Bruno Walter made three commercial recordings
of the Pastoral. This is the
earliest and whilst not dissimilar to
the later Philadelphia and Columbia
Symphony traversals it does show a slightly
tighter grip in places, though he does
spurn the first movement repeat. Of
the three I have to say that the middle
recording, with the Philadelphia in
1946, remains my favoured interpretation
but the pre-War Vienna has considerable
merits of its own and these are shown
in fine relief in this well aerated
transfer by Mark Obert-Thorn. Once again
he retains a limited amount of surface
noise in the interests of open and warm
sound.
The upper strings make
an impression but more so the characterful
Vienna winds. Rather less impressive,
a fault one assumes of the original
recording set-up, are the treacly and
congealed basses. Nevertheless the phrasing
is eloquent and refined, if a touch
inclined now and again to comma-ish
pointing; here the Philadelphia performance
is its superior in length of phrasing.
The Peasants’ Merrymaking is notable
for superlative flute, clarinet and
bassoon playing – the spatial matters
are nicely caught with the horns’ well
highlit and the violins’ entries crisp
and spruce. Those flutes pierce in the
Thunderstorm but there are a few balance
imprecisions between first and second
violins in the Shepherds’ Song.
The overtures cover
Walter’s London recordings with the
BBC Symphony, the British Symphony and
the LSO. They make a cracking quartet.
Leonore has been on the Great
Conductors series from Koch and it rightfully
takes its place here. So powerful is
its cantilever and so fluent is it in
its leonine drama. Coriolan is
similarly impressive though perhaps
the orchestral ensemble isn’t as tight.
His recording with the 1930 British
Symphony will alert collectors to the
Violin Concerto Walter was to lead with
Szigeti two years later. In fact this
quartet of overtures makes, if anything,
an even greater case for Walter’s status
as a powerful and incisive Beethovenian
than the Pastoral, fine though
it is. Those who only know him from
his post-War recordings will certainly
welcome evidence of his earlier mastery
in this repertoire.
Jonathan Woolf
BUY
NOW AmazonUK
BBC Symphony Orchestra * 
