Tianwa Yang plays Eugène Ysaÿe

It has always seemed to me that Yehudi Menuhin endorsed each new violinist presented to him as “the most wonderful I have ever heard”. So, I am conscious, I do with each and every new recording of Eugène Ysaÿe's much recorded six sonatas for solo violin. Only recently I was enthusing over complete sets from Kristof Barati and from Tai Murray. Today I am enthusing over a brand-new complete set from Tianwa Yang, the phenomenal Chinese violinist. Miss Yang transitions well from Sarasate (her recent 10-hour traversal) to Eugène Ysaÿe. Replying to a critic of Jascha Heifetz's speed in a certain work, Leopold Auer is said to have retorted: “Ah, yes. But you listened to every note, did you not?” When Tianwa Yang plays Ysaÿe, I listen to every note, since there is so much variety in the sound coming from her 1729 Petrus Guarneri violin. It reminds you just how great a range of colour a violin can come up with, in the right hands.

Nemanja Radulovic

Even now, after 200 years, much of the music of Niccolò Paganini is tough going, technically. Most top class violinists can play the notes accurately, but there are still visible challenges, like the melody in double stops in the finale of the first concerto, played in harmonics. I seem to have amassed 45 recordings of Paganini's first concerto, going alphabetically from Vasco Abadjiev to Ion Voicu. My principal heroes in the piece are Leonid Kogan, Viktoria Mullova, and Michael Rabin. The latest addition, number 45, is Nemanja Radulovic accompanied by the Italian Radio Orchestra.

From the many contemporary accounts of Paganini's playing, not only was he an incredible technician, but also a major showman and mesmeriser. This came to mind listening to Radulovic, whose playing swoons, wows, slows, speeds, whispers, shouts and generally indulges in a fair degree of rubato, tempo changes and very wide changes in dynamics. Paganini would probably have considered it “authentic”; most other performances sound somewhat staid and bland compared with Radulovic, and the Italian orchestra accompanies with the kind of enthusiastic gusto Paganini probably imagined from the sounds of early 19th century Italian opera orchestras.

Radulovic had me listening to every note (except some of the pianissimos, that were pretty inaudible to me). Someone who can have me hanging on to every note for 37 minutes in a piece of music I know inside out, gets my vote; this is a performance to which I shall return many times. The CD also contains three caprices, plus other Paganini numbers, all played with quite incredible technical aplomb. I suspect I might feel differently about Radulovic in Bach, Beethoven or Brahms. But for Paganini: he's my man.

Bernard Haitink in Bruckner

During the 1950s when I was exploring music, I acquired Mahler's Kindertotenlieder (Ferrier) and 4th Symphony (Kletzki), as well as Bruckner's 9th Symphony (Horenstein). I still have all three recordings. That was the start of my love affair with the music of Mahler and Bruckner. Both composers were late 19th century Austrians (though Mahler was a bit younger) and both wrote more or less nine symphonies. Actually, there the resemblance ends, and my enthusiasm for Mahler waned over the decades, but the love of Bruckner grew. There is a nobility and sincerity about Bruckner's music that makes it eternal and deeply satisfying.

Jascha Horenstein was a sure guide in Bruckner's 9th (I still find his reading of the demonic scherzo the most demonic of them all) but his 1952 recording was a bit thin and weedy. Later came many more, including van Beinum, Furtwängler, Jochum, Klemperer, Knappertsbusch, Schuricht and Wand, with Wilhelm Furtwängler's 1944 performance perhaps being the greatest of the great. Bruckner needs good sound -- the only conceivable drawback to Furtwängler and Horenstein. He needs a really good conductor, one who can control the ebb and flow of the music, retain a true pulse, shape the phrasing and sculpt the dynamics; and avoid Thomas Beecham's jibe against Bruckner that he heard seven pregnancies and six miscarriages.

