When in my mid-teens
I remember being taken up to London
(my first visit to the Royal Festival
Hall) to hear a concert by the London
Philharmonic conducted by Boult. After
a grandly built up "Meistersinger"
Overture Milstein arrived to play the
Beethoven Violin Concerto. The next
day William Mann, in "The Times",
commended Milstein’s "classical"
interpretation, but also commended the
organizers for having used Milstein’s
Beethoven as a bait to ensure a full
hall for a Symphony by Edmund Rubbra
– no. 7, which followed the interval.
Now that I find myself reviewing what
is presumably the same performance more
than three and a half decades later,
I suppose I should be lamenting that
the organizers in this case have not
used Milstein’s Beethoven as a bait
to introduce a new generation of fiddle
fanciers to the beauties of Rubbra 7
(if the performance survives); however,
Sir Adrian then set the symphony down
for Lyrita and no doubt would have preferred
us to hear the carefully prepared studio
version.
It would be nice if
I could say "Ah. it’s just as I
remember it", but perhaps the kind
of interpretative maturity on offer
here was not gauged to appeal to a teenager.
I can only say that now it strikes me
as one of the most perceptive performances
I have ever heard, one of the best coordinated
between violinist and conductor and
one of the best balanced with the orchestra.
From the outset one is struck by the
firm enunciation of the timpani motto
which is made to sound the germ from
which the whole movement rises, both
in its original form and later when
it is used in eighth-notes. After some
dubious ensemble (not typical of what
follows) on the very first page the
opening tutti is by turns peremptory
and noble; a slowish first movement
can be a tedious affair but here it
is kept alive with countless distinguished
touches of phrasing. It sets the tone
ideally for an interpretation notable
for its classical purity (interpretations
of this work can basically be divided
into classical or romantic according
to whether or not they slow down to
a crawl in the G minor episode: this
one doesn’t). Milstein’s tone does not
radiate humanity as Menuhin’s could,
but his silvery purity has a feeling
all of its own and he gives point to
all the passage work without either
parading his technique or hogging the
limelight when the melodic interest
is in the orchestra.
In the slow movement
we may first admire Boult’s ability
to maintain musical movement at a slow
tempo, and then Milstein’s true dialogue
with the orchestra; you can feel him
listening to the clarinet, for example,
and adding his commentary. Hearing this,
one is compelled to realise how often
in this movement we hear the violinist
doing his own thing and leaving the
orchestra to do theirs; it all means
so much more when played as here. Before
starting the finale Milstein plays a
cadenza that sets the new mood and then
establishes a joyous rhythm which Boult
catches exactly.
As to the excellent
balance between violinist and orchestra,
a live broadcast was hardly the place
for knob-twiddling; Boult was famous
for his orchestral balance and we can
hear that a concerto performance conducted
by him could be happily recorded as
it was without any further intervention
from the engineers. (Of course, the
engineers might not have needed to intervene
in either of Boult’s studio recordings
of this work, with Alfredo Campoli and
Josef Suk, but we don’t know this).
Fascinatingly, the recorded talk with
John Amis which closes the disc is illustrated
with a snippet from the first movement
of Milstein’s recording of this concerto
with the Philharmonia under Leinsdorf;
the tempo is slightly faster and the
effect is so different that it would
be fascinating to compare them fully.
The orchestral sound
is extremely good; that of the violin
is occasionally disfigured by a slight
impurity (distortion) in the highest
register. All the same, this is one
of the most revealing versions in the
catalogue. I promise you the occasional
coughs are nothing to do with me, but
my hands presumably contributed to the
applause to be heard at the end.
The shorter pieces
reveal Milstein’s sure technique and
patrician artistry; they also show that
he had not quite the charm of Kreisler
nor the diabolical panache of Heifetz;
you might say he was more musical than
either, and surely we hear him at his
best in classical concertos and sonatas.
He gives the game away at the
end of the interview, when he declares
he loves playing Bach above all other
composers; violinists who feel that
way should not bother with things like
Nováček’s “Perpetuum mobile”. His
violin sounds fine even in the 1957
recordings, but Ernest Lush sounds
as if he were playing in the next room.
Christopher Howell
Nathan Milstein (violin)