David Oistrakh and Igor Oistrakh perform in this 1961 recording of the Bach. Sir Colin Davis conducts the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra with Yehudi Menuhin and Kirill Kondrashin in these works by Bach, Mozart, and Brahms recorded in 1961 and 1963.

Franz Schubert:
Piano Trio No. 1 in B flat major, Op. 99, D. 898
Piano Trio No. 2 in E flat major, Op. 100, D. 929

Beaux Arts Trio

Recorded at Signet Library, Edinburgh, 13 July 1987 (Piano Trio No. 1) and 6 September 1977 (Piano Trio No. 2)

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: LPCM Mono
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Menu language: English
Running time: 81 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

The Beaux Arts Trio performs two central pieces of their repertoire on this DVD. Filmed at the majestic Signet Library in Edinburgh, the ensemble demonstrates its mastery in bringing out the deeply lyrical romantic expressions that have made these trios two of Schubert’s most cherished chamber music works. With founding member, Menahem Pressler on piano, Isidore Cohen on violin and Bernard Greenhouse on cello, the ensemble’s distinguished heritage is apparent.

The ICA Classics Legacy series presents a collection of historic performances by some of the world’s greatest artists. These performances are released on DVD for the first time, incorporating rare archive footage that has been expertly and lovingly restored. - ICA Classics

"Some consider Arrau’s live Beethoven sonata performances superior to the studio versions. In the later sonatas, Arrau himself alluded to the fact that an improvisatory approach was required which was difficult to achieve within a recording studio. Of op. 111, Jonathan Summers says in his booklet note that ‘as we near the close...we realise we've been transported to another world by Arrau’. This 1960 Stockholm recording, with Arrau at his career peak, is extremely rare and has never been issued."

HÉROLD-HAYDN-MARTINI-ROSSINI-DONIZETTI-HERTEL La fille mal gardée (arr. Lanchbery with additional music) • John Lanchbery, cond; Nadia Nerina, David Blair, Stanley Holden, Alexander Grant, Leslie Edwards (dancers); Royal Ballet Covent Garden O • ICA CLASSICS 5088, mono (90:37)

This is not an actual performance of La fille mal gardée but a film version made for the BBC between September 7 and 9 of 1962. The images are sepia and white, and at times the old style TV cameras can scarcely keep up with the speed of the dancers’ feet, but one thing that shines through like a beacon in this, as in so many ballets under the direct supervision of Frederick Ashton, is its marvelous combination of characterization and humor. I’ve long felt that Ashton always wanted to present characters up there on stage, not just decorous dancers showing off their techniques, and he was capable of slipping some humor into even the most serious works. In this piece of fluff, he was in his element, and as much as one can do so on a ballet stage, he created a silent film combining love story with comedy.


Although this derives from one of the oldest surviving ballets—its premiere was in 1789 at Bordeaux—both the choreography and the music morphed considerably through the next century and a half. The first step towards confusion occurred at the 1828 Paris revival, where Hérold was asked to adapt his score to include themes from other composers’ operas—among them Haydn, Martini, and Donizetti. In 1837 Paris Opéra ballerina Fanny Elssler insisted on a new tailored version of the pas de deux using her favorite melodies from Donizetti’s L’elisir d’amore (specifically, the tune of the finale and the middle portion of “Udite, o rustici”). Somewhere along the line, the opening scene music of Rossini’s Il barbiere di Siviglia crept in as the introductory music to Lise and Colas in act I, while in Berlin in 1864, a completely new score by Peter Ludwig Hertel appeared. Ashton, being a bit confused as to which form of the music to use, was partly guided in this respect by Tamara Karsavina, who had danced Lise at the Mariinsky Theatre. She suggested a return, more or less, to the 1837 version (which he found in the library) but using musical inserts of his own choice. Since Ashton created Widow Simone’s clog dance, he incorporated a piece of folk music into the score. Originally he was aided in the project by noted composer Malcolm Arnold, but for some reason Arnold quit, so Ashton turned to his conductor, John Lanchbery, to piece the music together. The two of them worked together for two months, meeting at least three times a week to match music to action. Lanchbery would play some of the music to get Ashton’s feedback. This eventually led to his writing interpolated passages to blend Hérold’s, Donizetti’s, Rossini’s, and Hertel’s music together, as well as composing Leitmotifs for Widow Simone and Colas and the “disaster” music in the last act.


The principal dancers—Nerina as Lise, Blair as Colas, Holden as Widow Simone and Grant as the “rich dweeb” Alain—were undoubtedly the cream of his then-current crop. By comparison with today’s dancers, only Blair suffers ever so slightly. He can do tremendous jetées and his elevation is superb, but he only occasionally creates the same kind of continuous flow with his motions that the amazing Carlos Acosta can achieve nowadays. Otherwise, however, this is the superior production. Pride of place goes to Nerina, whose series of rapid entrechats in the pas de deux have the rapidity and pointed grace of a cat; moreover, in all of her dancing one continually gets the impression that she’s having a ball, even though it must have been extremely demanding work. See my review elsewhere of An Evening with the Royal Ballet, and you will note my disappointment in the technically fine but somewhat staid dancing of the same scene by Marianela Nuñez.


