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BEETHOVEN
Symphonies 4 & 5
Mengelberg
Concertgebouw
1940
CLASSIC REVIEW:
Pristine's Andrew Rose continues his traversal of Mengelberg's live 1940 Beethoven cycle, with (once again) amazing results. Applying his XR remastering system to mint Philips LPs, Rose's transfers (after some poor sound at the beginning of the Fourth Symphony, owing to damage to the original acetate source) far surpass the quality of any previous CD release, including Philips's own.
The first movement of No. 4 (with exposition repeat) is rich and weighty, with Mengelberg's characteristic highly polished sheen to the orchestral tone, together with minutely detailed characterization to the end of clarifying phrase structure-listen, for example, to the way the main theme is subjected to constant tempo manipulation and rhetorical emphases, or his leisurely swinging into the second theme. Yet along with such license, there is a remarkable feeling of authentically classical elegance deriving from his phenomenal rhythmic control. The Adagio is notable for its operatic vividness of "vocal" phrasing (the main theme memorably molded, with more agogic manipulations than you would think the music can take, but Mengelberg makes it work). The Scherzo achieves a remarkable balance between whiplash snap with graceful shapeliness. The finale (with exposition repeat) is again unhurried, with time for nuanced shaping, and tremendous bite and articulacy.
The first movement of the Fifth is deliberate, though very flexible, and notable for his highly calculated intensification of rhetorical underlining as the movement progresses-most obviously in the increasingly dramatized treatment of the motto at each appearance, but also in more subtly structural ways, as in the degree of controlled accelerando he applies toward the closing section of exposition and recapitulation. The exposition repeat is not observed (surprisingly, given both his generosity with repeats elsewhere in this cycle, and his observance of it in the Telefunken studio recording of a few years before). His obsessive clarity of phrase articulation reaches rare heights of ferocity in the coda. At 10:07, the Andante is a whole minute slower than the brisk 1937 studio version, and a miracle of grace, fluidity, and pungent clarity-for a small example, hear the woodwind arabesques at bars 132 ff., combining minutely nuanced shaping with an extraordinary singing freedom. The Scherzo is phrased in long arcs, continued in an exceptionally fluid account of the Trio. The finale combines massive rhetorical freedom, at a constantly ebbing and flowing tempo, with articulation of phenomenal precision. The orchestra members play as if their lives depended on it; I don't think it's reading too much into these performances to hear in them the same kind of anxiety-tinged edge to the musical intensity that distinguished Furtwängler's wartime concerts. At the same time, the German maestro's (1943) conception of Beethoven's symphonic drama remained something altogether loftier, more idealized, less personal and idiosyncratic than the Dutchman's, reflected in his more seamless, gradual approach to tempo adjustment. At the other extreme, Toscanini's straight-ahead, uncompromising 1939 treatment-for all its incandescence-comes across as comparatively lacking in complexity and nuance.
If you don't know these performances, you're in for a uniquely exciting and rewarding Beethovenian experience. If you do, you'll hear them with new ears in these revelatory transfers..
Boyd Pomeroy
FANFARE Mar/Apr 2011
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PASC 236
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LATEST REVIEW
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25 November 2012
Fiedler's Brahms
by Gary Lemco
"Historic Brahms performances by a "living witness" to that composer's style, though less "authentic" than often startlingly original in energetic conception"
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Conductor Max Fiedler (1859-1939), along with conductor Fritz Steinbach (1855-1916), has come to be known as a Brahms interpreter uncommonly close to the tradition the composer himself embodied. Unfortunately, Steinbach left no recorded legacy, though conductors Adrian Boult and Arturo Toscanini claimed him as a powerful influence on their Brahms performances. Pristine, however, through the restoration efforts of Mark Obert-Thorn, resurrects the 1930-1940 mostly Grammophone shellacs that reveal to us Fiedler's idiosyncratic vision of Brahms, a willful and often immensely energized Brahms of power and conviction.
