Even though the BBC Archives have released some rare
live Moiseiwitsch – concerto performances, principally from the Proms
– it remains true to say that little live recital material from his
later years has survived. Arbiter here collates performances from his
world tours – New York in 1958 and again in 1960 and from 1954 from
Australia, New Zealand or South Africa (the exact location is in doubt).
Best of all of course would be to find recitals from his golden years
but in the absence of such we must be grateful for what we do have and
that the sonic problems have been so well overcome here.
The problems, intermittent though they are, are not
confined to the source material alone because Moiseiwitsch was no longer
quite the impeccable technician and stylist of old. His technique had
taken a buffeting during the War years when incessant travelling across
the British Isles had taken its toll (and recordings at around the end
of the War tend to document the fact) but it recovered over the next
few years. But even though Moiseiwitsch was now only in his mid to late
sixties the worn technique does make itself apparent in numerous ways
– a considerable number of finger slips, faults of chording and co-ordination
and the lengthening shadows of incipient old age generally pursue his
playing. Nevertheless much of the nobility and colouristic beauty remains
for this to be an important release and if you can look past – and hear
past – the imperfections you can still find a great deal to admire and
cherish.
The Chopin Ballade in F starts beautifully but there
are some very uncomfortable moments along the way, technical splashes
of which some are, frankly, major. From the same 1960 New York recital
comes the B flat major Scherzo and this shows a distinct improvement
in his technical resources – it’s far from note perfect but seems more
agile and determined with much better co-ordination between the hands
and very impressively characterised. The B flat major Prelude has some
fine – though inconsistently fine – things in it. The Bach-Liszt Organ
fantasie is notable of course for the first named because Moiseiwitsch
was certainly not noted for his Bach, at least on record. But this is
a very fine performance, one dropout excepted (it doesn’t last long)
along with some wow on the tape, with the pianist strong and commanding,
his voicings in the Fugue so subtle and restrained that one cranes to
hear them. I would characterise the performance of the Chopin-Liszt
"My Joys" as the carapace of a great performance because the
finger slips do tend to sabotage it as a reading. The Wagner-Liszt Tannhäuser
was always one of his most intoxicatingly magnificent performances (the
1938 HMV set is ever present on my turntable). He is still grand, noble
and still commands something of the leonine "three handed"
drama of it, with something of the sonorous drama of old, even if he
is no longer the technically eloquent stylist of old and the climax
doesn’t blaze as it once did. Nor is the Stravinsky quite the little
marvel he once made of it. The disc concludes with an amusing and avuncular
chat between two colleagues, Moiseiwitsch and Abram Chasins, on the
subject of Rachmaninov.
So in conclusion a disc that, for all the digital flaws,
brings rare and important late Moiseiwitsch to a wider public. I couldn’t
recommend it to those who have yet to experience his art – they would
find it compromised – and to those for whom Moiseiwitsch is still one
of the supreme musicians I would counsel intelligent detachment; in
that spirit one can still appreciate much about his outstanding musicianship.
Jonathan Woolf
Moiseiwitsch interviewed
by Abram Chasins