Reviewed by RICHARD FREED, DAVID HALL, GEORGE JELLINEK, PAUL KRESH, STODDARD LINCOLN, ERIC SALZMAN
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
J. S. BACH: Cantata 80, Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott; Cantata 79, Gott, der Herr, ist Sonn' and Schild. Elly Ameling (soprano); Janet Baker (alto); Theo Altmeyer (tenor); Hans Sotin (bass); South German Madrigal Choir; Consortium Musicum, Wolfgang G6nnenwein cond. SERAPHIM S-60248 $3.98.
Performance: Joyful and vigorous
Recording: Clarion clear
J. S. BACH: Magnificat in D Major (BWV 243, with Christmas Interpolations). Helen Donath and Gundula Bernat-Klein (sopranos); Birgit Finnila (alto); Peter Schreier (tenor); Barry McDaniel (bass); South German Madrigal Choir; German Bach Soloists, Wolfgang Gonnenwein cond. SINE QUA NON SQN 7739 $3.98.
Performance: Routine
Recording: Muffled
Bach's Cantatas Nos. 80 and 79, both written for the Feast of the Reformation, are sublime utterances of supreme joy and faith. Cantata No. 80, "EM feste Burg ist unser Gott," is especially fascinating because of its extreme vigor coupled with mind-boggling musical complexities. The opening chorus alone is a tour de force rarely equaled even by Bach himself. The first bass aria, too, is complex in its combination of a violin concerto, bass aria, and chorale melody. (One wonders if Bach would not have liked to have written three...
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Explanation of symbols:
= reel-to-reel stereo tape
= eight-track stereo cartridge
= stereo cassette
= quadraphonic disc
= reel-to-reel quadraphonic tape
= eight-track quadraphonic tape
Monophonic recordings are indicated by the symbol
The first listing is the one reviewed; other formats, if available, follow it.
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...separate pieces but simply had to superimpose them for lack of performance time.) And so on with the rest of the cantata, with its duet accompanied by double obbligato and another chorale setting against a blustering orchestral concerto grosso. Cantata No. 79 is not of the same complexity but also reflects Bach's masculine joy and affirmation in its splendid and exciting opening chorus. These two cantatas are well coupled on the Seraphim disc and make joyous listening. The beauty of the re cording is its clarity: each inner voice is distinct, the textures are well balanced, and one is able to follow Bach's involved musical thought. The soloists are excellent, and any bass who can sing the fierce melismas of "Alles, was von Gott geboren" deserves extra feathers in his cap.
Turning to the Sine Qua Non release of the Magnificat, we again find Bach at his most in spired, but the performance is, unfortunately, rather stodgy in its tempos and lack of articu lation (this is peculiar, since the conductor and choral forces, at least, are the same as on the Seraphim record). The sound is somewhat muffled, so that the lively inner parts are not clear. The soloists are adequate but bring nothing new to the music. Nonetheless, this recording is of interest because it includes the four Christmas Interpolations that were inserted by Bach when the Magnificat was sung at Christmastide. The text of the Magnificat itself is Mary's song of acceptance on the oc casion of the Annunciation. The four Interpolations, three choruses and a duet, are based on German and Latin texts that look forward to the time of Christ's birth and thus bring double perspective to the Magnificat text. The Interpolations, however, are not quite on the same musical level as the Mag nificat proper, and they detract rather than add to the unity of the Magnificat. This disc, then, is for the curious listener who is willing to hear a routine performance of a well known work in order to become acquainted with four little-known works by a master. S.L.
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
BRITTEN: War Requiem. Jeannie Altmeyer (soprano); Douglas Lawrence (baritone); Michael Sells (tenor); Ladd Thomas (organ); William Hall Chorale; Columbus Boys' Choir; Vienna Festival Symphony Orchestra, William D. Hall cond. KLAVIER KS544 two discs $15.96.
Performance Surprisingly good
Recording: Excellent
When London Records taped the War Requiem in Kingsway Hall in January 1963, un der the composer's direction, there were four hundred participants. The recording sessions lasted a week. The soprano was Galina Vishnevskaya, the baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, the tenor Peter Pears (for whose voice Britten has specifically composed so much of his vocal music). The Bach Choir, the High gate School Boys' Choir, the London Sym phony Orchestra, and the Melos Ensemble Look part. Such a combination of talents would seem unbeatable, and I turned to this new Klavier release with some apprehension.
But my skepticism evaporated as I listened to this recording. The conductor, William D. Hall, has given performances of the War Requiem all over the world. This one was re corded in Vienna, with the choir that bears Mr. Hall's name, along with the Columbus Boys' Choir and the Vienna Festival Symphony Orchestra. In Michael Sells, Mr. Hall has turned up a tenor who manages to match Mr. Pears' own style rather remarkably, without the particular mannerisms that sometimes make even Pears' strongest admirers flinch, with a more readily understandable enunciation of the English tongue, and with the obvious advantage of a younger voice. The other Soldier, the baritone, is the excellent Douglas Lawrence. And the soprano of Jeannie Altmeyer has all the power demanded of it.
If this fine performance lacks some of the veiled mystery and subtlety Britten was able to evoke from his all-star cast, it makes up for it with a force and clarity that emphasize other strengths in this music, and the recorded sound, twelve years later, is brighter, even more spacious, and less cavernous. Those who already own the London set will not find the Klavier album a reason to give it up, 'but, in all, this new recording of a landmark work is a stunning accomplishment. -P. K.
CARISSIMI: Historia di Ezechia; Tolle Sportsa; Mass for Eight Voices; Historia Abrahae et Isaac. Karinie Rosat, Jennifer Smith (sopranos); John Elwes, Fernando Serafim (tenors); Philippe Huttenlocher, Michel Brodard (basses); Chamber Choir and Orchestra of the Gulbenkian Foundation of Lisbon, Michel Corboz cond.
MUSICAL HERITAGE SOCIETY MHS 3091 $2.95 (plus 95ยข handling charge from the Musical Heritage Society, Inc., 1991 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10023).
Performance: Effective
Recording: Good
The real reason Queen Christina abdicated the Swedish throne was to go to Rome in or der to hear the music of Carissimi. That her decision was not frivolous is borne out by the popularity of Jephthah, and that her taste was exquisite is verified by the four contrasting and little-known works on this disc: the touching story of Abraham and Isaac, the dramatic history of Hezekiah, a moving dialogue between a man and wife, and a joyous Mass.
