Sunday 29 June 2008

Listened with great enjoyment to three violin concertos by Charles-Auguste de Bériot. It is a complete mystery to me why concertos such as these, plus the Vieuxtemps and Wieniawski concertos, are not played routinely. Some unplayed violin concertos (Godard, Milhaud) deserve their neglect. Concertos such as those by de Bériot certainly do not; they are well written and full of catchy tunes, themes and melodies. The second concerto, in particular, made a good impression on me at this first hearing.

The performances of concertos 2, 3 and 5 on the new CD (kindly supplied by Lee) are good (Philippe Quint) but the recording (2006) is a bit dim and the soloist struggles to stay in the forefront. This is a pity. It would be nice, but probably quite unrealistic, to imagine that this is the start of a de Bériot revival and that we can soon expect rival performances from Leonidas Kavakos, Alina Ibragimova, Sergey Khachatryan, Janine Jansen, Alexandra Soumm, Hilary Hahn, et al.

5 comments:

oisfetz said...

Harry, I can't agree with you about Godard. The first v.c.it's lovely IMO. Listen to Rosand version and you'll change your opinion. About de Beriot,try his 1,8 and 9 by Nishizaki on Naxos.

Harry Collier said...

I have several versions of Godard's first violin concerto (including that by Rosand). The slow movement is justly esteemed but the rest ...

I also have the Nishizaki Naxos disc of de Bériot, and the Breuninger disc featuring the second (hurrah!), seventh and fourth concertos. I am only missing the sixth concerto.

Anonymous said...

There are 10 VCs. I have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8 and 9. Now all of us need 6 and 10. And now you have the Scene de Ballet as well.

Harry Collier said...

Why doesn't Philippe Quint play any cadenzas? I listened later to Breuninger in No.2 -- and that is complete with a first movement cadenza, which sounds completely logical. The Quint disc is becoming mysterious.

Anonymous said...

Mysterious and also elusive to find.
What a tough one to get!