Beethoven Violin Concerto

[Brahmsian]

Well, there are even great enthusiasts for Beethoven who find themselves ambivalent about the Opus 61.

True, but certainly not in my case.  It is my favorite Beethoven concerto, by a country mile.  Always has been one of my favorite works of his.

[karlhenning]

True, but certainly not in my case.  It is my favorite Beethoven concerto, by a country mile.  Always has been one of my favorite works of his.

Me, too, to be sure.

[kishnevi]

I have seven:
Tetzlaff/Zinman
Pine/Serebrier
Jansen/Jarvi
Capucon/Nezet-Seguin
Mullova/Gardiner
Perlman/Guilini
Menuhin/Furtwangler

One further point of differentiation of which I was reminded when I played the Tetzlaff earlier this evening: the cadenzas.

The (apparently) gold standard cadenzas for the VC were written by Kriesler.  Menuhin  and Perlman used them, and so (among the recent crop) Jansen.  Looking through the booklet for the Capucon, I don't see any reference to the source of his cadenzas, and it's been a while since I listened to his performance, so I'm not sure if he also uses the Kriesler cadenzas.

The other three do not.  Pine wrote her own cadenzas;  Mullova used cadenzas written by Ottavio Dantone, and Tetzlaff transcribed for violin the cadenzas Beethoven wrote when he transcribed the VC as a piano concerto.

Side question: has anyone hear ever heard that piano version?

[Que]

Side question: has anyone hear ever heard that piano version?

Yes, and it's actually very nice!



Excerpts form "All Music Guide":

From the time of its premiere on December 23, 1806, Beethoven's Violin Concerto in D, Op. 61, was popular and rightly hailed as a masterpiece. Composer Muzio Clementi urged Beethoven to fashion a version for piano and orchestra. He was reluctant at first, but apparently needed little convincing, since he produced the new piano concerto within a year of the appearance of the violin original.

Beethoven retained the exact orchestration, resisting any temptation to make it fuller, aware the piano's tone was more voluminous than the relatively puny one of the violin and thus able to be heard amid fatter orchestral sonorities. He knew he had a masterpiece and was content to tamper with it as little as possible. He did, of course, have to augment the soloist's role, primarily making use of the lower and middle registers of the keyboard for additional harmonic support (see below). He also supplied cadenzas, which are completely absent from the Violin Concerto, those of Joachim, Kreisler and David typically used in performance.
[...]

As suggested above, there are many examples where the piano part enlarges upon the violin's role in the original version of the concerto. In the first movement, for instance, there is a quiet passage in G minor in which the piano's left hand must be given something to do or else leave the textures barren. Thus, it responds to the horns and bassoons with repeating quarter-note chords. In the finale, the second theme's first appearance draws an added scale from the left hand in the passage where the orchestra's ascending music is answered by the soloist's descending phrases. There are also numerous examples where the left hand mirrors orchestral sonorities, while the right hand carries the main material.

The work was first performed in 1807 and published in Vienna the following year. A typical performance of this concerto lasts between forty and forty-five minutes.

Q

[jlaurson]

and Tetzlaff transcribed for violin the cadenzas Beethoven wrote when he transcribed the VC as a piano concerto.

Side question: has anyone hear ever heard that piano version?

The cadenza that Tetzlaff uses is usually called the Beethoven-Schneiderhahn-Cadenza (or 61-A), because it was Schneiderhahn who first adopted it from Beethoven's own op.61a.
It's my favorite, actually... I love the inclusion of the timpani theme ...and used somewhat frequently; probably a (far, far distant) second to the Kreisler.

Incidentally, Zehetmair/Bruggen also use that cadenza.

FYI: Gidon Kremer I (Phililps) uses the Schnittke cadenzas.

http://www.weta.org/fmblog/?p=261
Apparently Repin had briefly considered the Beethoven/Schneiderhan cadenza from op.61a – the Piano version of the concerto – but in the end opted for the traditional Kreisler-cadenza for this recording. He did so, too, in his performance with the West German Radio Orchestra under Seymon Bychkov that I was able to catch not too long ago. The cadenza-choice is a missed opportunity to my ears, because the almost-Beethoven version is much, much more than merely "different". It's a fresh air for a concerto we know well – and the timpani-shadow that links to the work's opening a pleasant dramatic touch. In any case, this is hardly a serious quibble. In concert the WDR SO matched his excellence step by step with finely honed, well controlled playing.