There are conductors who achieve many column inches in the media -- Bernstein, Barenboim, von Karajan, Dudhamel, Rattle, et al. And conductors who achieve quiet reputations among cognoscenti and orchestral players: Boult, Klemperer, Horenstein, Knappertsbusch, Wand -- and Bernard Haitink. My father, an orchestral player for most of his life, thought the world of Pierre Monteux. A neighbour of mine who was a prominent player in the Philharmonia in the 1970s when I lived in London, when asked by me which of the present conductors the Philharmonia preferred, replied succinctly: “We don't mind who conducts us, as long as it isn't Menuhin”. Orchestral players have their own hierarchies and most, I suspect, regard most conductors as unnecessary and often expensive hangers-on. But not, I suspect, when it comes to Bruckner symphonies that really need an overall controller to sort out those questions of pulse, tempo and dynamics. A conductor-less orchestra would be hard-pressed in Bruckner.

Tellingly, Bruckner is rarely the pasture where media-celebrity conductors shine. I was gripped and enthralled all over again by Bruckner's ninth symphony in a new recording (2013, live) from Bernard Haitink and the LSO. I frequently smiled during this performance as Haitink so expertly negotiated Bruckner's many tempo changes, seams and joints. The performance is leisurely, as befits a conductor in his 80s and, I would argue, Bruckner's music of the late 19th century Austria where everyone was in less of a hurry than nowadays. The LSO plays superbly here, and the recording is really first rate. What more does one want? Well, Furtwängler in 1944 does provide that little something extra, but one has to weigh the something extra against the inferior sound. I give both Furtwängler and Haitink three stars in this work and am really pleased to have added 2013 Haitink to my collection.

Adolf Busch

Adolf Georg Wilhelm Busch's life was blighted by history and politics – like so many of his generation. Born in Germany in 1891, by the time he was ready to launch his professional career, the Great War broke out. After the war, defeated Germany suffered poverty, hyper-inflation, then a massive economic collapse. The rise of National Socialism saw Busch leaving for self-imposed exile in Switzerland in 1933. He then eked out a career in the 1930s with teaching, concerts and with recording in England. With the arrival of the second world war, Busch left for America where, again, he eked out a living with teaching and a few concerts. His health suffered, and he died in exile in America in 1952 at the age of sixty one in frail health.

A highly interesting double CD set from the Swiss company Guild Historical reveals what a major violinist Busch was, in his prime. Berlin recordings from 1921-2, and 1928-9 show Busch as a violinist of real stature. His recording début had to wait until he was 29 years old, but the 1921-2 recordings show a violinist with a characteristic slashing right arm, exact intonation, exhilarating trills and a superb sense of rhythm; he is particularly admirable in the Brahms Hungarian dances on the CDs. In Bach, Busch is noble and authoritative, but it is particularly interesting to hear him in music he never again recorded (or was allowed to record) such as short pieces by Corelli, Dvorak, Brahms, Gossec, Kreisler and Schumann.

Violin classes at music conservatories could well start with in-depth listening to violinists such as Kreisler, Busch and Enescu – in particular, the use of bow strokes to articulate phrasing and rhythm. Post-1950, smooth, seamless bowing became the accepted fashion (David Oistrakh remarked how Yehudi Menuhin used lots of bow strokes, and Menuhin's teachers included Enescu and Busch).

The sound on these recordings from the 1920s is surprisingly good, and few allowances need to be made. The string quartet excerpts from 1922 suffer most; good for listening to Busch, but the other three merge into a mush far from the horn. The jump in quality when we reach 1928 is very noticeable. I enjoyed everything on these two CDs except, perhaps, Busch's rendition of Schumann's Träumerei (arranged by Hüllweck) which is very slow and with lavish portamenti that distract. Busch's blighted solo violin career was tragic for him – but also for us.

Shostakovich's Symphony No.14

When Shostakovich's 14th symphony saw the light of day in 1969, my three children were already present and smiling. So, for me, it's a somewhat recent work -- possibly the most “modern” work to have entered my listening repertoire. To my great shame, it's a work I had never heard until 30th March 2014; sad neglect on my part.

I bought the CD because I like Shostakovich, I like late Shostakovich, I like Vasily Petrenko and the Liverpool Philharmonic, and I like Naxos's recordings and prices. No disappointment. I cannot judge the performance on the basis of only one known version (to me), but Petrenko, Gal James and Alexander Vinogradov seem to be thoroughly satisfactory in the eleven linked songs that constitute the 14th symphony. The Liverpool Phil, minus woodwind and brass, sounds very professional. Pretty gloomy music, and it would not really be appropriate for a Home for the Aged and Dying. But much Russian music is gloomy, as is much of the music of Dmitry Shostakovich. Tough. I enjoy the 14th symphony immensely and I like Petrenko, James and Vinogradov.