I was also very impressed by the dancing of the two comic roles. Holden certainly can’t hold a patch technically on William Tuckett, who does the clog dance in the later video, but he doesn’t have to. His highly practiced “stumbling” looks more real, as if he’s about to trip over his own ankles and fall on the floor. Indeed, while watching him perform this dance I couldn’t help thinking that Ashton may have gotten the idea for some of these steps from watching Ray Bolger as the scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz, so similar were his motions. Alexander Grant, playing the role of the dim-witted Alain, conversely put me in mind of someone who came much later—Martin Short as Ed Grimley. Several of the steps Short used in doing his Grimley character were right there onscreen, being danced by Grant…not to mention a cowlick (but in the back rather than the front). I wonder if Short ever saw a production of this ballet?


I was particularly impressed by several of the little touches that Ashton put into certain scenes, for instance the intricacy of the dance in which Cola and Lise form a cat’s cradle out of her ribbon while dancing, or the maypole dance for the corps in which they twisted and untwisted the ribbons with deceptively simple but actually quite complex movements. And then there were the scenes involving Alain, of which I will give you two: During his first scene he inadvertently opens his umbrella and falls to the ground behind it. Colas and Lise push it aside to find him, but he has slid between the legs of his father and pops up behind him! Also, in the act I finale, a sudden thunderstorm, Alain and the Widow swerve back and forth across the stage—umbrella opened—as if they were actually being windswept, and do so in a really funny, skewered way.


If anything, act II is even funnier, more clever and well staged than the first, particularly in the modified morris dance for the male corps (no bells on their shins but they did dance with sticks held at shoulder height). Their dancing in this scene is simply spectacular. There’s also a marvelous scene where Colas (Blair) lifts Lise (Nerina) at the top of a double-door to give her a kiss, and she literally seems to be floating up to him; but this is one of Nerina’s special qualities, the ability to appear as if she is floating. Once again in this act, her work on pointe appears completely effortless—you never once see or sense the physical tension that goes into these moves.


Lise hides Colas in her bedroom before Mom (Widow Simone) comes back, but shortly after her return Thomas, the notary, the notary’s assistant, and Alain return to have her sign the marriage contract and wed her daughter to the dimwit. When Alain goes to open Lise’s bedroom door and finds her in her wedding dress, kissing Colas, he falls backwards down the stairs and everyone is in a tizzy, but Lise explains everything and begs forgiveness. Happily, even the notary realizes that they are a better match and encourages Simone to forgive Lise and accept Colas as a son-in-law, following which the latter celebrates his good luck with a series of excellent fast turns. Only Thomas seems to be taking it badly as he ushers his son out. And there are two surprise postludes: first, when Alain returns to the now-empty farmhouse and furtively moves around…until he retrieves his beloved umbrella, and the second when everyone is walking down the country path. Thomas makes a move to “come on,” which you assume is a gesture to Alain, but instead it’s the chickens who follow him first—trailed, finally and inevitably, by Alain.


The only complaint I have of this DVD is that the numbering sequence of the various “chapters” is off by one, because the booklet lists an “Introduction to the ICA Classics Series” as No. 1, but you only get this if you select “play all.” Otherwise, if you choose to select chapters of the ballet, you will be off by one number—in other words, the act I pas de deux is actually chapter 16, not 17 as listed in the booklet. But this is an absolutely delightful ballet and a classic performance. Despite the sepia-and-white print, I would even recommend this to young girls who are interested in ballet. It’s a funny enough story and has an excellent level of difficulty in it that will captivate and delight them. As for anyone else who enjoys ballet, this is a must.

FANFARE: Lynn René Bayley

Ferdinand Herold
LA FILLE MAL GARDÉE

Lise – Nadia Nerina
Colas – David Blair
Widow Simone – Stanley Holden
Alain – Alexander Grant
Thomas – Leslie Edwards
A Notary – Franklin White

The Royal Ballet
Covent Garden Orchestra
John Lanchbery, conductor

Frederick Ashton, choreographer
Osbert Lancaster, designer

Recorded at BBC Studio, London, 7–9 September 1962

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: Enhanced Mono
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Menu language: English
Booklet notes: English, French, German
Running time: 90 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

Francis Poulenc said ?in 1954, 'Music buffs believe that the greatest living conductor is Toscanini, musicians know that it is Hans Rosbaud.' This 'live' studio recording from 1951 is a new addition to the Rosbaud discography, released for the first time on ICA Classics. It has been regarded by a number of German musicologists as a truly legendary performance.

