Furtwangler: An Unassailable Reputation?

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  • aeolium
    Full Member
    • Nov 2010
    • 3992

    #16
    I think Furtwängler's reputation as a conductor has probably dropped off slightly in recent decades, partly because of the much greater availability of recordings in high-quality sound (his recordings, especially the live ones, were often in much poorer quality sound) and partly with the rise of HIPP performances together with the increasing importance placed on accuracy of detail within recordings, as in Building a Library. I often hear reviewers in BaL metaphorically doff the cap to Furtwängler as a historical icon yet criticise the flaws in his performances and it is quite rare that any of his recordings is selected even as a historical choice, not least because BaL provides such a bad framework for bringing out the qualities of WF's performances, the intensity, the art of transition, the conception of the work as an organic whole whose every part relates to the others. Even though most people here will only ever have heard WF through his recordings, he disliked recording and some of his most memorable recordings were actually of live events.

    Anyway, for me some of his recordings are among the most intense and eloquent testaments of music-making I know: Haydn symphony no 88; Schubert symphony no 9; Mozart's 39th and 40th symphonies and the 1950 Salzburg Don Giovanni; Beethoven's Eroica with the VPO and the Violin Concerto with Menuhin and the Philharmonia; Schumann's 4th symphony; Bruckner's 7th and 8th (particularly the wartime 8th in 1944); the Tristan und Isolde with Suthaus and Flagstad; Verdi's Otello from Salzburg with Ramon Vinay. It's true that WF's musical personality is strongly present in these performances but I disagree that it is oppressively so, or that it distorts the character of the music: rather, it brings it out so that it is more intensely alive - as in, for instance, the first movement of the Mozart G minor symphony which could almost be a modern interpretation in its fast tempo and powerful rhythmic drive. There are many conductors whose personality is clearly imprinted on their performances - the two Kleibers for instance, or Klemperer, or Karajan or Bernstein - not to mention pianists or singers. That is something I admire, not some false attempt at objective truth.

    If I value one thing particularly in WF's work it is that he reminds us that a musical performance is at its best a single non-repeatable event. Even if he conducts a work many times, each of those performances will be different. In the recording age when performances can be replayed endlessly there is the risk of staleness, of a mechanical response in both player and listener. Whatever the flaws in WF's performances - and they were certainly there - staleness and predictability was not one of them. His was, especially in the wartime and post-war recordings, an essentially tragic vision - but then the age he had lived through in his maturity was one of the most tragic in human history. As ferney says, you will not find much wit, sparkle or lightness in his recordings - though there is at times a bucolic quality, as in the 3rd movement of the Haydn 88 or the peasants' scenes in Der Freischütz, and I love the irresistible joie-de-vivre in the finale to the Haydn 88 (and he did record the overture to Die Fledermaus!)

    I am never searching for the perfect or the definitive recording, but rather enjoy the many different ways in which works of genius can be performed. I don't often listen to Furtwängler's recordings now - the memory of them is still clear - but, flawed and wonderful, they made a huge impression on me when I was discovering music.

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    • ferneyhoughgeliebte
      Gone fishin'
      • Sep 2011
      • 30163

      #17
      Originally posted by aeolium View Post
      As ferney says, you will not find much wit, sparkle or lightness in his recordings - though there is at times a bucolic quality, as in the 3rd movement of the Haydn 88 or the peasants' scenes in Der Freischütz, and I love the irresistible joie-de-vivre in the finale to the Haydn 88
      YES! I wish I'd thought of "bucolic" - it's there in the Finale of the Mozart Gran Partita, too.

      (and he did record the overture to Die Fledermaus!)
      Leonora #4!

      Provided to YouTube by The Orchard EnterprisesDie Fledermaus Overture · Strauß · Wilhelm Furtwängler · Berliner PhilharmonikerWilhelm Furtwängler: Mendelssoh...


      (unfair - the Berliners do a really good Viennese accent here.)
      [FONT=Comic Sans MS][I][B]Numquam Satis![/B][/I][/FONT]

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      • Barbirollians
        Full Member
        • Nov 2010
        • 11669

        #18
        I think his reputation has gone up in recent years . I remember quite a lot of critical comment at the time of his centenary in 1986 .

