Most performances conducted by Sergiu Celibidache (or Celi as he was popularly known) harbour at least one incomparable ‘Celi moment’, and this set includes plenty. In fact, were I to reproduce the reams of notes that I scribbled while listening to these remarkable recordings, I would probably monopolize at least four pages of this month’s issue. The man was undoubtedly a phenomenon: he could galvanize, mesmerize, enrapture and insinuate even the most bizarre interpretative ideas into your consciousness. As a musical magician, he was peerless; but as an exponent of the Classics, he constantly courted controversy. He abandoned the recording studio soon after the war, and it is only thanks to his son and family that the flood of pirate Celi CDs can at last be challenged by superior authorized alternatives.
Celibidache’s Brahms has been an occasional presence on the ‘unofficial’ LP/CD scene for years, but this particular set is better played and better produced (bar one or two audible edits) than anything that preceded it. Firstly, the recorded balance is excellent. Textures are transparent (the woodwinds especially), instrumental perspectives are unusually true and the incredible force of fully scored passages – such as the organ-like sonority that launches the First Symphony’s sustained opening – is never compromised. The main body of the First Symphony’s opening Allegro is buoyant and light in texture, except for the clarinet/horn duet at 5'17'' (and again at 10'37'' into the recapitulation), where Celi slowly – and somewhat unexpectedly – applies the brakes. The build-up to the development’s great central plateau (from 8'04'') is awe-inspiring, and although the coda is broad, it never drags.
The slow movement is something of a minor miracle. Each time I hear the flowering string lines from 2'01'' (not to mention the oboe/clarinet dialogue that succeeds them) the blood rushes to my head. It is another one of those moments, but there are more in store, notably in the finale, at 2'42'', where slowly interweaving violin desks achieve a perfect diminuendo. Another occurs around the famous horn episode, at 5'08'', where horns answer each other with incredible power (at 5'16'' you actually hear Celi give a prompting shout). The celebrated string melody is leisurely and serene, but the tempo soon picks up and the rest of the movement is pure joy. All in all, this must now be counted among the most imposing Brahms Firsts currently available.
Celi frequently alters Brahms’s written dynamics (invariably more to clarify than to pressurize) and yet his ability to follow the passage of a single instrumental line helps illuminate aspects of musical argument that others fail to notice. For example, near the beginning of the Second Symphony, where the strings take the lead, the horns remain much in evidence. Musical punctuation is another consideration. Celi marks a small (unauthorized) comma before the big staccato string figure at 3'07'', while the brass’s warm delivery at 5'48'' smooths the contours of Brahms’s most exposed (and in my view ugliest) symphonic brass writing. There is remarkable intensity to the cello line later on in the movement (especially in duet with the horn at 12'17'') and a gentle staccato to the woodwind line for the coda. The slow movement builds to an epic climax at 8'47'' where full winds and brass declaim above a slow-moving tide of first-violin semiquavers (another of those unforgettable moments), and the finale’s accelerating coda is immensely exciting. Indeed, the whole score enjoys an unusually cogent interpretation.
By contrast, parts of the Third Symphony sound decidedly odd. Immediately after the opening brass chords, Celibidache divides the principal string melody into a spurious ‘question and answer’, alternating Brahms’s prescribed forte passionato with an unmarked mezzo-forte. Then, at 0'42'', he dips the level yet again. ‘Fussy’, I thought, and the drop in tempo for the grazioso second subject confirms that impression. And yet there are some wonderful moments later on: the quieter episodes in the central development, the fire of the string playing in the recapitulation and the delicate balance of forces elsewhere. The Third’s principal ‘Celi moment’ happens at 7'46'' into the second movement, at the point where the strings draw a broad expressive arch, played here with the greatest intensity and mesmerizing control. The finale receives a relatively straightforward reading, often at white heat and again with some first-rate string playing. But, viewed as a whole, this is not a Brahms Third to live with.
For the Fourth Symphony, in addition to the complete performance, we are treated to a full rehearsal of the opening Allegro non troppo where a fully ‘fired-up’ Celi takes the greatest pains over matters of rhythm and articulation. The slow, sweet centre of the movement is addressed in almost mystical terms, far more effectively in concert than in the rehearsal. At the beginning of the second movement, Celi’s ear for balance benefits oboes and clarinets and there is another of those slow-burning string crescendos, from 3'04''. The glorious second subject (4'26'') could hardly have been more beautifully played, and yet when it returns later on (at 9'08''), supposedly ‘expressive and a little louder’, the dynamic level is far too low. Both the third and fourth movements accommodate the conductor’s penchant for trance-like slow episodes, the third at 3'06'' (thus making the return of the giocoso element doubly effective), and the finale, for the slow sequence that starts with the flute variation (at 3'02''). Celi also inserts a quaint diminuendo prior to the finale’s first variation. Cumulatively, the Fourth Symphony is taut, intimate, transparent and rich in incident, and only sometimes deprived of the ‘long’ view.
Remarkable, inspiring, exasperating – Celibidache was all of these, and more. And if the overall approach was sometimes excessively interventionist, you learn so much from listening that eccentricities soon cease to register. These discs enshrine the work of a man who obviously loved every note of Brahms’s symphonies (although he omits all three first-movement repeats) and was not afraid to express that love in interpretative terms. The only relevant comparison is EMI’s forthcoming rival Brahms symphony cycle, where Celi conducts the Munich Philharmonic (probably using even broader tempos), and when it finally appears, I will no doubt wax lyrical all over again. So be warned!'