Rachmaninov was, by his own account, Svetlanov's favorite composer. This new live recording of his Symphony No.2 from the Royal Festival Hall in 1993 with the Philharmonia Orchestra has never been issued before. The recording is in excellent stereo and Svetlanov was at his most exciting when caught live as opposed to working under studio conditions. This is a riveting performance.

The ICA Classics Legacy series presents a collection of historical performances by some of the world's greatest artists. These performances are released on DVD for the first time, incorporating rare archive footage that has been expertly and lovingly restored. 'Luckily for all of us, it wasn't enough for Leonard Bernstein to compose music and conduct orchestras. He felt equally compelled to talk about music - to try and explain what made it tick, what made it good, and what made it affect US in all the ways that music does. The other piece of good luck was that Leonard Bernstein and television came along at the same time. They were born for each other.' (Jamie Bernstein), the films on this DVD are taken from the 'Symphonic Twilight' series of TV programs made in the mid-Sixties that were the brainchild of Humphrey Burton, then the newly appointed Head of Music and Arts Programs for the BBC. In his booklet notes for this DVD, Burton reveals himself to have been instrumental in bringing Bernstein the conductor to the wider British public, who knew him foremost as the composer of West Side Story. In 1965 Burton persuaded Bernstein to conduct the LSO at the Royal Albert Hall and the resulting Mahler 8 was a spectacular occasion, broadcast to the nation. The following year, they put together these programs, filmed specifically for the new television audience. The works Bernstein chose to record are twentieth-century orchestral masterpieces, for which he is known to be a champion. His recordings of Sibelius's Fifth Symphony for CBS Records and Deutsche Grammophon were acclaimed by critics worldwide, and his interpretation of the Rite of Spring in 1959 elicited an enthusiastic 'Wow!' from Stravinsky himself! They are accompanied on this DVD by an in-depth interview, given here as a bonus and subtitled in French and German.

Russia’s two great ballet companies, the Bolshoi Ballet and the Kirov Ballet (now the Mariinsky) undertook their first major post-war tours in the early 1960s, exposing the West to the bravura and discipline of the Russian dancers for the first time. This DVD brings together performances by members of both companies, providing rare footage of some of the most brilliant dancers of their time. This is the first DVD released of this material.

Sergey Prokofiev: The Tale of the Stone Flower, Op. 118: Act I
Danila – Yuri Soloviev
Katerina – Alla Sizova
Mistress of Copper Mountain – Alla Osipenko
Severyan – Anatoli Gridin
Kirov Ballet
Royal Opera House Orchestra, Covent Garden
Niyazi, conductor
Yuri Grigorovich, choreographer
Recorded from the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden on July 1960

Pyot’r Ilyich Tchaikovsky: Swan Lake, Op. 20, Act II: Scene and pas de deux
Odette – Galina Ulanova
Prince Siegfried – Nicolai Fadeyechev
Bolshoi Ballet
Royal Opera House Orchestra, Covent Garden
Yuri Faier, conductor
Lev Ivanov and Alexander Gorsky, choreographer
Broadcast from the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden on 21 October 1956

Sergey Prokofiev: Cinderella, Op. 87, Act II: Cinderella and the Prince at the ball
Cinderella – Raisa Struchkova
The Prince – Mikhail Lavrovsky
Bolshoi Ballet
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Alexander Kopylov, conductor
Algis Zhuraitis, conductor
Rostislav Zakharov, choreographer

Adolphe Adam: Giselle, Act II: Giselle and Albrecht
Giselle – Ekaterina Maximova
Prince Albrecht – Maris Liepa
Bolshoi Ballet
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Alexander Kopylov, conductor
Algis Zhuraitis, conductor
Jean Coralli and Jules Perrot, choreographer

Aram Khatchaturian: Gayaneh, Act IV: Gayaneh and Armen
Gayaneh – Nina Timofeyeva
Armen – Nikolai Fadeyechev
Bolshoi Ballet
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Alexander Kopylov, conductor
Algis Zhuraitis, conductor
Nina Anisimova, choreographer

Ludwig Minkus: Don Quixote, Act I: Kitri and Basilio
Kitri – Maya Plisetskaya
Basilio – Vladimir Vasiliev
Bolshoi Ballet
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Alexander Kopylov, conductor
Algis Zhuraitis, conductor
Alexander Gorsky, choreographer
Recorded from 26–30 July 1963

Picture format: NTSC 4:3 B/W
Sound format: Enhanced Mono
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Running time: 81 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

Available for the first time since original broadcast!

