AVAILABILITY
www.tahra.com
We have here three
relatively well-known commercial recordings
from 1948-49 and the bonus of a previously
unpublished rehearsal of the first movement
of the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto given
by French violinist Michèle Auclair
in Boston in 1951. The Brahms Violin
Concerto has already appeared, nicely
transferred on Dutton, and is played
by the short-lived Viennese fiddler
Ossy Renardy (born plain Oscar Reiss
in 1920). This is a recording that many
admire. There’s certainly a mix of measured
control and strong accelerandi, the
lyrical and the passionate that intrigues.
The second movement is sweetly lyric
indeed though I have to say I find Renardy’s
playing a little glutinous sometimes
and claustrophobic; and, to be schoolmasterly,
those repetitious slides in the finale
simply won’t do – all too unvaried.
The demerits of the performance are
ones of youthful monochromaticism –
there just aren’t enough tone colours
for this of all works. Given the choice
of this and the Dutton and the palm
goes to Dutton. There’s some 78 hum
on this Tahra and the strings do sound
a bit starved high up – a Decca tendency
and one that Dutton has dealt with much
better. Some of the side changes are
noticeable as well, with subtle acoustic
shifts that are momentarily off putting.
The Dutton is coupled with Furtwängler’s
problematic recording of Brahms’ Second
Symphony with the LPO – which may affect
things.
Beethoven’s Seventh
Symphony was recorded with the Boston
Symphony the following year. There’s
surface noise but a big and wide acoustic
spread with some moments of diffusion.
Munch was something of an underrated
Beethovenian; take the Allegretto, which
is fluid and flexible, not rushed though
not dawdling either. The dynamics however
are excellent and the weight in the
tuttis is finely calibrated, not at
all too emphatic. He may sound a mite
cautious in the finale but saves his
tinder for later in the movement where
he presses on – though the original
recording is unhelpful in bringing out
string choir strands. The little "Congratulation
minuet" is the rare filler to the
Seventh Symphony. Munch of course made
multiple recordings of the Symphonie
fantastique, probably the best known
being the Boston and L’Orchestre de
Paris traversals. Tahra’s is the September
1949 78 set with the orchestra of ORTF.
Consistently quicker than his French
colleague Pierre Monteux, Munch offers
a powerfully linear alternative and
here, in his pre-Boston days one feels
the strength and finesse he’d already
cultivated. Wind solos are characterful;
his Ronde de sabbat is powerfully
driving, intensely so in fact, and the
personality of the piece etched with
tremendous outline – a genuinely involving,
big reading and rather more so than
his other three commercial discs – the
Boston isn’t quite so larger than life
and the later Paris LP recording had
slowed down. The 1949 recording has
appeared on A Classical Record, Albert
ten Brink’s specialist label, but I
think that will be hard to find now
– there it was misdated 1945 and was
coupled with Munch’s other Parisian
discs of the period. Some of the sides
in Tahra’s release are a touch scuffy
and the middle voices are muffled in
the recorded balance, with quite a bit
of raw brass and booming percussion
– but against that it’s an impressively
immediate recording and exceptionally
enjoyable.
Which brings us to
the previously unissued Tchaikovsky,
given by the twenty year old Michèle
Auclair. This is a work she was later
to record, twice, in Austria during
an unusual career on disc, featuring
on domestic French labels as well as
such as on Remington. Those looking
for explosions and temperament from
the conductor will be disappointed.
Munch had been a distinguished string
player and had risen to the heights
of orchestral leader and occasional
soloist so he knew the ropes. He is
concentrated and business like; occasionally
he sings along, once he calls out "too
loud" (in English – his introductory
welcome to this most French of American
bands was in French). Once or twice
he raps out the rhythm when he feels
it’s getting slack. There is admiring
applause from the orchestra at the end
of the movement; Auclair plays well,
with elegance and a certain raffiné.
There are some notes,
in French and English, outlining Munch’s
career. A salutary couple of discs,
then, that introduce us to a younger
Munch than we are generally used to.
I rate this Berlioz very highly and
the Brahms and Beethoven are revealing
of his conductorial priorities. The
transfers, as I suggested, can be variable
but at their best they’re convincing.
Jonathan Woolf
Michèle Auclair (violin)/Boston Symphony
Orchestra, live 1951 
