''Producer unknown'' reads this disc's information regarding the Violin Concerto, and it also wrongly gives September 1949 instead of late August as the recording date. In fact the recording took place during one of Waiter Legge's forays on to the continent. At the Lucerne Festival two years earlier he had caused the symbolic post-war union of Menuhin and Furtwangler in Beethoven's Violin Concerto to be sealed by a recording, and now he followed this with the Brahms. On their expedition EMI's engineers took early tape equipment rather than recording waxes, and clearly the new technique had yet to be perfected, since if the recording isn't exactly afflicted with flutter there is a roughness in the tone-quality which comes from uneven tape running. There is also a good deal of rumble, and one or two poor edits.
The performance itself is on a very high plane. Menuhin and Furtwangler enjoyed a very close artistic rapport, and together they explore the Concerto in a profound, very inward fashion. Menuhin is in quite good form technically, and his radiantly lyrical, inspirational playing is well matched by Furtwangler's ardent, highly expressive conducting. The tempo of the first movement is fairly leisurely, but such is the wealth of detail and golden quality of phrase that every moment tells. These artists find an almost painfully eloquent, elegiac quality in the slow movement and there is sharp contrast in the finale, which has a joyous, outgoing spirit, and an abundance of physical energy.
The Double Concerto was recorded at a live performance. Willi Boskovsky had been the VPO's concertmaster since 1939, and Emanuel Brabec was the orchestra's principal cellist. The acoustic is a little confined, and the solo cello seems to catch the microphone slightly, but the balance is reasonably good and the sound itself quite clear. The performance starts unpromisingly, with fairly ordinary contributions from the soloists and a rather heavy tutti from Furtwangler, but as the first movement procedes a greater spirit grows, and soon soloists and conductor establish a good rapport. The slow movement is given a lovely, serene performance, although the finale is taken at a dangerously slow tempo. There are some good touches here but a somewhat strained, impatient quality in the solo playing, as if Boskovsky and Brabec wanted to escape from the orchestra's somewhat lumbering presence. This is a flawed performance, then, but it has thought-provoking and stimulating qualities too.'