Includes work(s) by various composers. Soloist: Gundula Janowitz.

MOZART Violin Concerto No. 5. 1 SHOSTAKOVICH Violin Concerto No. 1 2 • David Oistrakh (vn); Evgeny Mravinsky, cond; Leningrad PO • ORFEO 736 081, mono (64: 06) Live: Vienna 6/21/1956; 1 6/23/1952 2


Gottfried Kraus’s booklet notes point out that although Oistrakh had appeared in Russian-controlled Vienna after WW II, the concerts in June 1956 marked the debut of the Leningrad Philharmonic there. (Fortunately, the engineers captured these in crisp, surprisingly realistic recorded sound.) Yehudi Menuhin had earlier played Mozart’s Third and Fourth Concertos, and Oistrakh followed with the Fifth. He had already recorded it with Kondrashin in 1947 and with Konwitschny in 1954 (and he would commit it to disc once again, toward the end of his career, in 1970, playing with, and conducting, the Berlin Philharmonic). He also played the Concerto with the New York Philharmonic under Mitropoulos when he visited the United States in 1956. If this live performance in Vienna represents Oistrakh as edgier than he usually sounds (as Kraus points out in the notes), his reading hardly lacks sensitivity or his identifiable tonal intensity. Neither the first movement and its cadenza (by Joachim) nor the second movement takes any prisoners: they’re straightforward and even matter-of-fact, yet without giving an impression that the soloist remained aloof from either the music or the audience. And he introduced a special poignancy into the second movement’s middle section—a poignancy enhanced by the sumptuous, detailed orchestral accompaniment. He’s elegant in the movement proper and piquantly energetic in the finale’s Turkish episode.


The recording of Shostakovich’s First Concerto falls halfway between those with Mitropoulos and the New York Philharmonic on January 2, 1956 (the even more exciting live Western premiere from the night before has also been available from time to time), and the performance with Mravinsky and the Leningrad Philharmonic on November 30th of the same year. Oistrakh, then approaching the age of 50, communicated haunting mystery in the first movement, caustic mordancy in the second, probing profundity in the third, virtuosic strength in the cadenza, and breathtaking energy in the finale—all in benchmark proportions that still haven’t been quite equaled (in fact, they don’t mix with quite the same success in his later live performance with his son Maxim and the New Philharmonia from November 20, 1972—he’d record it again, for the last time, I believe, with the same orchestra five days later—when Oistrakh had already entered his sixties). In general, the live performance from Vienna sounds especially elegant and lavish in suggestivity in the first movement. The engineers don’t seem to have brought as much definition to the lower strings as would Columbia or, later, the Russian engineers in the November studio recording. The Scherzo seems more burly and massive than its cousins in other performances, while in the Passacaglia, Oistrakh gives the impression of heightened intensity. The cadenza and finale really break away, growing almost frightening in their ferocity (if this finale, in particular, can sound flippant even in vintage Oistrakh performances, it certainly doesn’t do so here).


For live performances of some of Oistrakh’s most characteristic repertoire, as well as for documentary significance, Orfeo’s release deserves a very high recommendation. It might have been an urgent one had the recorded sound provided clearer definition.


FANFARE: Robert Maxham

Wolfgang Sawallisch is known throughout the world and especially in his birthplace as a paragon among his generation of conductors and musicians, exemplifying a former world of music. After a thorough music education and a firm grounding in the art of conducting operas he soon began to assume more elevated positions on the music scene. The extent of his success in the 1950s was so great and indeed so rapid that by 1957 he was given the privilege of conducting at Bayreuth.

That said, the most decisive period of his career was probably from 1971 to 1992, when he enjoyed huge success with the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, both in the city and worldwide. He was initially appointed General Music Director, and in 1982 was promoted to State Opera Director. It was in the Bavarian capital that he expanded his role as a highly diversified, top-notch musical director.

His wide-ranging, active repertoire was founded on three mighty “pillars”, namely Mozart, Wagner and Strauss, each of them very safe in his hands. One of his legendary achievements is his complete cycle of Wagner’s operas, a feat he achieved in 1983, and the Orfeo catalogue includes excerpts from the first of Wagner’s operas – Die Feen, Das Liebesverbot and Rienzi – which are now acknowledged as benchmark recordings.

