When I was an “A”-level music student in the late
sixties, Berg’s Violin Concerto was seen as an essential subject
of study. Conscientious to the last, I decided to buy a record
of it, and the choice seemed to turn between two which had been
released within a month of each other. One was the marvellous
version by Joseph Suk on Supraphon, coupled at the time with
the Bach cantata quoted by Berg, and now available with two
other concertos in Supraphon’s remarkable Ancerl Gold Edition.
The other was this performance by Grumiaux, and since I found
the Stravinsky coupling more appealing, that was the version
I invested in.
The two twentieth-century concertos have already appeared on
CD in the Philips Legendary Classics series. The Philips name
and logo do not appear on this issue, sadly, but we do have
an extra work, the Tchaikovsky, billed as a first international
CD release. I’ll deal with that performance first. Grumiaux
plays, as always, with impeccable technique and much bravura.
His reading of the first movement cadenza is highly individual,
and indeed his expressive manner brings with it a few surprises
throughout the work. Most collectors will already have more
than one performance of this concerto on their shelves, and
many of these will feature rather more in the way of Russian
passion than this one. I wouldn’t want to emphasise this too
much, as Grumiaux is very satisfying. Even so, there are several
points where he sounds less that completely comfortable. Perhaps
he and the conductor, a name unknown to me, didn’t see eye to
eye. The orchestra plays well enough, but there are brief moments
of imprecise ensemble in both the first and last movements,
and the accompaniment as a whole remains earthbound. The performance
is far more than an interesting supplement to the other two
concertos, however, and Grumiaux admirers such as I will be
very happy that it has been made available. But many other performances
are preferable as single-choice recommendations.
It is the other two concertos which make this disc indispensable
. Stravinsky’s concerto is a masterpiece. There are four short
movements, two fast ones enclosing two slow, both of which carry
to title Aria and both of which contain passages of great
beauty. It is one of his neo-classical works, firmly in D major,
and with characteristic motor rhythms pervading the music, particularly
the outer movements. I recently heard the finale described –
I forget by whom – as “a riot”, and this seems fair. It’s hilarious
at times. The scoring, for large orchestra, is typically idiosyncratic,
being heavily biased towards the winds. I know of no more successful
performance than this one. Grumiaux has the measure of the work,
highly expressive yet cool in the two slow movements, brilliant
and incisive in the rest. The orchestra, under Ernest Bour,
plays superbly, with particularly honourable mention going to
the trombones who contribute not a little to the general hilarity
of the finale.
Back in my “A”-level days, critical faculties developing and
so on, I heard someone describe Berg’s Concerto as “sick”. The
idea was thus planted in my mind, and I held the same – demonstrably
second-hand – view for many years thereafter. My feelings began
to evolve at about the time I realised that we all have the
perfect right to think what we want about a given work of art.
So I still find that there is a richness, an over-ripe, charged
atmosphere there which can seem at odds with the notion of a
work in memory of a young girl. Berg’s way with the Bach quotation
when it comes, too, the different harmonisations of the tune,
rather add to this effect. But there are passages of quite astonishing
beauty throughout the work, and its dramatic structure is most
satisfying. Despite the fearsome technical challenges, it is
decidedly not a romantic, virtuoso concerto, and though the
player must inevitably demonstrate total mastery of these challenges,
the solo instrument must not draw attention to itself in this
way. I admire enormously the Suk performance mentioned above,
and one by Frank Peter Zimmerman that I reviewed in a huge EMI
box was only one of several more recent performances that I
have found satisfying. But Grumiaux remains, in my view, the
finest exponent of the work I have heard on record. He plays
with quite extraordinary purity of tone, and his poise, sense
of line and phrasing are unparalleled and totally at one with
the spirit of the work. Not once does he overstep the line,
so easy to do in this concerto, and allow the music to become
lachrymose. In other words, this is the performance to convince
listeners that Berg’s Violin Concerto is a serious musical and
emotional document, and not “sick” at all. It’s a performance
that should be on every serious collector’s shelves, and coupled
as it is with an equally outstanding performance of the Stravinsky
plus a respectable performance of the Tchaikovsky, all at an
absurdly low price, this disc is absolutely unmissable.
William Hedley
Arthur Grumiaux (violin) 