Fritz Kreisler and Jack Liebeck

It is said that Fritz Kreisler was the only violinist Jascha Heifetz admitted to admiring, and a photo of Kreisler always hung in Heifetz's house in California. Probably in recognition of Kreisler's unique tone and style, Heifetz seems to have avoided recording most of Kreisler's compositions, probably realising his performances would never be compared favourably with those of Kreisler himself.

Fritz Kreisler was born in Vienna in February 1875 and most of his compositions for violin date from the end of the nineteenth century and the very beginning of the twentieth. His earliest recordings date from 1904, when he was already 29 years old and in his violinistic prime. For over 100 years, Kreisler's compositions and arrangements have delighted violinists and listeners alike; they are all short, melodious, well written for violin and piano accompaniment, and reflect the fin de siécle world of late nineteenth century Vienna and Berlin. Technically, the pieces are usually not too challenging to play -- even I played most of them, in my time. But they were written to show off Kreisler's unique technique and tonal palette and it is notoriously difficult to approach, let alone equal, Kreisler's own recordings, the earliest of which, Caprice Viennois, dates from 1910.

I usually buy new recordings of the music of Wieniawski, Vieuxtemps and Sarasate -- and of Kreisler, though recordings of Kreisler pieces are often a disappointment. Not so a brand new CD from Jack Liebeck where, appropriately accompanied by Katya Apekisheva, he plays some 17 Kreisler compositions and arrangements over a period of nearly 69 minutes. Liebeck's style is not Kreisler's, but he is convincing in his 69 minute traversal, and he has an excellent feeling for rhythm and tempo, so important in this music. He ends with Kreisler's arrangement of Giuseppe Tartini's “Devil's Trill” sonata, thankfully played in true 20th century style without the museum approach advocated by modern fashion; I have always found Kreisler's cadenza in this work exemplary, and a moment I always anticipate with pleasure (as long as I do not have to play it myself). For Liebeck and partner, Hyperion provides a good, well-balanced recording, with neither instrument too forward. A rare treat.

Paganini's 24 Capricci

It takes a great violinist to hold a listener's attention through 60 minutes of solo violin playing. Although the violin has a wide palette of dynamics and effects, it takes a great violinist to manipulate all the levers. Paganini's 24 caprices are now, technically, almost bread and butter to conservatoire-trained violinists. To master their intricate technicalities is one thing; but a really good performance only comes when the violinist can brush aside the technical challenges and concentrate on the music and on exploring the various voices and colours of the violin.

This blog is becoming (temporarily) a bit of a James Ehnes fan club, but I have just been listening to him in Paga's 24 and was kept gripped until the end. I enjoyed Ehnes's rendition of the finger-twisting sixth caprice. And with Ehnes at the helm, the somewhat weird harmonies of the 8th caprice were just that, and not some violinist encountering intonation problems. And, pace many of the critics --- most of whom turn out to be pianists or choristers -- the 24 capricci are really well written and are attractive music in their own right, not just exercises to show off violin technique. They come into their own when played as music, not as exercises and it was this that so endeared James Ehnes's performance to me. Bravo.

Elgar's Violin Concerto

Much of the music of Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Elgar and Mahler is filled with Angst; it was that period in musical history 1880-1920 when many things were in a turmoil. To my taste, there are two convincing ways of playing angst-rich music: either play it straight, on the grounds all the emotion is already written into the music. Or play it with heart-on-sleeve for all it is worth. In Mahler, take your choice between someone like like Haitink or Klemperer; or someone like Bernstein. In Rachmaninov, take your pick between someone like Rachmaninov himself, or extroverts such as Martha Argerich or Yuja Wang. In Tchaikovsky, the Pathétique Symphony used to please me when played fast and straight by Cantelli or Toscanini, but nowadays I go for heart-on-sleeve Pletnev or Gergiev.

In the Elgar violin concerto to which I have just been listening, those who like the music slobbered over can go with young Menuhin, or with Nigel Kennedy. Those who like the music left to speak for itself can go with Thomas Zehetmair or with James Ehnes, to whom I listened again with admiration yesterday evening.