Historians often argue that Fritz Steinbach took a relatively conservative approach to the Romantic repertory, and as such influenced the classically-minded Felix Weingartner. Fiedler's more liberal, metrically-subjective approach cannot claim the same "authenticity," but it certainly provides a specific atavistic realization of the Brahms scores that communicates warmth and spontaneity of feeling. The Academic Festival Overture (rec. 1931) provides an instant case in point: athletic, driven, and prone to sudden advances and retreats in tempo that must be felt as liberal responses to the Brahms ethos that wants to break free of the composer's own emotional restraints. We find similar "deviations" from the letter of the composer in Bruno Walter and Dimitri Mitropoulos, without our necessarily censuring their efforts. Besides, Fiedler, too, often releases inner voices and harmonic counterpoints that others bypass or elide, strictly to emphasize melodic continuity.
The D Major Symphony (rec. 1931, for Polydor), among the composer's sunniest scores, enjoys wonderful forward motion and persuasive sympathy. Fiedler credited Hans von Bulow as his own model for the shaping of the Brahms periods, but the resonant colors Fiedler achieves strike me as singularly his own. The long arches that no less emphasize the resilience of the interior contrapuntal phrases seem a cross between Walter and Toscanini; when the luftpausen and rubati apply, we move closer to the Brahms world that Willem Mengelberg bequeathed us. The Adagio generates a "genial melancholy," if that is not too paradoxical. The sudden storm in the midst of reflection attains some vividly lyric outpourings by strings and winds in Fiedler's Berlin Philharmonic. The Intermezzo enjoys a plastic transparency that lightens the mood until it, too, undergoes a brief moment of passion in the midst of otherwise bucolic musings. The robust elan of the last movement Allegro con spirito rather basks in the tempo adjustments Fiedler imposes in the course of its lyric outpourings. Fiedler graduates the snarling and darkly grumbling lower voices so they soon ascend, ineluctably, to an explosion of joyful ardor, perhaps a consciously volatile rebuttal to Hugo Wolf's criticism that Brahms could not exult.
Fielder's approach to the Fourth Symphony (rec. 1930 for Grammophone, but here taken from American Brunswicks) urges its monumental dignity, its gloomy Spartan nobility. Fiedler rocks the rising and falling thirds with discrete moments of metric tugging, affecting the essentially lyrical effluvium surrounded by an excess of "learned" tissue. On the other hand, few conductors have brought out the Schubert influence, the country laendler element, with such thoughtful affection. The deliberately maestoso coda that suddenly leaps forward suggests a sleeping tiger hiding among contrapuntal vines. Equally monumental, the Fiedler Andante confirms the opinion of Richard Strauss, who called it "a funeral procession moving in silence across moonlit heights." The sheer melancholy warmth of the BSOO cello line warrants the price of admission. This remains a sturdy, passionate account by any standard. The muscular Allegro giocoso declares itself a scherzo with no apologies, the colors intensely accented and driven with hearty vigor. Fiedler imbues the last movement passacaglia with solemn majesty, careful to underline the irregular agogics and sudden thrusts that impel this ancient form to new relevance. String tremolandi and strettos take on particular impact under Fiedler, and his brass periods convey a heft and pomp we miss from many a glib current recording.
The Brahms B-flat Concerto with Elly Ney (1882-1968) was inscribed in two distinct sessions, of which only the first (1-5 June 1939) actually "belong" to Max Fiedler. Ney's unhappiness with some takes resulted in a projected date to re-record; but Fiedler's death in December 1939 forced the producers at Grammophon to hire an uncredited conductor (Alois Melichar?) for the second set (29 April 1940) of takes with Ney. The hybrid (duly noted by Mark Obert-Thorn in the accompanying booklet) still projects a loving vision of the composer's "symphony with piano obbligato," lyrical and phrased with ripe, rounded periods and imaginative fire, if not note-perfect digital accuracy. Rather, the pearly play and broad grandeur of the conception of Ney's playing commands our attention. The Andante movement features lovely singing dialogues between an intimate Ney and first cellist Hungarian virtuoso Tibor de Machula (1912-1982). Taken quite literally, the last movement plays Allegretto grazioso, of which the first three minutes belongs to Fiedler. For the Brahms connoiuseur, these performances supply precious moments for our sense of stylistic evolution and musicianship in the grand manner.
PASC 363 (72:20)
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CONTENTS
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Editorial A look back over the year - and a free gift for you!