R E V I E W:

All of a sudden, Charles Munch's star seems to be once again in the ascendant. Sony has recently reissued a swathe of his RCA back catalogue on its new Sony Originals label, including his Debussy orchestral works and his recordings of the Dvorák and Walton cello concertos with Piatigorsky. Coming soon in April is an eight disc box set on RCA Classical Masters that brings together recordings of Brahms, Schubert, Schumann and Mendelssohn symphonies and other orchestral works … and at a ridiculously low price. Meanwhile, the new independent label, ICA Classics, has brought to market three DVDs of Munch in concert with his Boston Symphony Orchestra. This Beethoven DVD and its companions (a DVD of Debussy and Ravel, and a DVD of Franck, Faure and Wagner) capture live broadcasts that have not been seen since they first went to air in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
 
I have always been in two minds about Munch's Beethoven. His Boston Beethoven 9 for RCA - one of those new Sony Originals reissues - 88697702992 - is one of my favourite recordings of the work. It is unsubtle, oddly up close and spotlit and never plumbs the depths of piano let alone pianissimo, but it is absolutely thrilling from first note to last and very moving. His Beethoven 5, however, is one of the most enduring disappointments of my CD collection. I pull it out every year or so to see if this time I will find something magical in the performance, and each year I hear scrappy and dynamically flat orchestral playing and an interpretation lacking in nuance.
 
What a delight it was, then, to listen to and watch the performance of the 5 ^th that closes this DVD. Here is the Munch reading I had been listening for in vain: a dramatic and rhetorical performance; a performance that builds inexorably towards the final peroration; a performance of contrast held together by flexible but fundamentally solid tempi; a performance abounding in spontaneous touches, like the extra space and freedom he affords his oboist, Ralph Gomberg, for his solo in the first movement. It is wonderful to hear, and also great fun to watch Munch's facial expressions and the way his baton drops when the dynamics do so that he seems to be conducting with shoulder movements rather than the invisible stick that is beating time around his knees.
 
As good as the 5 ^th is, it is the 4 ^th that for me is the highlight here. Munch cuts an unexpectedly dour figure in the adagio introduction to the first movement of the Fourth Symphony. If it weren't for the expansive baton strokes and the white hair, you could almost believe you were watching Fritz Reiner. The allegro ignites, and Munch seems himself once more. Is it a trick of the lens, or is his baton bent a little towards its tip? My goodness, he does shake it about a bit in the allegros! Beethoven's games with rhythm in this symphony are right up Munch's street. His knack of pushing a performance forward and building momentum suits this symphony beautifully. There is a bounce and swagger to the third movement that you just won't hear elsewhere and the finale fizzes.
 
The music from Beethoven's Prometheus ballet is an interesting inclusion. The liner-notes make much of the fact that Munch hardly ever played this music, so the conductor's most ardent admirers will no doubt need to acquire this DVD to round out their collected discographies. The Overture receives a scintillating performance, right from the whip-crack of the opening staccato chords. I was less impressed by the other two selections from the ballet, though the adagio shows off the orchestra's flute, bassoon, cello and harp. The mono sound does their magnificent playing full justice.
 
The picture quality of the monochrome source tapes is variable. The Prometheus footage has a tendency to fog and fish bowl curvature. The opening of the Fourth Symphony is disfigured by static lines. The camera work itself is conventional, but the editing strikes a fair balance between footage of the orchestra and the man on the podium. Fortunately the mono sound is clear and carries fair detail. Only at the close of the 5 ^th does the music sound a little cramped in its single channel.
 
Anyone with an interest in Munch and his magnificent Boston band will find this DVD fascinating.
 
-- Tim Perry, MusicWeb International

Arvids Jansons (1914-1984) was born in Liepaja on Latvia's west coast. He studied violin from 1929 until 1935 at the Conservatory of Liepaja, then composition and conducting (under Leo Blech) at the Conservatory of Riga from 1940 until 1944 while working as a violinist at Riga Opera. In 1944 he was appointed conductor of Riga Opera, then of the Latvian Radio Orchestra (1947-1952). In 1952 he was appointed associate conductor of the Leningrad Philharmonic under Yevgeny Mravinsky and toured frequently with them, as well as with other Russian orchestras, to the UK and to the Continent from 1970 onwards. Jansons became principal guest conductor of Manchester's Hallé Orchestra in 1965 at the personal invitation of Sir John Barbirolli, who knew of Jansons as an expert orchestral conductor but a genius in the rehearsal studio. It was in Manchester that Jansons collapsed and died from a heart attack in 1984 while conducting a concert with the Hallé. Arvids was the father of Mariss Jansons (1943-2019).

Sir Adrian Boult began his long association with the music of Vaughan Williams in 1918 when he conducted A London Symphony, earning praise from the composer. Boult's commitment to the symphony, which he described as very near to his heart, never wavered, and he conducted it over 60 times from the 1918 concerts right through to 1973. The Daily Telegraph described Boult's conducting of this performance from the 1971 Proms as 'quietly authoritative.. which held one's attention throughout'. Martin Cotton, in his booklet note, states that the performance is closer to his 1952 recording when the composer was present with a greater sense of flow than his EMI recording of the same year. The fill-ups of Butterworth's A Shropshire Lad from 1971 and Moeran's Sinfonietta from 1963 are testimony to Boult's deep engagement with British music, which remained strong throughout his career.

