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VAUGHAN WILLIAMS
Symphony No. 9
Symphony No. 2
RPO/Sargent
NBC SO/Mitropoulos
Recorded 1958 & 1945
CLASSIC REVIEW
Pristine Audio continues there valuable reissues series with performances of major interest to collectors. The Vaughan Williams CD is essential. We have the world premiere of Symphony No. 9 from Royal Festival Hall April 2, 1958, with the Royal Philharmonic conducted by Sir Malcolm Sargent as well as a performance of the London symphony with Dimitri Mitropoulos, and the NBC Symphony, a broadcast from Studio 8H December 9, 1945. The latter is available on a hard-to-fine Italian CD but this is first issue of the premiere of No. 9. Audio quality is excellent for No. 9, less so for the London.
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REVIEW
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"Excellent transfers of treasured performances ... deserving a place in the collection of all Beethoven lovers."
These recordings have hardly been out of the catalogue since they were recorded in the late 1950s. They were laid down at the same time as a series of concerts at the Royal Festival Hall. My cousin, who is older than me, attended these and still talks about them in awe. My first memories of Klemperer's Beethoven were his performances in the early 1970s, shown on the BBC. These seemed very slow and ponderous but the recorded cycle dates from fifteen years earlier and I enjoyed them, particularly the Pastoral, in the late 1980s. However, it's been some time since I've heard them. EMI Classics, for whom Klemperer recorded, have re-released the entire Symphonies and Overtures, including the mono recordings of 3, 5 and 7 in a budget box of 10 CDs. That's on EMI 4 04275 2 but typically, these recordings have not re-mastered: the mastering comes from the 1990s, apart from the Pastoral, which was re-mastered in 2003 as a GROC. My colleague Christopher Howell described that disc as follows: "The recordings still sound very fine; this is Beethoven you must have. As long as you don't have only this Beethoven". Having reacquainted myself with these middle symphonies in the present splendid transfers, taken from LPs, I can only concur.
The Fourth is a classic recording and been highly commended since its release. The Philharmonia were, based on studio and live recordings, the finest orchestra in the world at the time, and the playing throughout is top class. The detail of the instruments comes through and it helps that Klemperer, like many of the "Old School" divides his first and second violins, left and right to get the antiphonal sound that Beethoven wanted. The first movement goes at a fair rate and the second movement is sublime. The horn player at the end of the movement is Alan Civil who replaced the great Dennis Brain, who had tragically been killed two months earlier. The wit of the third movement is well conveyed and comes over as if at a live concert. Great sound too in the finale: granite-like comes to mind. This all serves to confirm this as one of the great Fourth, along with Walter (Sony), Karajan 1962 (DG) and Norrington (EMI).
The stereo Fifth has sometimes been unfavourably compared with the mono version, recorded in 1955. However, on its own terms it's a fine performance. Klemperer recorded the symphony three times in less than ten years; the earliest being with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra (Vox) which I haven't heard for a long time but is craggy, just like the other two.
The Pastoral is quite simply one of the finest versions ever set down. It's up there with Toscanini, BBC 1936, Walter, Boult and Stokowski. Right from the start there is rhythm and forward momentum. I compared the Pristine with the EMI Classics. In the first movement; whilst there is more bass in the former I found the sound slightly clearer in the EMI, though both are very good. The original recording was first class, produced by the unique Walter Legge (Mr Elizabeth Schwarzkopf). I suspect those who grew up with the LP will prefer the Pristine version. The first two movements are relatively uncontroversial and delightfully convey the joy of this piece; especially the splendid wind playing. The third movement, "Peasants' merrymaking" has been the subject of folklore since Legge complained of the slow speed. Klemperer retorted "You'll get used to it, Walter!" Well I have always got used to it, seeing Klemperer's vision of old men dancing, possibly having over-imbibed! The storm is very powerful and the final movement is intensely moving and beautifully played. A Pastoral for special occasions like Eeyore's birthday.
Finally we have the orchestration by Felix Weingartner of the Grosse Fuge, which I have on a budget EMI reissue. I can only endorse Christopher Howell's recommendation. If you want to hear this work - wrongly titled according to Hans Keller - by an orchestra, rather than by a string quartet, then this is one to go seek out. The sound, from 1956 is admirable - like that achieved for all the recordings here.
Whilst for many people the EMI set is to be preferred the Pristine set is excellent and may well also suit those who want only these works. Listening to these wonderful performances and reviewing them has been a real privilege.
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CONTENTS
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This Week Gieseking's Beethoven Concertos
Pristine Super-fast new server for downloads
Gieseking Beethoven's 4th and 5th Piano Concertos
PADA Feuermann plays Hindemith - all by himself!
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Real stereo recording in 1944
Complete with real artillery fire in the background!