Although I would have liked to hear or namentation applied to Carissimi's stark but beautifully molded lines, the music comes off well through a clean, straightforward, well-paced performance. The realization of the figured bass is effectively handled; depending upon the character singing, organ or harpsichord is used, and at particularly dramatic moments discreet string parts are added, a historically justified solution. If, then, one has a taste for seventeenth-century Rome, this al bum promises to gratify it to the very fullest.
S.L.
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
DELIUS: North Country Sketches; Life's Dance; A Song of Sumner. Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Charles Groves cond. ANGEL 0 SQ-37140 $6 98
Performance Splendid
Recording Very good
In this recording Sir Charles Groves again shows himself to be the legitimate heir to Sir Thomas Beecham as the prime interpreter of the music of Delius. If his readings do not quite match those of Beecham in intensity, they need defer at no point as tonal poetry. It is in the opening Autumn section of the North Country Sketches-something of a Delian counterpart to Vivaldi's Four Seasons-that Groves' flair is most clearly evident here, for every bar of Delius' individual harmonic textures makes its point with almost painfully poignant effect. The whole is complemented by sonics both wonderfully transparent and highly detailed. The Delius magic also comes through beautifully in the opening of the final March of Spring section.
The conception of Life's Dance, recorded for the first time here, dates from the period that produced Paris. the Song of a Great City, and its textures, like those of Paris, vary from the enchantingly mellifluous to-the harshly strident. Yet, as a whole it is not nearly as spellbinding a work as Paris. A Song of Summer, one of the pieces reconstituted by the old and blind Delius with the help of Eric Fenby from a 1918 piece, is good though not altogether top-drawer Delius.
It is for the North Country Sketches that I would acquire this album, for, fine as the 1951 Beecham performance was, the extremely close microphone placement in the earlier re cording destroyed much of the atmospheric quality of the music. Angel's recording here, especially when heard in quadraphonic (SQ) playback, enhances most satisfyingly the loving care of the performances. - D.H.
RECORDINGS OF SPECIAL MERIT
DUFAY: Fifteen Songs. Entre vous gentils umoureux: Resveillus vous; J'ay mis mon cuer; Je sui povere de leesse; Je ne suy plus: Alons ent/Resvelons nous; Ce jour de l'an: Dona i ardenti rai; Par le regard; Mon bien m'amour; Malheureulx cueur; Les douleurs: En triumphant; Puisque vous estez campieur: Helas mon dueil; Ma tres douce/Tant que mon argent/Jevous pri. Musica Mundana, David Fallow cond. 1750 ARCH RECORDS 1751 $6.95 (from 1750 Arch Records, Box 9444, Berke ley, Calif. 94709).
Performance: Spirited
Recording: Alive
DUFAY: Motets. Supremum est mortulibus; Flos forum; Ave virgo quae de caelis; Vasilissa, ergo gaude; Alma redemptoris muter.
DUNSTABLE: Motets. Veni Sancte Spiritus; Salve Regina misericordie; Beata mater; Preco proheminencie. Pro Cantione Antigua, London; Hamburger Blaserkreis fur Alte Musik, Bruno Turner cond. ARCHIV 2533 291 $7.98.
Performance. Ethereal
Recording: Clear
It is indeed meet that two such excellent discs of Dufay's music should be granted us just after the five-hundredth anniversary of his death. Whether Dufay was the culmination of the Middle Ages or the inception of the Renaissance may be a moot question, but his understanding of musical architecture and feeling for sensitive melody is indisputable.
Dufay at his wittiest and most delightful is represented by the fifteen secular songs re corded by Musica Mundana. This record is one of those miraculous creations that will appeal equally to the musician and musicologist (may the musicologist-musician forgive me for making such a distinction!). The notes, after a fine introductory essay, offer the texts of the songs in the original language and in translation, each followed by a brilliant commentary. But, above all, the performances are vital in their rhythmic strength and down-to earth approach.
The Pro Cantione Antigua disc shows us Dufay's religious side in motets for ceremony and private devotion. Equally important are the motets of Dunstable, that remarkable English composer who brought to medieval structure the sweet, sonorous triadic sound (the "contenance angloise") that so influenced Dufay and changed the course of Continental music. What the Pro Cantione Antigua lacks in rhythmic vitality is more than compensated for in its seamless melodic flow filled with subtle nuance and beauty of sound. It is a perfect sound for religious mu sic and the resonance of the fifteenth-century cathedral. -S.L.
------------ 97 Guillaume Dufay and Gilles Binchois with a portative
organ and a harp, respectively, as depicted in a fifteenth-century miniature
by Martin Lefranc (Paris, Bib. Nat.)
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
DVORAK: Cello Concerto in B Minor, Op. 104. Lynn Harrell (cello); London Symphony Orchestra, James Levine cond. RCA ARL 1-1155 $6.98, C) ARSI-1155 $7.95, ARKI-1155 $7.95
Performance: First-rate
Recording Very good
Every high-powered cellist in the business has recorded the Dvorak Cello Concerto over the past twenty years, though few have matched in overwhelming intensity the unforgettable 1937 Casals-Szell-Czech Philharmonic reading. And yet, this latest recording, representing the newest generation of performing talent, definitely stands up to those of seasoned veterans. Its particular excellence lies both in the superb teamwork of soloist and conductor and in RCA's outstanding sonics.
Lynn Harrell, who has won just about every young artists' award in the book over the past few years, concentrates more on the lyrical than the dramatic substance of the music, but he keeps the whole work beautifully woven together with the excellent orchestral backing of Levine and the London Sympho ny. Certainly I would not throw out any of the best of the earlier recordings I own of this masterwork, but for anyone who wants an experience of today's younger artists at their very best, this disc is a darned good place to start.
A word about the cassette issue: the sound compares favorably with the disc at every point, and RCA seems to have improved its signal-to-noise ratio significantly over what it was several years ago. However, I was in furiated to discover that, in the interest of avoiding rewind when flipping to side two, RCA interrupted the slow movement in mid phrase-in my opinion, an absolutely barbarous procedure! - D.H.
FRANCK: Chorale No. 1, in E Major; Chorale No. 2, in B Minor; Chorale No. 3, in A Minor. Thomas Murray (organ). NONESUCH H 71310 $3.98.
Performance Very good
Recording: Excellent
Thomas Murray not only gives lust-class performances of the Franck chorales. but pro vides his own concisely informative notes on both the music and the Johnson & Son organ in Boston's Church of St. Mary of the Sacred Heart on which he performs it. Engineer David Griesinger has captured the sound of the instrument with exceptional realism, and the pressing itself is unusually clean. Most other records of these chorales manage to accommodate at least one additional piece; I don't mind the omission of the filler on this modestly priced, excellent-sounding disc, but I would question the necessity of splitting the E Major Chorale for turnover (the sequence here is No. 3, No. I, No. 2), which strikes me as unnecessary in the presentation of a fourteen-and-a-half-minute work--particularly when it would seem that any two of the chorales would fit comfortably enough on a single side.
