Biddulph is doing sterling
work restoring to the catalogue some
of Szigeti’s least well-known recordings.
This makes for essential, though often
uncomfortable, listening for his many
admirers because the focus inevitably
falls on the LP discs of the 1950s;
ones that show considerable decline
in his playing. I’ve written about the
graphic manifestations of this before
in a previous Szigeti/Biddulph release
so won’t labour the point here - review.
We have a mix of Baroque
sonatas and concertos. The Handel and
Tartini sonatas were stereo remakes
of 78 sets Szigeti had recorded many
years before. I cleave to the 1937 Handel
as one of the most life affirming and
exciting performances of a Handel sonata
I know but the remake shows all too
coolly the erosion of his technique.
He’s fortunate that Carlo Bussotti takes
the ear with his playing – no subservient
lamb, he – and is almost over recorded.
There are too many incidents of desiccated
tone, bowing accidents, trembling, compromised
intonation and woefully slow vibrato
to make this anything other than a sad
and tattered remnant. The Tartini is
rather better, the phrasing luminous
in the opening Adagio (few fiddle players
could phrase like him in such works,
even given that he lacked an opulent
tone) but the presto demands cause problems.
The little Tartini
Concerto was a favourite of his – you
can see him essaying it in a Canadian
television performance on VAI – and
it too has some uncomfortable moments
though generally his playing here is
in less stark relief and he emerges
creditably. Not a comment that could
be levelled at his accompanist George
Szell, who sounds to have been in a
thoroughly bad mood here and in the
Bach Concerto (I’ve adjusted Biddulph’s
notes to show its exact origin). This
performance is also on Naxos. As I wrote
in my review of this performance there
– and nothing has modified my view;
we have the God-awful George Szell conducting
the G minor/F minor Concerto. The gimlet-eyed
Hungarian conductor must have been in
an especially tough mood as he leads
his compatriot through a galumphing,
miserable reading. Szigeti exhibits
some serious bowing arm defects, as
was often the case in these, his declining
years and his unevenness and unsteadiness
is accompanied by a tonal shrillness.
I don’t know what to say about Szell’s
marshalling of the orchestral pizzicato
figures except that they’re truly terrible
and that Szigeti’s downward portamenti
sound rather forced. The original recording
hardly modifies the stultifying, remorseless
heaviness of the undertaking. Of the
two transfers I much prefer the Naxos.
The most valuable work
here is actually the solo Bach which
predates the complete set of Sonatas
and Partitas Szigeti recorded in the
1950s. These are noble remembrances,
compromised by the playing but ultimately
illuminating of a great Bach performer’s
Last Will and Testament. It’s a pity,
as Tully Potter says in his notes, that
Szigeti didn’t record them all in his
prime – at around the same time Casals
was recording the Cello Suites. He left
only two from this period. In 1949 he
recorded the Third Sonata, in C. Certainly
there are problems in bow sustenance
and some attacks are inclined to be
brittle, but the playing throughout
shows the best qualities Szigeti brought
to this repertoire – a masculine strength
coupled with powerful intellect; tone
subservient to textual meaning, as it
were. And a worthy resurrection; in
fact the principal attraction of this
disc.
As ever Biddulph dispense
with matrix and original issue numbers.
Recommended principally for the Bach
sonata.
Jonathan Woolf
BUY
NOW Crotchet
Columbia Symphony Orchestra/George Szell 
