107

The Gramophone, August, 1925-

-------------------------------------------------------------pedaJlts argue that a sense of the drama is not required to a.ppreciate music, I r~ tort th a t unless you have a 'ense of drama you can't appreciate Beethoven. Half the depreciation of Beethoven nowadays comes from people who have no conception of drama outside the melancholy . truggles that take place in their own digestive organs.

Next month I shall be dealing with the Polydo r rec()rds that I have received, and I will reserve till then my list of choices for people who want aU the Beethoven symphonies and are now hesitatin gbetween this and that version. I will say at once that all these six i ss n.es by the Parlophone s ~rik e: me as better than the 7th, 8th, and 9th which the v iss ued first.

The Columbia issue of the Enigma Varia tions conducted by Sir Henry Wood is not nearly so g'ood a,s the R.M.V. issue conducted by Sir Edward E lgar himself. The interpreta,tion is rough and casual. The phrasing is confused like a bad elocut ioni. t's. To be sure, we have lost the scratch; but ill lOSing the scratch we don't wa.nt to lose the claw:; as well. Another of my criticisms last quarter was answered in adva,nce by the Columbia Compf10-Y'S printing the t i t le of the work on the hack of the album that contains i t . Now, may I rceommend flap s to the envelopes like tho se us ed by the Parlophone Co. in their admirable a.lbums ? \ \Tllile reading the excellent analysis printed on the Columbia envelope I got up in a hurry to change the reeord tha b was playing, with the result that one of the disc hUTtled out and was smashed to pieces on the floor. I was upset for the moment, because I feared I was in for seven yea,rs' bad luck tlu'ough breakinO' a mirTOI'. However, the smashed disc was no t so much like a mirror as some of the others in this set, and I am hoping i t will be all right.

TIl e Columbia issue of Beethoven's Fifth Sy'mphony conducted by -Weingartner is a dull vel'. ion. I f anybody cares to know what is my ide~t of the way the finale should be taken, let him invest in the Toscanini record published oy the Victor Company. Glorious ! I once said that Sil' Landon Ronald conducted the F -ifth Symphony as if i t was an omnibus. Well, Weingartner's final e i~ like an elderly lady trying to catch that omnibus. Nor can I praise highly the Parlophone version conducted by \Veissma,nn. However, i t is sOl1nd cnou h, and at the price this is certai nly the befit Y[~lue for money of any complete 1. 'sue at the moment. What a pity that the old H.M,V. issue of the Berlin Philharmonic under Nikisch was so h~ ment ab l y recorded! Now, tha,t wa,s the andante. I f only th e horn-' at the beginning didn't sound as if the pa.riommaid had sl ipped downst,lirs with the bl'eakiast tray! \Vheu we get this electric r ec ruing, I h01 e that we 'hall also get an electric b{lton for t he F-ifth . Kou ssevitzky would be my choice .

1~ h e enterprise of the Parlophone Company in i suing, or as th ey prefer to say "releasing'," tIle n ille symphonies of Beetho ven h8,d turned "his lpat wav into a sound wave. As I had chosen th e same period to indulge in a debauch of Polydor Bcetho,'cn symphonies, I've had such a doing of th em as n1ight cure a Ie s devoted ,\'ors11ipper.

FromParlophone, too, comes Strauf;s'sHeldenleben. I heard thi s when i t was fir-:;t played in England round about twenty years ago. In those days A Hell of a Life seemed an apter translation th ~L n A H ero's Life. Now i t seems so easy, so graceful ,-and so melodious where grace and melody arcintendpd, and no t particularly ferocious where fero city is implied. The only theme I seem to recognise from the comp0f;er's other works is th e dance of the tailors in the Bmwgeous GentiZhomrne. I don't know whether the occurrence of that in the earlier portion is intended to indieate th e hero's pre-occupation with clothes as a younO' man._ These are very O'ood records indeed . I hope we shall have Don (/1t ixote soon . The Parlophone TocI is to my t aste the best of the three Tods we have. The 'drum at the beginning is splendicUy managed, and doesn't sOllld like the nurse tappingon a t in of diges tive biscu i ts in the sick man's room, as i t does in the Columbia version. An interesting pa,ir of records from the same company is the Siegfried IdJIll conducted by Siegiried Wagner himself. I am afraid i t is like Johnson's lady who preached. He doesn't do i t well, but one L'l surprised to heal' him doing i t at all. I f you haven't got the Siegfr'ied Idyll, I have no hesitation in rec<?mmending the Vocalio n ver'ion, played by the ChamberOrchestra as much the best that has hitherto b eell i:s. ued. I find that I want to play thi s at 82. Any confirmation from greater ('.x per s than myself ~ These strike me as exceptionally good records" and don't forget that like the Parlophone's they only cost 4s. 6d. each. The second Peer (Yynt S~tit e from Pariophone comes off capitally . The Dance of th e Ara,bs is so realistic that i t frightened my Sia,rn ef;e cat, a,nd she'K used to queer noises,. what with some of our English tenor.. on the gramophone and t-wo vivacitlus Amazon parrots. in the verandah.

A genial recorc1 from Columbia is Brahms' Academic Overt1l1'e. We should like the Trctgic ' Overtt('I'e now. H.M.V. gave us one of D ebussy '.' N octllmes-a pleasant l i t t le work with lo ts of good t impani effects. Ponchielli's Dance of the HO'U'I's is not so suecessful as i t oug'ht to be. I h ave H. be t ter Fonotipia, r ecord of this. 'L'heBrunswick F'reis chiitzOI'Cl'tUI'C is good, but not so good a,s the H.YLV. version, anc1 i t cost s eighteenpence more. Their other orchestral reC01'(1 of the aZZ eg'feUo from Brahms' S eco nd Symphony and Sib eli us , IYnlmtt11'a is also good, but mu ch too expensive. By far the best