This week's new release I'm not sure when it took place, nor precisely where, but when Walter Gieseking sat down to play Beethoven's Emperor Concerto in Berlin sometime in the dark autumn of 1944, just months before the city was overrun by Allied forces, and with what we assume to be air defences pounding away audibly in the background, he may not have appreciated something truly historic was going on quietly in the background: his concert was being recorded in stereo.A certain Dr. Hans Joachim von Braunmühle, head of the Reichsender Research Department certainly did have an idea as to what he was doing, and though few of his tapes survived bombing and subsequent looting, this week's new release did. Braunmühle had once discussed the earlier Bell Labs stereo experiments with Leopold Stokowski during a (pre-war, I assume) visit by the conductor to Germany - and with the aid of a special stereo Telefunken 30ips tape machine, fitted with all-new AC bias controls, Braunmühle is believed to have made a good number of experimental recordings during the early to mid-1940s in a kind of stereo. I say "a kind of". Stereo was still in its infancy. Nobody outside of the research labs had the ability to reproduce it, and there was no marketable means of mass-producing the recordings at the time. Unlike later recordings, which at their simplest (and for some, purest) are made using a crossed pair of directional microphones to pick up the stereo field, Braunmühle used three spaced non-directional microphones. The result is a rather blurred spread of sound, which generally lacks the kind of focus we're been used to hearing in commercial stereo recordings since the 1950s. When listening it's a little similar, in fact, to the various "accidental stereo" recordings that have been assembled, where two microphones in different positions were recorded onto different machines. Bringing two such recordings together and matching them up in time whilst panning them to the left and right - as we did for our Toscanini 1950 Verdi Requiem - does indeed give a stereo spread feel to the sound too, though its efficacy does depend on quite how the microphones concerned were positioned. By contrast, Braunmühle's technique bridges the gap between accidental and modern stereo, and of course his microphones were deliberately placed and fed into a properly set-up two-channel recorder. We're lucky too to have the performance, as Gieseking really does play well here, "at the height of his powers". With an XR remastering bringing out more detail and a fuller, cleaner sound than has been heard from these recordings in the past, it's now as much a thrilling concert performance as it is an historic technical curiosity. And what better recording to pair it with than the Fourth Concerto Gieseking recorded in London in 1951 with Herbert von Karajan for EMI's Columbia label? Initially issued on 78s and soon on LP, with the Philharmonia Orchestra at the time reckoned by many to be the finest in the world, von Karajan's international career about to turn stellar, and Gieseking turning in an excellent performance at the keyboard. Hard to beat! I've turned the playing order around from the one you might expect and put the 5th first and the 4th second on this release. Personally I'd rather listen to them one at a time rather than back to back, but for me it's the stereo 1944 recording that's the star of the show here for so many reasons - historic and technical - that the 1951 Fourth could never compete with, hence this decision. I hope it doesn't trouble you too much!
Pristine Classical - new media server a-hoy!
Some changes are planned, others are not. For reasons that are ultimately irrelevant we're in the unusual position of a forced relocation of all of our download files from the server we've been using in Texas for the last few years to a brand new one in London. I received notice on Tuesday morning that this would need to be put in place within 7 days, and as a result have been working feverishly hard to ensure there's no break in service for our customers during this time. At some point in the next few days we'll be switching over everything to the new server; shortly after that the old one will cease operation. For a while the only sign of this being a problem will be MP3 sample links in older newsletters, which will temporarily cease to work until we've got them pointing to the new files. It's been a lot of work, and there's much left to do. It's also cost a fair bit to organise! But the end result should be much faster downloads for all, coming directly off a lovely, new and dedicated super-fast server on a Gigabit internet connection. This week's new release - and the sample download below of the first movement of the Emperor Concerto - is already coming directly from our new server, should you care to put it to the test. STOP PRESS: Since this was written we've managed to get almost all our files online and switched over to the new server. I ran some tests this morning and saw the fastest Internet file transfers (admittedly from an otherwise unused server at a quiet time of day) I've ever seen at Pristine Central! Hopefully everything will continue to run smoothly over the next few days - and remember if you do encounter any difficulties to drop an e-mail to: downloadsupport@pristineclassical.com outlining the problem and we'll fix it just as quickly as we're able. Andrew Rose
28 June 2013
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Ground-breaking early genuine stereo Beethoven recording remastered!
