Roll over, Chuck Berry. Beethoven and Toscanini are here to stay. Records, tapes, and compact discs will see to that. Rockers are not the only people with a taste for golden oldies. Fans of symphonies and sonatas enjoy them, too. The golden oldies played on late-night rock radio remind graybeards of the senior prom, but classical golden oldies are legendary performances by great artists of the past.
The rise of the CD gives collectors an excuse to assemble libraries of golden oldies. Almost daily CD companies release discs of historic performances, usually at budget or mid-line prices. Given the high cost of CDs—which retail for $15 and up—the golden oldies translate into a bargain. And while listeners save money, they often obtain performances with far more character and style than the bland performances proliferating today.
A word about sound. Older recordings suffer sometimes from surface noise and distortions. The notes for one historic CD list "total time (atmosphere and pauses)." The sound on CD reissues of older performances often lacks the clarity and resonance of recordings made in studios with space-age equipment. How could it be otherwise? Many of the discs are reproductions made from tapes of live broadcasts dating from thirty, forty, or even fifty years ago. Microphones weren't as sophisticated then as now. Even in the studios the state of the recording art was basic. If sonic spectaculars draw you to stereos and CDs, stick with music recorded recently. If, however, you are interested in music making of the highest artistic order, these historic CDs are unexcelled.
Kleiber's Eroica
Start with Erich Kleiber's recording of Beethoven's Symphony No. 3 in E-flat Major, the Eroica, which is available on the London label. Kleiber—the father of conductor Carlos, who last season triumphed with La Bohème at the Metropolitan Opera—remains unappreciated. He was a man of high principle; his Beethoven is a revelation.
From the Eroica's opening chords, the listener experiences this oft-played symphony as if for the first time. The Promethean themes in the finale have never sounded so alive, the coda so vivid. Although the performance is passionate, Kleiber was not a show-off. He focused attention on the music, not on the orchestra (the Vienna Philharmonic) or himself. When an admirer described his performance of Weber's Der Freischutz as "wonderful in every detail," Kleiber answered, "No wonder, really: Weber put them there."
The Eroica is easily misunderstood. Beethoven's inscription to Napoleon, subsequently scratched out of the manuscript, can prove distracting. When heard with open ears, the symphony seems not a political statement about republican heroism but a musical statement about the composer's "spiritual development," to borrow the title of J.W.N Sullivan's short biography of Beethoven. Shortly before composing the Eroica, Beethoven wrote a letter, now known as the "Heiligenstadt Testament," to his brothers in which he discussed his deafness:
"[W]hat a humiliation when one stood beside me and heard a flute in the distance and I heard nothing, or someone heard the shepherd singing and again I heard nothing, such incidents brought me to the verge of despair, but little more and I would have put an end to my
...
Read Full Article
|