Cortot Chopin & Debussy - Prelude recordings, 1930-33
Klemperer Beethoven Symphonies 4-6, Große Fuge
PADA Liszt Piano Transcriptions, played by Egon Petri
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A look back over 2012 at Pristine Classical
Four hours of free 24-bit music to download!
This week I'm in Ireland (and not too far from the photo at the top of this e-mail) on family business, which gives us a moment's break from continual weekly releases to look back over the year's highlights. For those whose appetites are insatiable, fear not, both Mark Obert-Thorn and I are busy in preparation of a Furtwängler double-bill scheduled for next Friday. Meanwhile aside from this column the newsletter is a repeat of last week's, for those who may have missed it - and the sample links, which were down for a couple of hours after the original e-mail was sent, should both be up and running. Talking of Mark, it was good to see one of his productions getting a nod from MusicWeb International's Classical Editor Rob Barnett in his Recordings of the Year list. Writing about our release of Zimbalist playing Brahms and Sibelius violin concertos ( PASC307), he says: Pristine are another powerhouse of reissue activity. Their sheer industry and productive diligence tells against them when discs like this are swamped by one monthly avalanche of reissues after another. The Zimbalist disc offers very special performances and the recordings have been made to sound very healthy indeed. Zimbalist's silky and friction-less legato is combined with a juicy succulence of tone. If there is a touch of Hollywood limelight it has a wonderfully seductive glow. Violin aficionados need to hear these Brahms and Sibelius concertos. It was a close run thing between this and the Hanson-conducted Americana series.Well, as we do have a moment to pause and take breath between "one monthly avalanche of reissues after another", why not begin here? The Zimbalist recording was a fascinating one, both musically and technically. It also highlighted one of the advantages of working online and preparing downloads and CDs to order, rather than pressing a thousand copies or so of any particular release as might have been the case 10 years ago. I remember Mark contacting me with the Zimbalist some time before the release. A curious echo was present for the first four minutes or so (i.e. a side of a 78rpm acetate) of the opening of the Sibelius concerto. Could I think of any way to cure it? Mark had struggled in vain to remove the echo. Well, despite a couple of apparently workable ideas, I managed to get no further forward. After some discussion we decided to go ahead with the release anyway - the rest of it was fine, it was indeed an important musical document, and so we issued it with a written apology for the echo (which was read by most purchasers before listening!) Anyway, the reviews copies went out, word got around, and sure enough, someone was able to unearth a second dub of the disc in question, at slightly lesser quality it has to be admitted, but without the offending echo, and a copy was soon sent to Mark. He then got to work on trying to make it sound as good as the rest of the recording, and we were quickly able to offer a replacement first movement to downloaders, and sent out replacement CDs too. A good part of my efforts this year have been employed looking for and filling major gaps in the catalogue - essential to any label that associates itself with the great historic recordings of the past. This gets a bad press from some reviewers, who'd usually rather write about something rare that they've never heard before, rather than all-time favourites that may never have been out of print. Yet they're usually the releases which pay the bills and almost always sell well - and if we can make great strides in sound quality with them as well then it's surely worthwhile at a time when other record companies are boxing up old transfers and selling them cheap(er), rather than spending too much time revisiting them with an ear to better sound quality. Given the ease with which, for example, clicks can be seamlessly excised from recordings, surely EMI has no excuses releasing big box sets of historic recordings which leave them in in 2012! With XR remastering Pristine aims much higher than simply cleaning up the crackles and clicks, and I think we usually achieve what we set out to do: producing the ultimate in sound quality, usually involving major sonic improvements throughout. Thus we're in the middle of Klemperer's classic stereo Beethoven cycle, having earlier tackled his Brahms. Maria Callas has finally made it into our catalogue, as we work through her early studio recordings to great effect. We've finally completed