Classical Music

Wilhelm Backhaus realized the significance of the gramophone record early on, making his first solo recording in 1908 and going on to record many more, each tantamount to a live performance. These recordings, offered up here, represent the earliest ever recordings of works by composers like Mozart, Strauss, Chopin, Brahms, and Liszt.

5 PIANO SONATAS

BACKHAUS

"Essentially, in the incredible ease and naturalness of his pianism, in the unassuming simplicity and absorption of the man, Backhaus was much the same artist and personality then. And he was far from unknown. Even before he won the Rubinstein Prize in 1905, Backhaus was internationally celebrated as a prodigious virtuoso. [...] Backhaus never failed to win a succès d'estime among professional musicians. They always knew his qualities, always marveled at his instrumental perfection, his titanic mastery that scorned every complexity, his unsurpassed freedom and endurance. There was never a time when Backhaus could not toss off any or all of the Chopin études or the Brahms-Paganini variations with an imperturbable calm, an implacable security that left one open-mouthed. Not everyone, for only the pianists really knew what was happening before their eyes and ears, knew how to measure such achievement. There they all sat, in breathless astonishment and envy and despair. [...] Backhaus was a shy, unaffected, recessive personality whose sensational capacities were so unsensationally projected that lay audiences remained totally unconscious of his fabulous accomplishments." (Gerhard Melchert)

REVIEW:

This 10-CD box brings us not only concert recordings of works closely associated with him but also early piano roll and studio recordings, including the first complete recording of the Chopin Etudes and a variety of other short pieces.

Backhaus's technique has been praised by many critics, but his scintillating virtuosity in the shorter pieces on CDs 1 and 2 nevertheless came as a revelation to someone who mainly knows him from his later years. These are technical display pieces, and Backhaus plays them to the hilt.

The most impressive piano rolls are of two Liszt pieces (La Leggierezza and a Mendelssohn paraphrase) and of a very difficult arrangement of a Delibes waltz by Dohnanyi. The sparkling virtuosity here is breathtaking.

CD 3 has the 24 Chopin Etudes. They have been reissued repeatedly, but this was a nice opportunity to hear them again. They remain one of the best recordings of these challenging pieces, and the sound is quite good. Backhaus's seemingly effortless technical mastery without musical superficiality is spellbinding. He was the rare German pianist who excelled in Chopin.

The Beethoven sonatas on discs 6-8 come from two recitals: Carnegie Hall, 1954 (8, 25, 17, 26, 32), with four encores, and Carnegie Hall, 1956 (5, 14, 29), with four different encores.  The performances have all the hallmark qualities of Backhaus: They are unfussy, straightforward, and totally convincing.

Turning now to the major concertos, there are two recordings here of Beethoven's Fourth, one with the New York Philharmonic under Guido Cantelli (Carnegie Hall, 1956) and the other with the Suisse Romande under Ferenc Fricsay (Montreux, 1961). They are almost identical in their timing. The sound of the Cantelli recording is boxy, and piano and orchestra are tightly integrated. With Fricsay the sound is better, but the piano is more prominent, drawing attention to the soloist. Backhaus's well-nigh definitive interpretation exhibits superb phrasing, articulation, and dynamics, rhythmic precision, virtuosity without showiness, little rubato, and close coordination with the orchestra.

Not only has this collection been largely cobbled together from previous releases, but CDs 9 and 10 each have less than 40 minutes of music, so there could have been additional recordings of this splendid artist. I already mentioned one omission of information. Some Beethoven sonatas have numbers in the booklet, but others don't. Here a date is duplicated; there a track number is wrong. I wonder how reliable the dates are (see Mozart concerto above). But the booklet essay by Gerhard Melchert is good and includes photographs of the artist at different stages in his career as well as reproductions of newspaper articles and of personal notes or dedications from Brahms (when Backhaus was 10), Arthur Nikisch, Moriz Rosenthal, and Rachmaninoff.

. It struck me that Rachmaninoff and Backhaus have a lot in common. They had a superlative technique; they played serious major works as well as small showpieces (not Backhaus in his later years); their playing was unmannered and unsentimental, brilliant but never superficial; they played hardly any chamber music; they did not teach; and they were very private individuals (especially Backhaus, about whose private life little is known). There is a famous anecdote about Rachmaninoff who, when asked who he thought were the great living pianists, replied, "Well, there is Josef Hofmann and there is myself" and then fell silent. He should have added Backhaus.

-- American Record Guide (Bruno Repp)

Chopin: Etudes

BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas: No. 6 in F; No. 29 in B?, “Hammerklavier.” SCHUBERT Impromptu in B?, D 935/3 • Wilhelm Backhaus (pn) • ICA 5055 (62:35) Live: Bonn 9/24/1959


This recital features Wilhelm Backhaus (1884–1969) near the end of his long career. The German pianist was known throughout his lifetime for his interpretations of Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, and Mozart primarily, though it should not be forgotten that he was the first person ever to record the 24 Chopin etudes back in 1928. This recording remains a remarkable document of the ease of execution and the elegance of musical interpretation he shared with certain members of that generation of pianists. His technique was formidable in his heyday and—perhaps even more astonishing—it remained so to the very end of his career.