The recently reissued Mercury disc of Marcel Dupre's 1959 recording (on the organ of St.
Thomas' Church. New York) offers each of the chorales without a break and includes a stirring account of the Piece Heroique, but the price is nearly double that of the new Nonesuch, which does take top honors in the realm of sonics.
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
HANDEL: Chandos Anthems: I will magnify thee; In the Lord put I my trust. Philip Langridge (tenor); Caroline Friend (soprano); Choir of King's College, Cambridge; Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, David Willcocks cond. ARGO ZRG 766 $6.98.
Performance: Joyous
Recording: Magnificent
Those familiar with the massive Handel of the oratorios will be interested in hearing his inti mate chamber style. The orchestra, conceived of as a trio sonata, and accompanying a three-part chorus, produces a clarity of line that Handel imbued with all the contrapuntal artifices of the Baroque era. Although the sound is not what we consider typically Handelian, the music is, and it contrasts bold masculinity with ever-flowing melody.
----------- LYNN HARRELL: A youthful Dvorak Cello Concerto
The orchestral playing is excellent and the soloists very fine indeed (Philip Langridge is to be congratulated for his tasteful ornamentation), but the palm must be awarded to the chorus. Given only three-part writing, David Willcocks has achieved a stunning balance that places the emphasis on the virtuoso tenor part without sacrificing the two outer parts.
The effect is unusual, but it makes sense when one considers the nature of the choral writing.
As in most recordings of the King's College Choir, the echoey sound of the cathedral is perfectly reproduced but is never allowed to obscure the clarity of the music. All in all, this disc sheds new light on Handel's all too neglected anthems. S.L.
HARRIS: Folk-Song Symphony. Utah Sym phony and Chorale. Maurice Abravanel cond. ANGEL SQ 36091 $6.98.
Performance: Spirited
Recording: Good
Roy Harris is not at his best, in my opinion, when dealing with the substance of American folk song; he tends to impose his highly personal and epic style on the material, with re sults ranging from fascinating to disturbing.
His is definitely not the approach of a Virgil Thomson or an Aaron Copland, which seeks to retain or, if possible, enhance the essence of the original material. Nevertheless, I gave this recording of the Folk-Song Symphony--a work designed to match high-school choruses with professional symphonic forces-a good hard listen, and. though I have not essentially changed my opinion of the work. I found it went down a lot easier in this performance than in others I have heard both on and off discs. Unquestionably, the spacious yet clear ambiant quadraphonic sound (SQ matrix) provided by Angel is a big help.
The symphony has seven sections. in five of which the chorus provides the ratans firums for colorful and highly varied orchestral commentary-sometimes akin to that of an elaborate Bach choral prelude, as in the first movement, but more often along the lines of what one might call fantasy-variation. The third and fifth movements are orchestral interludes-one on Anglo-Irish Appalachian fiddle tunes, the other on familiar folk melodies, of which Leather-Winged Bat will be the most familiar. The Gall Left Behind Me dominates the opening movement, with choral handclap-ping and a touch of Good Night, Ladies serving as coda. Oh Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie is the burden of the second movement, giving way briefly to The Streets of Laredo.
The central movement, Mountaineer Lore Song, is the heart of the score-a kind of tonal counterpart of a Thomas Hart Benton painting. even in its curious harmonic commentary-distortion of the original material. The Negro Fantasy sixth movement has a curious power all its own, somewhat akin to Morton Gould's stylization in his Spirituals for string choir and orchestra, but more expansive in scope. The finale is a choral fantasy on When Johnny Comes Marching Home and draws heavily on music Harris wrote for his remark able overture of that name back in the middle 1930's. Abravanel and his forces give a spirited performance, which, as I have noted, is excellently recorded. -D.H.
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
HAYDN: Symphony No. 101, in D Major ("Clock"); Symphony No. 103, in E-fiat Major ("Drum Roll"). New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein cond. COLUMBIA M 33531 $6.98.
Performance: Vigorous
Recording: Excellent
Everybody is at his best here: Haydn in his popular Clock and Drum Roll Symphonies; Bernstein in his vigorous, straightforward readings; and the New York Philharmonic in its clear sound and precise playing. What more can you ask? S.L.
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
IVES: Violin Sonata No. 2; Violin Sonata No. 3. Marilyn Dubow (violin); Marsha Cheraskin Winokur (piano). MUSICAL HERITAGE SOCI ETY MHS 3160 $2.95 (plus 95t handling charge from the Musical Heritage Society, Inc., 1991 Broadway, New York, N. Y. 10023).
Performance: Feisty
Recording: Very good
The performances and discussions of last year's Ives Centennial Festival-Conference convinced me that the creations of that American prophet-patriarch can stand a good deal more performance latitude than many musicologists are ready to admit. Indeed, statements from Ives himself support this point of view: it is the spirit rather than the absolute letter that counts.
So, while I still don't go along with Noel Lee's treatment of the First Piano Sonata on Nonesuch, I find much to admire in what Marilyn Dubow and Marsha Cheraskin Winokur get out of these violin sonatas, both despite and because of the points of variance with the "definitive" readings of all four sonatas for Nonesuch by Paul Zukofsky and Gilbert Kalish (who examined the Ives manuscripts at Yale and collaborated with curator and master Ives interpreter John Kirkpatrick).
Except for a decidedly freer treatment throughout of the Second Concerto's In the Barn episode in the present recording, there are few points of sharp difference in basic tempo between the readings. The real differences arise in matters of dynamics, Dubow and Winokur opting for a much more assertive and peppery approach (they also choose not to include the drum effects).
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Desmar: A New Label Braves the Classical Seas
-----Garrick Ohlsson: finest playing of the evening
ONLY bold, hopeful, and hardy souls launch a new, independent, classical-repertoire record label in these times, especially when their product is in the full-price category. But there have been other instances of seeming foolhardiness on the part of aspiring independents that have paid off over the years in both respectable livings for the producers and first-quality products for the consumers. They can be counted on the fingers of one hand, but they do exist, Vanguard being a prime example. There is no reason why the new Desmar enterprise cannot achieve a similar track record, given the right proportion of common sense, first-rate craftsmanship, imagination in the areas of artists and repertoire, and some lucky breaks in merchandising and sales.