a Furtwängler Beethoven symphony cycle, and both Furtwängler and arch-rival Toscanini have had Brahms cycles added to our listings. Less obvious, perhaps, was the decision to exhume Backhaus's early 50s Decca Beethoven sonatas, all but one of which he re-recorded in stereo not long after the mono cycle was completed. It's something of an uneven set, both technically and in terms of performance, but one which deserves a wider hearing from one of the great pianists of the era. Piano releases have been among the main beneficiaries of the pitch stabilisation software we pioneered the use of in the summer of 2011, and which has featured in the vast majority of 2012 releases. It's also helped us to fix previously intractable problems in recordings Mark Obert-Thorn has worked on, widening the scope of his choices for issue where some discs simply wavered up and down too much to be considered. Back in February I applied this new technology to Maurice Duruflé's classic 1961 recording of the Poulenc Organ Concerto, where the orchestra was tuned almost a quarter-tone sharper than the organ. For some this may not be a problem, for others however it makes it almost impossible to enjoy. Thanks to a "dialogue" style of composition, it has been possible to almost entirely eradicate the pitch discrepancy - certainly this listener can now enjoy the recording without his teeth constantly being set on edge by constant grinding jumps up and down as the music passes from organ to orchestra and back. Curiously (and this is the sort of thing you only discover by trial and error), because the software looks for dominant pitches within the harmonic mix, when both organ and orchestra play together the pitch is set by the louder of the two, effectively masking the pitch of the other to sufficient extent that it doesn't offend the ear, or at least, doesn't offend mine. I didn't know this was happened before I tried it. It turns out to be quite a useful psychoacoustic trait: recordings where solo vocals are accompanied by, for example, a piano, should in theory be quite difficult to correct where there's wow and flutter present. The dominant "instrument" is usually the voice, and it employs vibrato intentionally. Thus "correcting" this for pitch stability would create a kind of robotic effect which infests so much of today's pop music. However, when I apply pitch correction only to the sections of music where the piano plays solo, thus solidifying the tone and ironing out wow and flutter there, but do nothing where there's singing present, the natural vocal vibrato has a masking effect such that any pitch instability in the piano goes pretty well unnoticed. (I suspect there are limits to how far this might operate!) The same is true in opera and choral music. I've realised than simply seeking out instrumental passages and fixing these alone is often the best policy, leaving the vocal sections as they were. The wavering of pitch in an old recording is very hard to detect in vocals which waver themselves by design, even when it's blindingly obvious when the singing stops! Meanwhile other technologies continue to develop apace in 2012 - just last week came the first tests of new, even more powerful restoration software, which I hope we'll once again be the first to put to commercial use. I've experimented with "audiophile" vinyl this year for the first time. And once again we're lucky to have access to broadcast tapes from the archive originally held by Leopold Stokowski: Just as we began 2012 with his Met. Opera Turandot from 1961, expect something special to celebrate the opening on 1st January 2013 of the 1962 archives to Pristine's musical magic. I wrote last week of the onward march of "digital" - the concept of playing and storing music on a hard drive based system for computer replay (or one of the fancy new digital all-in-one networked amplifier systems the hi-fi industry has been releasing lately) rather than via "hard" media such as CD, DVD or SACD. Well, just last night I downloaded and installed beta test software of my favourite multimedia player, XBMC, onto my phone. Yes, I know I've got a lot of media players on my phone already, but XBMC now lets me listen to all 1000+GB of my music (or watch all 1500+GB of my video) using my Samsung smartphone whenever I'm at home and in reach of wi-fi, which is most of the time. Coupled with a lovely pair of Sennheiser Bluetooth wireless headphones, I can see this getting a lot of use! Free 24-bit compilation - 4 hours of superb music!If you took the plunge last week and downloaded our free 24-bit Klemperer Beethoven 1 - or if you're already up to speed with this kind of ultra-high resolution replay, then I've got a real treat for you here. I've browsed through 2012's