BaL 1.03.14 - Beethoven Symphony no. 7 in A

[LeMartinPecheur]

I recall Andrew McGregor saying there were 55 recordings. I made it 178 or thereabouts.

I think what was actually said was that Deathridge had listened to 55. Would be very interesting to know who picked them out and how!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Did he do this? Any more than any other reviewer, that is? Apart from the obligatory "isn't Karajan crap" comments (which are compulsory amongst Oedipally-inclined critics of a certain age on Seedy Review these days) I thought that this was a well-presented and remarkably balanced overview.

There was a certain balance; this is true, but what derision punctuated it. A few examples:

Like many others, he [Weingartner] probably fell hook, line and sinker with the nineteenth century story that the tune was taken from an Austrian Pilgrim's hymn. Yet another tall tale from the pious world of Beethoven mythology, for which there's no evidence at all.
But if you do want to believe it, you may be glad to hear this…

(Barenboim)


Just how supercilious can you get? And an argument that has nothing to do with musical merits.

Or this one:

…and when you take that away,….. all you have left are boring white knight heroics and much loved musical moments homogenised for easy listening

(Karajan)



Or this, following an extract from Norrington's LCP version:

Roy Goodman, Franz Bruggen, Christopher Hogwood and John Eliot Gardiner also produced their own period instruments recordings of Beethoven Symphonies… to counteract misplaced glossiness and bad musical habits.

Many will agree with his sentiments, but he phrases them as absolute facts rather than just opinions.

[Prommer]

As I watched the tumultuous and extended audience reaction I was minded of the things that people kept aying about Kleiber in the two recently released films (available on youtube) about his shyness and reluctance to become a machine musician on the one hand and about his dedication and relentless drive once the conditions were right on the other hand. Seeing him stooping to accept the many bunches of flowers I was touched by the idea that such an artist must both delight in such a reception of the work that he & the orchestra have just recreated but also he might fear the night when this doesn't happen, when the magic fails. How to go on? And that of course is what happened in London on that evening replacing Boehm when the critics were savage, and he never returned, I realised. Was the audience receptive in London, I wonder?

Well, amateur51, I have heard excerpts of the concert Kleiber gave with the LSO at La Scala a few days before the London concert, and the audience goes wild at the end. Yes, a different evening and crowd, but the same forces and the same programme. It is very exciting playing and occasionally lacking pinpoint precision in the last movement, and I think this was one of the things the critics objected to - ie it wasn't like his studio VPO recording which everyone by then had come to love and accept as a world beater, 'definitive' etc. A bit like going to a concert and hearing a different version of a song one has always 'heard' in one's mind from a record - and being disappointed...?

Alternatively, he may have had a bad experience with the LSO, which could apparently be a tricky bunch at the time - but there has never been any hint of that being the reason for problems. It seems Kleiber was offended by the critics, pure and simple, and therefore it would appear that he at least thought it had gone well - NOT that it had been an off-night!

[Bryn]

There was a certain balance; this is true, but what derision punctuated it. A few examples:
(Barenboim)

Like many others, he [Weingartner] probably fell hook, line and sinker with the nineteenth century story that the tune was taken from an Austrian Pilgrim's hymn. Yet another tall tale from the pious world of Beethoven mythology, for which there's no evidence at all.
But if you do want to believe it, you may be glad to hear this…

Just how supercilious can you get? And an argument that has nothing to do with musical merits.

Or this one:

…and when you take that away,….. all you have left are boring white knight heroics and much loved musical moments homogenised for easy listening

(Karajan)



Or this, following an extract from Norrington's LCP version:

Roy Goodman, Franz Bruggen, Christopher Hogwood and John Eliot Gardiner also produced their own period instruments recordings of Beethoven Symphonies… to counteract misplaced glossiness and bad musical habits.

Many will agree with his sentiments, but he phrases them as absolute facts rather than just opinions.

Thank you for illustrating (and at a stroke effectively demolishing, to my mind) the basis for your antipathy regarding the review. All three points well made by JD, I feel.

Karajan was a damned good Honegger conductor, however.

[verismissimo]

... Many will agree with his sentiments, but he phrases them as absolute facts rather than just opinions.

Think I guessed that they were opinions, Alpie.

[HighlandDougie]

but it's now been supplanted by a Blu-ray Audio release.

If anyone has a Blu-ray player in their set-up, the improvement in sound to the Kleiber in this format is little short of remarkable.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

There was a certain balance; this is true, but what derision punctuated it. A few examples:
(Barenboim)


Just how supercilious can you get? And an argument that has nothing to do with musical merits.

Well - the idea that the theme is "taken from an Austrian Pilgrims' Hymn" is mistaken, and so performances which ignore the Allegretto marking (even if the conductor doesn't hold faith with Beethoven's metronome markings) and perform the Movement as a slow(ish) Movement have a similarly mistaken idea of how the Music should best "go". This is "Musical merit", surely?

The criticism of Karajan is, as I suggested earlier, part of the current trend. But at least Deathridge supported his opinion with an excerpt which (in isolation - which is always the weak point of the discussions: Krivine sounded so fast played straight after Kleiber - in the context of the whole performance, it is exactly right) illustrated his point - it wasn't a gratuitously derisory insult. (Significantly, Deathridge avoided using any of Karajan's later recordings which, as he had to admit between gritted teeth, were closer to what Beethoven wrote. A refreshing change from the "Karajan never altered his view of the works he conducted" mantra which is usually trotted out.)

Or this, following an extract from Norrington's LCP version:
Many will agree with his sentiments, but he phrases them as absolute facts rather than just opinions.

