The first CD in the set couples the famous 1913 Nikisch account of the Fifth Symphony, the first complete recording of any symphony, with a 1941 set of the Eroica from Carl Schuricht and the Berlin Philharmonic. Although it was listed in Clough’s and Cuming’s World Encyclopaedia of Recorded Music, I don’t remember it ever appearing here. I like it very much: there is something of the ‘lean-beef’, no-nonsense approach that distinguished Weingartner’s pre-war records with the Vienna Philharmonic. In his excellent accompanying essay RO speaks of Schuricht bringing to the Eroica “the same kind of steadiness and integrity of utterance, dark-toned and articulate, which he brought to late Bruckner”. I must say war or no war, the horns in the trio are pretty spectacular. Its companion, Nikisch’s cogent and powerfully conceived Fifth, is recorded in very primitive sound and readers will want it ‘for information’ rather than pleasure.
The second CD is devoted to a 1957 account of the Third Piano Concerto with Annie Fischer and the Bavarian State Orchestra under Ferenc Fricsay and a 1960 performance of the Seventh Symphony that Fricsay made with the Berlin Philharmonic. RO goes so far as to say, “For drama, power, imaginative reach and the astonishing sense it conveys of improvised intellectual gamesmanship (the hallmark, it is said, of Beethoven’s own playing of the work) the performance is probably without peer in the annals of this concerto on record”. Trevor Harvey’s first review spoke of it as “a fine performance of the concerto without a doubt” and he was particularly taken with the finale (“lively playing with an air of gaiety about it; and what charm this pianist gives the main theme when, after its appearances in the minor, it is heard in D flat major”). Fricsay’s recording of the Seventh Symphony was not included in the 1994 DG compilation. When it first came out, in 1962, EG wrote that “the impression is of energy rather than restraint with the finale specially exciting” but though his responses were positive he generally seemed to have preferred either Klemperer or Sir Colin Davis. Still it strikes me as impressive and fiery.
The third disc brings Danish Radio performances of the Leonore No. 2 Overture and the Ninth Symphony from the autumn of 1950 with the legendary Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra under Fritz Busch. It originally appeared as a handsomely packaged special issue on Nordisk Polyphon. Looking back I see that I reviewed it in its first DG incarnation and found in it “nothing that distracts the attention even momentarily from the music’s progress to the performer’s art ... a totally selfless and wholly classical reading”, though I did note that the orchestral playing “while always alive is not quite in the category of the Berlin and Vienna orchestras”. Ultimately a good rather than great performance.
I dare not say that Josef Wolfsthal’s 1929 account of the Violin Concerto has not appeared since the five 78s came out lest a vigilant reader immediately sends details of a continental transfer, but in any event I must confess to not having heard it before. It was in fact Wolfsthal’s second recording of the work made not long before his early death at the age of 32. A pupil of Carl Flesch, he plays with a kind of blissful ease and effortless virtuosity as well as considerable depth of feeling, which all make for a wonderfully memorable performance. His octaves at the opening of the cadenza are stunningly true! I have never encountered Kempff’s fine 1936 Emperor Concerto either, though it is not superior to either of his subsequent records; the balance does fuller justice to his delicate pianopianissimo tone, particularly in the first movement exposition, than the subsequent LPs with Paul van Kempen and Ferdinand Leitner. The highlights on the fifth CD are Furtwangler’s highly charged Coriolan Overture from Berlin in 1943 and Richter’s 1959 account of Mozart’s D minor Concerto, K466, made in Warsaw, which owes its presence here to the Beethoven cadenzas the great Russian pianist used.
Kempff recorded the violin sonatas with various partners, the most recent being Menuhin in 1970 but the inclusion of his 1935 set of the Kreutzer Sonata with the legendary Georg Kulenkampff is particularly welcome. As in his famous pre-war Telefunken set of the Violin Concerto, Kulenkampff brought a rare purity to his music-making and masterly though the post-war Schneiderhan Spring Sonata with Kempff is, Kulenkampff’s is very special and has good sound too. The noble account of An die ferne Geliebte that Heinrich Schlusnus and Sebastian Peschko recorded in 1939, was reissued on LP and is currently available on Preiser. One final point: what a pleasure it is to see a booklet of quality which, despite the minuscule format of CD jewel-boxes, looks good and is produced with taste and elegance!'