The "Romantic revival" seems to rate high in Desmar's initial repertoire plans, especially on the piano front-at least judging from the label's initial offering. The International Piano Archives (formerly the International Piano Library) has played a major role here, not only in providing the superb 1951-1952 Liszt tapes Claudio Arrau did for Columbia, but also in making available the intriguing high lights from the December 1974 London con cert given for the benefit of the IPA. The latter involved the services of no less than a dozen major concert pianists plus the ineffable Victor Borge, himself no mean piano player.
His performance of one of Ignaz Friedman's Viennese Dances is purest delight. So too is Shura Cherkassky's marvelously slithery treatment of the Albeniz-Godowsky Tango in D. Perhaps the finest playing of the evening, at least in this Desmar selection, is Garrick Ohlsson's elegantly nuanced reading of the slow movement from the Chopin E Minor Concerto in the Balakirev solo arrangement.
Tamfis Vfisary and Mint Vizsonyi turn out a glittering Fetes from the Debussy Nocturnes in the Ravel arrangement, calling to mind the famous mid-Thirties recording by Josef and Rosina Lhevinne. Then there are the comic turns, not only by Borge, but also by such supposedly staid grander dames of the piano as Gina Bachauer and Alicia de Larrocha, who came on stage in little-girl party dresses to do a W. F. Bach bit with Ohlsson sand wiched between them on the piano bench (see "A Multi-Piano Gala and Other Delights," STEREO REVIEW, March 1975). The Beethoven Turkish March in various forms, outlandish and otherwise, turns up here and there- first on eight pianos played by double the number of distinguished hands, and subsequently in a couple of parodistic treatments that would do credit to a Charles Ives. And, thanks to the recording staff of EMI, all the taped excerpts on the Desmar disc are first rate in sound. All told, this is a most entertaining souvenir.
On a more serious level, I rate Claudio Arrau's disc of Hungarian Rhapsodies as the most exciting single item of the Desmar de but. There is no finer Lisztian than the great Chilean in top form; for a combination of exquisite pianistic refinement and dazzling virtuosity, this performance is a hard one to beat, and Desmar has done wonders to make the Fifties sound clean and full without any fakery or tasteless tinkering.
Desmar's gesture in the direction of the Baroque takes the form of returning veteran harpsichordist Fernando Valentito the re cording studio to produce a set of ten colorful sonatas by Scarlatti disciple Padre Antonio Soler. The sonatas are flavored with Spanish folk dance, fandango rhythms, drone basses, and so on. All but the G Major Sonata were also recorded by Valenti some twenty years ago for Westminster, but here he has the benefit of distinctly superior modern sonics.
For best listening results, however, playback should be at a considerably lower volume level than normal.
Prize of the chamber-music discs here is the Busoni Second Violin Sonata (1898), which gets its best recorded realization to date at the hands of Endre Granat and Harold Gray. The early pages are in a rather Brahmsian vein, but with the concluding variation movement, based on a Bach chorale, we get a taste of the mature Busoni. The Paderewski violin sonata, composed more than a decade before the Busoni one, is decidedly more old-fashioned and distinctly a concert display vehicle rather than a classical-style chamber-music work. This is the first time it has been recorded, and it is an interesting building block in the "Romantic revival" edifice.
Richard Strauss' youthful piano quartet, composed before he became infected with the Wagnerian virus, is also post-Brahmsian in its musical language, though even here the big lyrical tunes have the sweep characteristic of Strauss' earliest tone poems and latest op eras. The Los Angeles-based ensemble delivers a taut, lively performance, and this re cording handily supplants the early and long-out-of-print 1951 recording by Bernardo Se gall and a group of New York musicians for the New Records label.
THROUGHOUT the two chamber-music discs and Valenti's Soler disc, the recorded sound is consistently excellent: clean and full bodied for the chamber duo and ensemble, perhaps a bit over-resonant for the harpsichord (but, as I have noted, this can be con trolled by keeping the level down). It is small wonder that sonic excellence is the rule for the Desmar recordings, for the engineering and production are by David Hancock, one of the best in the business. The pressing quality, too, is first-rate.
-David Hall
INTERNATIONAL PIANO LIBRARY GALA CONCERT-HIGHLIGHTS. Gina Bachauer, Stephen Bishop, Jorge Bolet, Victor Borge, Shura Cherkassky, Jeanne-Marie Darre, Ali cia de Larrocha, John Lill, Radu Lupu, John Ogdon, Garrick Ohlsson, Minas Visfiry, Bilint Vfizsonyi (pianos). Recorded at Royal Festival Hall, London, December 9, 1974. DESMAR DSM 1005 $6.98.
LISZT: Hungarian Rhapsodies: No. 8, in F-sharp Minor; No. 9, in E-flat Major; No. 10, in E Major; No. 11, in A Minor; No. 13, in A Mi nor. Claudio Arrau (piano). DESMAR DSM 1003 $6.98.
BUSONI: Violin Sonata No. 2, in E Minor, Op. 36a.
PADEREWSKI: Violin Sonata in A Mi nor, Op. 13. Endre Granat (violin); Harold Gray (piano). DESMAR DSM 1004 $6.98.
SOLER: Harpsichord Sonatas in 13-fiat Major, C Minor, II Major, A Minor, F-sharp Major, D Minor, G Major, D Major, G Minor, and F Major. Fernando Valenti (harpsichord). DESMAR DSM 1001 $6.98.
R. STRAUSS: Piano Quartet in C Minor, Op. 13. Irma Vallecillo (piano); Los Angeles String Trio. DESMAR DSM 1002 $6.98.
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This is even more evident in Sonata No. 3. The ruminative reading of Zukofsky and Kalish is very different from this one, which takes an altogether more positive and rugged view of the music. Thus, the MHS performance takes around 27'30" as against Nonesuch's nearly 36', and I will confess that it holds my attention more effectively-even though Zukofsky and Kalish still have the edge when it comes to details of poetic nuance.
Certainly I would not be without the None such set, but it is good to have this and other such vital recorded performances of Ives, if only to remind us of the various angles from which the crags of his music can be scaled. A special word of praise is in order for the excellence of violin-piano balance maintained throughout the MHS performance-no easy task, given the density of texture in the middle movements of both works. D.H.
----- M. C. WINOKUR AND M. DUBOW: Vital, different Ives sonatas.
JOPLIN: Complete Works for Piano. Dick Hyman (piano). RCA C RL5- 1106 five discs $27.98.
