George Szell and Thomas Scherman conduct Brahms

From a Music Appreciation issue, the glorious music of Brahms juxtiposing perennial favorites, the Academic Festival Overture and Variations on a Theme by Haydn with the less heard "New" Liebeslieder Waltzes. The orchestral selections are led by George Szell with "his symphony orchestra" while Thomas Scherman conducts the choral waltzes.  Vocal soloists are Lucine Amara, Frances Bible, David Lloyd and  Hugh Thompson. The duo pianists are the excellent Abba Bogin and Eileen Flissler.

Music Appreciation, Book of the Month, Musical Masterpieces of the World were great services in their day. Marketed to the masses, their issues introduced many a lay person to the great classics by "assisting" the listener in choice of repertoire and performance. In essence, the services made choices for listeners who might have not made a choice at all if left to their own devices. For the most part, performances were well chosen and the artists often musicians overlooked or underappreciated by the big labels.

As you would expect, George Szell leads pointed and detailed renditions of the Haydn Variations and the Academic Festival Overture. A total unsentimental approach ensures an orchestral approach which is above all, based on precision with respect to the architecture of each piece. With Szell, the overall structure does not break down into mere episodes. If one can say anything about Szell, he was a consistent artist whose recordings came to symbolize "quality," both in sensible interpretation and immaculately prepared performances.

Scherman's New Liebeslieder waltzes are more thean adequate though strangely, I feel that vocal contributions are rather pushed and pulled at times. With a solid quartet, I find this quite odd however, there is an  upside in that Bogin and Flissler are quite effective as duo pianists. These waltzes are beautiful examples of Brahms' mastery of the human voice though Scherman could have introduced a little more subtlety to the proceedings.

Both recordings are decent mono and date from the mid 50's.

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Richard Strauss with Reiner and Szell

Though I've got the 10 inch jacket pictured above, my transfer is from ML4800, which includes the Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme suite conducted by Reiner while in Pittsburgh. I picked up this really rough lp for the suite since I've had in my collecton a really crappy sounding Membran cd for sometime. Membran is the German company that puts out 10 cd boxes for under 15 bucks of historic performances.Their transfers leave something to be desired though because they over filter and the sound quality becomes incredibly muffled. This is especially pronounced when original recordings were less then their company's best efforts, as was the case with Columbia in Pittsburgh and Minneapolis.

People might scoff at me but I have long enjoyed Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme. This is delightful, unpretentious fare, wonderful melodies with skillful writing. Call it bottom drawer Strauss if you wish, but I love it and well that's that! Reiner, of course, recorded it twice - in Pittsburgh during the mid 40's and in Chicago in the late 50's. Outside of Bud Herseth's magnificent trumpet playing in the Chicago recording, I find the Pittsburgh issue more relaxed and inviting, less driven then Reiner's later recording. In addition, there is a more intimate feel which is wholly appropriate for this suite of incidental music.

As I stated earlier, this particular lp was in a real rough shape. Do people use lp's as frisbee's? I wonder. Running it through ClickRepair several times cleaned up a lot but a couple of hiccups remain and I think they are quick and not cumbersome to the listening experience. Oh! the sound is much better then the Membran cd and I can hear details that on the cd were muffled away. 

Reiner leads an engaging and impressive Don Juan and Szell, in one of his earliest Cleveland records, captures the vitality of Till Eulenspiegel ...with charm!

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George Szell conducts Schumann and Beethoven from Cleveland & New York

I was most fortunate to acquire this week two extremely well preserved lps of George Szell conducting in Cleveland  (1952) and New York (1954ish I think). Here they are and, for the first time, I am trying ClickRepair in its trial edition.

Szell is rather interesting character in my book. An incredibly gifted musician (many do not realize that he was a piano prodigy and composer), he was also a difficult, rather mean spirited man, who sought only to promote his ambitions, often at the expense of weaker and sometimes less talented musicians. Given what I have read, it seems that no really liked Szell but his willful personality manipulated and cajoled those around him into doing his bidding. At its very best, the results of the Szell way was unparalleled excitement coupled with breathtaking musical virtuosity and execution.

The Schumann from Cleveland is Szell's first take on the work with this orchestra. Those that know his celebrated cycle from the late 50's, early 60's may not recognize this as being from the same conductor,or orchestra for that matter! This is highly driven performance from an orchestra that is not quite the precise ensemble it would become within the next 8 to 10 years of this recording. Without a doubt, Szell blows off whatever cobwebs his predecessors laid on the work and he presents a blazing account of a rather wonderful score. I have never heard a Schumann 2nd that moves like a great performance of a Beethoven symphony..but this one does!

Beethoven's Pastorale from New York is noticably more restrained than the Schumann but features more secure playing and a warmer touch. Like Szell's later Cleveland account, this is a good reading but the maestro's temperament is somewhat at odds with the general flavor of the score. I've always thought that a more genial Walter way or, expansive Stokowski vision, works best in this colorful music. Szell doesn't strike me as a man who had much to do with nature...could you imagine him fly fishing? Whatever the final verdict, Szell does deliver Beethoven with an overall faithful approach to the score. Surprisingly, I hear portamento from the strings and THAT was a bit of a surprise....maybe Szell was indeed relaxing a bit!?

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