- Producer's Note
- Full Track Listing
- Cover Art
- Additional Notes
- Extra Review
Furtwängler's unrivalled wartime Beethoven - in sound quality to knock you out
"The intensity of this reading is searing" - Fanfare
Of the two, the Coriolan shows perhaps the rougher edges - the sound is full, clear and superbly dynamic, but things start to fall apart at the uppermost frequencies when the music is at its loudest.
The Eroica on the other hand is a revelation, and I had to double-check when returning to it for final tracking that I'd not accidentally substituted a much later recording when initially restoring it. But no, it's definitely the 1944 VPO performance, which Ardoin dates across 19th and 20th December, with the unmistakeably strident brass, but also with a fullness, richness and clarity that previous issues have barely hinted at.
A truly essential Eroica for all - even if it's already in your collection from a previous release elsewhere.
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BEETHOVEN Coriolan Overture, Op. 62
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
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BEETHOVEN Symphony No. 3 in E flat major, "Erioca", Op. 55
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
Coriolan Overture: Recorded 27-30 June 1943, Alte Philharmonie, Berlin
Symphony No. 3: Recorded 19-20 December 1944, Musikvereinsaal, Vienna
Wilhelm Furtwängler, conductor
The Coriolan performances range in time over eight years, but the
post-war performances, despite their effectiveness, are no match for the
1943 performance, one of the most supercharged and dramatic of
Furtwängler’s performances. It is like a great fist delivering a series
of crippling blows, and along with the sense of struggle and agony in
the 1943 performance comes the sensation of life ebbing away, of breath
leaving a body.
Three places in particular are worth special
mention. First, those opening blows, which sweep upward with enormous
thrust from the depths to the heights of the orchestra, then the eerie
moment Furtwängler makes of the final section (seventy bars from the
end), and finally the coda, which along with the end of the Mahler Ninth
Symphony, comes as close as music can to capturing the sensation of
death and dying.
The magnificent 1944 performance with the Vienna
Philharmonic, an authenticated performance that is not only
Furtwangler’s noblest and most compelling Eroica, but one unrivalled on
disc. In retrospect, it is ironic that Furtwängler had this recording
suppressed legally when it first appeared in 1953 on the Urania label,
for it has a thrust and majesty he was unable to recapture in either of
his studio Eroicas. Like the 1951 Hamburg performance of the Brahms
First Symphony or the wartime Coriolan Overture, this performance
recreates the impact of Furtwängler at his most inspired. It sings with
exaltation, particularly in the triumphant sounds of the brass, without
losing the work’s architectonics. This Eroica is more focused and less
mercurial than the headstrong “Schreiber” performance, and its nerve
ends are less exposed. But the concentration and fierceness are markedly
similar, though the 1944 performance seems somewhat broader in attitude
because it is more consistent in its momentum, and its fire is more
warming.
John Ardoin The Furtwängler Record (Amadeus Press, 1994)
James A. Altena reviewed this release in Fanfare 40:4, and thus I will be brief. He concluded by saying “emphatically recommended, and a major candidate for the 2017 Want List.” It might well wind up on at least two Want Lists in that case.
This “Eroica” has always been a very special
performance, even in Furtwängler’s discography, though it has always
shared first place in my mind with a Berlin Philharmonic performance
(available on Music & Arts and Tahra). But
But, of course, I cannot overlook the “filler,” a performance of Beethoven’ Coriolan Overture that my colleague in his review called “shattering and cataclysmic.” When I put the disc on and the opening of Coriolan exploded
out of my speakers I found myself catching my breath. This is as close
to explosive as musical performance can get, and once again
If symphonic music is of more than passing interest to you, if you understand that Beethoven dealt with life and death issues in the music he wrote, then what is preserved on this release is something you simply must experience.
Henry Fogel
This article originally appeared in Issue 40:6 (July/Aug 2017) of Fanfare Magazine.
Fanfare Review
This is a must-have for Furtwängler devotees in particular, and collectors of historical performances in general. Emphatically recommended
Both of these fabled performances have enjoyed
many releases before, but what
Furtwängler’s reading of the Coriolan Overture is shattering and cataclysmic, as over the top emotionally as his fabled but controversial 1942 performance of the Ninth Symphony. There is simply no other reading like it. For me, this account is definitive for capturing the truly apocalyptic dimension of the Roman general’s tragic fall (though my reference point is of course Shakespeare, not the virtually forgotten play of Heinrich Joseph von Collin for which Beethoven wrote his overture). Compared to the Music & Arts remastering that colleague Henry Fogel reviewed in 18:3, the sound here is far more natural—the frequency and dynamic ranges are opened up, and an annoying rippling sound in the background has been totally removed.
For the “Eroica,” the point of comparison will be
the remastering of this symphony in the 18-CD set of Furtwängler’s
Vienna Philharmonic performances. Fogel has reviewed multiple releases
of this performance; see for example issues 13:2 (Rodolphe), 20:4 (Music
& Arts), 23:2 (Music & Arts), and 37:3 (the Orfeo set) for his
descriptions of both the performance itself and the comparative quality
of the various remasterings. I agree with him that the Orfeo (I own both
that and the M& A release) was the best to date. The Orfeo is very
good, and I could happily continue to live with it; but, for my money,
the new
In short, this is a must-have for Furtwängler devotees in particular, and collectors of historical performances in general—and anyone who isn’t dead-set on having only high-fidelity digital or analog stereo recordings in a collection should acquire it as well. Emphatically recommended, and a major candidate for the 2017 Want List. James A. Altena