I first read about this album in one of Norman Lebrecht’s articles.
Bemoaning the apparent ‘death of Decca’, he describes the soloist’s
sound and the general production as “poorly balanced and over-bright
... firmly in the lower leagues. Decca in its heyday would not
have passed this product.” Elsewhere, the disc has received almost
universal plaudits and has become an immediate bestseller both
as hard copy and download. So, what’s all the fuss about, and
who is right?
With innumerable
rave concert performances and numerous successful releases
on the Pentatone label, Julia Fischer has not only been establishing
a name for herself as a performer of stature in core repertoire
for the violin, but has also already shown her skill and commitment
to the works of J.S.
Bach, winning the Yehudi Menuhin competition and winning
praise for her playing of that composer at a very young age.
Pentatone has a niche market specialising in SACD recordings,
and Julia Fischer appears on nine of their current releases
with more in the pipeline. Even such an array of musical calling
cards, combined with the marketing strength possessed by sexy
young violinists in a line from Anne-Sophie Mutter in the
1980s to Janine
Jansen and others in the naughties doesn’t guarantee mass
popularity and success when transferred to a label with the
long tradition and reputation of Decca. While I’m prepared
to bet my Woolworths shares that it does help, it has
to be the intrinsic quality in the performance and recording
which gives such a release real legs.
These are some
of my favourite pieces of all time, let alone favourite works
by J.S. Bach, and I’m sure there are many of the same opinion.
The sheer upbeat nature of many of the outer movements and
the sublime beauty of the middle movements make the best of
these pieces a guaranteed winner on any desert island, and
in such circumstances you are going to want recordings to
which you can listen time and time again, without losing all
that fresh energy and moving emotion on repeated hearings.
My long-term favourite in these works has been that with the
father and son team of Igor and David Oistrakh in the double
concerto, David Oistrach a soloist in the BWV 1041 and two
concertos, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted
by Sir Eugene Goossens, and not forgetting the impeccable
George Malcolm helping everything along on harpsichord continuo
in the double concerto. This Deutsche Grammophon recording
has less of a chamber-music feel than this new release from
Decca, but the sheer beauty of texture in the orchestra and
emotion in the solo playing is something which has always
brought me back. There are a few others from the ‘non-authentic’
stable which I still have kicking around: the rather nasty
sounding early digital Gidon Kremer multi-tracking the double
concerto on Philips, Yehudi Menuhin with the Bath Festival
Orchestra in 1960 on EMI for instance which has rather more
pleasant memories, and that with Josef Suk and the Suk Chamber
Orchestra on a 1980s Supraphon disc which now seems terribly
heavy and lugubrious when compared to the shafts of sunlight
projected through our speakers from Julia Fischer and the
‘conductor-less’ Academy of St Martin in the Fields.
To my ears, the
pacing of each movement is well nigh perfect on this new disc.
The opening of the Concerto for Two Violins in D minor,
BWV 1043 invites the listener in with bright energy and
fleet lightness of touch. The soloists are in fact not as
far forward in the balance as many other recordings I could
name, and this means that the solo/ripieno effects of the
concerto grosso legacy from which this style of work derives
work very well. The soloists can almost disappear into the
orchestral texture during tuttis, and soar majestically when
the accompaniment takes on a secondary role. The famous Largo
ma non tanto moves along with elegant grace rather than
cloying sentimentality, but the sighing downward motifs are
allowed plenty of space to develop, and the contrapuntal layers
are beautifully balanced. Alexander Sitkovetsky matches Julia
Fischer well in terms of tone and expression, and it is often
hard to tell the two apart. They both play Guadagini violins
of similar 18th century vintage, so this is no
great surprise. The final Allegro swings along with
maximum élan, but still with a delightfully understated undertow
from all concerned, placing all the notes where they belong
rather than succumbing to a headlong tumult which compresses
and distorts.
The two solo concertos
have similar qualities. The pace of the faster movements is
brisk and light, the interaction between soloist and orchestra
is close and intimate, a cultivated conversation rather than
authoritarian dictation from one to the other. Is the Andante
of BWV 1041 a bit on the heavy side? It might seem
so in the beginning, but as the extended arches of each harmonic
progression take hold and the solo line sings above I can
entirely follow the logic of this interpretation. It has the
feel of Bach’s great forefather and example in this genre,
Vivaldi, and one can almost feel bathed in the lazy summer
heat of one of the ‘Four Seasons’. The final Allegro assai
of this concerto is irrepressibly bouncy, and Fischer
has great fun with the technical leaps, as well as retiring
into the background when Bach’s sparing brushstrokes serve
only to highlight what is going on in the orchestra. BWV
1042 opens attractively, with maximum dynamic contrast
bringing everything to life. One of the highlights of any
such set of these concertos has to be the sublime Adagio
from this concerto, and Fischer does us desert island
residents proud. The bass line has plenty of that tear-jerking
pathos we need from this music, and the whole thing has all
of the quiet drama of the most moving scene in the most devastatingly
beautiful opera you could imagine, but without the ‘fluitketel’
soprano to spoil it all with her wobbly vibrato. The gentle
central section builds from a moment of profound silence at
2:30, spanning over to the minor climax of the quiet return
of the opening theme at 4:40, and allowing room for the major
but oh-so-brief climax at 5:33, ushering in a coda of intense
dignity and softly unassuming power.
The Concerto
for Oboe and Violin in C minor, BWV 1060 might
seem a bit of a filler after the previous violin masterpieces,
but its warm good humour feels like a gift from a benign deity.
Andrey Rubtsov’s oboe tone is mellow and attractive, and its
lines sometimes lead the rest of the strings as if attached
to its notes like the strings of a puppet in the opening Allegro.
Transparency of texture characterises the Adagio, with
Fischer’s violin taking second place to the oboe, and the
jaunty final Allegro, with nicely done echo effects,
provides a fittingly animated close to this excellent programme.
I have no agenda when
it comes to reviewing this or any other CD which comes my way,
and I hope you will trust my objective point of view in stating
that this release is a delight from start to finish. I have listened
to this CD on numerous systems and, while the recording is bright,
this goes hand in glove with the nature of the performances, and
for once I am overjoyed to hear a violin soloist who doesn’t sound
louder than the entire orchestra when in full cry. ‘Full cry’
is not a term I would apply to this performance in any case, for
while the dynamic range has plenty of width, there is always a
sense of energy and power in reserve – the refinement and subtlety
of Bach’s compositions coming a long way before technical muscle
in the playing. If I haven’t mentioned phrasing or vibrato it
is because the question never arose: there is plenty of evidence
of ‘historically informed performance practice’ having rubbed
off here, but not to the extent of unnatural excision of vibrato
and addition of improvisatory improvisation. Expression, vibrato,
line and length of delivery are all in the service of the music,
something which to my mind transcends both taste and cricketing
metaphor. My only criticism of this release is in the presentation.
We get no fewer than nine different pictures of Ms Fischer and
not a single one of the other soloists, which I know will be down
to some marketing expert somewhere, but might lead an innocent
public to imagine that the other players are too upsettingly ugly
to appear, which I’m sure cannot be true. The notes are a bit
sketchy as well, but do give some insights into Fischer’s relationships
to the pieces, and that with her fellow musicians. All in all,
if there were any remaining doubts you can drop them in the litter
bin on your way out of the record shop. I sincerely hope this
release does not signal the death of Decca, and will in fact stand
for its turnaround into a gloriously creative and profitable future.
Either way, for a modern instrument performance of these great
works, this is now the one to beat.
Dominy Clements
Julia Fischer
(violin) 