output and selected something special from just about every month of the year to create our first major 24-bit-only compilation. Running to just short of four hours, it features music from Bax to Wagner, recorded between 1933 and 1961. Featuring not just individual movements and excerpts but complete works as well, it's a real incentive to get playing with digital music! Here's what's on the compilation: BAX Viola Sonata, 1st mvt. (Primrose, Cohen, 1937) BEETHOVEN Piano Concerto No. 5, 1st mvt. (Solomon,1955) BEETHOVEN Piano Sonata No. 23 (Backhaus, 1952) BEETHOVEN String Quartet No. 12 (Hollywood Quartet, 1957) BRAHMS Symphony No. 3, 1st & 2nd mvts. (Furtwängler, BPO, 1954) CHOPIN Preludes 1-4 (Cortot, 1933/4) DVORAK Cello Concerto, 1st mvt. (|Rostropovich, Talich, 1952) HANSON Symphony No. 5 (Hanson, 1955) HAYDN Symphony No. 100, Military (Beecham, 1958) POULENC Organ Concerto (Duruflé, Prêtre, 1961) PUCCINI Tosca, 13 min excerpt from Act 2 (Callas, de Sabata, 1953) SIBELIUS Symphony No. 2, 1st mvt (Toscanini, NBC SO, 1940) SIBELIUS Violin Concerto, 1st mvt. (Neveu, Susskind, 1945) WAGNER Parsifal, Prelude to Act 1 (Paray, Detroit SO, 1956) Each recording is presented as a 24-bit 48kHz FLAC file, identical to those included in our FLAC downloads, with embedded cover artwork. Remember, these tracks are NOT CD compatible - they can only be listened to using a compatible player or software (or via DVD Audio using special writing software). The download comes as a single ZIP file which you'll need to unzip (or extract) before you can play the contents. For help on this see our online help files - and if you need more, Google is your friend! The download is available to all our newsletter subscribers: click here to start downloading. It's 2.26 GB in size, so it'll probably take a while to arrive, depending on your connection speed. Tracks are in alphabetical order by composer - but feel free to re-order them or pull individual tracks out as you wish. Good luck - and good listening! Andrew Rose
7 December 2012
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Cortot's brilliant 1930s recordings of Chopin and Debussy Preludes
Truly superb sound quality in these newly 32-bit XR remastered recordings
 CHOPIN
24 Preludes, Op. 28
DEBUSSY
Preludes, Book 1
Recorded 1930-34
Producer and Audio Restoration Engineer: Andrew Rose
Alfred Cortot piano
Web page: PAKM 059
Short Notes
"His complete recording of them seven years ago has a place in gramophone history; the significance of this set is in what good piano recording of to-day has been able to do for it. It tells tremendously, of course, in such as Nos. 8, 12, the middle part of No. 15 (the "raindrops"), and No. 19. Those, indeed, are the ones that most move me to marvel; No.8 can only be compared to lightning, or to a rapid, crystal-clear stream scintillating in the sun..."
- C. M. Crabtree, The Gramophone, March 1934
Cortot's recordings of the Chopin and Debussy Preludes are rightly the stuff of legend - superlative playing and exquisite interpretation set a bar almost impossibly high to follow.
Now you can hear these fabulous recordings in sound quality that finally does justice to the performer, brought to incredible new life with Pristine's 32-bit XR remastering; this album is spellbinding from start to finish.
Notes On this recording
I've attempted on a number of occasions to work on the solo piano recordings Alfred Cortot left us in the earlier years of electrical recordings, but on previous occasions found my source material lacking, or my technical resources not up to the job. There is little point reworking this repertoire unless and until one can bring something really special to it.
That is what this volume, which I hope will be the first of many, has I hope achieved. For the first time the vagaries of 1930s pitch stability have been treatable, bringing an iron-like stability and solidity to Cortot's piano. This, coupled with the re-equalisation of 32-bit XR remastering, brings Cortot's instrument back to life as never before. I've also used the sympathetic resonances of the small recital hall at Santa Cecilia in Rome to further bring a sense of "being there" to the sound of these unsurpassed performances, and for this reason would recommend listeners to the Ambient Stereo editions of this release - they retain the mono integrity of the original recording whilst offering breathing space around the intrument.
As with our remastering of Schnabel's Beethoven sonatas, the combination of these approaches will surely allow those already familiar with these recordings to hear them almost afresh, to re-evaluate Cortot's artistry again, and greatly enhance the pleasure of listening to one of the greatest of pianists at his very finest.
