the rehearsal having heard all sorts of things about Callas and determined not to put up with any 'funny business.' He need not have worried. After half an hour he declared her a Genius. He also wrote movingly of her as a perfect colleague. In this recording Cherubini (with a little help from Franz Lachner* who wrote the music for the recitatives) could be said to be a first class composer. He was admired by Beethoven even though reviled by Berlioz. 

*Lachner was actually a terrible composer but the original 'Medea' is with spoken dialogue which lowers the temperature after every 'number.' In the hands of Callas, the Lachner recitative on Medea's first entry is actually a highlight:

Medea: 'E forse qui che'il vil sicuro sta.' 

Chorus and soloists: 'Chi sei tu?'

Medea: 'Io? MEDEA!' 

D Donizetti. Lucia di Lammermoor. Joan Sutherland as Lucia in her breakthrough run of performances at Covent Garden in 1959. Live recording. The atmosphere surrounding the seismic discovery of a major new talent, Sutherland is palpable.

E

F

G Gluck. Original instruments, 'Authentic' baroque and pre-classical style have certainly helped Gluck find new admirers but he can also convince in great performances on modern instruments.

Orphee. The marvellous (studio) recording by the great French Canadian tenor Leopold Simoneau of the French version conducted by Hans Rosbaud. Poulenc on Rosbaud: 'Music buffs believe that the greatest living conductor is Toscanini; musicians know that it is Hans Rosbaud.'

Iphigenie en Tauride. A live performance from the 1952 Aix Festival with Patricia Neway, Leopold Simoneau (again), Rene Massis and Robert Massard, conducted by Carlo Maria Giulini. Riveting.

Don Juan. Marriner. People forget that Gluck reformed the Ballet as well as Opera. Don Juan is almost through-composed with a feeling for Leitmotif. Mozart must have known this music: a lot of Don Giovanni sounds as if it couldn't have been written the way it is if that wan't the case.

H

I

J Janacek. Sinfonietta - Mackerras. Sir Charles Mackerras is justly hailed as the man who brought Janacek into the maistream. Funny that there are Czech voices which seek to denigrate him. Apparently he is not as idiomatic as they would have him be. Maybe they don't want to share him? 

In any case the Sinfonietta (composed for an athletics meeting of all things) is a brilliant piece. There's nothing '-etta' about it. It's as long as many a symphony and with 14 trumpets (I think) it's big. I can't fault Mackerras's recording but then I'm not Czech.

An amusing story from a friend who happened to attend a function in Prague in which Sir Charles was being honoured and he noticed that with Czech intonation his name sounded like 'Sir Charl smacker-arse.' 

K

L Locatelli. Locatelli's capriccio 'Il labirinto armonico (Facilis aditus, difficilis exitus)' is written for solo violin.This is a fun piece I first heard when Salvatore Accardo used to lead 'I Musici.' and played it as an encore. There are two videos on You Tube of David Oistrakh playing the work: once as written for violin alone and once with a clever discrete orchestral accompaniment composed and conducted by Gennady Rozhdestvensky. 

Victor Hochhauser who worked with David Oistrakh on all his engagements abroad liked to comment on how his mundane appearance would never suggest that he was a god of the violin. 'Like a shopkeeper' Victor used to say. In the video with orchestra the TV lights must have been very hot because Oistrakh is 'glowing' rather a lot. His trademark jowls are wobbling more than usual what with all the cross-bowing that's needed in this piece. Nonetheless, the impression is of a very aimiable and sympathetic character which I am sure Oistrakh was. The Oistrakh and Rozhdestvensky families were great friends. Gennady Rozhdestvensky's father, the conductor Nikolai Anosov recorded 'Sheherezade' with David Oistrakh playing the violin solos!

M  Mahler. Das Lied von der Erde. Georges Sebastian, Rita Gorr, Kenneth Macdonald. Kenneth Macdonald was a Covent Garden stalwart singing the 2nd tenor roles. For example, when they did 'Lucia' they would bring in an Italian guest for Edgardo but Macdonald would sing Arturo. On one occasion they gave him Arturo in 'I puritani' alonside Joan Stherland with Richard Bonynge conducting. Macdonald had one of the most beautiful voices I had ever heard so I was overjoyed finally to be able to hear him in a leading role. Once a member of Covent Garden's management had told me they didn't cast him in leading roles because of his chin which was let us say more suited to character roles.

Anyway, Macdonald sang magnificently until it came to 'ah, credea si misera' - the final duet when his voice gave out and he had to croak his way through. I went backstage where I sought to impress in Richard Bonynge that despite this at least one member of the audience had enjoyed his performance. Bonynge said understandably that he had to learn to pace himself.' I don't think he was given the chance again to do that.