Performance Smooth
Recording: Excellent
Scott Joplin was not only a composer of pure rag-times: his published output included, be sides thirty-nine rags, a tango, five waltzes, half a dozen marches, and, of course, his op era. (Another rag, attributed to Joplin. was recently discovered on a piano roll.) That is not to say that the heart of his genius was not in ragtime; indeed, the charm of some of the waltzes is that they are so beguilingly ragged.
And the rags! I would not want to claim that all Joplin rags are equal masterpieces. hut his inventiveness and his spirit and his wit almost never flagged. Within a terribly limit ed form, the variety is incredible. It is possible--at least for longtime ragtime enthusiasts like myself-to take heaping platefuls at a sit ting without feeling indigestion or satiation. As in any great classic art. there is a perfect balance between the familiar and the unexpected. all contained within a tight form that is, nevertheless, never felt as a restriction. In spite of all the high spirits and rhythmic infectiousness that made the music famous. Joplin's real tone is one of lyricism-he is a kind of black American Schubert. His rags are lyric odes, sonnets with a hop, a skip, and a bounce. His speech is simple. unaffected, and popular in tone, and yet he is a master of his language-not a dialect, but perfectly grammatical and highly artistic. Art of this kind is rare, for it takes a coming together of genius with the right set of historical circumstances.
The appeal of the music is not merely nostalgia; it reflects a very deep desire for a popular art rooted in deeper values (or. if you wish, a "classical," enduring art rooted in the popular genius).
Who would have predicted a few years ago that RCA would bring out a five-record set of Scott Joplin put together with all the serious ness of a Juilliard Quartet late-Beethoven set? Dick Hyman is a jazz-pop pianist, composer, and arranger, but he has classical training, and indeed his style is a smooth, effective combi nation of ragtime classicism--pioneered by such pianists as Rifkin and Bolcom-and a good feeling for a jazz shuffle. There is some thing missing, though: a quality of articulation, of crispness, of lift; Hyman's cool-jazz-playing background makes him a smoothie.
Except for some wobbly piano tones at the inner grooves of one or two of the sides, the sound is good, and there is a useful booklet by Rudi Blesh. Incidentally, the note on Non-pareil perpetuates an amusing error that apparently goes back to Joplin's publisher. Since Nonpareil refers to the painted bunting, the sheet music shows Uncle Sam patriotically displaying a swatch of colorful Fourth of July bunting. Joplin must have had a good laugh over that one: as every Southerner knows, the nonpareil or painted bunting is the most beau tiful bird in North America. a multicolored jewel which, like Joplin's music. can be said to he second to none. E.S.
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
MARTIN: Petite Symphonie Concertante.
ROUSSEL: Sinfonietta. TORTELIER: Of frande. London Chamber Orchestra, Paul Tortelier cond. UNICORN UN S 233 $6.98.
Performance Deep-felt
Recording: Very good
The Petite Symphonic. Concertante of the late Frank Martin is a work whose absence from our catalogs for the last several years is not only baffling but outrageous. The instrumental color alone-the scoring is for two string orchestras with solo piano, harp, and harpsichord--makes it an intriguing piece. While 1 would have been happy enough to see the Stokowski version (or even the older Ansermet, in mono) reinstated, I am delighted to have this rich-sounding new recording (made in January 1971), which marks the phono graphic debut (in this country) of the distinguished cellist Paul Tortelier in the role of conductor. His pacing is somewhat less fleet than that of the conductors who recorded the work earlier, but not because of a more relaxed approach on his part. Quite the contra ry: the sustained intensity of Tortelier's reading invests the work with greater weight, which, together with his superb feeling for the composer's expressive use of rhythm, simply demands slightly broader tempos. The flow is natural, unlabored, and convincing; the playing is polished throughout, and the balance between the three component elements is at all times excellently judged.
A little less than half of side two is devoted to a crisp, forceful presentation of Roussel's very brief Sinfonietta, and the remainder to Tortelier's own Offrande, for which the com poser-conductor provides a spoken introduction on the disc as well as a written program note. Although I appreciate Tortelier's con cept and admire the performance itself, I can not pretend to find more to the piece than an engaging exercise in string sonorities. As such, however, it is engaging. At any rate, the record would be worth its price for the Mar tin alone, not to mention the finely molded Roussel. - R.F.
RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
MASSENET: La Navarraise. Marilyn Horne (mezzo-soprano), Anita; Placido Domingo (tenor), Araquil; Sherrill Manes (baritone), Garrido; Nicola Zaccaria (bass), Remigio; Gabriel Bacquier (baritone), Bustamente; Ryland Davies (tenor), Ramon. Ambrosian Opera Chorus; London Symphony Orchestra, Henry Lewis cond. RCA ARL 1-1114 $6.98.
Performance: Very good
Recording: Excellent
After decades of total neglect we now have two first-rate recordings of Jules Massenet's turbulent verismo one-acter La Navarraise.
In my review of the Columbia version (August 1975) I praised the overall result with the reservation that the music called for weightier timbres than those provided by Columbia for the three principal roles. RCA offers decided improvement in this respect, and gives us a stirring account of the opera, though the casting is still not ideal in all respects.
------------ GREGG SMITH: a dramatic, eclectic cantata about war.
Henry Lewis paces the opera more broadly and elicits an even more responsive performance than did Antonio de Almeida from the same Ambrosian Opera Chorus and London Symphony Orchestra-by now, obviously, seasoned interpreters of this once unfamiliar music.
As Araquil, Placido Domingo provides the "sturdier, more ringing sound" I missed in Columbia's Alain Vanzo, and he sings with equally convincing ardor. Sherrill Milnes, too, is more effective than Columbia's Vicente Sardinero as the Spanish general, Garrido. Gabriel Bacquier, Ryland Davies, and Nicola Zaccaria make solid contributions in minor roles.
Marilyn Horne throws herself into the title role with blazing passion and full commitment. But, though her voice has better weight and color than Lucia Popp's (Columbia), she sounds quite uncomfortable in some exposed high passages-a range that presents no problem whatever to Miss Popp.
RCA's producer Richard Mohr and engineer Anthony Salvatore have given us a superbly realized production. G.J.
MOZART: The Abduction from the Seraglio (highlights). Margaret Price (soprano). Konstanze: Ryland Davies (tenor), Belmonte: Noel Mangin (bass), Osmin: Daniele Perriers (soprano). Blonde: Kimmo Lappaleinen (tenor), Pedrillo: London Philharmonic Orchestra, John Pritchard cond. VANGUARD VSD 71203 $6.98.
Performance: Good
Recording: Good
What a treasure trove of happy melodic invention this Turkish delight is. and what a pity that it is so rarely staged nowadays! The present disc, culled from the 1972 Glyndebourne production, has much to commend it. Besides, it is the only single-disc version of highlights in the current catalog.
