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Peter Ilyich
TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893) Swan Lake op.20 (1877) [155:38]
Ida Haendel
(violin), Douglas Cummings (violoncello)
London Symphony Orchestra/André Previn
rec. 26-28 May, 8-10 June 1976, Kingsway Hall, London CLASSICS
FOR PLEASURE 3 93243 2 [77:52 + 77:46]
“Classics for Pleasure” has a nostalgic ring, but when I was buying
cheap LPs in my university days the CFP “Swan Lake” was a
single disc of extracts by the Philharmonia under Efrem Kurtz
with Yehudi Menuhin playing the violin solos.
In 1976 Previn was about two-thirds through his decade with
the LSO. With an EMI contract under their belt the team was
flooding
the market with reliable, musicianly versions of the popular
repertoire. Everything here is beautifully played, in good
style, with lively rhythms, warm, relaxed phrasing and some
excellent wind solos. I thought the Mazurka (no.23) a bit
too fast but there’s nothing else to fault. You can tell
the amount of care that went into it from the fact that the
movements which you only hear in complete performances are
done to the same standard as the ones the orchestra could
play blindfold.
And yet … I prepared this review contemporaneously with that of the
single CD of extracts recorded by Fistoulari with the Concertgebouw.
Comparing Fistoulari with Kurtz I wrote that “In each of
the movements they have in common … Fistoulari, with a slight
tweak of the tempo faster or slower, with sharper articulation,
more detailed phrasing and greater appreciation of the orchestral
colour, brings the music into focus. You feel that he is
challenging and stretching the orchestra to the brink while
Kurtz just lets them play”. A comparison between Fistoulari
and Previn reveals the same thing. Whereas between Previn
and Kurtz it is a matter of swings and roundabouts, sometimes
one is a little preferable, sometimes the other. Previn does
get considerable panache in the festivities of Act III and
in the final scene he at last stretches the orchestra, creating
the sort of colossal tension that Fistoulari gets all the
time. 1976 would be about the time when the LSO came to realize
that for all Previn’s excellent qualities, they were ultimately
under-achieving under his amiable management. If they were
to maintain their international status they needed someone
to challenge them, as Abbado later did.
I remarked that Kurtz’s saving grace was the presence of Yehudi Menuhin,
whose playing “has a vocal, intensely human quality”. Ida
Haendel has a different personality, of course, but a similarly “vocal,
intensely human quality” shines through. The movements in
which she appears are the highlights of the performance.
And so? This is a safe recommendation, no doubt. But “safety first” isn’t
the best way to conduct Tchaikovsky and I’m not sure you
wouldn’t do better to have 46 minutes of this music under
Fistoulari than the whole thing under Previn. Unfortunately
I am not able to advise readers over the merits of Fistoulari’s
more complete versions, though the earliest (1952) is in
mono and the later one had Phase 4 sound which not everybody
likes.
For a bit of dangerous living I fished out a curious string
of movements taped off the air under a conductor once hailed
in Italy
as the greatest living interpreter of Tchaikovsky – Vladimir
Delman (1923-1994): the great Pas de Deux for Siegfried
and Odette with the maximum of its mournful poetry squeezed
from it and shorn of its final Allegro, the opening bars
of no.11 treated as an introduction to the Bolero, the Czardas
and an outrageously camp version of the Neapolitan Dance.
All done with a verve, a gut conviction and a desire to communicate
you just don’t find in Previn.
But still, as I say, Previn is a “safe recommendation”. A
detailed synopsis is provided, but some of the tracks are
too long.
The Dances of the Swans in Act II, for example, have a single
track of 17:50. Yet they consist of seven distinct movements
with pauses between each other. Did it not occur to whoever
prepared this that some listeners might like to be able to
separate out the Pas de Deux with its memorable contribution
from Haendel?