So it was with amazement that I discovered one day that he had sung in 'Das Lied von der Erde' for the French Radio. The tenor part in 'Das Lied' calls for a Jon Vickers in the first song. I remember seeing (the operative word) Fritz Wunderlich looking like a fish gasping for water in a performance under Klemperer. You couldn't hear him at all but I'm sure that wasn't a problem when it came to the recording. Indeed you can hear Macdonald very well indeed in this recording and very impressive he is too.

As if that was the only point of interest, Rita Gorr was singing the Mezzo part. She had been a star in my operatic firmament from the early days. She had a voice of unmistakable character and was a great artist. She sang well into her advanced years and I even handled a couple of contracts for her as an agent when she was invited to sing some 'Grandma' role in a Janacek opera, maybe Jenufa. By then she was a bit hesitant and a bit tricky to deal with but everything worked out. Here she is in for her unusual repertoire but she does very well indeed as you might expect.

Georges Sebastian had an interesting career. 'Of Hungarian birth' as they say he studied with Bartok, Kodaly and Weiner and then became Bruno Walter's assistant at Munich. After working at the Met as a repetiteur, he was engaged as 1ster Kapellmeister at the Staedtische Oper Berlin. He guested in major German cities such as Hamburg and Leipzig and suddenly got appointed Musical Director of the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra. there he premiered the first version of 'Boris Godunov.' 

He spent the war years in America with the San Francisco Opera, CBS and the Scranton Philharmonic Orchestra. He returned to Europe after the war to take French citizenship and work at Radio France for whom he recorded all the symphonies of Bruckner and Mahler. He was conductor for both the French debuts of Maria Callas and Renata Tebaldi.

In later life Sebastien used to sit on competition juries and the young George Benjamin found himself  making friends with SebasTien when the others ignored him. Sebastien told him that once when he was conducting at the Bolshoi Theatre in the presence of Stalin, the Generalissimo had summoned him to his box during an interval and told him he had enjoyed the performance but that the orchestra was playing half a tone flat. Sebastien quickly thought of a good reply and thanked Stalin for pointing this most important defect out to him and assured him that in the second half the orchestra would remedy this defect and play a semitone higher. 

That would ahve been a wonderful anecdote were it not for the fact that it had already been told of Samosud and Stalin. 

In any case I remember Sebastien at the Paris Opera in the 1960s when he conducted Wagner. He was booed on entering the pit I don't know why. There as here he did a very good job. 

This may not be the greatest recording of 'Das Lied' but it means a lot to me as you can see from the above. 

Le Sieur de Ste. Colombe. A deux viols esgales. Wieland Kuijken and Jordi Savall. Astree. Again thanks to the advice of Gustav Leonhardt, I became a great admirer of 17th century French Viol and key oard music. It is composed without bar lines and is of the most expressive romanticsm imaginable. This recording by the great Wieland, brother of Sigiswald (Baroque Violin) and Barthold (Transverse Flute) and Jordi Savall who needs no introduction is literally heavenly. 

Le Sieur de Sainte Colombe was on this evidence a great but enigmatic composter.  Historians can't say for certain what his first name was, nor with certainty his dates of birth and death (about 1640-1700). The only thing we know for certain is that Mr de Sainte-Colombe wroten 177 pièces for one viol and 67 for two viols and Marin Marais was his student.

Mendelssohn. Scotch Symphony. Norrington. The transition between the 3rd and 4th movements of this symphony has always been a problem for me. The music of both movements is beautiful but Mendelssohn's usual craftsmanship seems to have deserted him  when aliding the two. 

That was until I heard a fantastic performance on my car radio. The troublesome transition which always seemed so 'clunky' was managed so perfectly as to convince me that it was inevitable. I had to stop the car and wait to the end to find out that the conductor was Roger Norrington.

Months late I had the opportunity to congratulate Roger on his performance of the symphony and he said 'Yes, I know. I often hear a good performance on the radio and say to myself "I hope that's me" but then it turns out to be John Elliot Gardiner.'

 

Violin Concerto. Heifetz and Toscanini. The last movement is played faster than humanly possible. Heifetz's impregnable technique is tested by Toscanini in his most extreme 'speed merchant' mode. It doesn't do the music any harm. That's down to both artists' great artistry as well as daring.

Mozart. Sinfonia Concertante - Casals. 

Serenata Notturna - Britten. 

Les Petits riens - Goldschmidt. 

Die Zauberfloete - Beecham. 

Violin Concerto No. 5 ('Turkish') - Heifetz

Mussorgsky. Boris Khovanshchina Pictures Songs

N

O Offenbach. The Tales of Hoffman. Live relay from the Met on 28.2.44. The cast is unsurpassed; Raoul Jobin at the height of his powers sings Hoffmann, Novotna is Antonia, Pinza - Coppelius and Dr. Miracle, Mack Harrell - Lindorf, Martial Singher - Dapertutto, Moscona - Crespel, Margaret Harshaw - Antonia's mother (talk about casting from strength!}. Two lesser known singers are no less brilliant than their starry colleagues; Patrice Munsel sings Olympia and Lily Djanel sings both Giulietta and The Muse.

