Klemperer
made two studio recordings of Bruckner 4. The first, with the
Vienna Symphony Orchestra for Vox (1951), was famous for its
fast tempi and generally bulldozing approach. The second, with
the Philharmonia for EMI (1963) is famous for rather better
reasons and has remained at the top of the symphony’s discography,
together with the VPO Böhm (Decca). To these should probably
be added the live Munich performance under Kempe
(1972). I was deeply impressed by the 1975 Karajan,
though not all agree, and Bruno Walter’s Columbia Symphony performance
still has its adherents.
A
number of live Klemperer performances have been added to the
equation. Tahra have put out a 1947 version with the Amsterdam
Concertgebouw while EMI themselves have added a Munich performance
from 1966. Now comes this midway version from 1954, a time when
the reading was still pretty fiery. His timings of 14:48, 13:16,
10:29, 17:25 compare strikingly with Kempe’s 18:55, 14:33, 10:13,
20:15 or Karajan’s 18:21, 14:33, 10:49, 20:27. Klemperer’s 1951
recording is said to be the fastest on record at under 52 minutes,
while I see from Patrick Waller’s review
of the most recent reissue of the 1963 studio performance that
it is about five minutes longer than the present one – and still
too fast for Patrick!
I
can’t say the tempi seemed to me at all breathless and I was
struck by the inevitability with which the first movement unfolded.
But if this much as you would expect from Klemperer, I found
he failed to hold me to the end. The orchestral playing is not
terribly good, for one thing. The string choir can be quite
lush, even schmaltzy, but there is a lean, stringy timbre to
much of the wind playing, at least as recorded. The brass climaxes
have a paint-stripping quality which is viscerally exciting
at first but gradually becomes tiresome. Amazingly for Klemperer
there is no real attempt to grade the climaxes, each one sounds
equal with everybody letting fly for all they’re worth, and
the music then trundling along dutifully in between. This is
particularly noticeable in the finale.
In
1954 Klemperer was on the threshold of that extraordinary turn
in his fortunes which turned him in the public eye from a controversial,
somewhat erratic figure into a great conductor. Those who saw
him in Cologne 1954 described a “physically broken man supported
on a stick” who “makes his way to the conductor’s desk and then,
held by nearby musicians, lets himself fall into a chair”. Perhaps
he had not the strength to impose his interpretation fully on
the orchestra beyond the first movement. There may be some interest
for Klemperer completists to hear Klemperer when not a-Klempering,
but this can hardly substitute the EMI studio recording as a
general choice.
Klemperer’s
new-found fame restored his energies and the 1956 Don Juan –
sonically huskier and duller than the Bruckner, for some reason
– is high on octane. I don’t find the humanity of the greatest
Strauss performances, though. The other surviving versions of
the piece under Klemperer are studio versions, with the Berlin
Staatskapelle in 1929 and the Philharmonia in 1960.
Altogether,
I think this is a disc for confirmed admirers of the conductor.
Christopher
Howell
Kölner
Rundfunk-Sinfonie-Orchester/Otto Klemperer
