Beethoven: Violin Concerto, Coriolan Overture. Erich Röhn, Berlin Philharmonic, Wilhelm Furtwängler. Deutsche Grammophon “Dokumente” 427 780-2 (1989) barcode 028942778023:
From 10-CD set “Wilhelm Furtwängler Recordings 1942-1944”, Deutsche Grammophon 427 773-2 (1989) 028942777323:
Reissue 4 CDs “Wilhelm Furtwängler Aufnahmen Recordings 1942-1944 vol. 1” DG 471 289-2 (2001) 028947128922:
Recorded live 12 January 1944 (Concerto), 30 June 1943 (Coriolan Overture)
A strong contender for Furtwängler’s best version of Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, and an awe-inspiring Coriolan
Originally posted on Amazon.com 6 August 2014
With three celebrated recordings with Menuhin including two in the studio (1947 in Lucerne, beautifully reissued in 1997 on Testament SBT 1109, link will open new tab to my review and listing of subsequent releases; and 1953 with the London Philharmonia, first CD reissue in 1984 on EMI CDC 7 47119 2), and the live from 30 September 1947 in Berlin (now on Audite’s “Edition Wilhelm Furtwängler – The Complete RIAS Recordings”, 21.403, barcodes 735084493904 and 402143214038 – previously reissued in a lesser-quality transfer on Tahra FURT 1020, see my review) and one more live in Berlin from May 1953 with Wolfgang Schneiderhan (Deutsche Grammophon Dokumente 474 728-2 or 477 5030), you’d think this war-time version, from January 12 1944, with concertmaster Erich Röhn (1910-1985), would be little more than a curio, a conductor’s version reserved to the devoted Furtwänglerite. Röhn didn’t make much of a solo career, no information whatsoever about him is provided in DG’s booklet and there’s only very scanty biographical information available online, no entry even on German Wikipedia. So the main information accessible comes from the recent reissue of radio studio recordings by a new German label called Meloclassic (MC2017, barcode 791154050392, sold only on their website, see here). Röhn had been engaged by Furtwängler as concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic in 1934 at the age of 24, a position he shared with Hugo Kalberg and Siegfried Borries. In 1941 he succeeded Borries as First Concertmaster, and appeared as soloist in a number of concerts under Furtwängler, Knappertsbusch and Abendroth – sure, in 1944, Menuhin wouldn’t have been available to play in Berlin. When the new Berlin Philharmonic was formed after the war, Röhn, with a few others (among them Gerhard Taschner), was left out, but he soon found a replacement as concertmaster of the North German Radio in Hamburg, which had just been established by Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt at the request of the British military authorities. Röhn served there until his retirement in 1974.
So his main claim on posterity seems to be, really, his participation to this concert – which happens to have been, also, the last appearance of a soloist at the old Philharmonie, the Berlin Philharmonic’s concert venue. Two weeks later, it was bombed to rubble by the allies. Someone at headquarters must have disliked Beethoven.
Yet, on the strength of its first movement, this performance is a strong contender for the title not only of Furtwängler’s best version, but possibly also of one of the most beautifully conceived renditions of the first movement of Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, ever.
What makes it so is the magical balance of contrasts it achieves. Other than the immense power in the orchestral outbursts, one of the main hallmarks of Furtwängler’s art of conducting – more even in concert than in his studio recordings, especially those he did for EMI at the end of his life – is not so much the expansive tempos (as I, with many others, once thought when I knew less), as the great flexibility of tempo. Furtwängler can start in a very deliberate manner, but with the rise of dynamics and the approach of the more dramatic moments he will step on the gas pedal to near-Toscaninian frenzy. Contrary to what the other reviewers on the CD’s Amazon entry say, objectively, opening tempo is not particularly fast – certainly not compared to Toscanini’s with Heifetz in 1940, or even to Walter’s with Szigeti in their two recordings of 1932 (on Dante Lys 518-519 , Bruno Walter edition vol. 7, barcode 3421710425186) and 1947 or to most other recordings of that era – although it certainly does not give the impression of dragging. It is also impercepibly more animated than with Menuhin, but very similar to the 1953 performance with Schneiderhan, and the power in the orchestral tutti is certainly there. But what sets this performance apart from Furtwängler’s other recordings of the Concerto, if very subtly, is the combination of great drive and intensity in the more dramatic moments (paralleled only in his live performance with Menuhin in September 1947, and to a slightly lesser degree in Lucerne with Menuhin and with Schneiderhan live in 1953; but some episodes display more crispness and tautness here in 1943 than in any other Furtwängler performance), and the expansive songfulness on the more lyrical passages (which is paralleled in none of his other versions, even those with Menuhin, beautifully lyrical as they are), and the naturalness of the transitions from one to the other (which sets it apart from the live performance with Menuhin, where the accelerations are more abrupt). Although I haven’t checked back to make sure, the expansive lyricism of this version reminds me of Oistrakh with Cluytens in 1958 (first reissued to CD in 1989 on EMI Studio CDM 7 69261 2, barcode 077776926124); but Oistrakh and Cluytens kept the proceedings very expansive all the way; here, there is more urgency and drama in the more dramatic moments.
