The Dutch conductor, Paul van Kempen (1893-1955) had a fairly
short podium career. His life as a professional musician began
at the age of seventeen, when he joined the first violin section
of Mengelberg’s Concertgebouw Orchestra. A number of orchestral
posts in Germany followed but it was not until he was in his
thirties that he began to conduct. Fairly early in his podium
career he was offered the conductorship of the Dresden Philharmonic
Orchestra in 1934. He stayed with them until 1942 when he succeeded
Karajan as Generalmusikdirektor in Aachen. Returning
to his native Holland after the Second World War he had to wait
until 1949 to secure another permanent post, this time as conductor
of the orchestra of Radio Hilversum, a post he held until his
death. He was concurrently Generalmusikdirektor in Bremen
from 1953.
Perhaps he might
have made a greater impact had his career not coincided with
the war and had he not elected to remain in Germany for the
duration. One suspects that his associations with Germany
worked against him in Holland in the immediate aftermath of
the war. As is evident from the brief biographical details
above he never led a major orchestra though he did make a
number of commercial recordings, mainly for Philips, with
the Concertgebouw Orchestra after the war and also with the
Berlin Philharmonic. It is his studio relationship with the
latter orchestra that is represented on this Tahra set.
The shorter pieces
show him at his best here, I think. I’m afraid I can never
get very excited by Les Préludes, which always seems
to me to be a pretty empty creation. It gets a civilised reading
from van Kempen and the BPO plays pretty well for him. Sample
the sweet violins at 9’23”, though there’s a fairly prominent
cracked note in the horns a second later. The Hebrides
overture gets a good performance. The opening paragraphs are
nicely shaped, with some affection, though there’s no undue
lingering. Later on van Kempen whips up a pretty energetic
storm. I also liked his account of the overture to Benvenuto
Cellini. This has flair and life and when the allegro
section is reached the music fizzes nicely.
I was less enamoured
of his Beethoven. The reading of the first movement is clean
and is given at a steady pace. Whilst this steadiness ensures
clarity the music really needs more fire and urgency than
is on display here. The middle movements are a trifle staid
though the finale does have welcome drive and purpose. All
in all this isn’t an especially memorable account of Beethoven’s
most energetic and good-humoured symphony.
I had never heard
of Adrian Aeschbacher, the soloist in the Brahms concerto
and Tahra’s note, disappointingly, tells us absolutely nothing
about him. I believe he was a Swiss pianist, born in 1912
but beyond that information on him is sparse. It appears that
he recorded this same Brahms concerto with Furtwängler (Music
and Arts CD-941). He plays well and van Kempen is an attentive
accompanist. I liked the buoyant second movement and Aeschbacher
is sensitive in the gorgeous slow movement - where he is
well supported by the BPO’s principal cellist – casting Brahms’s
lyrical spell effectively. The finale is light on its feet
and trips along nicely. However, the performance is hobbled
by the recorded sound. It’s a rather boxy recording, especially
of the piano, and climaxes are constricted with the orchestra
recessed too much behind the piano. Worst of all there are
pretty regular fluctuations in pitch, which impart a definite
sense of aural queasiness. All this, I assume, is the result
of flaws in the original source material since the other transfers
in the set are quite good. Just to be sure I wasn’t being
hypercritical I got down the Testament transfer of Solomon’s
1947 HMV recording (SBT 1042). Though the recording was made
four years earlier than this Aeschbacher version the sound
is incomparably better and the pitch remains constant. Sadly,
listening to Solomon also confirmed that his magisterial version
is much superior to that by Aeschbacher. Solomon digs deeper
and reveals more about Brahms than is vouchsafed here. In
short, the van Kempen/Aeschbacher traversal is good but not
especially memorable.
And that verdict
really applies to the whole set, I fear. The performances
are solid, musicianly and well prepared but they lack that
last bit of distinction that separates the great performances
from the good ones. This is a useful set, not without interest,
but I must be honest and say that it would not be a priority
purchase for me.
John Quinn
Adrian Aeschbacher
(piano)
