BOHUSLAV MARTINU Violin Concerto
No 2 (1943) [28.50] ORTFSO/Jean-Michel Leconte rec
1955
ARAM KHACHATURIAN Violin Concerto (1940)
]29.02]
Santa Monica Orchestra/Jacques Rachmilovitch rec 1946
JOSEPH ACHRON Stimmung
[3.16]
arr and cond Bernard Herrmann, Columbia SO rec 1949
RIMSKY-KORSAKOV Hymn to the Sun
[4.20]
TRADITIONAL Londonderry Air [3.34]
TCHAIKOVSKY Andante
Cantabile 5.05
Two violin concertos and some oddments. Why should you bother? The first
thing is that you SHOULD bother although not on account of the makeweight
oddments about which I have nothing to say except that anything that gives
us the chance to hear an orchestra conducted by Bernard Herrmann is likely
to be worth preserving..
The compulsion to purchase arises from the quicksilver ripeness of Louis
Kaufman's playing in the two concertos. The recording quality is tolerable
but pretty much compromised by the passage of the years in the case of the
Khachaturyan.
The Martinu is not exactly over-recorded. I know of the Suk disc (coupling
the two Martinus) and that is about it. The work begins in chasm and cataclysm
like Herrmann's Kane music. Soon this gives way to a display of the
most superb double-stopping and this is done musically in a way linking to
the glowing dynamics of the 4th Symphony (when is someone going
to reissue the glorious Turnovsky Supraphon recording of LP memory?). Colours
shine and glint from this playing: amber, emerald, scarlet, jet. The second
movement is emotionally vivacious and the third resplendent in tumbling tonal
splendour and energetic poetry. I have not heard the Suk for a long time
but as an interpretation the Kaufman is probably superior dulled only marginally
by the historic but respectable recording.
The Khachaturyan is the next notch down again in aural quality. The playing
is glorious; not a single ugly note. The pitch, yaw and surge of this performance
is breathtaking without the neon heartlessness which occasionally undermines
Heifetz's recordings. Vigour flashes and jabs through the pages of this populist
concerto and the central movement has a warm caramel sweetness in which one
can easily lose oneself. The finale has a hell-for-leather dash with a Russian
grace (5.18) to offset the helter-skelter progress. Superb performance.
Stimmung and the other 'bon bouches' are there and provide light diversion
but little to impress in this company. They do however allow a Beechamesque
sequence of lollipops in which the listener can relax after the lightning
and emotional storm of the two concertos.
Recommended as a musical and historic experience. Avoid if you must have
the dernier cri in audio. Do not miss it if you are looking for enduring
musical rewards. Violin fanciers will presumably already have it. If not
then do not hesitate to buy it now. © Rob Barnett
Available from DIMus@aol.com at £11.50
sterling excl p&p.
Reviewer
Rob Barnett
with
Paul Ulanowsky (piano) 
