Tahra is good at giving
one the pounds, the shillings and the pence of performance
history undertaken by their chosen artists. In the case of
this release for instance we have a simple two page look
at Haskil and Beethoven; which works were performed and how
often. I had forgotten entirely – if I ever knew – that she
had played some of the Violin Sonatas with Ysa˙e in Paris
in March 1927. Her conducting colleagues for the Concertos
went from Enescu to Weingartner via such as Scherchen, von
Karajan Fricsay, Wand et al. The two concertos she performed
the most were the C minor and the G major, the ones duly
presented by Tahra. The Fourth was her most often performed;
remarkably she never performed the Fifth, a trait shared
with the Grieg, Tchaikovsky; she never played any of the
Bartók concertos.
For the C minor she was
joined by Charles Munch and the Boston Symphony in November
1956. This has been out before now, on Music and Arts [CD
1096(2)], though I’ve not heard that rival transfer and so
can’t say whether – though assume – it shares the cloudy
sonics of this one. There are very occasional finger smudges
but they are of passing moment. Rather more of a loss is
the obscuring of orchestral detail due to the nature of the
recorded sound. Much more important though is the sympathetic
direction conjured by Munch and Haskil’s elegant precision;
that fine first movement cadenza, the lyrical buoyancy of
the central movement, its wave like lyricism in her hands.
The finale is genial and not over-accented. The winds are
Boston-distinctive but only when Haskil is not playing and
we can hear them. Munch unleashes his bass section appositely
here and the percussion ensures the concerto receives a characterful
and vital close.
The
collaboration between Haskil and the Studio-Orchester Beromunster
under Erich Schmid is new to me and to the discography. It
was recorded a few years later in 1959 in much better sound,
though one must note the acidy string tone and the lack of
ambience and bloom in that sound. As with the earlier concerto
we have commercial documentation of her way with this, but
there is an engagingly fresh sense of phrasing that will,
I think, compel genuine interest from even those sated by
the work – if there are such. The exchanges between Haskil
and the wind principals are fine, and again her first movement
cadenza is first class. Her pliant responses to the orchestral
forces in the slow movement are affecting but not quasi-philosophic.
And her lightness and grace haunts the finale to great benefit.
There
is a caveat enshrined in any recommendation here – principally
regarding recorded sound – but these live performances add
something important to the known parameters of her studio
recordings of both works and are therefore worthy of note.
Jonathan Woolf
Clara Haskil (piano) 
