This week’s release is one of the most exciting that I’ve had the privilege to be a part of (writes Mark Obert-Thorn). How often does one get the opportunity to expand in a significant way the slender discography of a major artist? Ginette Neveu’s complete studio recordings barely fill four CDs, and what broadcast recordings survive take up about another four.
One of her most celebrated interpretations, that of the Beethoven Violin Concerto, was never commercially recorded; and although a critically praised live version with Hans Rosbaud and the Southwest German Radio Orchestra (Baden-Baden) has been available for decades, another one released more recently has now been judged to be a misattribution
All the more reason for my excitement at the discovery of a broadcast recording of the work under Serge Koussevitzky and the Boston Symphony Orchestra in fine sound from Neveu’s first American concert tour in 1947. I’ve coupled it with the two works she performed with Charles Munch and the New York Philharmonic from a 1949 concert, the Chausson Poème and Ravel’s Tzigane, which have been issued before, but probably never from sources as pristine as the ones to which I had access. Since these three works constitute all of her recordings which have surfaced from the United States, the release is titled Ginette Neveu en Amérique.