[mjwal]

Tetzlaff had already used this cadenza with Gielen, in a recording not generally known which can be picked up for a song (coupled with Leonskaya's Piano Concerto #2). I find their performance controlled, cleanly played - and a bit dull & lacking in individual character i.e. the Szigeti element is missing. And I would have expected more cutting drive from Gielen. But the cadenza is remarkable.

[Todd]

Side question: has anyone hear ever heard that piano version?

Yes, I have several versions in my collection (always a filler or part of a set), and it's deadly dull in the piano incarnation.  Stick to the violin version.

[ccar]

                           


Sometimes, when I try to express how some musical interpretations touch me deeply, because I sense a rare mix of emotional expression, warmness and fragility, I may say they are "more humane". This is not to say there aren't other beautiful readings who strike me in a different way.  But sometimes it is also a reaction to many "stylish" and perfect readings, where every right note is there, the technique is faultless, the historical archetypes are faithfully respected, the recorded sound is impressive and yet there is, for me, some mysterious lack of emotional communication or more deep musical insight.  I admit this may be seen by some as a simplistic or snobbish intellectualization, to justify a personal "taste" or some form of cultural "ideology".   But in spite of some political incorrectness, I still believe Music can help us to resound and connect with our own feelings in a deep and individual way. And that's why I always search for those interpreters who help me to connect more intensely or emotionally with the music, who sometimes I may  describe as "more humane" readings. 

This personal reflection about the "humane" character in musical interpretation was prompted by relistening to a famous recording that impresses me since I first discovered it (more than 20 years ago, with an "old" 1987 FonitCetra CD). It is the famous after-war encounter of Yehudi Menuhin, Wilhelm Furtwangler and the Berliner Philharmoniker, playing the Beethoven Violin Concerto - for the American troops stationed in Berlin, on 28 September 1947. I still remember vividly my first impression, particularly of a unique and serene magic in the Larghetto. The gentleness of the violin entrance, the beauty of the phrasing and the meditational restrain of the orchestra, all conjured in a mixture of intensity and stillness, as I rarely encountered in this work ever since.

Today we can listen to this mythic recording in an 'audite' box, with the improved sound coming from the RIAS broadcast tapes. But there are also earlier editions from Tahra, Music & Arts and some minor labels. And for those who want to compare there are the other Menuhin - Furtwangler versions of the Beethoven concerto – the August 1947 studio with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra (Naxos/Testament) and the more widely known 1953 studio with the Philarmonia Orchestra (EMI). These are all wonderful performances, like many other beautiful recordings with other great interpreters. But for me that live 1947 Berlin encounter is always special, perhaps because of the symbolic moment or just because I feel it is somehow "more humane"...

[quark]

My favorite version is probably the Schneiderhan/Jochum version many already mention. For me, it captures the character of this piece (which is arcadian, at least to my ears) better than all the other version I know. 
One version (probably not my favorite, but up there with the best) no one has yet mentioned is the one by Erich Gruenberg and Jasha Horenstein on Cesky.
It's interesting that, as someone mentioned, there's a comparative lack of great Beethoven, as opposed to Brahms's violin concertos.
Beethoven's violin concerto, while not as perfect a  creation as the Brahms (or, in my opinion, as the Mendelssohn), is rightly considered the pinnacle of the violing concerto repertoire because it's so difficult expressively (while comparatively easy technically). It reminds of S.Richter's words who considered Mozart the most difficult of all composers. one must keep an ideal "classical" balance between attention to detail and view on the whole, involvement and detachment, expressiveness and serenity...a heavy handed accentuation and you've spoiled it all.

[Mandryka]

 There is a recording of this concerto which seems to me to be of such iconic stature, such creative energy, such profound poetry, such intensely engaged cooperative music making, that it stands sui generis and hors concours.