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        • Eine Alpensinfonie
          Host
          • Nov 2010
          • 20570

          #19
          The following is a list of the works for which recordings by WF survive:

          As conductor -

          J.S.Bach: Orchestral Suite no. 3
          J.S.Bach: Brandenburg Concerto no. 3
          J.S.Bach: Brandenburg Concerto no. 5
          J.S.Bach: St Matthew Passion

          Bartok: Violin Concerto no. 2

          Beethoven: Symphonies 1-9
          Piano Concertos 1, 4 & 5
          Violin Concertos
          2 Romances for Violin & Orchestra
          Beethoven: Fidelio
          Beethoven: Egmont Oveture
          Beethoven: Leonora no. 2 Overture
          Beethoven: Leonora no. 3 Overture
          Beethoven: Coriolan Overture
          Beethoven: Cavatina from String Quartet Op. 130
          Beethoven: Grosse Fugue Op.133

          Berlioz: The Damnation of Faust

          Blacher: Concertante Music for Orchestra

          Brahms: Symphonies 1 – 4
          Brahms: Variations of a Theme of Haydn
          Brahms: Hungarian Dances 1, 3 & 10
          Brahms: Piano concerto no. 2
          Brahms: Violin Concertos
          Brahms: Double Concertos
          Brahms: A German Requiem

          Bruckner: Symphonies 4, 5, 6 (exc.) 7, 8 & 9

          Cherubini: Anacreon - Overture

          Dvorak: Slavonic Dance Op. 46, no. 3

          Fortner: Concerto for Violin & Large Chamber Orchestra

          Franck: Symphony on D minor

          Furtwangler: Symphony no, 2
          Furtwangler: Symphonic Concerto for Piano & Orchestra

          Gluck: Alceste - Overture
          Gluck: Iphgenie en Aulide – Overture
          Gluck: Orfeo ed Euridice

          Handel: Concerto Grosso Op.6, no.5
          Handel: Concerto Grosso Op.6, no.10

          J. Haydn: Symphonies 88 & 94

          Hindemith: Concerto for Orchestral
          Hindemith: Symphony “Harmony of the World”
          Hindemith: Symphonic Metamorphosis on a Theme by Carl Maria von Weber

          Honegger: Movement Symphonique no. 3

          Liszt: Les Preludes

          Mahler: Leider eines fahrenden Gesellen

          Mendelssohn: Violin Concertos
          Mendelssohn: Hebrides Overture
          Mendelssohn: A Midsummer Night's Dream Overture

          Mozart: Symphonies 39 & 40
          Mozart: Serenades 10 & 13
          Mozart: Piano Concerto 20 & 22
          Mozart: Concerto for 2 Pianos
          Mozart: Don Giovanni
          Mozart: The Marriage of Figaro
          Mozart: The Magic Flute
          Mozart: Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail - Overture

          Nicolai: The Merry Wives of Windsor - Overture

          Pepping: Symphony no. 2

          Pfitzner: Palestrina (excerpts)
          Pfitzner: Symphony in C Major

          Ravel: Daphnis et Chloe - Suite no. 2

          Rossini: La Gazza Ladra – Overture
          Rossini: The Barber of Seville - Overture

          F. Schubert: Symphonies 8 & 9
          F. Schubert: Rosamunde (excerpts)

          H. Schubert: Hymnic Concerto

          Schumann: Manfred – Overture
          Schumann: Symphonies 1 & 4
          Schumann: Piano Concerto
          Schumann: Cello Concertos

          Sibelius: Violin Concerto
          Sibelius: En Saga

          Smetana: Vltava

          J. Strauss II: Emperor Waltz
          J. Strauss II: Die Fledermaus – Overture
          J. Strauss II/Josef Strauss: Pizzicato Polka

          R. Strauss: Sinfonia Domestica
          R. Strauss: Metamorphosen
          R. Strauss: Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks
          R. Strauss: Death & Transfiguration
          R. Strauss: Don Juan
          R. Strauss: Four Last Songs
          R. Strauss: Four Songs

          Stravinsky: Symphony in 3 Movements

          Tchaikovsky: Symphonies 4 - 6
          Tchaikovsky: Serenade for Strings

          Verdi: Otello

          Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen
          Wagner: Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg
          Wagner: Tristan & Isolde
          Wagner: Siegfried Idyll
          Wagner: The Flying Dutchman – Overture
          Wagner: Tannhauser – Overture
          Wagner: Parsifal (excerpts)
          Wagner: Lohengrin (excerpts)

          Weber: Der Freischutz
          Weber: Euryanthe – Overture
          Weber: Oberon – Overture
          Weber: Invitation to the Dance


          As pianist -

          Wolf: Eichendorff-Lieder
          Wolf: Morike-Lieder
          Wolf: Goethe-Lieder
          Wolf: Italian Songbook
          Wolf: Six Old Tunes
          Wolf: Six Songs for Female Voice
          Last edited by Eine Alpensinfonie; 22-10-15, 14:53.

          Comment

          • Roehre

            #20
            Many thanks EA

            Comment

            • gradus
              Full Member
              • Nov 2010
              • 5604

              #21
              CFM/David Mellor broadcast 3 Furtwangler excerpts this evening as part of his week of programmes devoted to the BPO. He played the last movt of a Beethoven 7 from 1943 that I hadn't heard before and it was as though I was hearing the symphony for the first time. Utterly extraordinary in every respect and if you have never heard the performance, I urge you to find a copy and listen.

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