Seldom does one encounter a Casadesus disc that disappoints. Here
we have Cologne broadcast performances from Medici’s increasingly
active stable and none disappoints. The repertoire may not perhaps
stir the breast – these were all very familiar works but the uniqueness
of the inscriptions should tempt collectors of artist-led discs
such as this. The presence of Scherchen on the rostrum will –
or should –also add a pressing interest, though colleagues such
as von Dohnányi and Georg-Ludwig Jochum are hardly going to turn
away prospective purchasers.
The broadcasts date from a period of just over a decade. Mozart
was a Casadesus speciality of course. A Barbirolli-led performance
exists live from New York in 1938 on APR 5601. Then there’s
the famed Columbia Symphony/George Szell Sony Classical from
1959. True the Barbirolli suffers from indifferent sound and
the Szell will be the main point of comparison, but all three
performances enshrine very similar virtues of clarity and
proportion, of delicate precise passagework and indeed a very
similar approach to rubati and to proportion in general. Typically
elegant the passagework in this Cologne performance approaches
the pellucid, and ensemble is maintained throughout. There’s
an especially impressive first movement cadenza. The slow
movement bears tribute to the warm, uncloying clarity of Casadesus’s
playing whilst the finale enshrines Gallic insouciance in
profuse quantity – along with bushels of timbral sophistication
and nuance. Incidentally a performance of K467 given on 15
May 1956 with these same forces exists, and can be found on
Melodram GM40048.
The Emperor, with von Dohnányi, reprises the more salient
qualities of line and narrative control, and contour. His
tone is necessarily fuller and he displays a commanding, unhackneyed
sense of drama. Noble and self effacing as he is in the slow
movement it’s never too reserved and the forward moving sense
of tempo he proposes here acknowledges the un poco messo
instruction. He establishes the dramatic terpsichorean basis
of the finale early, but he is quite capable of the most ravishing
liquid phrasing and right hand delicacy, as well as ensuring
that the balance between hands is properly weighted. This
should justly be added to the Mitropoulos and Previtali led
recordings for points of comparison.
Finally we have Ravel’s Piano
Concerto in D major for the Left Hand. The soloist was much
associated with it and his 1947 recording with Ormandy has
long stood the test of time. This live recording was made
a decade after the pianist’s commercial recording. It’s a
pretty good recording and once past the rather untidy opening
things begin to burgeon nicely. Scherchen was no stranger
to the work; he had conducted it for the dedicatee, the argumentative
Paul Wittgenstein, in April 1934, and again in 1958 in Buenos
Aires and in 1959 with Monique Haas and the Berlin Philharmonic.
Now trenchant, now terse, colourful and sinewy this is a powerful
reading with the two men seemingly in fine accord. The “brassy”
first trumpet makes his presence felt and the jazz-influenced
pages are accomplished with rhythmic assurance. Casadesus
is a nuanced and characterful soloist and more extrovert than
his compatriot Jacques Février whose 1942 recording with Charles
Münch, though tonally constricted, offers similar musical
rewards.
The
Ravel has been out before, on Tahra TAH651, an all-Scherchen
disc. If you don’t have it you can find it now on this finely
transferred and annotated Medici tribute to a treasurable
artist.
Jonathan Woolf
Robert Casadesus
(piano) 