Margaret Price floats some ethereal tones as Konstanze. She is without a doubt a musicianly singer and a fine Mozartian. Whether she has the combination of fiery temperament and coloratura agility to do justice to the "Martern alter Arten" episode remains unanswered because that aria is not among the highlights recorded here. Ryland Davies discloses a good style and an agreeable voice that is a shade too fragile for an ideal Belmonte.
The Blonde and the Pedrillo perform well in their scenes, and Noel Mangin is an expertly comic Osmin. The ensemble work, too, is fine, suggesting a well-prepared performance under John Pritchard. - GJ.
MOZART: Music for Wind Instruments (see Choosing Sides, page 100)
MOZART: Symphony No. 26, in E-Bat Major; Incidental Musk to "Thamos, King of Egypt" (see Best of the Month, page 76)
ROUSSEL: Sinfonietta (see MARTIN) SCHUBERT: String Quintet in C Major (see The Basic Repertoire, page 50) SMITH: Beware of the Soldier. Rosalind Rees (soprano); Douglas Perry (tenor); Charles Greenwell (bass); Chuck Garretson (boy soprano); Texas Boys' Choir; Columbia University Men's Glee Club; orchestral ensemble, Gregg Smith cond. CRI SD 341 $6.95.
Performance: Impressive
Recording: Very good
Gregg Smith has long been one of our great choral directors, and his experiences in the field have been of obvious advantage to him as a composer of choral works, songs, chamber operas, and instrumental music. His latest work, Beware of the Soldier (1969), is a kind of American answer to the Benjamin Britten's War Requiem. Here, as in the English work, the performance calls for soloists, a boys' choir, and a large chorus and orchestral ensemble. But where Britten turned to the Latin Mass and the war poems of Wilfred Owen for his literary base, Smith has woven a text about the ugliness of war out of quotations from the Songs of Innocence by William Blake, the war poems of Stephen Crane, the prose of Mark Twain, fourteenth-century La tin writings, an elegy of Thomas Hardy, a poem by Keats, even a Japanese haiku.
All this is ingeniously fitted into a dramatic cantata of eclectic style that is eminently sing able but often says more for Smith's skills as an arranger than for his talents as a composer.
It was admirably ingenious to contrast the sweet melodic settings of the Songs of Innocence with a twelve-tone approach to the Songs of War ("In my mind," Smith says, "twelve-tone music seems to have an overall melancholy to it"), but the melodies are not distinguished and the twelve-tone passages are more cleverly devised than truly inspired.
The performance, however, is certainly first rate, and the Ford Foundation grant that financed this big composition was on the whole well spent. The recorded sound is spacious though just a little pinched in the upper registers. P.K.
TCHAIKOVSKY: Eugene Onegin (see Best of the Month, page 75)
TCHAIKOVSKY: Manfred Symphony, Op. 58. Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra, Gennady Rozhdestvensky cond. MELODI VA/ANGEL SR-40267 $6.98.
TCHAIKOVSKY: Manfred Symphony, op. 58. London Symphony Orchestra, Andre Previn cond. ANGEL S-37018 $6.98.
Performances: Muscovites more dramatic Recordings: Londoners have the edge Tchaikovsky himself described his Manfred Symphony as long and difficult of performance. The difficulties lie not only in matters of execution--as in the dazzling scherzo--but in achieving a convincing synthesis of dramatic rhetoric and structure, which amounts to a major challenge in the scissors-and-pastepot finale. Having heard dozens of performances, beginning with Toscanini's (who drastically cut the finale as one solution), I feel that the best solution is to have a virtuoso orchestra on hand, and then to throw all caution to the winds and treat Manfred wholly as symphonic drama. This seems to be the Russian way too. It works, but of the Soviet orchestras only the Leningrad Philharmonic under the likes of Eugene Mravinsky (who has not re corded the work) has the requisite virtuoso capacity.
Andre Previn's London Symphony has virtuosity to burn and absolutely superb wind players who really show their stuff in the middle movements. And the Angel recording job is one of the label's very best, certainly the best that has been accorded Manfred thus far.
But Previn's reading, for all its felicitous refinements in the middle movements, lacks the one thing this music needs to make its point, and that is Byronic passion.
This quality can be found in full measure in the two Russian recordings that have been issued on Melodiya/Angel, Gennady Rozhdestvensky's and Eugene Svetlanov's. Rozhdestvensky's is the more carefully detailed of the two readings, with special attention being paid to inner-part woodwind writing. Svetlanov (S-40028) chooses to play out the music in great broad strokes, somewhat after the fashion of the nineteenth-century Russian battle murals of Borodino or Sevastapol. In some ways, Svetlanov's performance carries the greatest impact of all. The recording may have something to do with it too. Rozhdestvensky's seems a bit small-scaled and with a flatter stereo perspective than Svetlanov's, whose recording team has opted for the deepest and broadest possible panoramic sound. I think it is his that I'll stick with for the present. D.H.
TORTELIER: Offrande (see MARTIN)
VIVALDI: Flute Concerto in A Minor (P. 80); Flute Concerto in G Major (P. 140); Flute Concerto in D Major (P. 203); Flute Concerto in D Major (P. 205); Concerto in G Minor for Flute, Bassoon, Strings, and Continuo ("La Notte"), Op. 10, No. 2 (P. 342). Severino Gazzelloni (flute): Jffi Stavieek (bassoon, in P. 342); I Musici. PHILIPS 6500 707 $7.98.
Performance: Magnificent
Recording: Excellent
This is an imaginatively chosen program-the first three concertos listed here do not seem to be otherwise available on records now--and it is all extraordinarily well played. It hardly needs saying that Severino Gazzelloni is a fabulous flutist, or that I Musici must be the finest group of its kind for this material: they respond to each other, and to these concertos, with performances that are irresistible in their own right and can stand as models of the par ticular sort of vigor, elegance, and subtlety that add up to the most convincing style. The bassoonist Stavieek, in the familiar double concerto, has a less than equal role as soloist but shows himself an artist on the same level, and so does the unnamed harpsichordist whose knowing continuo adds substantially to the pleasures of these magnificent performances. The Philips engineers, too, have done their part superbly, but the perversity of interrupting the unfamiliar A Minor Concerto for turnover after its first movement deters me from calling the recording one of "Special Merit": if an eleven-minute work cannot be accommodated intact, then perhaps four of these concertos would have been a generous enough offering. R.F.