I'm talking about Szell/Huberman/VPO

[jlaurson]

Tetzlaff had already used this cadenza with Gielen, in a recording not generally known which can be picked up for a song (coupled with Leonskaya's Piano Concerto #2). I find their performance controlled, cleanly played - and a bit dull & lacking in individual character i.e. the Szigeti element is missing. And I would have expected more cutting drive from Gielen. But the cadenza is remarkable.

Yes, but the recording is NOT good at all. Tetzlaff's second go is MUCH, MUCH better.

[Florestan]

There is a recording of this concerto which seems to me to be of such iconic stature, such creative energy, such profound poetry, such intensely engaged cooperative music making, that it stands sui generis and hors concours.

I'm talking about Szell/Huberman/VPO

Seconded.

[Mandryka]

Here's the Szell/Huberman, just in case anyone's curious. It's not on youtube

http://www.mediafire.com/?30n4505bdi0s1

It's one of those rare instances of a concerto recording with two creative musicians expressing themselves freely , and yet they both seem to fit each other like a glove. Furtwangler/Fischer in Brahms PC2 has the same sort of feeling.

[Dancing Divertimentian]

It's one of those rare instances of a concerto recording with two creative musicians expressing themselves freely , and yet they both seem to fit each other like a glove. Furtwangler/Fischer in Brahms PC2 has the same sort of feeling.

Well, I don't know, Mandryka...isn't what you're describing just a weeee bit more common that all that?

The way I see it collaboration is the name of the game in the concerto arena and all participants better know their roles or the whole shebang sinks. I have any number of concerto recordings where it's as if the telepathy were flowing freely between every musician and collectively the whole production, err...sings, if you will.

If it what you're describing were "rare" I have my doubts many performers would even bother showing up!  

[mjwal]

Well, they don't necessarily know how it's going to turn out at the concert/recording sessions. Great performances are unpredictable - and rare, in my experience - which is limited, of course. And with concertos you might get a soloist on fire and a dull accompaniment - bad recordings can also dampen the effect. Szigeti is wonderful in his first recording - but the British orchestra under Walter sounds dull, for whatever reason.

[Mandryka]

I too consider this a great recording, but rarely admit as much, since I also rarely wish to get into a discussion about Gould.

Which is exactly why I removed the post -- but you got in there before I did the deed.

Gould brings out the worst in people.

[snyprrr]

Thomas Zehetmair/ Ensemble Modern-Ernest Bour

'live' Konzertmitschnitt, Oct. 26, 1987
Kolner Philharmonie, im Rahmen der Weltmusiktage 1987

I got this as a 'pendant' to a Xenakis piece !! It's not a piece I have ever 'listened' to,... and so, when I went to, the opening drum rolls caught me off guard, and I think it was the performance. Overall, I have no way to judge the proceedings, but my initial 'spider sense' questioned my ultimate pleasure as the sound coming from the speaker hit my ears (not necessarily a recording issue, but, was... what was I, or wasn't I hearing? I don't know). Was I not impressed by Zehetmair, someone I've been impressed with (though I maaay dotingly get Zehetmair and Tetzlaff confused sometimes)?

Does anyone know this, and could comment?

[Reverend Bong]

Has anyone the experience to give me comparative recommendations of Szeryng's recordings of the violin concerto?  I'm aware of Haitink, Thibaud and Isserstedt but there may well be more.  Do any of these stand out?

[trung224]

Has anyone the experience to give me comparative recommendations of Szeryng's recordings of the violin concerto?  I'm aware of Haitink, Thibaud and Isserstedt but there may well be more.  Do any of these stand out?

I think Szeryng at best when he plays Bach, Brahms. Despite his impeccable technique, sound and musical taste, he suffers from the worst problem of soloist: faceless interpretation. All of his account is same, good but hardly memorable, especially when his accompalish conductors are also faceless like Haitink and Isserstedt. The one with Thibaud is more interesting despite dated sound because Thibaud's accompany  has some individual, sensitive and colorful touch (though imprecise)  and Szeryng is young and plays with more fire

[Sergeant Rock]

Here's the Szell/Huberman, just in case anyone's curious. It's not on youtube

http://www.mediafire.com/?30n4505bdi0s1

I somehow missed this last year. Downloading it now. Thank you 


Sarge