Patrice Munsel was only 19 on the date of this performance. She was the youngest singer ever to have made her debut at the Met which she did at 17. Bing called her 'a superb soubrette.' Lily Djanel was a Belgian soprano who had been described as a 'Magnetic Carmen' and who had sung Salome under Strauss's direction before emigrating to the US in 1941 where she worked for war charities as well as singing at the Met. 

The opera is conducted by Beecham who is on fire on this occasion as on so many others. The edition is the old Choudens - none of those modern Kaye or Oeser confabulations which only hold up the action with unimportant addenda.

Not only the greatest imaginable performance of this opera but the recording is a candidate for the greatest recording of any opera - ever! 

P Paganini. La Campanella - Kogan.A simply unbelievable piece of violin playing and I'm not the only one to think so. Paganini was an interesting character. He had a hard childhood thanks to a cruel father. As a young man he was obviously highly attractive and led a rather bohemian life and used to carry one of his children on his back when making concert tours. Later he had some sort of wasting disease and became painfully thin and gaunt. That may have been when the legend arose that he had sold his soul to the devil in exchange for his superhuman virtuosic powers. 

He also had a decidedly good melodic gift and his compositions, although almost always a vehicle for showing off his unbelievable technique are attractive in a superficial way. The exceptions are some pieces for guitar which he composed for his landlord's young daughter.

I love the story of how he was crossing a piazza in  Rome he bumped into Rossini. He asked the composer what he was doing in Rome and Rossini answered that in the mornings he slept late, then went to an art gallery, had lunch and in his spare time did a bit of composing. In fact his new opera Matilde di Shabran was to be premiered that evening and they had lost the musical director. He asked if Paganini would agree to step in and indeed he would and so it has entered the annals of histroy that Paganini did indeed premiere this work on the 24th February 1821. 

He must have been an extraordinary musician to have stepped in at such short notice and lead the performance while sight-readung from the first violin desk. 

It is reported that after the performance there was a brawl between Rossini admirers and detractors. Obviously Fotball has taken the place of opera in that respect.

Q

R Rameau. Hyppolyte et Aricie Ballet Music. La petite bande, Sigiswald Kuijken. I loved the recording so much I got La petite bande invited to give a programme at the Proms including this ballet music, The money didn't stretch very far so I got the orchestra rooms at the Avoca House Hotel in Belsize Park and booked the hall of the Hall Junior School across the road for rehearsals.

I had been a Hall boy myself and it was in that hall that I had my first violin lessons. the repertoire was an amazingly difficult piece called 'Busy Bee' consisting of 3 notes (on one string) adagio. 

The Prom concert (with Hyppolyte et Aricie, not Busy Bee) was a huge success. At that time orchetras playing on original instruments were a rarity at the Albert Hall and maybe the sound grew so gradually the ear became accustomed and one could appreciate the fact that the orchestration was fascinating (I remember a phalanx of 4 bassoons).  

They were never re-invited. That happens sometimes when something has been outstanding.

Rossini. Il barbiere di Siviglia. Callas. To my knowledge, only ever sang Rosina on stage once (at La Scala). Walter Legge brought the whole cast over to yhe Kingsway Hall, London a year later in February 1957 to make this wonderful recording for EMI. The other singers included Luigo Alva, Tito Gobbi and Nicola Zaccharia. Alceo Galliera conducts the Philharmonia Orchestra and Chorus.

Those were the days when the greatest operatic festival in the world took place in London's recording studios. As well at EMI Studios in Abbey Road and Decca's studios in Broadhurst Gardens, there were in addition to Kingsway Hall, Brent Town Hall, Walthamstow Town Hall, the Troxy Cinema and maybe others. There you could find Philips recording their series of early Verdi opera under Lamberto Gardelli. Solti recording Don Carlo, Sinopoli recording Manon Lescaut, Gardelli recording Guillaume Tell and so many others.

All that has gone now. 

This recording shows her fantastic gift for comedy as well as her great voice, interpretative powers and coloratura.  

S  Schubert. 'An die Musik, Wunderlich

Schumann. Traumerei, Horowitz, RFH

Smetana. Vltava - Celibidache.

Stockhausen. Freude

J. Strauss. New Years' concert - Carlos Kleiber

Stravinsky. 'Le sacre du printemps' Monteux

Tchaikovsky. Nutcracker. Rozhdestvensky. Bolshoi Orchestra.

U

V Verdi. La forza del destino. Arias and duets for Tenor and Baritone. Franco Corelli, Giangiacomo Guelfi. Basile.

Falstaff. Toscanini

W Wagner. The Mastersingers of Nuremburg. Sadlers Wells. Goodall.

Weber. Der Freischuetz - Carlos Kleiber.

X

Y

Z Johann Dismas Zelenka. 

 To be continued....