It is well known that Sawallisch was an excellent pianist who would play chamber music or accompany singers from time to time, and the Orfeo catalogue features Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Hermann Prey, Bernd Weikl and the very first Orfeo album of all: Schubert Lieder with Margaret Price. Recently released excerpts from Don Giovanni and Così are proof that he was capable in the 1970s of conducting fiery Mozart performances, while his Puccini and Rossini recordings are testimony to his mastery of the Italian repertoire. What is more, the Orfeo catalogue contains several digital studio recordings of symphonic repertoire by Bruckner, Pfitzner and Weber as well as the Brahms Requiem, interestingly featuring the “colleagues” from the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. Orfeo now releases a compilation of these recordings as a tribute to Sawallisch to mark his 95th birthday.

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Select excerpts of reviews accorded previously released volumes included in this set:

Bruckner: Symphony No 5


Bruckner’s Fifth has received more lousy performances than any of his symphonies, and accordingly few great ones. The best, for my money, remain Gielen (Intercord), Abbado (DG), Skrowaczewski (Oehms), and Jochum II (EMI), but this may be the greatest of them all. It’s one of those performances where everything just goes right. The orchestra plays with true feeling for the idiom. The strings remain alert, giving life to their acres of tremolo and even the least interesting accompaniment. The brass sound distinct within their sections but blend beautifully in the chorales, and make a big sound that never turns crude.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday

Bruckner: Symphony No 1


Judicious balances, ideal pacing (especially in the not-too-slow Adagio), and an exciting finale all give the music a feeling of inevitability. You don’t ordinarily listen to Bruckner and admire his formal elegance, but you do here. This is one of the very best Bruckner Firsts around, and the essential place to start if you love the work.

-- David Hurwitz, ClassicsToday

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Orfeo has shown a strong commitment to releasing broadcasts given by Rafael Kubelík during his tenure as chief conductor of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra. The repertoire has included Bartók, Berlioz, Bruckner, Debussy (Pelléas et Mélisande), Handel, Hartmann, Orff, Smetana and a slew of Beethoven and Dvorák. This 3-CD box of mono broadcasts amplifies his reportorial strengths in the case of two of these composers and adds Mendelssohn and Schumann. All recordings were made between 1960 and 1963.

The Schumann Cello Concerto (April 1961) with János Starker does indeed possess, as booklet writer Rob Cowan notes, intriguing little bends of the line in the opening paragraphs and the malleable flexibility of the soloist’s phrasing is very notable here. In fact it’s somewhat unusual, as his studio inscriptions with Giulini and Skrowaczewski are rather straighter in that respect. The expressively weighted caesurae and the natural-sounding but intense rubati all attest to a strong collaborative rapport between Starker and Kubelík. Starker is quite forwardly balanced which accentuates the taut and focused tone, sometimes a touch nasal. The oasis of the slow movement, beautifully played, is followed by witty exchanges in the finale between the supple wind players, and a fine cadenza. This first CD also contains two of Haydn’s London Symphonies. No.101 was given in May 1963, No.102 being part of the same Schumann Cello Concerto concert. Both have warmly moulded opening slow introductions with droll characterisation in the Menuets, the one in Symphony No.101 in particular possessing a lively quotient of pesante phrasing and articulation. The slow movement of No.102 is perhaps even more affectionately spun than the companion symphony but both finales are full of elegance and fluency. I tend to associate Kubelik more with Haydn’s choral music – the Seasons, Creation and St Cecilia Mass (all in Orfeo’s live series) – but he proves a fine interpreter of the symphonic music.

The second disc observes symmetry by giving us Schumann’s Piano Concerto, with one of its most adhesive adherents, Claudio Arrau. This comes from the same concert as Haydn’s Symphony 101. Arrau’s playing marries his famously big, powerful tone with lashings of virtuosity. The later heaviness that could mire some of his performances is not apparent here, and he plays with purposeful and often fiery poetry. The cadenza is very much a case in point. Perhaps, unlike Starker, he is not quite as amenable to inflective novelty in his collaboration with Kubelík – the pianist remains the dominant personality - but it’s a fine performance nevertheless. It’s followed by the Rhenish Symphony (September 1962), which he recorded commercially in Munich. It receives a well-sprung, lively reading with an especially effective slow movement. It won’t efface memories of Giulini’s later LAPO recording but adds materially to the portfolio of the Czech conductor’s live Schumann on disc.