I have 22 recordings of the Elgar concerto and none of them are bad; the only bad one I had, with Igor Oistrakh all at sea, was deleted from my collection long ago. Apart from the superb Zehetmair and Ehnes modern recordings, I also own recordings by Hugh Bean, Alfredo Campoli, Kyung-Wha Chung, Philippe Graffin, Ida Haendel, Hilary Hahn, Jascha Heifetz, Nai-Yuan Hu, Dong-Suk Kang, Nigel Kennedy, Isabelle van Keulen, Gidon Kremer, Simone Lamsma, Catherine Manoukian, Yehudi Menuhin, Albert Sammons, and Elena Urioste. Quite a line-up, and some surprises such as the impassioned performance by Gidon Kremer, or Kyung-Wha Chung expertly guided by Georg Solti who, for all his faults, was an exemplary no-nonsense Elgarian. My personal favourite reading of all time is Albert Sammons recorded in long-gone 1929; no slobbering there!

James Ehnes and Khachaturian

Since 1996, I have been a fan of the playing of the Canadian violinist, James Ehnes. A rock solid technique, an avoidance of distracting mannerisms, good taste, high intelligence; any performance by James Ehnes almost always ticks the right boxes. His repertoire is wide, and I have especially enjoyed him in Bruch, Britten and Kreisler.

The only box Ehnes has rarely ticked in the past has been evidence of real emotional involvement. I bought his new recording (Khachaturian violin concerto) more on the strength of the other items on the CD (Shostakovich's 7th and 8th string quartets) than on expecting a dazzling performance of Khachaturian's vibrant, colourful and warm-hearted violin concerto. But I was pleasantly surprised; again, Ehnes ticks all the right boxes, but this time he lets himself go and gives us a performance of the concerto to rival my two all-time classics: Julian Sitkovetzky with Niyazi and the Romanian Radio Orchestra (1954), and Leonid Kogan with Monteux in Boston (1958). Melbourne is a long way from Armenia, but the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra players seem to be enjoying themselves. When musicians are having a good time, it shows, and Khachaturian must have made a welcome change for them from non-stop Brahms and Beethoven. England is nearer to Armenia than are Australia or Canada, but the conductor, Mark Wigglesworth enters into the spirit of things. And, to cap it all, Onyx has produced a well-recorded and well-balanced recording. To the groans of “expert” critics, Khachaturian's concerto has found a stable place in the repertoire of 20th century music -- I have 22 different recordings of the piece, and still new ones appear regularly and are usually snapped up by me. Ehnes breaks with tradition and plays Khachaturian's original first movement cadenza, not the Oistrakh one that is usually substituted. But anything is better than Mikhail Simonyan's cadenza that I criticised recently.

Chloë Hanslip plays Medtner

Chloë Hanslip has never featured among my favourite violinists, but I bought her new CD (Hyperion) of Medtner's first and third sonatas because I like the “Epica” sonata very much, and was happy to get to know the first sonata that is also on this disc. Ms Hanslip's playing here was a very pleasant surprise: committed, interesting, varied and subtle.

The violin is balanced too forward for my liking and, as recorded and played on my equipment, on occasions sounds somewhat strident and harsh. This becomes wearing in a long sonata such as the “Epica”. More annoyingly, the pianist -- Igor Tchetuev -- sounds a bit like a Russian Gerald Moore; agreeable, modest, faithful. But turn to Boris Berezovsky (with Vadim Repin, 1996) and the difference is immediately obvious. With Boris at the piano, the third sonata becomes a true duo sonata.

If Chloë Hanslip re-records the Medtner sonatas one day with a better balance and recording engineer and more suitable duo partner. I'll be the first to buy the new edition. The “Epica”, in particular, is a very fine sonata and well deserves to become better known and more often programmed.

Discreet Interpreters

Back from my travels – Luang Prabang in Laos was particularly fine – I quickly plugged back into music listening, something that had been missing for two weeks. First off the storage rack was Matthieu Arama playing (very well) a selection of pieces by Wieniawski, Brahms, Paganini, Sarasate, etc. He is a fine violinist, though I had never heard of him before buying this CD.