In my reviewing, when it comes to the performers’ choices of phrasings, the way they articulate and sing the melodic phrases, I try to set aside my own personal subjectivity. In my imagination I may prefer it phrased otherwise and I fancy that, if I were the performer, I’d do it otherwise (and better, of course), but after all who am I to say that my personal subjectivity is worth any better than the interpreter’s? I may dismiss a performance because it is sluggish, lacking bite, imagination, but I make it a rule never to do so because I don’t agree with such and such detail of phrasing: this is the performer’s liberty.
But here, I can say that the way Röhn and Furtwängler play that first movement, their agogics, their architecture of tension and repose, is pretty close to an ideal of mine, the way that, in my dreams, I fancy that I’d sing Beethoven’s Violin Concerto if I were playing it.
Of course none of that would matter if Röhn was an inferior soloist, or even one with a great musical mind but technical skills and tonal delivery that weren’t up to it. Not so, he is in no way inferior to the best Menuhin or to Schneiderhan, and at times, in those lyrical phrases in the upper reaches, there is a lyrical plenitude that eludes even them, to make it incomprehensible that he didn’t make more of a solo career – or it only proves that there are zillions of great fiddlers out there, but only a few become successful soloists.
However, the Larghetto isn’t quite on the same plane. The basic conception is similar to what it will be with Menuhin in 1947, very held back, more a Largo than a Larghetto. But, maybe because of the need to project in a large hall, Röhn doesn’t command the hushed intensity and luminosity of Menuhin in Lucerne, and his pitch tends to stray in some of the higher notes. As for the Finale, of Furtwängler’s five performances, this is, and by a margin, the most animated, the one that best expresses a spirit of playfulness and dance. Those with Menuhin were never very dynamic (an abiding feature of Menuhin’s interpretation, down to his 1960 and 1966 studio and stereo recordings with Silvestri and Klemperer – links to my reviews), although some made up in bounce and orchestral vigor (and thanks also to Furtwängler’s typical accelerations along the way) what they lost in their opening pacing, and the one with Schneiderhan wasn’t significantly different. The only reservation with Röhn’s is that his G string sounds wiry and not particularly beautiful.
The track listing claims that Röhn plays Joachim’s cadenzas, but that is not true: they are Kreisler’s, and a much-abridged version in the Finale – the same used by Menuhin in his 1966 studio recording with Klemperer. The sonics are fine for their vintage, with a vivid violin and a good orchestral presence, and some overload in the fortissimo tutti of the Finale. They are far better than Menuhin’s live 1947 Berlin performance, not as good as the Lucerne recording in Testament’s great transfer, let alone the 1953 recordings, live or studio. There’s no ideal Furtwängler version of the Violin Concerto. The ideal might be Röhn in 1944 playing with the tone of Menuhin in Lucerne and the sonics of 1953. The ideal Furtwängler version inhabits our imagination, and it is probably better so. This one is indispensable to the Furtwänglerite, and probably to any music lover seriously in love with Beethoven’s Violin Concerto.
Although the Violin Concerto alone warrants the purchase of this disc, it would be unfair to leave without comment the performance of the Coriolan-Overture, recorded six months before, on June 30, 1943. It is breathtaking. You just need to listen to the three orchestral explosions that introduce the Overture. This is not the curtain opening on the tragedy of the Roman general Coriolanus, it’s the fist of Yaveh smashing down the walls of Jericho. I don’t think they were ever played, before or after, with such devastating power. After that, that Furtwängler’s performance is one of the most deliberate ever recorded (but, mind you, not THE most deliberate: that award probably goes to Jascha Horenstein in 1953, reissued in 2001 on Vox Legends VOX2 7808 barcode 047163780820), and that he takes every opportunity to slow down even more when comes the lyrical second theme, is of no importance. What might have been exceptionable with any other contributes here to the awe-inspiring, super-human power and grandeur of this interpretation.