There’s not a huge amount of Kubelík’s Mendelssohn on disc which makes this live Hebrides overture from January 1962 and the Reformation Symphony from October 1963 valuable. He is very responsive to the elemental terracing of dynamics in the Hebrides and directs a powerful, prayerful, intensely sculpted Fifth Symphony. The orchestra’s sonority remains warm throughout the various choirs, but there’s no lack of momentum when required. As ever with Kubelík, it’s of the flexible kind, not least in the poignantly expressive Andante. Stern collectors may well ask how many different versions of Firkušný’s Dvo?ák Piano Concerto one needs. It was a work he recorded multiply in the studio. Other live accounts exist in addition to this February 1960 account. In fact this Cologne broadcast was made close in time to his studio Westminster recording. As so often, he performs the Kurz edition. If there is nothing especially revealing here, that’s because the pianist was so consistently outstanding an exponent of the work and so closely identified with it. His fellow countryman brings a powerful orchestral palette to bear, and that is certainly worth considering. The piano sound is for me just a touch recessed but it doesn’t spoil enjoyment of a markedly successful reading.

The re-mastering has been accomplished most sympathetically, and Orfeo’s latest release to celebrate Kubelík’s art can itself be very warmly commended.

– MusicWeb International (Jonathan Woolf)

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The artistic breakthrough of the pianist Van Cliburn came in 1958 when he won the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow in his early 20s. It was also a political sensation, coming as it did in the midst of the Cold War, and his recording of Tchaikovsky’s First Piano Concerto later sold millions of copies. Van Cliburn had begun to play the piano at the age of four and later attended the famous Juilliard School in New York. After Moscow he was soon invited to the world’s big concert halls, as for example in 1964 to give a solo recital at the Salzburg Festival (his one and only ever performance there).

There, as ever, he demonstrated a fully developed technique and a unique art of interpretation, offering an impetuous programme that ranged from Beethoven’s Appassionata Sonata via Chopin’s b-minor Sonata op. 58 to the less well-known Sonata op. 26 by Samuel Barber. Two years before his Salzburg debut, Van Cliburn had organized the first “Van Cliburn International Piano Competition” in Fort Worth in Texas, which has since become an important first step in the career of many young pianists. Van Cliburn performed less in public from the 1970s onwards, but occasionally returned to the limelight and in 2003 was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the USA’s highest civilian honour. He died in Fort Worth on 27 February 2013.

MAHLER Das Lied von der Erde. SCHUBERT Symphony No. 4 • Rafael Kubelík, cond; Hilde Rössel-Majdan (mez); Waldemar Kmentt (ten); Vienna Phil • ORFEO 820102, mono (2 CDs: 90:22) Live: Salzburg 8/30/1959


This taped concert comes from the archives of Salzburg’s summer festivals, which hold a rich treasure trove of historical opera and orchestral performances. Rafael Kubelík, who, of course, enjoyed a long association with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, taped a later, stereo Das Lied in a 1970 live performance with the orchestra joined by Janet Baker and the same tenor as on the present recording, Waldemar Kmentt. Unfortunately, I don’t have that version, so I can’t tell you how it compares to this 1959 performance; and though it was released on Audite in 2002, I don’t find a review of it in the Fanfare Archive. There also exists on a two-CD EMI Seraphim set a recording of Schubert’s Fourth Symphony with Kubelík and the Vienna Philharmonic, but it’s not coupled with the Mahler, and I don’t know if it’s the same performance that’s on this disc or not.


I’ll begin with the Schubert since it occupies the whole of disc 1. If you’re not mono-averse, this is a wonderful performance of the 19-year-old composer’s score to add to your collection of more recent versions. Kubelík commands a disciplined unanimity from the Vienna players that I don’t hear in either Kertész’s or Muti’s recordings with the orchestra. The first movement, taken without its exposition repeat of course, is articulated very cleanly and goes at a quite sufficiently brisk tempo. There’s a tendency, I think, among modern conductors, especially of the period-instrument persuasion, to take this movement hell-bent-for-leather. True, Schubert qualified his Allegro with a vivace , but he didn’t halve the 4/4 meter to cut time. The Andante is lovingly shaped. The Menuetto, if a little heavy-footed, is not so swift that it loses its dance character altogether. And the concluding Allegro, which Schubert did specify in cut time, goes like the wind. This is a very nice performance and the recorded sound is quite respectable.