The opening of the “Hammerklavier” Sonata is a bit slow and heavy, but this soon gives way to a torrent of energy and an upsurge in tempo just a few bars later. Backhaus seems to want to show that each theme, each section, has its own character, which needs an adjustment in tempo to best bring that out. The pianist makes the most of the diverse musical sections in the sonata, from the fluid and graceful scalar passages in the first movement, which sound like shimmering silky waves made of delicate musical fabric in his hands, to the big chordal passages, which are powerful walls of sound that surround and engulf the listener. Backhaus has no qualms about enhancing the effect of certain of these latter passages by adding extra sonority in the bass parts—most often just doubling the octave. The slow movement, one of the most difficult and sublime in Beethoven’s oeuvre, is emotionally taxing to even the most seasoned performers. Backhaus intelligently chooses a flowing tempo: never so slow as to drag, but never too fast as to trivialize the music. The finale is taken at a brisk pace. There may be a few wrong notes here and there (albeit not very many), but his sense of pacing is thrilling: There is more than just a sense of danger; there is in his interpretations the conviction that regardless of the obstacles, he will triumph in the end. There is as much fire in this “Hammerklavier” as the best of them.


The other works on the recital are well played as well, the Schubert being particularly inspired. The gentle way in which the pianist caresses the instrument betrays the age in which he matured: This is elegant and lyrical, and Backhaus shows that though this composition is in the same key as Beethoven’s grandest essay for the piano, it is in character lightyears apart. The Beethoven F-Major Sonata is no minor work, and Backhaus gives it all the respect and love that he does the rest of the program. The opening movement is playful in that Haydnesque vein, the fugato finale lighthearted yet filled with Beethovenian determination and drive. The quirky middle movement is perhaps my favorite in the sonata, though. Backhaus revels in the mysterious opening phrases, lightening the path through the middle section, bringing the piece to a wistful end. It is three and a half minutes of pure bliss.


This is a remarkable recital, one that grows on you the more you listen to it—one captured in remarkable sound given its vintage. For a live recital, one should expect a few wrong notes here and there. Backhaus at 75 plays as few as I’ve ever heard in a riveting performance of the “Hammerklavier.” This is no lightweight rendering of the piece, either; this is one to remember. That said, I have a few other favorites: Richter, Gilels, Rudolf Serkin. The one that I come back to more than any other, though, is Peter Serkin (on Pro Arte). There is in his playing the soaring of spiritual heights along with a real sense of structural logic. The fugal finale is brisk, light, rhythmic—almost jazzy—in his hands. But Backhaus is a welcome addition to my collection. If you are a fan of the “Hammerklavier,” then this recording should be welcome to yours as well.


FANFARE: Scott Noriega

In cooperation with the International Mozarteum Foundation belvedere is publishing highlights of the Mozart Week from first beginnings until today. Contemporary history and the history of interpretation become audible on carefully restored sound documents in excellent sound quality. Moreover, the edition will also comprise current recordings from the Mozart Week and concerts throughout the season, using the most up-to-date recording and production techniques. The Mozart Week has taken place annually in Salzburg since 1956. Renowned artists have made their mark on this festival since its beginnings and created a distinct impact as regards interpretation, artistic analysis and musical performance. Concerts of the Mozart Week have been recorded on radio and television since the inauguration of the festival. The treasures in the archives of these concert recordings are now being reissued. The album "Wilhelm Backhaus plays Mozart" contains a recording of the pianist's recital from 1956, the 200th anniversary of Mozart's birth and also the year when the Mozart Week was founded, and recordings from the recital in 1967. It offers an interesting opportunity to compare Backhaus's interpretations and the implicit relationships Mozart's compositions. Wolfgang Schaufler writes: "We have to bear in mind that Backhaus worked closely with Hans Richter who conducted the first performances of some works by Brahms."

Instrumental concertos 1938-1940 After numerous large-scale symphonic productions Karl B�hm and the S�chsische Staatskapelle opened up a new genre in the fall of 1938 a new genre. From now on, more and more renowned instrumental instrumental soloists were brought to Dresden for recordings - an illustrious mix of world stars, some of whom who were guests in symphony concerts of the S�chsische Staatskapelle on several occasions, such as the pianists Wilhelm Backhaus, Edwin Fischer and Walter Gieseking, from newcomers such as the young violinist Wolfgang Schneiderhan and many more

As one of the great pianists of the 20th century, WILHELM BACKHAUS (1884–1969) needs no introduction. He recorded almost continuously from 1908 until his death, but this set, focusing on his earliest recordings, completes APR’s coverage (see also APR 6026, APR 6027 and APR 5637) of all his solo and concerto output for The Gramophone Company/HMV, except the electrically recorded Brahms titles, which are available elsewhere. These early discs reveal Backhaus as an exciting young virtuoso, rather than the sober purveyor of German classics he was to become.