Andrew Rose
MP3 Sample Preludes - Seven complete
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PAKM 059 - webpage at Pristine Classical
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Klemperer's classic Beethoven Symphony Cycle:
The middle set, Nos 4-6
Unprecedented sound quality in these new 32-bit XR-remastered transfers
 BEETHOVEN
Symphony No. 4
Symphony No. 5
Symphony No. 6 'Pastoral'
Große Fuge
The Philharmonia Orchestra
Otto Klemperer conductor
Recorded 1956-59, stereo
Producer and Audio Restoration Engineer: Andrew Rose
Web page: PASC 369
Short Notes
"This seemed to me a performance of the utmost integrity in the monaural version. The stereophonic one is even more impressive, and, of course, much more realistic. As you listen, you become conscious that the instruments are in their accustomed places, with an interesting exception to which I shall come in a moment, and that they show no tendency to move about. Stereophonically this record is a huge success."
- RF, The Gramophone, 1958
Recorded in the highest quality with the advent of stereo in mind, Klemperer's Beethoven cycle with the Philharmonia Orchestra is one of the highlights of the early LP era. These XR-remastered reissues blow the dust off the limits of 1950s sound technology to offer as close to a 21st century sonic experience as can be imagined for these classic recordings, to truly stunning effect - this album is worth it for the finale of the Fifth alone!
Notes on this recording
It's true to say that these recordings were very well made for their day - better perhaps than the Brahms which had preceded them. XR remastering here isn't a question of rescuing a dismal historic artefact; rather it's a case of eliciting the very finest sound quality possible from from fine source material - digging deep into the bass for added richness; opening out oft-constricted strings; lifting a veil from the upper treble. In short, whilst the current EMI transfers are perfectly acceptable representations of what was possible in 1956-59, these Pristine remastering offer us what more could have been heard had Klemperer and the Philharmonia had a 21st century recording facility to work with. It's one of those classic series of recordings which merit the very best sound quality - and which should stand thus in every collection.
Andrew Rose
Review Symphony No. 6, stereo LP issue
This seemed to me a performance of the utmost integrity in the monaural version. The stereophonic one is even more impressive, and, of course, much more realistic. As you listen, you become conscious that the instruments are in their accustomed places, with an interesting exception to which I shall come in a moment, and that they show no tendency to move about. Stereophonically this record is a huge success. The second violins are not in their usual place. Most English conductors put them behind the first violins, on the left of the platform so that the bellies of the instruments are facing the audience. But in the old days they were usually put at the front on the right, so that the audience could enjoy visually as well as aurally antiphonal effects between the two groups of violins on opposite sides of the platform. Sir Adrian Boult is one of the few modern conductors who preserves this traditional layout, and he affirms that composers in the classical period often wrote with it in mind. The disadvantage is that the second violins cannot hope to produce so full a tone as the firsts because the bellies of their instruments are facing backwards away from the audience, and certainly for sound radio and for monaural records it would seem preferable to have firsts and seconds together on the left, producing their maximum tone. But what about binaural records? For the first time in the world of canned music the antiphonal effect becomes a possibility. How conductors are going to react remains to be seen, but Klemperer for one seems happy to use the old layout with the second violins on his right. A passage like the opening of the Storm movement in the Pastoral certainly profits from this arrangement. RF, The Gramophone, October 1958
MP3 Sample All three first movements!
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Stereo MP3
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CD purchase links and all other information:
PASC 369 - webpage at Pristine Classical
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Egon Petri plays Liszt Transcriptions
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PADA Exclusives
Streamed MP3s you can also download
LISZT Piano Transcriptions
Midsummer Night's Dream,
Beethoven's Adelaide,
Faust Waltz,
Mephisto Waltz (arr.Busoni),
Marriage of Figaro
Egon Petri piano
Recorded 18 June 1956 for Westminster LP XWN-18844
Transfers by Dr. John Duffy Additional restoration by Andrew Rose Over 500 PADA Exclusives recordings are available for high-quality streamed listening and free 224kbps MP3 download to all subscribers. PADA Exclusives are not available on CD and are additional to our main catalogue.  Subscriptions start from €1 per week for PADA Exclusives only listening and download access. A full subscription to PADA Premium gets you all this plus unlimited streamed listening access to all Pristine Classical recordings for just €10 per month, with a free 1 week introductory trial.
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