This outstanding performance of Mahler’s Sixth Symphony formed part of Hartmut Haenchen’s Mahler Cycle with the La Monnaie Symphony Orchestra. Haenchen is renowned and respected for his interpretations of Mahler and Wagner and has had a significant presence in many of the world’s leading opera houses. An expressive and dramatic rendition of the Tragische, Haenchen’s high intellect and musical integrity are apparent. The recording also benefits from DTS 5.1 surround sound.

The ICA Classics Live series features performances from ICA’s own artists recorded in prestigious venues around the world. The majority of the recordings are enjoying their first commercial release.

MOZART Piano Concertos: No. 20 in d, K 466; No. 15 in B?, K 450 • Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli (pn); Antoine de Bavier, cond; Stuttgart RSO • ICA 5103 (54:24) Live: Ludwigsburg 7/11/1956


Michelangeli’s Mozart is often criticized for having the same flaws as many of his other recordings: His playing is controlled, perhaps for some over-controlled to the point of being static in conception; his tempos are extreme, slower than normal in the middle movements, faster than most in the outer ones; he is free with rhythms in certain places, perhaps more so in the cadenzas than elsewhere (I have little problem with this detail in these areas in particular). Some would call him cold, a surface performer who glosses over the true spirit of this music. But it is difficult to judge harshly a performer who is so very polished in his interpretation. Even if Michelangeli were not only in his mid-30s at the time of these readings, one would be hard-pressed to call these performances cold. Perhaps even more importantly, these readings took place in the 1950s, when every composer was still seen through 19th-century eyes in some way or another; the “informed” practice of the second half of the century was soon to begin—the research into original instrumentation, dynamics, articulation, etc.


When listening to Michelangeli’s Mozart as performed at Ludwigsburg, one is struck more by the forward-propelled, one might even say Beethovenian, momentum of his playing. In the D-Minor Concerto, it is the latter composer’s oft-played cadenzas, which Michelangeli has also chosen to perform. In his hands the entire work seems momentous, from the very first low orchestral grumblings of the opening movement, through the lyrical at times, stormy at others, Romanze , to the virtuosic and flighty finale. Michelangeli performs as expected: His tone is always beautiful and rounded, his scales and arpeggios are crystal clear, his control of dynamic shading and nuances is awe-inspiring; but even more importantly his energy is palpable as is his sense of danger. One sits on the edge of one’s seat when listening to this Mozart. The B?-Major Concerto, K 450, was one of the pianist’s favorites. This reading is filled with some of the best of the qualities of the D Minor, though here some of those negative complaints heaped upon the performer seem more justified: The tempo in the opening movement is too fast. There are moments which just sound rushed; the rhythmic quirks are evident from the very opening—initiated by the orchestra, these are later echoed by the soloist. Yet for all the flaws, there are moments which are just magical: the gorgeous opening trills of the cadenza, and even more so the dance-like lift the pianist gives to the second subject just a few moments later; the simple yet sincere way the forces play the second movement, especially the wonderful sense of dialogue they maintain throughout. And if one requires technical perfection for any of Mozart’s finales, it would certainly be this one—one of the most difficult of his concertos. Michelangeli is not one to disappoint.


If one requires Mozart to sound the way a Brendel, a Schiff, or a Perahia would perform these works, then one should look towards those other performers; but if one is open to a variety of approaches, then this Michelangeli will supplement one’s collection nicely—to me the very best Mozart that the pianist ever committed to disc (forget the old EMI or DG recordings)! Though the sound is still somewhat primitive and the orchestra a bit stiff in certain places, these are, regardless, performances to cherish.


FANFARE: Scott Noriega

Leinsdorf belatedly enters the select list of the greatest Tchaikovsky performances on record.

The previous Leinsdorf offering in this series had a very good-to-fine Schubert 9, an even finer Schumann 4 and a wonderful Wagner “Good Friday Music”. However much you enjoyed it, I should think that only those present in the Boston Symphony Hall on 15 April 1969 could be fully prepared for the impact of the present resuscitation.
 
The first pleasant surprise that the material is in colour, even if definition is not up to modern standards. The second is that Leinsdorf, who was usually seen – before and after 1969 – without a baton and said in a late interview that he felt freer to mould the music expressively with just his hands – marches on with a longish baton and seems accustomed to wielding it. Richard Dyer, whose eye-witness notes continue to be such a valuable feature of this series, makes no mention of this. It would be interesting to know more about Leinsdorf’s use and non-use of the baton.
 