"Gieseking, at the height of his powers in 1944, is deft, delicate, infinitely resourceful"
- Gramophone
GIESEKING
Beethoven Concertos 4 & 5
Walter Gieseking piano Berlin Reichsender OrchestraArtur Rother conductor Philharmonia OrchestraHerbert von Karajan conductor
Recorded 1944 & 1951
Producer and Audio Restoration Engineer:
Andrew Rose
Web page: PASC 390 Short Notes
Gieseking, at the height of his powers in 1944, is deft, delicate, infinitely resourceful. From the moment of the piano's re-entry, Gieseking points our attention away from heroic postures (though he has strengths in reserve) towards that visionary mood which underwrites the whole of the Violin Concerto and subtly pervades the Emperor, too. The recording was made at a concert in Berlin and claims to be a genuine stereo recording...
- Gramophone, 1980
The Gieseking 1944 Emperor is indeed a stereo recording, one of very few that survive from this era, and even fewer which consist of a complete work. This new XR remastering brings out hidden depths and much improved sound quality in what is one of the great recorded performances of this work.
Likewise in performance its partner here, the 1951 Fourth with von Karajan, introduced by the Gramophone's reviewer at the time thus: "Here, I venture to suggest, in the Gieseking-Karajan G major Concerto, we find almost the ideal recording..."
Notes On this recording The 1944 recording of Walter Gieseking playing brilliantly Beethoven's Emperor Concerto sits among a select few stereo recordings made experimentally prior to the 1950s, the earliest dating back to the early 1930s. It's one of the only complete works recorded in stereo prior to the general adoption of stereo recording in the 1950s - only one other stereo recording (of a single movement) is known to survive from 1944, also recorded in Germany. It was the development of tape recording which made stereo technically feasible - not until 1958 would disc replay catch up - and the Germans were a considerable way ahead on tape technology by 1944. Even so, the high levels of hiss on this recording - unsurprising given that each channel has half the tape width and thus double the noise levels - shows much was left to be done.
As well as improvements to the sometimes wayward and ill-defined stereo imagery, I've sought to reduce tape hiss, enhance the overall tonal balance, flatten out wow and flutter, and give this historic recording as good an outing as it's ever had. The 1951 EMI studio recording of the Fourth Concerto was of course made in easier conditions (no anti-aircraft fire in the background either!) but was far from perfect. I've been able to fill out the orchestral tone considerably, whilst cutting tape hiss back. The piano tone remains mellow and warm, but occasionally less than brilliant during louder passages, where I've had to fight against some peak distortion, though this is happily insufficient to distract from what is a truly superb account of the concerto.
Andrew Rose Review Concerto No. 5
Gieseking, at the height of his powers in 1944, is deft, delicate, infinitely resourceful. From the moment of the piano's re-entry, Gieseking points our attention away from heroic postures (though he has strengths in reserve) towards that visionary mood which underwrites the whole of the Violin Concerto and subtly pervades the Emperor, too. The recording was made at a concert in Berlin and claims to be a genuine stereo recording, a precocious example of the highly sophisticated Berlin Radio system and its Magnetophon recorders. Clearly it is a stereo recording in the same way that an 1840s Fox Talbot is a photograph, but the stereo images are vague and the level of background hiss is almost unacceptably high. That said, the beautifully natural, slightly recessed concert hall image serves Gieseking well; and the orchestra, which is immaculately conducted by Arthur Rother, is finely focused. In the latter part of the first movement cadenza artillery can be heard dimly popping and pummelling in the background, much as it probably did at the time of the work's première in war-torn Vienna. Gieseking, ever the poet and professional, remains perfectly poised, whilst the horns sweep calmly and steadily in.
R.O., Gramophone, January 1980
Review Concerto No. 4
Here, I venture to suggest, in the Gieseking-Karajan G major Concerto, we find almost the idea! recording ; sides 3 and 8 in particular seem to me as nearly perfect examples of reproduced sound as one is ever likely to meet. Gieseking's approach to Beethoven is suitably gentle and caressing ; but he can be dramatic at will, and his good musical manners are no sign of weakness or mere amiability. Technically, he exhibits a remarkable power of light but firm emphasis. His touch is even sure when he wishes to vary it, which is the equivalent of saying that he has perfect control ; that would be wasted had the pianist not also the musical mind to inform his fingers. He seems to play the G major with the utmost naturalness, as though he were a learned and fluent and friendly improviser in a tautly listening party. The secretive opening of III on side 6, the brilliance of side 2, the flourish in the cadenza and the sweet-natured reentry of the first subject are tokens of his success. The balance between soloist and orchestra is right, the ensembles are warm and rich, the tuttis never alarming. I particularly like the weight of the strings and the even distribution of tone across the orchestral gamut.
H.F., The Gramophone, November 1951
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Feuermann plays solo Hindemith
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PADA Exclusives
Streamed MP3s you can also download
HINDEMITH
Solo Cello Sonata, Op. 25, No. 3
Emanuel Feuermann cello
Issued as Columbia 69001-D
Matrices CAX 7076-7
This transfer by Dr. John Duffy
With additional remastering 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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