Firstly, Naxos bills Dohnányi
in a curious mixture of the original Hungarian form of
his name - albeit spelled wrongly - and the Germanisation
(Ernst von Dohnányi). The latter he adopted for his professional
career although the ‘von’ was completely bogus.
Unlike his closely contemporaneous
compatriots, Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály, Dohnányi stayed
firmly rooted in the central European Romantic tradition.
Not for Dohnányi the exploration and collection of Hungarian
folk music, although there are Hungarian ‘flavours’ in
some of his music. Rather, he produced two massive symphonies,
two large-scale Romantic piano concertos, many extended
pieces of chamber and solo piano music, as well as some
lighter – and better-known – works such as
Ruralia Hungarica and
the
Variations on a Nursery Tune for piano and orchestra.
His two violin concertos
are also substantial structures. Although the second is
recorded elsewhere - by James Ehnes, no less - this recording
of the first concerto from 1915 is the only one available
at the time of writing, making this issue an important
and welcome one. The earlier of Dohnányi’s violin concertos
shares with his First Symphony an unashamed Romanticism
which betrays the fully-assimilated influences of Brahms,
Wagner, Strauss and even Mendelssohn. In fact, the First
Violin Concerto adopts a four-movement structure as chosen
by Brahms for his Second Piano Concerto. Dohnányi’s work
brings to mind a kind of four-movement latter-day Brahms’ Violin
Concerto. After a truly symphonic
Molto moderato first
movement, a lush, lyrical – and very Brahmsian – slow movement
and a
scherzo, the top-heavy last movement can be
a bit heavy going. For me, it is too long and rambling.
I could have done without the development of the violin’s
first-movement opening
cadenza which opens the finale.
It is a full three minutes before the movement gets underway
properly with a theme which reminded me more than a little
of the big main theme from the finale of Brahms’ First
Symphony. This theme is treated to some imaginative variations
before a very traditional
cadenza, coda and obligatory
upbeat ending.
While the first concerto
was written in his native Hungary, the second comes from
a much later period when Dohnányi had finally settled in
the western United States after several years of moving
around. It was the establishment of the communist régime
after the Second World War which finally drove Dohnányi
away from his homeland for good. The style is less overtly
Romantic, very slightly edgier and more obviously ‘Hungarian’.
It is also more concise. The concerto gets underway without
any preamble and has a style now much more aligned with
Erich Korngold and Miklós Rózsa (with perhaps the slightest
hint of Prokofiev) than the first concerto’s Brahmsian
colours. The order of the two inner movements is reversed
here, with the slow third movement providing the musical
and emotional heart of the piece. Unlike the somewhat rambling
final movement of the first concerto, that of the second
is a much more succinct six minutes and feels all the more
satisfactorily for it.
This CD introduces a new
name to me – the soloist Michael Ludwig. He seems to be
quite a find. His sound isn’t the largest or most robust
but his playing is musicianly and very secure. He is superbly
accompanied by the Royal Scottish National Orchestra conducted
by one of the leading female conductors, the American JoAnn
Falletta. The warm and spacious sound of Glasgow’s Henry
Wood Hall will be well known to Naxos collectors and the
recording is as good as one could wish, making this disc
an invaluable one for lovers of Romantic and post-Romantic
violin concertos.
Derek Warby
see also reviews by Kevin
Sutton and William Kreindler
Michael Ludwig (violin)
