The Columbia Beethoven Centennial Symphony Series, Volume 4 (1926/27) - PASC414

The Columbia Beethoven Centennial Symphony Series, Volume 4

Penultimate issue in this groundbreaking Symphonic series, first issued in 1927, in new Mark Obert-Thorn transfers

This volume is the fourth of five which will reissue, for the first time in one series, the complete symphony cycle which English Columbia commissioned to commemorate the centennial of Beethoven’s death in 1927. The first four symphonies were assigned to British conductors (Henschel, Beecham, Wood and the Northern Irish Harty) while the remainder were given to Weingartner, already generally acknowledged as a Beethoven specialist.

For the Seventh and Eighth Symphonies, Weingartner was returning to scores he had only relatively recently recorded for Columbia using the old acoustical process. In the Seventh, he restored a cut he had made in the Scherzo in the previous nine-sided version, while the remade Eighth took one side less due to the elimination of a large overlap of repeated music in the third movement. Both of the present versions are swifter than their 1936 remakes, but the differences are not as marked as those between his 1927 and 1933 versions of the Fifth Symphony (detailed in the notes to Volume 3).

The two overtures date from the Concertgebouw Orchestra’s first recording sessions in May, 1926. The early electrical sound is noticeably more primitive than that of the symphonies, showing the great advances Columbia had made over the intervening months. The single movement from the Eighth Symphony was included as the filler side to Mengelberg’s recording of Cherubini’s Anacreon Overture. While not part of the Centennial Symphonies series per se, these sides have been included not only to fill out an otherwise short program, but also because, along with Henry Wood’s Leonore Overture No. 3 in Volume 1 and the symphonies, they comprise the complete electrical orchestral recordings of Beethoven which Columbia had in print by the end of the Centennial year of 1927, (excluding Louis Zimmermann’s recording of the Violin Concerto, released only in Holland).

The sources for the present transfers were American Columbia “Viva-Tonal” pressings. While these are usually the quietest versions available, a higher-than-average amount of surface noise will be noticeable in the Mengelberg items. When played using the typical recording curve for the early electric era, these sides sound dull and bass-heavy; however, by playing them with a “flat” equalization and then significantly boosting the upper frequencies, the balance and detail of the original recordings comes into focus, albeit at the expense of significantly increased hiss. The severe speed fluctuations of the originals have been corrected through the application of Celemony Capstan, allowing the performances to be heard with rock-solid pitch for the first time since the original recording sessions.

Mark Obert-Thorn