For that kind of music, one needs a performer of talent and individuality. Turning afterwards to late Beethoven piano sonatas, I again marvelled at the playing of Igor Levit; when Levit plays, you forget about Levit and his piano and immerse yourself in the late sonatas of Beethoven. Just as when Kempff, Pires or Andsnes play late Schubert, or Adolf Busch and friends play Bach, Schubert or Beethoven, or Philippe Herrewhege conducts Bach … it's the music that occupies centre stage, and the performers involved become almost transparent media.

Hélène Grimaud plays Brahms

Today, Friday, turned out to be Brahms day, with two hearings of his first piano concerto, and one of his second. Pianist in both was Hélène Grimaud and I greatly enjoyed her playing. The orchestral background was suitably rich and Brahmsian (Bavarian Radio orchestra, and Vienna Philharmonic in respectively the first and second concertos). Against this rich background, Ms Grimaud's clarity and transparency of textures was very welcome. It is many years since I have heard the first concerto -- to my surprise, I discovered that until today I no longer had any recording of it; again to my surprise, I found I enjoyed the first concerto even more than the second. Tastes change, with age and experience. I had not expected to enjoy Ms Grimaud's playing in Brahms as much as I did, but these are performances I shall return to often, with pleasure. Good recording and balance. Usual tacky DG notes, with no less than eight photographs of the attractive Ms Grimaud, most of them with staring eyes that remind me of a deer caught in the headlights.

Probably a couple of weeks pause in this blog while I take off for Northern Thailand and Laos. Lots of sun and good food, I hope, but probably little music until I return.

On Bach and Berlioz

At a concert of solo violin music by Bach a year or so ago in a small concert hall, I was amazed at the range of dynamics produced by the solo violin of Alina Ibragimova, whose sound went from a barely audible pianissimo to a very loud fortissimo. If you are going to listen to a solo violin for 90 minutes, such a range of colour is pretty well obligatory. I thought of this yesterday when listening to Gregory Fulkerson playing unaccompanied Bach. Stylistically and technically the performances were impeccable, and highly enjoyable. But, finally, the works began to pall a little since Fulkerson, as recorded here in a somewhat reverberant acoustic, came over as playing with a fairly limited dynamic range.

I switched to Simone Kermes singing coloratura arias from (mainly) little-known composers of the early 18th century. Thoroughly enjoyable for the music, and for the singing. They knew how to write good tunes in those days and to keep you listening for a whole hour!

Earlier, I had once again abandoned poor old Berlioz's Harold in Italy, a work I have tried hard to enjoy for around half a century now, but still with little success. Not due to the executants, I think, since I have Menuhin or Tabea Zimmermann both conducted by Colin Davis, or William Primrose conducted by Beecham. As a proud owner of two excellent violas on which I scrape away from time to time, I am heavily predisposed to like the viola. But there is something about Berlioz's Harold that gets in my teeth and I very rarely manage to get through listening to all the movements. Perhaps it is just that the plaintive idée fixe theme comes around too often for me, or that I am uncomfortable trying to grasp a work that is neither a symphony, nor a concerto.

Gilels, Kogan and Rostropovich

It is difficult to form a great piano trio (as opposed to a very good one). First of all, one needs three players of top-notch international stature. Then one needs those three players to play together regularly over a period of years. The three players need to be collegiate -- that is, from approximately the same musical backgrounds. Finally, the three players need to be friends, not competitors each seeking advantage or the limelight; friends share things fairly and naturally.

Recently I enthused over the piano trio formed by Cortot, Thibaud and Casals -- a true model of a great piano trio. Yesterday I spent no less than five hours re-listening to a Doremi set of piano trios played by Gilels, Kogan and Rostropovich; to my mind, another great piano trio that met all my conditions above. The three Russians play Haydn, Beethoven, Mozart, Saint-Saëns, Shostakovich, Tchaikovsky and a few other pieces. They seem to be enjoying themselves, and we can enjoy the music with them. It's good, listening to Gilel's piano playing. It's good listening to Kogan's violin playing. And it's good listening to Rostropovich's cello playing. Considering the source of the originals (1950s, mainly early Russian) the Doremi transfers are excellent.