But all this pales before the fact that this sometimes austere and pedantic conductor is on truly inspired and inspiring form, conducting with total involvement. This doesn’t mean that it’s all fast and loud: the Beethoven goes at a good but not excessive pace and there is plenty of expressive weight to the introduction. The wind phrases in the allegro are beautifully turned and the coda truly blazes.
 
Leinsdorf’s Beethoven is a known factor. If it wasn’t always this good, I suppose it doesn’t need a lot of imagination to see that, on the right day, it could be. But his Tchaikovsky?
 
Leinsdorf only recorded one Tchaikovsky Symphony commercially, the Sixth with the Los Angeles Philharmonic some years before his Boston appointment. I’ve never heard this, nor have I ever seen it spoken of with bated breath. Whereas the internet grapevine has been shouting excitedly about this Fifth ever since somebody posted an incomplete sound-only version, as Richard Dyer relates. I can well understand those internet commentators who say they’ll never listen to their other discs of the work now this is available, or one who actually heard it at the time and has been unable to find a performance to match it – not even Mravinsky – ever since.
 
On the face of it, Leinsdorf doesn’t “do” anything particular with the music. The introduction is brooding but also purposeful – he notes that it is “andante” not “adagio” and one senses a great latent power behind waiting to be unleashed. His “Allegro con anima” does not sidle in slowly, gaining speed later, he sets an up-front tempo straight away. It will sound very fast to some listeners. But this is his tempo, so the first crescendo is not accompanied by an accelerando and the hammering passages go at about the “normal” speed. Nor does he deviate from this tempo, except where Tchaikovsky actually requests a slower pace for the second subject. Leinsdorf plays this with great tenderness and free rubato, even risking some less precise ensemble. On paper, this might sound like one of Leinsdorf’s dogmatic demonstrations, and if he had subsequently taken the performance into the studio I fear it might have turned into just that. I must emphasize that here everything is white-hot and convinces as a free expression of emotions.
 
So, too, does the slow movement. The tempo is pretty steady but there is a sense of free-soaring passion which completely effaces any sense of the four-square. The waltz has an elegance which does not prevent exploitation of its darker moments while the finale carries all before it. The coda has an air of crude triumph presaging Mahler. Audience reaction is rightly rapturous and even Leinsdorf manages some smiles. It looks as though the Bostonians learnt to love Leinsdorf just as he was on his way out.
 
I haven’t ventured to compare this with other favourites. Once the initial impact has worn off I cannot believe that performance by such as Mravinsky or Markevich, which have provided inspiration to generations (and to me) can be wholly and eternally eclipsed. The case still remains for a cooler, more brooding approach, notably provided – in very primitive sound – by Landon Ronald. At the opposite extreme, the capacity of late Celibidache to bend your internal clock and suspend disbelief at his time-dilations is not to be dismissed either. What I am quite sure of is that Leinsdorf has belatedly entered the select list of the greatest Tchaikovsky performances on record.
 
Back to batonless Leinsdorf in black and white for the Mozart bonus. He puts on an incredibly autocratic face with black looks all round. Those used to modern Mozart will gasp at the fullness of the first attack, yet there is lilt as well as majesty, and delicacy later on, Leinsdorf shaping the music with crisp finger-movements.
 
An interesting filler, perhaps. But don’t miss the Tchaikovsky on any account.
 
-- Christopher Howell, MusicWeb International

LEINSDORF CONDUCTS BEETHOVEN AND TCHAIKOVSKY

Ludwig van Beethoven: Egmont, Op. 84: Overture
Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 5 in E minor, Op. 64

Boston Symphony Orchestra
Erich Leinsdorf, conductor

Recorded at Symphony Hall, Boston, 15 April 1969

Bonus:
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Serenade No. 9 in D major, K. 320, "Posthorn": II. Menuetto: Allegretto

Recorded at Sanders Theatre, Harvard University, 15 January 1963

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: Enhanced Mono
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Menu language: English
Booklet notes: English, French, German
Running time: 57 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

Just prior to the Second World War, Sir Adrian single-handedly built the BBC Symphony Orchestra into a world-renowned ensemble. This live 1975 Proms performance of Brahms's Symphony No.4 has never been issued before. It has been recorded in stereo and fully captures the 'Indian summer' that Boult enjoyed at the Proms and in the studio with EMI at the time.

Herbert von Karajan and the Philharmonia Orchestra sometimes had a tense working relationship, especially during the period of their US tour in the autumn of 1955 and the beginning of their European one in January 1956. Yet, as these live broadcasts repeatedly demonstrate, that tension resulted in music-making of astonishing power, scorching intensity and unrivalled beauty. The tensions became a trend in Karajan’s later career, too. It happened with the Vienna Philharmonic at Salzburg in the mid-1960s, and it happened again towards the very end of his tenure with the Berlin Philharmonic, but rarely were the results as magical as those he achieved in the 1950s with the Philharmonia.

