Post by gerontius on Aug 28, 2008 16:24:07 GMT 1
I was privileged to attend only two concerts conducted by HVK. As a listener, I have always loved sumptuous sound - my favourite conductor is Stokowski and so much of the appeal of K's soundworld is its sensuality. While there are other conductors whose work I admire, many fall into what I call the "rhythm method" - meaning they are more concerned perhaps with rhythmic precision than gorgeous sound (think Szell, Muti, Klemperer, Solti). K seemed to me to be more interested in gorgeous sound than rhythm, but I'm sure I'll get in trouble with that.
My first encounter was in 1981 at the Festival Hall where he brought the BPO to perform Bruckner 5. The dynamic range was HUGE - from the opening pianissimo one was straining to hear the sound. The fortissimi were a torrent of tone, like Furtwangler these huge chords splattered out toward us (as opposed to a Muti experience where they are incisively intoned - "banged" perhaps). K inherited the huge sound of the BPO from Furtwangler and then enhanced it. The sheer volume of tone was unlike anything I'd heard from a British orchestra, the VPO or the Czech PO to name a few I was familiar with at the time. In short, it roared like a lion. I've never heard this sonority and weight of tone equalled since, even by the BPO itself.
K used some extra instrumentalists in the Bruckner 5 - doubled timpani and 8 horns helped the overall sheer weight of tone. At the end of the finale the Franz Schalk effect (6 trumpets and 6 trombones) was finally brought to bear in a peroration that the RFH could not really contain without it becoming "noise" (this happens for example, at Avery Fisher in NY at anything above ff in, say a Tchaikovsky symphony).
I did not know the 5th well at the time and couldn't comment on it as a performance, however , "that sound" has never left my skull and I never expect to hear it equalled.
In 1988 K came to NY with the VPO to perform two concerts including the Bruckner 8th. Having bumped into Ozawa on the stairs going into the concert, I was aware of numerous glitterati in the audience. While the sound was not as large as the BPO, it had a radiant sheen which was utterly seductive. Brass playing was distinctly off form that evening, however I have never heard the Haas edition conveyed with such powerful logic. The "drive to the precipice" toward the end of the first movement was extraordinary and unequalled in my experience.
I missed the concerts from a few seasons before where the BPO visited to play the Alpine Symphony. I have a bootleg in-hall recording and it's very fine, but you had to "be there" as a friend of mine was - he described it as "deafening" and "sublime" in the very same sentence.
K has gone through a remarkable period of "dis-appreciation" since his death. He was never really popular with US critics because he didn't conduct here much and was suspected of being an opportunist during WW2 where people would rather have seen him "pull an Erich Kleiber" and leave the country. He is certainly not best represented by his records which are to my mind (at least the post 1970s DG ones) ludicrously manicured (take for example the Alpine Symphony DG recording - loads of fluffs in the horns and the "descent section" in the strings sounds louder than the storm itself). Moreover, many lack the excitement of what he was obviously capable of in concert. While I believe he was a conductor who tended to conduct what he rehearsed (unlike say Munch, Stoki or Beecham who could and would do all sorts of things differently in concert than rehearsal) he nevertheless was an exciting presence, unquestionably a great conductor. My chief gripe - small repertoire on record - he could have done more there. His Honegger #2 and Shostakovitch 10 and Nielsen 4 (ugly sound there though) indicate what could have been in store if he had done something other than yet another set of Tchaik 4,5 and 6.................
My first encounter was in 1981 at the Festival Hall where he brought the BPO to perform Bruckner 5. The dynamic range was HUGE - from the opening pianissimo one was straining to hear the sound. The fortissimi were a torrent of tone, like Furtwangler these huge chords splattered out toward us (as opposed to a Muti experience where they are incisively intoned - "banged" perhaps). K inherited the huge sound of the BPO from Furtwangler and then enhanced it. The sheer volume of tone was unlike anything I'd heard from a British orchestra, the VPO or the Czech PO to name a few I was familiar with at the time. In short, it roared like a lion. I've never heard this sonority and weight of tone equalled since, even by the BPO itself.
K used some extra instrumentalists in the Bruckner 5 - doubled timpani and 8 horns helped the overall sheer weight of tone. At the end of the finale the Franz Schalk effect (6 trumpets and 6 trombones) was finally brought to bear in a peroration that the RFH could not really contain without it becoming "noise" (this happens for example, at Avery Fisher in NY at anything above ff in, say a Tchaikovsky symphony).
I did not know the 5th well at the time and couldn't comment on it as a performance, however , "that sound" has never left my skull and I never expect to hear it equalled.
In 1988 K came to NY with the VPO to perform two concerts including the Bruckner 8th. Having bumped into Ozawa on the stairs going into the concert, I was aware of numerous glitterati in the audience. While the sound was not as large as the BPO, it had a radiant sheen which was utterly seductive. Brass playing was distinctly off form that evening, however I have never heard the Haas edition conveyed with such powerful logic. The "drive to the precipice" toward the end of the first movement was extraordinary and unequalled in my experience.
I missed the concerts from a few seasons before where the BPO visited to play the Alpine Symphony. I have a bootleg in-hall recording and it's very fine, but you had to "be there" as a friend of mine was - he described it as "deafening" and "sublime" in the very same sentence.
K has gone through a remarkable period of "dis-appreciation" since his death. He was never really popular with US critics because he didn't conduct here much and was suspected of being an opportunist during WW2 where people would rather have seen him "pull an Erich Kleiber" and leave the country. He is certainly not best represented by his records which are to my mind (at least the post 1970s DG ones) ludicrously manicured (take for example the Alpine Symphony DG recording - loads of fluffs in the horns and the "descent section" in the strings sounds louder than the storm itself). Moreover, many lack the excitement of what he was obviously capable of in concert. While I believe he was a conductor who tended to conduct what he rehearsed (unlike say Munch, Stoki or Beecham who could and would do all sorts of things differently in concert than rehearsal) he nevertheless was an exciting presence, unquestionably a great conductor. My chief gripe - small repertoire on record - he could have done more there. His Honegger #2 and Shostakovitch 10 and Nielsen 4 (ugly sound there though) indicate what could have been in store if he had done something other than yet another set of Tchaik 4,5 and 6.................
