Rostropovich - Cello Concertos
CD 1
Aram KHACHATURIAN (1903-1978)
Concerto-Rhapsody for Cello in D minor (1963)
London Symphony Orchestra/George Hurst
Royal Festival Hall, London, 21 December 1963
Dmitri SHOSTAKOVICH (1906- 1975)
Cello Concerto No.2 Op.126 (1966)
BBC Symphony Orchestra/Colin Davis
Royal Festival Hall, London, 5 October 1966
Peter Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)
Variations on a Rococo Theme, for cello and orchestra, Op. 33 (1876)
London Symphony Orchestra/Colin Davis
Royal Albert Hall, London, 30 June 1964
BBCL 4073-2 [75:22]
CD 2
Robert SCHUMANN (1810-1856)
Cello Concerto in A minor, Op.129 (1850)
London Symphony Orchestra/Benjamin Britten
Aldeburgh Festival, Orford Church, 6 July 1961
Antonin DVOŘÁK (1841-1904)
Cello Concerto in B minor, Op. 104 (1895)
USSR State Symphony Orchestra/Evgeny Svetlanov
Royal Albert Hall, London, 21 August 1968
Peter Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)
Pezzo Capriccioso for cello and orchestra, Op. 62 (1887)
English Chamber Orchestra/Benjamin Britten
Aldeburgh Festival, Maltings, Snape, 16 June 1968
BBCL 4110-2 [71:02]
CD 3
Joseph HAYDN (1732-1809)
Cello Concerto in C major, Hob. VIIb:1 (c.1765)
London Symphony Orchestra
Royal Festival Hall, London, 1 July 1965
Camille SAINT-SAËNS (1835-1921)
Cello Concerto No. 1 in A minor, Op. 33 (1872)
London Symphony Orchestra/Gennadi Rozhdestvensky
Royal Festival Hall, London, 7 July 1965
Edward ELGAR (1857-1934)
Cello Concerto in E minor Op.85 (1918)
London Symphony Orchestra/Gennadi Rozhdestvensky
Royal Festival Hall, London, 5 July 1965
BBCL 4198-2 [67:35]
BBC LEGENDS BBCL 5005-2 [3 CDs: 75:22 + 71:02 + 67:35]
This three CD slip-cased set consists of discs that were previously available
singly at full price. Re-packaging has led to a pleasing price drop. They
were taped for the BBC during the years 1961 to 1968, the overwhelming majority
being in mono.
A number of these performances have become well known, and so I’ll highlight
what’s in store for a prospective purchaser. The Dvořák
Concerto was given on the day that Soviet tanks crushed the Prague Spring
and angry protesters can be heard decrying the invasion, shouts that are swiftly
repudiated by other audience members. Rostropovich takes the same sort of
tempi he’d taken a decade earlier with Boult, and the same that he had
taken (live) with Boris Khaikin but he starts with considerable tensile venom
and even rushes some bars in the first movement, so intense is his performance.
Rostropovich recorded this work many times, but this live one holds a special
place in his discography, even if the Talich and the Boult are the most solidly
and musically recommendable.
Rostropovich never recorded the Elgar commercially, and the reason given was
invariably that he considered the performances of it by his erstwhile student,
Jacqueline du Pré, definitive. In fact she and Barbirolli made that
famous LP a month after this concert performance. It’s something of
a loss that he never took it into the studio, as he clearly brought an insightful
view to it. A couple of his live performances have fortunately survived, and
this reading is one of two with conductor Gennadi Rozhdestvensky to have been
issued. It’s a technically adroit and in many ways convincing performance
- not quicksilver, but a touch more measured and musing. Vibrated intensely
in the first movement, the cellist is at his most quixotic, indeed skittish,
at points in the finale. The orchestral fabric is more debatable, lacking
a measure of grip. There is a degree of tape hiss, as indeed there is on most
of these broadcasts, but it’s not worryingly intrusive.
For the Schumann he collaborates with Britten and the LSO at the Aldeburgh
Festival in a highly recommendable performance which convinces at almost every
turn. Maybe he lacks something of the sheer elegance of Fournier in this work,
but setting that aside, the work’s wayward rhetoric is securely judged
by soloist and conductor.
In Haydn’s C major Concerto Rostropovich directs the LSO, which sounds
a bit flustered as a result. The cellist plays with gusto and panache, and
employs Britten’s cadenzas. Ensemble just about survives at a couple
of junctures. Saint-Saëns’ A minor Concerto is played with marvellous
technique and rich legato phrasing, though it’s slightly let down by
Rozhdestvensky’s inattentive accompaniment.
The Russian pieces are clearly going to be special, and so they prove. Khachaturian’s
Concerto Rhapsody is an excitingly windy piece but this is its first
Western performance and its dedicatee plays it with the necessary clout. Intense
melodic phraseology marries virtuosic panache in this searing performance,
whatever one’s feelings about the work itself. George Hurst does a thoroughly
estimable job with the LSO. Shostakovich’s Second Concerto is with the
LSO and Colin Davis. This too is an outstanding, remarkably powerful reading.
The BBC Orchestra holds up well, the brass survives the pressure and little
pockets of lyricism are plundered avidly. This, again, is the Western European
premiere, and is one of the very best prizes in this set of three discs. Tchaikovsky
is represented by the Rococo variations in the Fitzhagen arrangement
- again with Davis - and the Pezzo capriccioso in a sizzling performance.
If you missed the single discs, then now is the chance to acquire all three
at that reduced price. The performances certainly justify the acquisition.
Jonathan Woolf
Masterwork Index: Shostakovich concertos ~~ Dvorak concerto ~~ Elgar concertoThe chance to acquire all three discs at reduced price. The performances certainly justify the acquisition