Dedicated Mahlerites will naturally find their interest drawn more to Kubelík’s Das Lied von der Erde . I will tell you first that I was amazed by the presence and depth (front-to-back, as opposed to left-right) dimensionality of the sound. One barely notices that the recording is in mono let alone misses the stereo aspect.


Second, though as stated, I’ve not heard Waldemar Kmentt’s later team-up with Kubelík, Baker, and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the tenor’s voice in this earlier performance is in absolutely prime estate. His “Das Trinklied” emerges effortlessly with full, rounded tone, and not a hint of forcing or discomfort on the highest notes.


Third, with regard to the mezzo numbers—“Der Einsame im Herbst,” “Von den Schönheit,” and the concluding pages of “Der Abschied”—I do have Janet Baker with James King and Haitink leading the Concertgebouw, and here’s the good news and the bad. The good news is that Hilde Rössel-Madjan’s mezzo-soprano comes from somewhere down deep, more contralto-ish than mezzo-ish, which suits Mahler’s music better, I think, than Baker’s slightly lighter-toned voice. The bad news is that Rössel-Madjan’s projection and diction sound somewhat muffled and mushy, almost as if, from time to time, she’s singing with a dishrag stuffed in her mouth. I’m going to give her the benefit of the doubt by casting aspersions on the acoustics of Salzburg’s Festpielhaus and/or the microphone pickup, which seem to have been kinder to Kmentt.


Finally, the Vienna Philharmonic plays Mahler’s score as if each individual player knew Mahler personally, which, in 1959 when this performance took place, some of them, no doubt, probably had. But for those not old enough at the time for primary contact, they would have come to know Mahler through his emissary Bruno Walter, who had led the orchestra seven years before Kubelík in one of the all-time classic performances of Das Lied with Kathleen Ferrier and Julius Patzak, a recording originally released (and still available) on Decca and since recycled on at least a couple of labels I’m aware of, Opus Kura and Regis.


For dedicated Mahler fans, there’s no question but that Kubelík’s Das Lied will be self-recommending, even though it is a bit spoiled for me by Rössel-Madjan’s marred vocal production, which, as noted, may not have been her fault. In any case, a worthy addition to the legacy of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde on record.


FANFARE: Jerry Dubins

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Surely one of the great Resurrections of our time.

It’s a matter of some regret that James Levine and RCA never completed their Mahler cycle, especially as this conductor is one of the finest Mahlerians around. Indeed, I’d suggest his recordings of the First and Third Symphonies - with the LSO and Chicago Symphony respectively - are among the most desirable in the catalogue. Thankfully, Sony-RCA have reissued the entire set, giving veterans the opportunity to re-evaluate these performance and new listeners the chance to discover them. And to complete the picture - well, almost - we now have this live Resurrection from Salzburg, with the incomparable Christa Ludwig in ‘Urlicht’.

From the first bars it’s clear this is going to be a tough, no-nonsense reading, made all the more visceral by the dry, close recording. Don’t expect the highest fi - editing is a little untidy, with a curious pre-echo reminiscent of LPs at the very start - but that hardly matters when the performance is as incisive as this. Levine doesn’t resort to expressive underlining, preferring instead to press ahead with astonishing clarity and precision. In many ways his approach reminds me of Jonathan Nott’s taut, propulsive version - - which was one of my picks for 2010. It couldn’t be further from the self-conscious, ill-conceived posturing of Stenz and Jurowski, two real let-downs among the recent crop of Mahler 2s.

Despite the relatively narrow soundstage, dynamics are well managed, although the timps are apt to crack like rifle shots and the cymbals are a tad reticent at times. But goodness, there’s a drive and passion to the music-making that brought an early attack of the goose-bumps, something normally reserved for the symphony’s closing pages. As for the downward figure at the end of the Allegro it’s on the slow side, but in the context of what’s gone before it sounds just right. Oddly, the engineers are slow to fade the audience noise, which continues for quite a while. As usual, the first movement is contained on a single disc.

