MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger

REVIEW


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 

 


Johann Sebastian BACH (1685 - 1750)
Bist du bei mir BWV 508, arr. Klemperer [3:28] (1)
Air from Suite no.3 BWV 1068 [6:24] (2)
Magnificat in D BWV 243 [29:16] (3)
Brandenburg Concerto no.5 in D BWV 1050 [20:42](4)
Anna Báthy (soprano) (3), Judit Sándor (soprano) (3), Magda Tiszay (contralto) (3), Lajos Somogyvári (tenor) (3), Grörgy Littasy (bass) (3), Oliver Nagy (continuo) (3), Sandor Margittay (organ) (3), Tibor Ney (violin) (4), János Szebenyi (flute) (4), Annie Fischer (piano) (4), Budapest Chorus (3), Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra (1, 2), Budapest Radio Symphony Orchestra (3, 4)/Otto Klemperer
rec. live, 11 February 1945 (1), 16 December 1945 (2), 13 January 1950 (3, 4), Los Angeles (1, 2), studios of Radio Budapest (3, 4)
GUILD GHCD 2360 [60:38]

Experience Classicsonline



Amidst a swathe of recent Klemperer releases — new and old, studio and live — comes this rather tangential affair from Guild. I say tangential, not because of any inherent peculiarity, or irrelevance, but because the performances derive from rather under-documented periods of Klemperer’s peripatetic life. These are covered in the booklet notes, which are written by Claudio von Foerster who also seems to have provided the master material, though someone should surely have tidied up his approximate English.

We open in Los Angeles in 1945. Bist du bei mir is a famous ‘non-Bach’ Bach piece, buried in Anna Magdalena Bach’s Notebook. Klemperer has the strings of the local orchestra at hand to present a languorous arrangement (his own) seemingly out to out-Stoky Stokowski. Klemperer was on record as having hugely admired the string tone Stokowski managed to produce with the Philadelphia, so maybe it was his aim to attempt likewise. What he can’t replicate however is Stokowski’s sense of vitality and intensity in Bach, however it was achieved and despite the liberties he took. By contrast the Air from the Third Suite is an unmitigated mistake, taken at a terribly slow tempo, lacking variety of articulation and any semblance of animation.

At this point we leave LA, and return to Europe for 1950 performances from Budapest. A number of Hungarian live recordings have circulated over recent years that do something to illustrate the breadth of his performance life in the city. There’s a certain amount of Wagner, for instance. Here there is more Bach and it does, at least, consolidate the disc with stronger evidence of his affinities with the composer — affinities that were later to be explored more fully, and deeply, in London with the Philharmonia.

His tempos for the Magnificat in D are vigorous and sometimes even bracing; similar to the kind of tempos Hermann Scherchen was taking in Bach, but without quite Scherchen’s sense of purpose. He has a rather uneven line up of solo vocalists and a rather ragged chorus; also a piano continuo. It’s probably best to concentrate the high points of the performance—which means glossing something like the choral Fecit potentiam — and admire instead the felicitous flautists, the laudable, if taxed tenor, the decent sopranos and the neat bass. The Brandenburg Concerto that follows is much better. The Budapest Radio Symphony Orchestra is on good form; violinist Tibor Ney is only so-so for some of the time, and his intonation comes under pressure. I wonder if János Szebenyi was one of the flautists in the Magnificat. I assume so; he’s very good, once again. The real star though is Annie Fischer who plays beautifully, and commandingly, throughout. There isn’t the sense of chamber intimacy in the central movement that others have cultivated, but that’s probably not the intention. What emerges is a good performance, well performed (mostly) and very decently transferred.

I can’t say this is an especially compelling release for most listeners. For Klemperer stalwarts it fills in geographical and temporal gaps, perhaps, but on stylistic and interpretative grounds needs to be approached with a degree of caution.

Jonathan Woolf

see also review by Christopher Howell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools






Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.