The Test of Musical Greatness
JAMES, HIBBARD
MUSIC By Hibbard James The Test of Musical Greatness I HAVE always fell that one function of true greatness in music is the frequency with which it can be played without becoming boring, trivial...
...Both performances have their considerable merits, and...
...But he seems just a little too careful and fastidious in his approach to communicate fully the breadth and power of the Ninth...
...The nearest to a perfect performance of the Ninth was, perhaps, by Weingartner with the Vienna Philharmonic on an ancient, scratchy Columbia 78 RPM album, which has unfortunately disappeared from the catalogues (its recording technique was apparently too primitive to be transferred to LPs...
...In the final analysis, there can probably be no perfect performance of the Ninth...
...Thus, in some fashion, von Suppe's Poet and Peasant Overture seems predictable and familiar even on first hearing, while there are always fresh surprises and unexpected depths in such things as Brahms' German Requiem or Schubert's Unfinished Symphony...
...it was a great performance, its only flaw being that the conductor's approach lacked sufficient grandeur to lift it to the level of the all-time greats...
...The singing of the first part of the "Ode to Joy" is such a case...
...The Toscanini recording, for instance, was a great performance (it's still available on Victor LM 6009), with all the force and clarity of reading that were the Tosca,nini hallmark...
...MUSIC By Hibbard James The Test of Musical Greatness I HAVE always fell that one function of true greatness in music is the frequency with which it can be played without becoming boring, trivial or uninteresting...
...and when the orchestra comes crashing to a stop and the baritone soloist soars up with his ringing "O, Freunde, nicht diese Tone . . ." the effect is stupendous, even though the music is so familiar that one can't help mentally predicting each note in advance of the singer...
...9 is pre-eminent among the music that triumphantly meets this test of greatness...
...Surely Beethoven's Symphony No...
...But it doesn't quite come off because the tempo robs the opening passages of intensity and negates the joyous quality that Beethoven was striving for...
...and the bass...
...There was something Olympian in his snarls and rages, and there was a touch of hellfire in his mirth...
...He captures all the force and excitement of the first and second movements, but there are places in the third and fourth movements where he asks more than his performers—or, I am inclined to think, any performers—can possibly deliver...
...There is always something new and thrilling about the first statement of the choral theme by the double basses...
...But in this case, as in a number of other Toscanini performances, the reading is too clear...
...I have had various occasions to mull over these ideas in recent week, first when I heard Herbert von Karajan conduct the New York Philharmonic with soloists and the Westminster Choir, and since then, as I have played and replayed the excellent new recording with Otto Klemperer conducting the Philharmonia Orchestra with soloists and chorus (Angel 3577...
...Toscanini always made us hear every element in the music, but is this what the composer had in mind...
...In many ways, I prefer Otto Klemperer's reading...
...The work of the tenor, Leopold Simoneau...
...and if you are lucky enough to know anyone who has it, you can hear an inspired performance that no other currently available record can match...
...Von Karajan is unquestionably one of the great conductors of our day, with a wide range of moods and styles at his command...
...although they inevitably call for comparison with other performances and recordings of Beethoven's masterpiece, they clearly demonstrate that in such great music as this a wide variety of interpretations seem perfectly possible...
...Beethoven's music demands both verve and intensity...
...The late H. L. Mencken once said of Beethoven: . . the feelings that [he] put into his music were the feelings of a god...
...Even with these defects, however, it is a stirring performance that can stand comparison with most of the currently available recordings...
...Klemperer takes it so slowly presumably in order to heighten the contrast, as he builds first to the presto and then to the final prestissimo...
...There is a fine von Karajan recording with the Philharmonia Orchestra—Angel 3544...
...in efFect, he clothes Zeus in evening dress and, while the result is undeniably handsome, the end product is a shade too civilized...
...and when some of the passages are taken at as slow a tempo as Klemperer demands they become almost impossible to sustain...
...Norman Scott, was excellent, and the choral work was superb in the fiendishly difficult fugue section, known to singers as "the desert...
...Von Karajan is a bit too urbane to play Beethoven in this fashion...
...All in all...
...With all its technical faults, it was a magnificent recording...
...It has always seemed to me that the famous Toscanini clarity sometimes actually detracts from the beauty of the music he played by overemphasizing its architectural detail...
...In his performance, von Karajan was in complete control of everything, and the orchestra, soloists and chorus responded to his wishes...
Vol. 42 • March 1959 • No. 9
