Sir William Walton

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

From WAYLTN thread:
Walton Symphony No.1
New Haven SO
Cond. William Boughton

A very successful account of this great work.
The oboe passage at the start has just the right fragile quality to it which is essential to my enjoyment of the work (the famous Previn version, while well played, is too 'matter-of-fact' for my liking - I never liked that performance).
Boult (PYE), Sargent, Walton, Harty and Thomson get it just right.

Nice recording! I think W. Walton conducted SY1 with New Zealand Orchestra as well. I forgot how it was.

[Roasted Swan]

Nice recording! I think W. Walton conducted SY1 with New Zealand Orchestra as well. I forgot how it was.

Re the Walton 1/New Zealand performance - one of the very few versions of that work I bought and SOLD!! (reach your own verdict!)  Memory is not a great performance and not a great recording......

[vandermolen]

Nice recording! I think W. Walton conducted SY1 with New Zealand Orchestra as well. I forgot how it was.

Here it is. I rather like all Walton's recordings of the work including the one from the Edinburgh Festival but his EMI studio recording remains my favourite:

[relm1]

What is your best recommendation for Belshazzar's Feast?  The only recording I've heard is Rattle/CBSO.  Just curious if I'm missing on something great.

[VonStupp]

What is your best recommendation for Belshazzar's Feast?  The only recording I've heard is Rattle/CBSO.  Just curious if I'm missing on something great.

Previn with Shirley-Quirk!

I also like Willcocks a fair bit too.
VS

[Roasted Swan]

Previn with Shirley-Quirk!

I also like Willcocks a fair bit too.
VS

For sure Previn/LSO/Shirley-Quirk.  Curiously there are a lot of good recordings but not that many great recoridngs.  Its the kind of piece with a big choir and spectacular orchestration that you might think would be a showpiece for any number of conductors/orchestras/labels.  I quite like Andrew Litton's Bournemouth version because it was recorded in Winchester Cathedral and has a real sense of occasion.  Bryn Terfel back in the mid-90's still could just stand and sing magnificently without mannerisms.  Another "big occasion" version turned up on the BBC Music Magazine cover from Andrew Davis, Willard White and the BBC SO forces recorded in Leeds Town Hall - the venue of the 1st performance.  You can find this disc from the usual online marketplaces and its well worth tracking down.  Especially as the coupling is one of the great Tallis Fantasias - this time recorded at its premiere location - Gloucester Cathedral.  So that is one of the few versions of that work recorded in an acoustic, the acoustic that defined the work.  The Belshazzar on this disc is very good, the Tallis is great.

My sorrow with Belshazzar is that apart from a couple of American versions (Ormandy not great  audio, Shaw dull, Abravanel so so) it has never been recorded by a large/good non-British choir and Orchestra.  I could imagine a crack German or East European Choir absolutely nailing it.

[vandermolen]

I grew up with Ormandy's recording on LP (reissued in the RCA/Sony box set of 'Great British Music'). I like Walton's studio recording as well.

[VonStupp]

Bryn Terfel back in the mid-90's still could just stand and sing magnificently without mannerisms.  Another "big occasion" version turned up on the BBC Music Magazine cover from Andrew Davis, Willard White and the BBC SO forces.

I see Terfel also sang Belshazzar with Andrew Davis and the BBC in the 90's. I may check it out too!
VS

[Irons]

The book I am writing, about composers and 'place' in British music, can find little space for Walton as he's generally not a very place-oriented composer. But, when considering why so many composers from the North left it, I did love this little line from him describing his time as a chorister at Christchurch, Oxford. It seems we have 'it's grim up north' to thank for all that wonderful music:
 

If I may be so bold I disagree. I very much associate Walton's music, especially his concertos, with the small island Ischia in the bay of Naples. Walton did not move to Ischia until 1949 but I am convinced he was aware of its beauty and tranquillity long before that - the opening of the Violin Concerto for example. I was fortunate to visit Walton's home in Ischia a few years ago. 