COLLECTIONS RECORDING OF SPECIAL MERIT
ITZHAK PERLMAN: Recital. Chausson: Poeme, Op. 25. Saint-Sanes: Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, Op. 28; Havanaise, Op. 83. Ravel: Tzigane. Itzhak Perlman (violin): Orchestre de Paris, Jean Martinon cond. ANGEL. CI S-37118 $6.98.
Performance: Voluptuous
Recording: Very good
-------- ITZHAK PERLMAN: dreamy, seductive performances of the
French masters
These are dreamy performances in more than a single sense. The tempos in the two Saint Saens pieces are slower than usual, but there is no loss of momentum; instead of merely giving off sparks, Itzhak Perlman and Jean Martinon (no mere "accompanist" here) en wrap the music in a dreamlike aura, turning the showpieces into poeticized fantasies of heady voluptuousness. And this languorous approach, as surprising as it is effective in the Saint-Sans items, suits the Chausson Paeme, of course, down to the ground.
Perlman is very young to be remaking his recorded repertoire, but the Tzigane offered here is even more seductive than the one he did earlier with Previn on RCA. And "seductive" is the word, for, again, it is not a matter of merely producing sparks, but an abandoned immersion in the essence of the music; it smolders as much as it glitters. This record (very handsomely recorded in Angel's SQ quadraphony) makes reference to comparison or duplication meaningless: it is a "show case," all right, not for fancy fiddling alone, but for all-round marvelous musicianship. - R .F .
MADO ROBIN: Recital. Donizetti: Lucia di Lammermoor: Mad Scene. Bellini: / Puritani: Qui la race ...Vier. diletto. La Sonnambu Ia: Come per me sereno ... Sorra it sen. Gounod: Mireille: 0 legere hirondelle: Heu reux petit berger. Alabieff: The Nightingale. Adam: A h! rams dirai-je maman. Mado Robin (soprano); various orchestras, Anatole Fis toulari and Richard Blareau cond. RICHMOND R 23197 $3.49.
Performance. Exceptional
Recording: Good
This record exhibits some of the highest notes ever attained by a singer-A-flat, A-natural, even B-flat above the high C! And these notes, as sung by the remarkable Mado Robin (1918-1960), are neither wildly pitched nor acidulously squeezed, but firmly centered, with a round musical sound to them. The high register is, in fact, the singer's forte; she soars into it effortlessly and lingers there dazzlingly, with undiminished elan and tonal strength.
Miss Robin was not a faultless singer. Her passage work here is good but not unfailingly accurate, and she misses true pitch on occasion. But she makes up for the lack of a Sutherland-like refinement and technical assurance with ample vivacity and an alert response to textual meaning. In any case, her shortcomings are dwarfed by her altogether spectacular feats in the stratosphere. These are unique and amply justify the acquisition of this bargain-price reissue. The orchestral backgrounds are respectable, and the sound (around 1955) holds up well. -G J.
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Heifetz: Six Volumes of History
------------a thread of concentrated intensity throbbing with a fast vibrato"----------
JASCHA HEIFETZ will be seventy-five years old on February 2. 1976. In anticipation of that anniversary. RCA has issued a retrospective six-volume series called "The Heifetz Collection." It encompasses virtually all (apart from the recordings made for Decca) of the artist's recorded legacy from 1917, the year of his New York debut as well as of his first recordings, to 1955, the end of the mono phonic era. These twenty-four discs offer a documentation of a unique recording career, unique in its vastness as well as its variety.
Hearing them from beginning to end-with their persistent adherence to an Olympian level of artistry through so many years-is an experience that inspires considerable awe.
Heifetz has always been the violinist's violinist, "the sort of fiddler almost every fiddler would want to be if life were a beautiful dream," observes Joseph Wechsberg in his introductory essay for the RCA series. Mr. Wechsberg also refers to a personally con ducted poll in which Heifetz was judged to be "the greatest living violinist" by his most eminent colleagues. Such accolades have sel dom come to Heifetz from music critics, with the possible exception of violinist-critics, for it takes such an observer to see the forest without getting lost in the trees, to admire the Heifetz achievement in its magnificent totality, certain artistic indulgences and eccentricities notwithstanding.
And just what is that achievement? Simply that through an extraordinary--superhuman, really-combination of tone and technique, Heifetz was able to dominate his instrument more than any other violinist alive in his own time. Where others conquer through struggle and stimulate us by making us participants in their ultimately triumphant effort. Heifetz confronts us with the fait accompli of the conquest itself. The "unplayable" chords of the unaccompanied Bach sonatas emerge from his instrument with a crystalline sound, and certain passages in the Sibelius concerto that in other hands are awkward blocks of sound fall from Heifetz's bow into tonal columns of graceful beauty.
Heifetz's formidable technical equipment was already complete in 1917, and it is captured in the astonishing early recordings of Volume 1: the audacious fingering solutions through which difficult intervals cease to be problems; the lightning staccato evident in the Valse Bluetit": the boldly attacked, crystal clear harmonics in the Glazounov Medallion; the incredible dexterity displayed in Paganini's Mow Perpetuo and Bazzini's La Ronde des Lutins. The characteristic Heifetz tone was already in evidence, too, a tone sil very rather than "juicy." a thread of concentrated intensity throbbing with a fast vibrato that changed almost imperceptibly with the demands of the music, but somehow never called attention to itself. Conforming to the permissive style of that period, there was a more frequent use of portamento (the opposite of staccato) in the early recordings, but by the Thirties, with the appearance of the first album-length recordings of major works, we can note the emergence of a fully disciplined "modern" violinist.
If there were artistic excesses, they stemmed from the kind of virtuosity that sometimes superimposes its own character on the musical design. Commenting on the fast tempo in the early rendition of the Mendelssohn E Minor Concerto finale (Volume 1), Irving Kolodin rightly observes that it was probably dictated by the necessity of rendering the music within the time limit imposed by a single 78-rpm disc. But the tempo remained equally fast when the entire concerto was recorded with Sir Thomas Beecham in 1949, and again with Charles Munch in 1958! The virtuoso challenge could not be resisted, the piece had to be "conquered" in the uncompromising, daredevil Heifetz manner.
There are, undoubtedly, musical and artistic question marks, and perhaps the most glaring among them is the ill-advised recording of the Bach Double Concerto with Heifetz playing both parts (Volume 5). Another is the ample evidence that his sonata partners were often denied the tonal prominence their music called for-even William Kapell suffered this fate, to the unavoidable detriment of an other wise exciting joint effort in the Brahms D Minor Sonata (Volume 6). One could cite a few more regrettable examples, but, on the other hand, one could also fill an entire page writing about renditions that are towering and probably unsurpassable landmarks, including works Heifetz singlehandedly championed in so final a manner as to discourage any other contenders (the violin sonatas of Richard Strauss, Camille Saint-Saens, Ernest Bloch, and Edvard Grieg, among others).