Karajan and Tchaikovsky have never struck me as particularly suited to one another (all of his studio recordings have, in one way or another, left me wondering if he really understood the music). And this really goes to the root of the Karajan problem for many listeners: There are two Karajans, one bound to the precisions of the recording studio, the other completely – and unidiomatically – improvising on the concert platform. I find many live Karajan performances to have such a deep sense of inner conflict it is almost impossible to take any one performance out of the context of what preceded it, and this is certainly true of the 1955 Tchaikovsky Fourth we have here. We do not have the Sibelius Fourth which came before it, but the turbulence, urgency, passion and drama of the Tchaikovsky are uncommonly vivid; it is a performance that is as much about the composer as it is about the conductor.

Karajan struggled with Sibelius’s Fourth throughout his career (indeed, he rarely programmed the symphony), and the only live recording I have ever heard of him doing the work (in January 1978, released on Fachmann or, more readily available, on Palexa) is the most devastating and bleak performance imaginable (not unlike his remarkable Philharmonia studio recording of the work). Karajan drives the Philharmonia in the Tchaikovsky into quite dark territory – climaxes are more like moments of crisis, the instrumental narrative seems closer to a psychological confession, and though there is much beauty to the phrasing and playing, it is so taut and angular as if the music has been stitched together with razor wire. There are eruptions in this performance that are dazzling, and the virtuosity is just on the side of effortless. It is fluid, yet volcanic, without sounding mannered as Karajan sometimes could be under studio conditions. And the improvisation he manages is replicated by players who are given the space to phrase their notes with genuine character, though the interpretation is not for one moment stretched out or slow. One can certainly listen to this Tchaikovsky Fourth on its own terms, though given how radically different it is to any of his studio recordings, how much darker and more tragic it sounds, the bleakness of the unknown Sibelius hangs over Karajan’s performance of it like none other by this conductor, in my view. It is absolutely compelling, and shattering.

The Philharmonia were always exceptional in French music – and the Ravel which completes the first CD is ravishing. It is not just the precision of the playing which is so marvellous, it is the breath-taking quality of their dynamic range. The mezzo forte of the opening Prélude is beyond criticism, as are the gloriously muted strings of the Philharmonia. For a conductor who could sometimes seem passive and ambivalent about rhythm, the flamenco and Habanera are rather sensual, and the Feria is a joy.

The second CD of this set is given over to a Mozart concert from 6th February 1956, the last concert the Philharmonia gave with Karajan as part of their European Mozart bi-centenary tour. The ‘Haffner’ had opened the huge programme of three symphonies, which included the Tchaikovsky Fourth, back in July 1955, and here we have the work again, coupled with the great Clara Haskil in the K488 and Mozart’s ‘Jupiter’, a symphony which Karajan seemed to have abandoned in the studio during his late August 1953 recording sessions with the orchestra at Kingsway Hall (a Beethoven Fifth suffered a similar fate the same month). Karajan’s Mozart certainly could not be called HIP, though these Philharmonia performances are much less imposing than live recordings from either Berlin or Salzburg. This is not just because the sound of the Philharmonia is so much leaner, and more tensile; Karajan himself is much more flexible than he later became in Mozart. The K488 with Haskil, a pianist of extraordinary sensitivity, which in part was necessitated by her physical frailty, is intensely poetic – very different from the masculine, urbane recording that Karajan and the Philharmonia made with Gieseking in 1951. The two Mozart symphonies are both beautifully played, fleet enough with tempos to just escape sounding heavy.

These are important additions to Karajan’s Philharmonia discography, in more than tolerable sound. One sometimes has to remember that the Philharmonia Orchestra was principally founded to make recordings and concerts came a distant second. Karajan, it seems, only conducted the orchestra about a hundred times in concert (from 1948 to 1960) – less than twenty of those concerts being in London, and six at the Edinburgh Festival. The rest were conducted in Europe and the United States. Whilst a Don Juan, from Turin, and a Tallis Fantasia, from Naples, both from the October 1954 European tour exist, little else does. The Tchaikovsky we have here is stunning, the Haskil Mozart a minor miracle… but I do rather think one would have killed to get hold of a live Philharmonia/Karajan Sibelius Fourth too!

– MusicWeb International (Marc Bridle)

As winner of the inaugural Tchaikovsky Competition in 1958, Van Cliburn was lauded by the greats, including Shostakovich, Gilels and Sviatoslav Richter, who is said to have proclaimed 'he is a pianist, the others are not'. The three Chopin performances on this DVD were filmed by the BBC just one year later, when Cliburn was still very much in his prime. His performances of these three popular Chopin works exude controlled brilliance - grandeur and virtuosity without ostentation. Claudio Arrau, recognizable for his rich, sonorous tone and often described as 'Prince', 'Emperor', and 'King' of the keyboard, is an excellent companion to Cliburn on this DVD. Widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century, he was renowned for his definitive interpretations of almost every composer he engaged with, although he remains most celebrated for his Beethoven.

