Two additional Remingtons to offer today: The Jilka Sextet performing Beethoven's Septet and pianist Felicitas Karrer, along with conductor Kurt Woss, in the immortal "Emperor" Concerto.
The Jilka Sextet, or rather septet, was an augmented version of the Jilka Trio, an ensemble led by violinist Alfred Jilka. A search yielded surprisingly little other than a reference to them on the Remington Records site. References aside, this is an enjoyable and vivid performance of this delightful work from Beethoven's early period. This is Beethoven without the angst and working within set forms, rather than stretching them to their melodic and harmonic ends as is best illustrated in the last quartets.
Felicitas Karrer offers more of a biographical background. Born in Vienna, she was quickly recognized as a gifted artist and embarked on a recording career shortly after her 21st year. Karrer, though, chose personal and family affairs over that of a busy concert artist so by her 30th birthday, she had practically receded into the background as a significant concert performer. A very fine detailed biography of Felicitas Karrer can be found here.
In the Beethoven "Emperor" she is well paired with the fine conductor Kurt Woss and his Austrian Symphony Orchestra (known today as the Tonkünstler-Orchester Niederösterreich). Woss had organized this orchestra after the war as the "official" state orchestra of Lower Austria and remained its principal conductor until being called to Japan to help reorganize the NHK Symphony. Later, Woss would return to Austria and rebuild the Bruckner Orchestra Linz. He is best remembered as an orchestral builder and trainer. There is an excellent recording of Woss conducting Bruckner's 4th symphony available at abruckner.com.
Karrer and Woss are two very likeminded partners on this recording of the Emperor. Though Karrer admitted that these Remington affairs were often recorded "on the fly," there is little sign of this based on what I hear. Piano and orchestral contributions compliment each other throughout and there is a healthy elasticity in the performance. In short, this is a joyous collaboration, one where everything just seems to fall into place with ease, naturally unfolding for the ears. There is no "Her versus Him' here. So pleasing are the proceedings that one overlooks any instrumental inadequacies from this hardworking, though technically challenged orchestra.
As always, working with these early 50's records poses challenges and difficulties. It is darn near difficult to get perfect results, unless one wants to dedicate literally hours to the process. I admittedly don't! What I strive for is something eminently listenable and honest. I hope that you enjoy these two Remingtons as much as I do.