But, having illustrated his opinions with enthusiastic and favourable discussions of Furtwangler, Toscanini, Klemperer and Kleiber (and, I thought, Barenboim) it is clear that "misplaced glossiness and bad Musical habits" don't refer to non-HIPP recordings or attitudes. Deathridge similarly opined against the "easy"-HIPP approach he found in Zinman, phrasing this just as much "as absolute fact rather than opinion".

I heard much more balance and a commendably open-minded attitude to the work than you did, Alpie - I didn't entirely agree with him, but I was able to hear what was fact and what opinion: and the passion for the work (rather than a self-admiring revalation of his own erudition to the poor mortals listening) shone through his comments for me.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Deathridge similarly opined against the "easy"-HIPP approach he found in Zinman, phrasing this just as much "as absolute fact rather than opinion".

He did indeed. But do two wrongs make a right? (Uh huh - that's my opinion, not necessarily a fact. )

But if you do want to believe it, you may be glad to hear this…

This was the most snide remark, implying that only those who believed in the tooth fairy would like Barenboim's performance

[seabright]

It would be interesting to know how many recordings of the 7th (studio or 'live') have been issued over the years. Presumably there were acoustic 78s of the work, though the electrical ones appear to have started in 1927 with Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra (reissued on Biddulph).

A website devoted to all the recordings of the "Eroica" ground to a halt in 2009 where, in the second panel (click link below) it says "there are now 397 performances on hand." Five years later I should think the total "Eroicas" must be getting on for 500 by now. I guess there'd be a similar number of 7ths too, from 1927 onwards, so imagine Mr D surveying that lot in 45 minutes flat :) ...

http://www.grunin.com/eroica/index_ref.htm

[aeolium]

I didn't mind JD having and expressing strong opinions about the work and performances of it - that to me is the point of BaL. I couldn't quite follow his harping on "mechanistic", as it's a concept that's never come into my mind when listening to this work. For me the Furtwängler/VPO recording has an intensity and control of transition that no other has (except possibly Furtwängler's wartime recording with the BPO in 1943, where the tempo fluctuations are more extreme). Apart from that, Kleiber's recording is wonderfully dramatic, has great orchestral playing and excellent recording quality.

[Nick Armstrong]

As usual I've delayed reading this thread until I'd heard the programme... Interesting that in the many pages above (unless I've missed it), the chosen recording wasn't mentioned at all, although the conductor was briefly present in all but name

Well, the 'poor' conductor was very known for his interest in Czech music and was a leading light in the rediscovery of Janacek. (As well as G&S!) Ring any bells?

Lots of interesting variety to be sampled. it was the live Carnegie Hall JEG that really caught my ear among the HIPP performances - although I agree HD, I too was

very glad to hear van Immerseel being given air-time

... Jan van Immerseel, as Mr Deathridge said

I have no problem with a bit of subjectivism in the survey - it's one person's view after all. Deathridge does have a slightly snooty tone to his voice but like ferney & aeolie

I heard much more balance and a commendably open-minded attitude to the work than you did, Alpie - I didn't entirely agree with him, but I was able to hear what was fact and what opinion: and the passion for the work (rather than a self-admiring revalation of his own erudition to the poor mortals listening) shone through his comments for me.

I didn't mind JD having and expressing strong opinions about the work and performances of it - that to me is the point of BaL. I couldn't quite follow his harping on "mechanistic", as it's a concept that's never come into my mind when listening to this work.

- the 'mechanistic' thing was lost on me too.

Apart from that, Kleiber's recording is wonderfully dramatic, has great orchestral playing and excellent recording quality.

Yes - I'll always come back to that. I've always found it right up there with the companion 5th, just thrilling playing. I'm interested to hear the whole Mackerras, and maybe the fluffs etc which were audible pale into insignificance in the context of the whole performance (as they no doubt did entirely at the concert itself) - but they can grate with me on repeated listening. As for Carlos K, I didn't until this morning know about

the little issue of CK, like EK, taking an 'interesting and unusual' decision re pizzicato at the close of the Allegretto!

I can't say it's a deal-breaker for me.

PS This gave me a great chuckle

I must get this Klieber recording! Sacrelidge that I hav'nt already(or have I?)

YES! You must get it! (Or have you found it?)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

About the "mechanistic" stuff - I understood JD to be referring to the contrast between the inflexible rhythmic patterns that LvB uses throughout the work (Daa-di-da, Daa-di-da etc in the First Movement, Dah-da-da dah dah in the second, teDada teDada teDada in the Third, Ta Diddleadda dada Ta diddleadda dada in the Finale) contrasted with more fluid counter melodies. What puzzled me was why he thought these "even more" prominant in this work than in, say, the Fifth or Sixth Symphonies.

[BBMmk2]

Hi Cali! I have his Brahms 4, but I am surprised JD didn't like Klieber!!

[aeolium]

About the "mechanistic" stuff - I understood JD to be referring to the contrast between the inflexible rhythmic patterns that LvB uses throughout the work (Daa-di-da, Daa-di-da etc in the First Movement, Dah-da-da dah dah in the second, teDada teDada teDada in the Third, Ta Diddleadda dada Ta diddleadda dada in the Finale) contrasted with more fluid counter melodies. What puzzled me was why he thought these "even more" prominant in this work than in, say, the Fifth or Sixth Symphonies.

Or, say, the Hammerklavier sonata. Odd to hear something described as "the apotheosis of the dance" by Wagner characterised as "mechanistic". Something rhythmic isn't necessarily mechanistic, surely?

[Nick Armstrong]

Hi Cali! I have his Brahms 4, but I am surprised JD didn't like Klieber!!

But he did! It came second (or perhaps 3rd, given his comments about the Krivine) out of his pile of 55 or whatever...

For the price of a couple of pints of Spitfire, it can be yours!

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/offer-listing/B000001GPX/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1393695100&sr=8-1&keywords=beethoven+7+kleiber&condition=used

Just do it !