[Luke]

If I may be so bold I disagree. I very much associate Walton's music, especially his concertos, with the small island Ischia in the bay of Naples. Walton did not move to Ischia until 1949 but I am convinced he was aware of its beauty and tranquillity long before that - the opening of the Violin Concerto for example. I was fortunate to visit Walton's home in Ischia a few years ago.

Absolutely right. I should have phrased it more carefully - I was talking about places in Britain. And I agree on the Violin Concerto. It always gets seen as inferior to the Viola Concerto. It probably is. But its specifically Mediterranean lushness and spice is so seductive that when I'm listening to it I always feel they are equals.

[Luke]

....and maybe Walton did 'predict' Ischia in the Violin Concerto (though I think it might be a more generally Mediterranean thing). After all, he did 'predict' DSCH in the Viola Concerto, years before Dmitri himself used the cipher.

[Roasted Swan]

I grew up with Ormandy's recording on LP (reissued in the RCA/Sony box set of 'Great British Music'). I like Walton's studio recording as well.

I re-listened to the Ormandy/Belshazzar yesterday - and I realise I was too dismissive of it the other day.  The actual engineering is really very good indeed for a recording over 60 years old - lots of detail and weight and a good stereo picture too.  I like the university choir - energetic and engaged and they sound youthful.  Baritone Walter Cassel has a nice voice too but although the sound is good his characterisation is pretty plain.  He reminded me of the Howard Keel in a Rodgers & Hammerstain musical.  Its a nice full sound but more concerned about the beauty of that sound than using the voice to pursue the work's drama.

This might be the kind of recording where Ormandy is criticised for being for a perfectly good, solid interpretation but with no special insights.  Of course the orchestra play very well and the performance is dynamic.  So I'd promote it up my list of Belshazzars but it supports my initial premise that there are a lot of "good" Belshazzars but few that are truly "great".

[vandermolen]

I re-listened to the Ormandy/Belshazzar yesterday - and I realise I was too dismissive of it the other day.  The actual engineering is really very good indeed for a recording over 60 years old - lots of detail and weight and a good stereo picture too.  I like the university choir - energetic and engaged and they sound youthful.  Baritone Walter Cassel has a nice voice too but although the sound is good his characterisation is pretty plain.  He reminded me of the Howard Keel in a Rodgers & Hammerstain musical.  Its a nice full sound but more concerned about the beauty of that sound than using the voice to pursue the work's drama.

This might be the kind of recording where Ormandy is criticised for being for a perfectly good, solid interpretation but with no special insights.  Of course the orchestra play very well and the performance is dynamic.  So I'd promote it up my list of Belshazzars but it supports my initial premise that there are a lot of "good" Belshazzars but few that are truly "great". I

I re-listened to the Ormandy/Belshazzar yesterday - and I realise I was too dismissive of it the other day.  The actual engineering is really very good indeed for a recording over 60 years old - lots of detail and weight and a good stereo picture too.  I like the university choir - energetic and engaged and they sound youthful.  Baritone Walter Cassel has a nice voice too but although the sound is good his characterisation is pretty plain.  He reminded me of the Howard Keel in a Rodgers & Hammerstain musical.  Its a nice full sound but more concerned about the beauty of that sound than using the voice to pursue the work's drama.

This might be the kind of recording where Ormandy is criticised for being for a perfectly good, solid interpretation but with no special insights.  Of course the orchestra play very well and the performance is dynamic.  So I'd promote it up my list of Belshazzars but it supports my initial premise that there are a lot of "good" Belshazzars but few that are truly "great".

For many years the Ormandy version, on LP, was the only version that I heard. I like the Rutgers University Chorus and also the American accents for some reason.
PS I'm having trouble with the 'quote facility'

[Symphonic Addict]

Walton's early Piano Quartet is a phenomenal masterpiece. I couldn't guess it was written by him, save for the 4th movement which features some rhythmic complexity that is more typical of his style. Each movement has its own compelling ideas. Was revisiting this interpretation and it impressed me a lot:

[Roasted Swan]

Walton's early Piano Quartet is a phenomenal masterpiece. I couldn't guess it was written by him, save for the 4th movement which features some rhythmic complexity that is more typical of his style. Each movement has its own compelling ideas. Was revisiting this interpretation and it impressed me a lot:

completely agree.  Excellent performance here too.

