Felix MENDELSSOHN (1809-1847)
Piano Concerto no. 1 in G minor op.25 [21:08]
Piano Concerto no. 2 in D minor op.40 [24:31]
Edvard GRIEG (1843-1907)
Piano Concerto in A minor op.16 [29:56]
Peter Katin (piano)
London Symphony/Anthony Collins (Mendelssohn), London Philharmonic Orchestra/Colin
Davis (Grieg)
rec. Kingsway Hall, London, 9-10 February 1956 (Mendelssohn), 2 October 1959
(Grieg). ADD
PRISTINE AUDIO PASC 279 [75:35]
I had expected Katin to be agile, nimble and clear-headed in Mendelssohn,
but he is more. In the G minor he is energetic and passionate, not in a way
that tries to turn it into a Rachmaninov concerto but in a way that does not
let us forget Mendelssohn can be a strong, involving composer, not merely
a decorative one. In the D minor he finds a good deal of gentle poetry. Conventional
wisdom has it that this is a less inspired work. I was never convinced of
this and I am now still less so.
The orchestral playing is spirited and has much heartfelt warmth in the lyrical
melodies. It is, however, surprisingly ragged. In the D minor, especially,
there’s hardly a pick-up that isn’t bedevilled by latecomers and
this isn’t going to improve on repetition. Even the second bar of this
concerto finds one of the players slightly out of step. A pity.
When reviewing the Pristine transfer of Katin and Boult’s performance
of the Tchaikovsky Concert Fantasy I queried whether the sound had
been too much filtered. A free download of the same performance available
on the Internet offered more background noise but more bloom to the piano
sound. I find the sound slightly dull and airless here, too. In this case
I’ve no other transfer for a comparison so can’t exclude the possibility
that the original sound just was like that. It is in any case good for its
age.
There’s more treble on the piano in the Grieg Concerto. Here I found
Katin absolutely ideal. He never indulges the music, but he always plays with
feeling, flexibility and a natural sense of flow. I don’t think I’ve
heard a better performance and I’m not surprised to find that in the
1960s the EMG Art of Record Buying made this their top recommendation, above
the celebrated Solomon and Curzon recordings, as well as several others.
There’s no problem about orchestral precision with the young Colin Davis
conducting, but he does try too hard at times. Hear his mannered, segmented
chopping-up of the lyrical second theme of the finale. Did he feel no sense
of shame when Katin entered and played it so limpidly and naturally? Fortunately
this is Davis’s worst moment. But go to Galliera, for Lipatti, or Menges,
for Solomon, at the beginning of the slow movement to realise that this concerto
actually works best with an “unoriginal” conductor who just gets
on with the job.
As with Katin’s Decca recording of the Tchaikovsky First Concerto, I
have to note the existence of a stereo recording made by Katin about a decade
later with the LPO under John Pritchard. This was issued on Classics for Pleasure
but does not appear to have been reissued. I haven’t heard it so I cannot
say which of the two represents Katin’s interpretation at its finest.
He does not seem to have recorded the Mendelssohn concertos again.
Collectors of vintage performances from the early LP era will not be troubled
by slight reservations of the sound, which is good for its age. My queries
over aspects of the orchestral contribution will probably not worry them unduly
either. General collectors of fine pianism will be lucky to find these three
concertos more sympathetically played.
This completes Pristine Audio’s transfers of Katin’s concerto
recordings for Decca. He subsequently made a few for Everest which may be
out of copyright already or shortly will be. My introduction to the Schumann
Concerto and Franck Symphonic Variations was Katin’s coupling of the
two, conducted by Eugene Goossens. Maybe this is on the way?
Christopher Howell
In the Grieg, Katin always plays with feeling, flexibility and a natural sense
of flow. You will be lucky to find these three concertos more sympathetically
played.