Terrific Brahms here led by Sir Adrian Boult. Featured works are the Academic Festival Overture, the Tragic Overture, the Haydn Variations and the Alto Rhapsody with Monica Sinclair as the soloist. These recordings made by Nixa-Westminster date from 1954.
Boult was hands down one of the greatest conductors of Brahms ever. His great attention to detail, careful preparation and ability to remain utterly unsentimental paid extraordinary dividends in his performances of Brahms. Just listen to the Haydn Variations, for example, and you will hear Haydn's voice as Brahms intended. Boult gets it and does not let this beautiful tribute wallow up into a grotesque parody of the simple joys that Brahms wanted to celebrate. The master Brahms penned these exquisite and deferential variations to a master whom he held in the highest possible regard.
The other pieces on this record are no less impressive. I especially love the rich and creamy voice of Monica Sinclair in Brahms' great tribute to the beauty of the human voice. Sinclair's phrasing, breathing and enunciation is a reminder of another time and place when a singer's identity could be easily identified. There's nothing generic here and Sinclair proves a wonderful partner for Boult as her presentation is musically pure and emotionally stable.
I do wish that I had a better copy of this record. There are two places where my heart sank a bit when skips could not be entirely removed. The most notable is in the last bars of the Haydn Variations where an awful scar left a blemish which momentarily jolts the listener during the quietest of passages. I did what I could and debated whether to offer the Haydn Variations because of this slight. I decided that one small spot was not worth scrapping the finest Haydn Variations that I have ever heard.
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