Beethoven is my favorite composer and I adore the concertos. I have so many recordings of them, though I am a devotee of the sound of the modern grand piano.
One of the real pleasures of record collecting is stumbling across something utterly unexpected, and last night I had that experience. Idly perusing eBay in a futile search for some empty clamshell style 78 storage albums, I stumbled across an early set on the Brunswick label: of all things, two organ concerti, one by Handel and one by Rheinberger, credited to soloist "Walter Fischer of the Berlin Cathedral" with orchestra. As the latter is not identified on the labels, at least those in the listing photos, and the set lacks its notes booklet, I may need to do a bit of digging to identify which one. Assuming it wasn't just a pickup group, the most likely candidate would be the ever-busy Berlin State Opera Orch. The set is billed as Brunswick Album VI and even has its original gold-colored album. Asking price seeming a bit high, I made a "best offer," and this morning the seller accepted. Alia jacta est! Presumably the records are domestic pressings of masters by Polydor, from which Brunswick seems to have sourced most of its classical catalogue. Early Brunswick classical sets of any stripe turn up infrequently, and organ music was not often recorded during the 78 era, particularly early on. I'll be interested to find out whether the records are early electric or late acoustic. [Now almost certainly the latter; see edit below.] I'm not expecting a lot in terms of condition--the seller's grading is a bit vague, but not terribly promising--but this set can't be common, and sometimes you take what you can get. Now comes the scary part: waiting to see if it survives exposure to the parcel carriers. The seller obviously has experience shipping 78s and has unblemished feedback, but still, . [Edit] Just started in with my Internet Shovel and turned up a bit about the soloist. This blog Selected concerto recordings with Walther Fischer and Kurt Grosse mentions "my" record set, expresses frustration about the paucity of information to be had regarding Fischer, and describes him as "one of the leading figures of the late German Romantic school"; in response to a plea for more, a reader sent the following: Some information about Walter Fischer (1872-1931) is to be found in: Max Reger Briefe zwischen der Arbeit 1956. Reger wrote letters to Fischer during the years 1902-1914. Fischer was an admirer of Reger and played each Thursday a concert, almost always with a piece of Reger. He was organist in Berlin: 1903-1910 Garnisonskirche 1910-1917 Kaiser Wilhelm Gedächtniskirche 1917-1931 Berliner Dom ...and another reader, whose name I recognize as being a well-respected source of information about early records, adds: The date that Walter Fischer recorded the Reinberger concerto would be autumn 1926 - I cannot really be any more accurate than this as the recording ledgers of Deutsche Grammophon/ Polydor are no longer extant for this period; it may be the Berlin Philharmonic or at least members of that orchestra that accompanied him, the conductor Bruno Seidler-Winkler the most likely candidate.
Me too, the grand rocks but the delicacy and subtleness of the fortepiano in some pieces is also special.
This seems to be my time to stumble across the unexpected. In looking for more information about my Brunswick set, I stumbled across an assessment of Max Reger--from 1922!--that I found to hold up quite well today. I can't claim familiarity with but a small fraction of the music discussed there, but the general outlines of the argument strike me as fair, and moreover the article gives an interesting perspective on musical life of the day. For instance, only once does it refer to a phonograph record, one of a movement from one of Reger's solo violin works, played by none other than Efrem Zimbalist (senior!); the gist is that such an opportunity is something far out of the ordinary. Remember, in 1922 most of Beethoven, much less Reger, was unavailable to the record buyer in any form, and much of what was available was abridged to fit one or two record sides with a maximum playing time of four minutes-thirty seconds. The Two Reger-Legends on JSTOR
Daft post, but a guy on another forum just said the last five minutes of this symphony were the most devastating he knows, but he finds it hard to listen to. Because all he hears is the soundtrack from Laurence of Arabia. As I got the soundtrack when the film came out, and know it well, but have never noticed, had to give it a go.
I don't know about the Shostakovich, but Edouard Lalo wrote a piano concerto in F Minor that does contain music bearing a striking resemblance to that "big theme" from the movie--I've read not by coincidence; supposedly the movie score's composer lifted it right from the concerto! (Possible urban myth? I never checked Snopes, so take that for what it's worth.) I have a recording of the Lalo, one of those ultra-cheapie issues, attributed to Marylene Dosse with Matthias Kuntzsch and the Stuttgart PO--Pilz CD160 352 P1. Of course, with that source, Lord knows whether those are really the performers.
Played the Shostakovich, there are no big themes but I can see were he is coming from the dramatic moments in the film do have a Shostakovian influence. Nothing wrong with that.
Was just listening to this recording on the Schubert "Trout" on the radio... Not bad! I'm not going to buy it, though, because I already have many other recordings of this that I'm very satisfied with.
-- It was a memorable day when I bought that Grumiaux set of the Mozart Quintets-- from a guy who lives in rural northern Virginia (near Manassas) who had a pile of Philips classical LPs he wanted to sell. He offered that I could drive up and check them out in person. The day I picked, though, was not the best: It had rained overnight and that morning was thick with fog and some drizzle, which made for an interesting drive on the muddy dirt road he lived on. Still, he was an amiable chap and we talked about classical music for a long time before I left with an armload of great albums. Regarding that Talich set of the Mozart Quartets: I've seen it posted a number of times on the forum, so I assume it must be well-liked here. It's OOP and used copies are not cheap, but I might stumble across one some day at a bargain price and pick it up. It sounds pretty good from what I can hear in the 30-second sound clips that Amazon makes available.
Cool. Are you open to CD? they have copies on Amazon for under $40 for the whole set. https://www.amazon.com/Mozart-Complete-Quartets-Talich-Quartet/dp/B005LL4TW8
As a retiree, I've cut back on spending for the last few years, but I'll pick up the occasional used CD or LP if it's a really good buy. I believe $40 is about 10% of the original list price for that set--which is probably fair, though I'd rather it was less. I'll take a look and think about it. Thanks for the tip.
Listening to Fauré Nocturnes, Nos. 1-7, this evening. Jean-Philippe Collard, piano. Recorded in the Salle Wagram, Paris, 1973. French LP, (P) 1974, by Pathé Marconi EMI
FRENCH BARITONE GABRIEL BACQUIER DIES AT 95 YEARS OF AGE Fallece el barítono francés Gabriel Bacquier a los 95 años de edad
Baritone Gabriel Bacquier and bass John Macurdy die Fallecen barítono Gabriel Bacquier y el bajo John Macurdy | Beckmesser
As I have shared with you before, a wonderful set of recordings. I have this set, which I need to return to very soon: From the amazon history, I can see that I paid only $12.93 for this new, back in 2006. What a steal!