Hey everyone! Welcome to Day 67!
For today I listened to two minor-keyed Beethoven symphonies. How odd that they are such major works.
Beethoven: Symphony No. 5 - March 22nd, 1952
Popularity has been more destructive to this symphony than to just about any another work in the standard orchestral repertoire. Over-familiarity has dulled its shock value, and given charlatan conductors leeway to misrepresent the work however they see fit in the name of having an "imaginative" interpretation.
The good news about this Toscanini recording is that it largely avoids these destructive mannerisms. The bad news is that the performance just isn't very good.
The problem from the very first measures is a general rhythmic unsteadiness. Although Toscanini's finest recordings from this period demonstrate that he was still capable of maintaining strict discipline from the podium, there can be no doubt that the general trend is one of diminishing control. This Beethoven recording never exactly falls apart, but it is wayward enough that momentum is rarely sufficiently maintained to produce successful climaxes. The line frequently meanders and loses focus.
Throughout all of this, Toscanini displays the same interpretive brilliance of his earlier and superior recordings of this symphony. The perfection of his tempos is a big factor in this. The extent to which Beethoven's metronome markings should be taken seriously is a touchy issue with the Fifth, but Toscanini's finest recordings of the work show how effective they can be when the indications are (more or less) adhered to. The scherzo is a perfect example of this, as it is frequently interpreted in a ponderous manner that transforms it into something slower that is most certainly not a scherzo. Toscanini hits Beethoven's tempo pretty much on the nose and elicits a performance of stunning vitality that erupts with passion and precision (or at least that would be the case in a better version of the same interpretation).
Considering the best and worst of this recording leaves me a little uncertain as to how much I like it. Toscanini's 1939 recording of the Fifth is vastly superior as a performance and displays the same interpretive brilliance, yet survives in much duller sound. This may be an instance where a listener has to take all of the available evidence and just use his or her imagination to supply the rest. Not a ringing endorsement, I suppose, but can you think of a better use for the imagination?
Don't answer that.
Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 - March 31st and April 1st, 1952
Toscanini's 1952 recording of Beethoven's Ninth is one of the most famous and influential of the many versions of the work. It has been used in a wide variety of NBC programs over the last fifty years (most recently in remixed form on Countdown with Keith Obermann), and can still be readily found in the few remaining record stores.
Yet Toscanini himself was a bit uncertain of his interpretive command of the symphony. During these recording sessions he was heard to say "I still don't understand that music." That statement has frequently been cited as an example of the conductor's humility, but some Toscanini biographers feel it was grounded in truth. Mortimer H. Frank, for example, notes that "Among all of Beethoven's orchestral works, the first movement of the Ninth Symphony may be the one whose mysteries he never satisfactorily penetrated." Actually, I think that sentiment could be applied to the whole symphony, at least to some extent.
In many respects I like this recording very much. It has power, intensity, and great beauty of line. But it is also lacking in harmonic drive and structural unity, and frequently meanders in its forward motion. The great Adagio, for example, is as beautifully phrased as I have ever heard, but is so lacking in harmonic weight that it loses all sense of structure. Much of the recording is like this, and as much as I would like to call this a great performance, there is just too much that is unsatisfactory.
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That's it for Day 67!
Check back tomorrow for four little pieces from four medium to large-sized countries.
Happy Sunday!
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