Search - Beethoven, Brahms, Mengelberg :: Symphonies 2 3 8 / Symphony 1

Rarities For The Mengelberg Collector

Jeffrey Lipscomb | Sacramento, CA United States | 04/20/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Gratitude is due to Tahra for its excellent transfers of these previously un-issued "live" performances by the great Dutch conductor Willem Mengelberg. Anyone who relishes superb playing by a great ensemble will find these accounts infinitely fascinating. As interpretations, however, they will seem willful and, especially in the Brahms, downright perverse to those who prefer a more "straightforward" approach in music making.



For me, the performance that makes this set a must-have is the glorious "Eroica." There seems to be some controversy as to the actual date of this performance - apparently it's either from 1942 (Tahra's guess) or from 1944 (which would make it one of Mengelberg's last recorded "live" concert readings). The Dutchman's studio effort from 1940, for sheer ensemble clarity, is one of the best-played accounts on disc: it's available in excellent transfers from Andante (see my review) and Pearl. But as this Tahra release amply demonstrates, Mengelberg was, like Furtwangler, even more free-wheeling in concert than he was in the studio. Everything is just a little more exaggerated here: the tympani are more prominent (and superbly played!), the rubato is more pronounced, and climaxes are even more exciting. The slow mvt. is intensely eloquent and profoundly moving. Oddly, there is less use of string portamento than previously. The horn playing is to die for in the Scherzo. This is surely an account worth having on the shelf, alongside other romantic excursion guides (e.g., various live Furtwanglers), as a sharp contrast to the excellent, but more "classically-restrained" readings by Weingartner (Opus Kura), Kleiber/VPO (Decca) and the live Schuricht/BPO (deleted Originals).



The Beethoven 2nd is very similar to the "live" 1940: both strike me as extremely well-played but a bit too heavy for this more Haydn-esque work. I prefer Mengelberg's studio 8th (Pearl CD) to this live one, which has a ludicrous ritard just before the 1st mvt. recapitulation, plus some spotty playing elsewhere.



Mengelberg made great studio recordings of Brahms symphonies 2-4, but he never got around to the 1st. I have long regarded his "live" 1940 performance of the latter (mine is on an old Japanese Philips LP) as an intriguing but singularly odd interpretation. This Tahra account from 1943 is even more "over the top." It features so many speed changes within each mvt. that the music becomes utterly sectionalized and episodic. For a "romantic" Brahms 1st, I think Furtwangler and Abendroth are far more persuasive.



Recommended to already-converted Mengelberg admirers."