This performance of Elgar's Enigma Variations forms an historic account of the first concert Sir Georg Solti conducted as Chief conductor of the LPO in 1975. It is also the first DVD release with Solti performing Elgar's Symphony No.2. Solti, who prepared new works by listening to Elgar's own recordings, identified closely with his music. The virtuoso playing of the orchestra combined with his fresh, energetic approach make for an exciting, uplifting experience. The ICA Classics Legacy series presents a collection of historic performances by some of the world's greatest artists. These performances are released on DVD for the first time, incorporating rare archive footage that has been expertly and lovingly restored.

Edward Elgar:
Symphony No. 2 in E flat major, Op. 63
Variations on an Original Theme, Op. 36, "Enigma"

London Philharmonic Orchestra
Georg Solti, conductor

Recorded at the Royal Festival Hall, London, 13 February 1975
(Symphony No. 2), and 25 September 1979 (Enigma)

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: LPCM Mono
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Menu language: English
Running time: 84 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

The combination of Karajan and the Vienna Philharmonic playing Mozart and Bruckner drew a “packed and raving audience” according to The Guardian. (ICA Classics)

Piano enthusiasts drawn to Shura Cherkassky's charismatic and capricious artistry will find the previously unpublished Cologne radio broadcasts contained on this release both valuable and fascinating. A 1970 Rachmaninov Paganini Rhapsody reveals Cherkassky's generally lyrical approach to the piano part, and his fondness for spontaneous dynamic inflections and rounding off phrases. For the most part, tempos are slow to the point of sedate (Variations 12 through 14 particularly drag), although there are moments when the performance perks up and Cherkassky's cream-coated filigree becomes energized, such as in Variation 15 and the group of four following the famous Variation 18. I suspect that the overly resonant acoustic contributes to the performance's less than incisive impression.

The solo selections date from between 1951 and 1953 and include a relaxed yet compelling, individually shaped Prokofiev Seventh sonata (a work Cherkassky otherwise did not record) that markedly differs from Horowitz's driving intensity. Cherkassky apparently coached Stravinsky's Three Scenes from Petrushka with the composer, yet I've never been convinced by the pianist's slow and clunky way with the Danse Russe, although his soft pedal effects throughout the Shrove-Tide Fair add appreciable color and character to a movement that others play with more bravura and power.

However, the Rachmaninov Polka de V.R. and Rameau/Godowsky Tambourin show off Cherkassky's tonal palette at its best, along with his scampering élan and effortless passagework in Chabrier's Bourée fantasque, another work new to the pianist's discography. For Cherkassky fans, the Prokofiev and Chabrier alone are worth the price of this disc.

--Jed Distler, ClassicsToday.com

Breathtaking pianism from Gilels: Tchaikovsky's Concerto No. 2 is titanic and tender by turns, and his opening phrase of Beethoven Four is near-miraculous. - BBC Music (ICA Classics)

The Quartetto Italiano is regarded as one of the finest string quartets of the twentieth century. They were formed officially in 1945. By the early 1950s, they had achieved a measure of international celebrity, and by the 1960s the ensemble had developed a world-class reputation. Here we have some rare BBC live performances from 1965 given in the Royal Festival Hall. They are recorded in excellent stereo and issued for the very first time.

Recorded in 1971 the film on this DVD is taken from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra's appearance at the Edinburgh Festival in the same year: their first ever concert outside America. This is the first release of this material on DVD and is the first in a series of Sir Georg Solti/CSO releases to come from ICA Classics to celebrate Solti's centenary.

Evgeny Svetlanov's was a masterly conductor of of Russian and non-Russian composers of the late-Romantic era. The Brahms is both powerful and mellifluous, superbly played by the LSO. The Debussy has tension from the start, combining colour, sensitivity and transparency. The bonus consists of Janet Baker singing the final song from Chausson's Poeme de l'amour et de la mer. The Brahms and Debussy are previously issued. Recorded at Royal Festival London, 1975.

The performance of Tchaikovsky's Symphony No.1 in April 2002 with the BBCSO was the last concert he gave before his death two months later. Svetlanov's studio made Tchaikovsky recordings with the USSR Symphony Orchestra for Melodiya in the 1960's were the cornerstones of the catalogue at the time and he brings an unqualified authority to the Barbican concert recorded here. Svetlanov's account of Stravinsky's Firebird is superbly detailed and imaginative with the Philharmonia in tremendous form. The digital sound recorded in the Barbican for both performances is totally natural and warm. These live recordings are issued for the first time on CD.