There are some strictly "audio" disappointments in the series, too, despite the prevailing excellence of the transfers. We can be grateful, for example, that modern Heifetz versions exist of the Beethoven and Brahms concertos, for those contained in Volume 4-the historical collaboration of Arturo Toscanini and Serge Koussevitzky, respectively, notwithstanding-are simply inferior in sound. The same goes for the Brahms Double Concerto with Emanuel Feuermann and the Philadelphia Orchestra under Eugene Ormandy-unfortunately it is also a performance of un paralleled intensity, and Heifetz's subsequent 1960 effort failed to match it. This particular period (1937-1941), when recording was al ready on the brink of a new era, paradoxically seems to be among the most difficult to cap ture faithfully, without distortion, for today's listeners.
THE set as a whole is undeniably impressive. almost intimidating in its entirety, but here are a few observations of the "odds and ends" variety: Heifetz recorded very little music by Fritz Kreisler, and nothing at all of it between the years of 1918 and 1972! If he recorded any Paganini caprices at all, he preferred them with piano accompaniments.
There are a number of previously unissued items here, including a 1934 version of Elgar's La Capricieuse containing, for all to hear, a single note that somehow escaped Heifetz's fabulous control. (I suppose there may be two or three more such instances, but / failed to catch any more of them in some twenty hours of listening . . .!) Each of the six volumes contains the same excellently prepared literary material: the affectionate Wechsberg tribute, the perceptive and historically aware Kolodin commentary, some interesting biographical notes and unusual pictures, a list of arrangers, and a complete Heifetz discography that includes even recordings still to be issued (but not, as it happens, by RCA). I recommend Volumes 1, 3. and 6 most emphatically, the others with more moderate but still lively emphasis.
-George Jellinek
JASCHA HEIFETZ: The Heifetz Collection, Volume 1 (1917-1924). Schubert: Ave Maria.
Wieniawski: Scherzo-Tarantelle, Op. 16. Achron: Hebrew Melody; Hebrew Lullaby; Stimmung. Glazounov: Meditation, Op. 32; Grand Adagio front Raymonda. Sarasate: Malagueita, Op. 21, No. 1; Introduction and Tarantelle, Op. 43; Zapateado; Zigeunerweisen, Op. 20, No. 1; Habanera, Op. 21, No. 1. Saint-Satins: Havanaise. And thirty-seven other concert pieces. Jascha Heifetz (violin); Andre Benoist, Samuel Chotzinoff, and Isidor Achron (piano). RCA ARM-4-0942 four discs $27.92.
The Heifetz Collection, Volume 2 (1925 1934). Schubert: Impromptu in G Major. Glazounov: Concerto in A Minor. Mozart: Concerto No. 5, in A Major. R. Strauss: Sonata in E-flat Major. Paganini: Caprices Nos. 13, 20, and 24. Grieg: Sonata in C Minor, Allegretto;
Scherzo-Impromptu; Puck. Ponce: Estrellita. And thirty-three other concert pieces. Jascha Heifetz (violin); London Philharmonic, John Barbirolli cond.; Isidor Achron and Arpad Sandor (piano). RCA ARM-4-0943 four discs $27.92.
The Heifetz Collection, Volume 3 (1935 1937). Wieniawski: Concerto No. 2, in D Minor, Op. 22. Vieuxtemps: Concerto No. 4, in D Minor, Op. 31. Saint-Satins: Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, Op. 28. Jascha Heifetz (violin); London Philharmonic Orchestra, John Barbirolli cond. Bach: Sonata No. 1, in G Minor; Sonata No. 3, in C Major, for Unaccompanied Violin. Faure: Sonata in A Major. Op. 13. Grieg: Sonata in G Major, Op. 13. Brahms: Sonata No. 2, in A Major, Op. 100. And seven concert pieces. Jascha Heifetz (violin); Emanuel Bay (piano). RCA ARM-4-0944 four discs $27.92.
The Heifetz Collection, Volume 4 (1937 1941). Beethoven: Concerto in D Major, Op. 61. Brahms: Concerto in D Major, Op. 77; Concerto in A Minor for Violin, Cello, and Orchestra, Op. /02. Prokofiev: Concerto No. 2, in G Minor, Op. 63. Walton: Concerto in B Minor. Chausson: Concerto in D Major for Violin, Piano, and Quartet, Op. 21. Saint Saens: Havanaise, Op. 83. Sarasate: Zigeunerweisen. Jascha Heifetz (violin); various orchestras, Arturo Toscanini. Serge Koussevitzky, Eugene Ormandy, John Barbirolli, and Eugbne Goossens cond.; Emanuel Feuermann (cello in Brahms); Jesus Maria Sanroma (piano in Chausson); Musical Art Quartet (in Chausson). RCA ARM-4-0945 four discs $27.92.
The Heifetz Collection, Volume 5 (1946 1949). Bach: Concerto for Two Violins and Orchestra in D Minor. Bruch: Scottish Fantasy, Op. 46. Vieuxtemps: Violin Concerto No. 5, in A Minor, Op. 37. Elgar: Violin Concerto in B Minor, Op. 6/. And thirty-two concert pieces. Various orchestras, Franz Waxman, William Steinberg, and Sir Malcolm Sargent cond.; Emanuel Bay (piano). RCA ARM-4-0946 four discs $27.92.
The Heifetz Collection, Volume 6 (1950 1955). Tchaikovsky: Concerto in D Major. Op. 35. Bruch: Concerto No. 1, in G Minor. Beethoven: Sonata No. 9, in A Major, Op. 47 ("Kreutzer"); Two Romances. Brahms: Sonata No. 3, in D Minor, Op. 108. Bloch: Sonatas Nos. 1 and 2. Saint-Satins: Sonata in D Minor, Op. 75. Ravel: Tzigane. Handel: Sonata in D Major, Op. 1, No. 13. Schubert: Sonatina in G Minor. Various orchestras, Walter Susskind, William Steinberg. Sir Malcolm Sargent, and Alfred Wallenstein cond.; Benno Moiseiwitsch, William Kapell, Emanuel Bay, and Brooks Smith (piano). RCA ARM-4-0947 four discs $27.92.
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Also see:
CAN YOU REALLY HEAR THOSE HI-FI SPECS? It all boils down to dynamic range and achievable loudness.
Source: Stereo Review (USA magazine)