The middle of the 20th century also saw another all-star piano trio: that of Rubinstein, Heifetz and Feuerman (later Piatigorsky). According to Rubinstein, Heifetz tried to insist that his name always came first, which is a clue as to why I would not classify this trio as “great”; they were not friends, they had different backgrounds, and they did not play together too often. Gilels, Kogan and Rostropovich played together for ten years (from 1949 until 1959). In the end, the stress between the passionate dissident Rostropovich and the patriotic communist Kogan became too much and Rostropovich left the trio. Our loss, but at least we have five hours of recordings as souvenirs.

George Emmanuel Lazaridis

A big advantage of the new age of recording technology that has spawned a vast array of companies and labels is that major artists who previously would have gone unnoticed can now have their performances listened to. I have just been enjoying the playing of George Emmanuel Lazaridis (who?), an excellent pianist who hails from Greece. His Schubert CD with the Wanderer Fantasy and the last B flat sonata reminds me of the recent Schubert recordings of Maria Pires; the same calm, straight playing without added histrionics or heightened pathos. Much of Schubert's music is best left to play itself, and it really does not need sophisticated interpretative intervention by the player. All praise to the hitherto unknown (to me) Mr Lazaridis. It's a change to meet an impressive new name who is not a young Chinese or Russian. And praise to the little Somm label for letting us hear George Emmanuel in Schubert.

Handel Arias

A good Sunday: a) it did not rain, for a change and b) two hours of Sandrine Piau singing Handel arias. In my current and on-going great purge of CDs I no longer want, these CDs of well-sung Handel arias will never go. The music is just so magnificent and varied.

And this evening my favourite dish: Vietnamese basa fish and smoked haddock with ginger, garlic, Thai fish sauce, olive oil, rice and chili. Delicious.

Julia Fischer plays Sarasate

As a paid-up member of the Sarasate fan club, I immediately bought Julia Fischer's new CD of Sarasate vignettes for violin and piano. A superb CD with an attractive selection of pieces and highly virtuostic violin playing. Strongly recommended. Sarasate's music has delighted violinists and audiences for around 150 years now and looks a safe bet for the next 150 since it is attractively tuneful and beautifully written for the violin.

Inevitably I compared Ms Fischer in Sarasate to Tianwa Yang, who recently recorded eight CDs of all Sarasate's music for violin and piano, and violin and orchestra. Both the Chinese and the German are technically completely on top of the music. Comparing them is a bit like having to compare a good coq au vin with a good boeuf Bourguignon; Tianwa Yang comes over as the more sophisticated player, drawing attention a little more to the music and a little less to virtuoso violin technique. Julia Fischer is more of a bravura player here, and one notices first and foremost her exquisite violin playing and slightly self-conscious virtuosity. I compared Zigeunerweisen back-to-back and liked both, though Fischer takes fully one minute less over this eight minutes-or-so piece compared with Tianwa. Have to have both.

Yuja Wang in Rachmaninov

The live performance of Rachmaninov's third piano concerto by Yuja Wang with the Venezuelan orchestra conducted by Gustavo Dudamel is a real triumph. No doubt some grumpy critics will opine that Herr Blankensof, or whoever, finds greater depth in the work, or whatever. But when the music demands lyricism, Wang is lyrical. When it demands tenderness, Wang is tender. When it demands molto bravura; Wang positively flies. At times I almost found myself shouting “Go, Yuja, Go!”

Until now, my favourite performance of this work has been by Martha Argerich. The Chinese now beats the Argentinian by a short head – helped maybe by Wang's being a live (very live) performance and by the Venezuelan orchestra sounding really on its toes; too many orchestras, when playing virtuoso concertos, fall back on autopilot. Not here. The CD also contains a live performance of Prokofiev's second piano concerto, but I have been so enthralled by Yuja Wang in the Rachmaninov that Prokofiev is having to wait.

The only sour note, is DG's liner note packaging. Tacky in the extreme, with multiple photos of Miss Wang and Dudamel, but just one small one each of Rachmaninov and Prokofiev. Instead of taking up a full page with a somewhat vulgar photo of the rear view of Miss Yang, DG could have given us more on the two composers who did, after all, make a significant contribution to the CD. In the old days, DG was famous for its tasteful LP sleeves. The current team, however, seems to think it is marketing young flesh and celebrity, rather than great performances of great music. Yuja deserves better.