The dance rhythms of the Andante are made to bounce and bend in a way that seems uniquely Viennese, although some listeners might want more schmalz than Levine allows. And despite the occasional imprecision, the Wiener Philharmoniker sound crisp and clean, pizzicato strings well articulated, the woodwinds and harp nicely caught; but, most important, the essential pulse is never lost. If there’s a downside, it’s that a degree of warmth and charm is sacrificed in the recording. Still, there’s a lightness of touch here, a directness of utterance, that’s hard to resist.

As for the strange Scherzo, Mahler’s danse macabre, it’s spookily done, rhythms winningly inflected and climaxes properly scaled. No empty rhetoric here, just a firm, unfussy grasp of the music’s architecture and a clear sense of its ultimate destination. And while that seismic shudder may sound a touch restrained it has a sense of proportion and rugged purpose. In that sense Levine’s is a somewhat ‘straight’, almost old-fashioned reading of this symphony, but that’s the way I like it. Indeed, it makes a refreshing change from the expressive liberties of, say, Bernstein and Tennstedt in this work.

We slide rather too quickly into ‘Urlicht’, Christa Ludwig’s distant star glowing in a vast, inky universe. At this point studio recordings tend to capture more nuance and loveliness - or an intrusive vibrato - so this swift rendition of ‘Primal light’ may seem less lustrous than most. That said, the orchestral supernova that follows is mighty, the brass and percussion emerging with a rare blend of grace and grandeur. And what a powerful sense of implacability there is in the build-up to the timp-led crescendi, what breadth in the passages that ensue. This performance simply grips me in a way that neither Stenz nor Jurowski does, Levine thrustful and thrilling at every turn.

The off-stage brass are certainly atmospheric, light vying with darkness in the prelude to that - very - hushed choral entry. There’s a shiver-inducing, ethereal quality to their singing that’s intensely moving, Levine coaxing the orchestra into some of the most radiant playing I’ve heard in ages. Battle and Ludwig are very well matched, if a little far back, but that simply adds to the otherworldly character of this unfolding drama. ‘Bereite dich’ is reverent rather than commanding, Levine gauging climactic strength to perfection. And even though the organ isn’t very prominent, this finale blossoms with a light that’s simply blinding.

This is a Resurrection of insight and honesty, eschewing all artifice and cutting to the very quick of this great symphony. It’s that rare thing, a genuinely transfiguring performance cast in the mould of Walter, Ormandy, Kubelik and Klemperer. And in a double centenary that’s yielded its fair share of disappointments, this recording will revive the spirits of those for whom it’s been a long and tiring journey.

Surely one of the great Resurrections of our time.

-- Dan Morgan, MusicWeb International

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There has been much speculation about the Art of Fugue, Johann Sebastian's unfinished work from his final decade. What would the ending of Fugue No. 19 have been? How would be the basic theme have been varied further, after all the multiplicity of variants that had gone before it? And what instrument(s) was it intended for? For one or more keyboard instruments, or even (since it is notated in score) a whole chamber music ensemble? Konstantin Lifschitz made a stir with his world première recording of his own piano solo version of an even later "late" work, the Musical Offering (on C 676 071), but he does not feel on the other hand that the Art of Fugue is "wholly a keyboard work (although it can be realized wonderfully on a keyboard). I myself can only perform it at a keyboard, and I can do it best on the piano". Today he is known across the world for his Bach interpretations (but by no means just for them). During his student days he played one or other of the fugues sporadically, either individually or in pairs. At that time, the Art of Fugue was never played entire in a single programme, let alone on the piano (though for Lifschitz, it is a work that really should be regarded as a single unit). Now a complete recording is finally available on CD. Lifschitz even performs the mirror fugues that until recently were regarded as unplayable by two hands (Bach had two players in mind). And thanks to the virtues of multi-track recording, he is also able to realize the four-part version of the three-part mirror fugue that Bach expressly intended for two players. The "Canon per Augmentationem in Contrariu Motu" is also offered in an earlier version too. In accordance with the tradition begun by the work's first publication, the recording closes with the chorale "Wenn wir in höchsten Nöten sein", BWV 668a, which Bach's closest family circle said he dictated in his final days. With such a "uniquely open" work such as the Art of Fugue, Konstantin Lifschitz cannot imagine there could ever be a single interpretation that would set the standard for all others. But whoever hears his new recording of this cycle cannot but reserve him a front-row seat among the candidates who might just set that very standard.

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