[Roasted Swan]

I've been returning to some Walton scores - he was my first "favourite" composer in my teens and I still find his music resonates with me strongly.  One acknowledged masterpiece but in an unexpected recording;



In the midst of all the noise and bluster of a "Last Night of the Proms" - the 100th Anniversary performance here - is an absolutely blistering Belshazzar's Feast.  By my reckoning Andrew Davis' 3rd recording available on CD and probably his best.  Featuring a fresh voiced and wonderfully compelling Bryn Terfel and the massed choirs and BBC SO playing and singing with real commitment.  It has exactly the kind of "Big Occasion" and Festive feel that the work was conceived for.  Davis chooses some challenging tempi but all rise to the occasion.

Then there is the late (actually last completed orchestral work) Prologo e Fantasia.  There has only been 1 studio recording which is not Bryden Thomson at his best.  Tempi feel sluggish and the Chandos recording congested and bloated.  Interesting to listen to a BBC broadcast from Edward Downes

The sonics here are really verging on poor and the BBC Northern SO (The BBC Phil of yesteryear) sound occasionally a bit rough too.  But the basic "feel" of the work is so much better; 5:05 to Thomson's 6:41.  That said it's hardly vintage Walton but rather him doing what he was prone to do in his later works - rehashing gestures and orchestrations/rhythms from his earlier more inspired scores.  That said 3rd rate Walton is still more interesting and exciting than many composers I reckon......

[arpeggio]

I just watched Hurwitz's assessment of the best and the worst recordings of Belshazzar's Feast.

I checked out his recommendations and compared them to the recordings I already had: I the have the Previn and the Shaw in my collection.  One can easily find samples of the various performances.

To show you how even picking the best recording of a work is subjective, my favorite is still the Shaw with the Atlanta Symphony:



Hurwitz felt the orchestra was wanting, and many may agree, but I still liked this one the best.

[Den glemte sønnen]

I just watched Hurwitz's assessment of the best and the worst recordings of Belshazzar's Feast.

I checked out his recommendations and compared them to the recordings I already had: I the have the Previn and the Shaw in my collection.  One can easily find samples of the various performances.

To show you how even picking the best recording of a work is subjective, my favorite is still the Shaw with the Atlanta Symphony:



Hurwitz felt the orchestra was wanting, and many may agree, but I still liked this one the best.

Colin Davis, Previn and Willcocks are my favorites in Belshazzar's Feast.

Speaking of works that have been thoroughly impressing me more and more, I have to give it up to Walton's Symphony No. 2. This is a work that has won my affection over the last couple of weeks. The performance that nailed it for me was Kirill Karabits/Bournemouth SO on Onyx. What a scorching performance!

[arpeggio]

Hurwitz's favorite is the Davis.

He was lukewarm with the Previn.  It seems that there were two Previn's. He liked the later one.

[Roasted Swan]

Hurwitz's favorite is the Davis.

He was cool with the Previn.  It seems that there were two Previn's. He liked the later one.

I skimmed this survey.  He says "Walton hated the first Previn recording".  In the selected letters of William Walton [pub. Faber 2002] Walton indeed does write to Malcolm Arnold that he feels Previn didn't get it all right in the recording - the implication is that tempo is substituted for tautness - and that a lot would have been better if he'd been at the recording to supervise (he couldn't attend because there was a dinner with the British PM!) because Previn was very open to guidance.  But he does NOT say it is awful.  The later RPO/Previn Belshazzer I'm not so keen on mainly because the soloist Benjamin Luxon - a GREAT singer in his time - was beginning to exhibit the cruel illness that would cut short both his singing career and indeed his life.