Expert: Pat G - 9/12/2009

Question
QUESTION: Hello! I don't play any instruments, but have been listening to classical music for almost my entire life. I like purchasing my music as complete box sets, for example, instead of buying one CD of Haydn symphonies at a time, I just went and bought a box set of all 104 of them!

The first box set I ever bought was the classic 1963 performance of Beethoven's 9 symphonies with Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic. I was in grade 7 in school, and had saved my allowance for a very long time to buy it! Needless to say, being my first classical music cd's, prior to that I only had a cassette player, they've given me countless hours of enjoyment.

Recently, I've been attending symphonies at the concert hall in my city, and sometimes they have been performing Beethoven symphonies. And just as I thought I had the best box set in the world, I now realize each time I see a Beethoven symphony performed how much is lacking in this Karajan set. I didn't know that at the time when I bought it (well I was only in grade 7 at the time lol), but for one thing Karajan ignores many of Beethoven's repeat signs that are on the original scores and manuscripts. That's probably a huge reason why Beethoven performed in the concert halls sound better to me. But that is my main problem that I have with this Karajan set of the Beethoven symphonies. He ignored many of the repeats in the original scoring. He also conducted the first movt of the sixth too quickly, and perhaps there wasn't enough instruments in the thunderstorm part either. I've heard that part performed with cymbals before which are lacking in this recording. Is it supposed to have cymbals?? And then also, there's a couple areas where the sound could be improved. The tympani in the 2nd movt of the 9th is too quiet, and in the 2nd movt of the 5th symphony, there's a couple spots where the woodwinds are either too quiet or drowned out by the strings, even though it's the woodwinds carrying the melody, and there are a couple spots where the double basses carry the melody, but are too quiet to be heard properly against the rest of the orchestra that plays one note or one set of notes in unison over and over kind of like bang bang bang bang bang and the melody underneath played by double basses isn't heard too good.

At any rate, I don't mean to make my Karajan performance of these symphonies sound bad. I really like them, but I am looking for better. There's so many recordings out there, but with the reviews of them online, there doesn't seem like a perfect set of Beethoven symphonies recorded that's for sure.

If I told you what I'm looking for, would you be able to recommend a complete set of Beethoven symphonies for me to check out?? I'm looking for something similar to the 1963 Berlin Karajan sound, just one that doesn't ignore any notes from the original manuscripts. People may disagree on the interpretations of how notes are played and they will till the end of time, but I'd at least want to have a recording where all the notes are there. I usually like larger orchestras with a more royal and full sounding quality. I also usually like slower tempos, so long as the slowness doesn't take away from any spark or fire that's supposed to be there. I want the orchestra to be able to breath and not be rushed. Karajan's performance of the ninth is 67 minutes. I've heard longer which I might even prefer. I've also heard much shorter. A 61, 62, 63 minute performance of this symphony feels so rushed, that the slow third movt doesn't sound anything meditational at all. I also like an orchestra where the percussion is heard really well.

Anyways, I've checked out a lot of versions from the public library in my city, and none made me completely happy. I was hoping you might be able to recommend something, anything, for me to check out based on the comments I've made about what I would like. If nothing jumps out at you, maybe you can tell me your favorite recording or recordings, and why they are your favorite, and that might be help enough.

Sorry this email was really long, I'm just very passionate about classical music. I probably could have just asked what's your favorite Beethoven symphony box set, and why, but I went into that long story somehow.

Thanks again

Darrin

ANSWER: Hi, Darrin,

I found your long story very interesting.

I do have some observations. First, you won't find the perfect recording. Different conductors have different interpretations. I don't recall whether the sixth had cymbals. I'd have to listen. Karajan was certainly a fine conductor.

My children's string teacher once told me that it's amazing how many ERRORS you find in various recordings. Unless you know the music intimately, you might never notice.

One of the best sets of performances ever was probably done by Toscanini. Keep in mind this recording was made a long time ago, and probably won't have the clarity of sound that some of the newer recordings do. They are available at amazon.com. You may be able to listen to excerpts to see if you like the tempo. Our recollection is that he took them more slowly.

Another thing to keep in mind about tempo is that sometimes these were changed as musicologists discovered more information. In the case of Beethoven, manuscripts with tempo markings were found, and they have been played faster ever since. So though you like the slower tempi, they may not be as authentic. It's all a matter of taste. Although ideally, a piece should be played the way its composer intended, this isn't completely possible, and what makes it worthwhile is the fact that people DO add some of their own coloring. I detest robot-like perfect recordings!

I remember one time listening to a recording of Rachmaninoff's Prelude in C# Minor, a piece I myself play. I didn't like the recording at all. Guess where it came from. It was one of those piano rolls that Rachmaninoff himself made! Shows to go ya, I suppose.

Another piece that's been very problematic for me has been Saint-Saëns' Organ Symphony. So many, many recordings just drowned out the organ part. It was years before I could find a recording where I could hear the organ in the second movement! Now they are doing much better mike placement, and the organ comes out a lot better. I was really fussy about that simply because I play organ, and I wanted to hear it! Whenever I hear an exceptional recording, I go ahead and buy it, so now I have several.

Bill McLaughlin, on his evening program, Exploring Music, several months ago, played a Shostakovich symphony, I seem to recall. It seems that Shostakovich composed one of his symphonies to be played at a slower tempo, so that's how it was played. Then along came an American conductor (can't remember who offhand), and he played it much faster. Shostakovich was present at the performance, and he liked it! One of the things to keep in mind about Shostakovich is that he lived during a very dark time in the Soviet Union, and the premier (I think it was) wanted happy pieces. So he composed pieces that might be seen as happy, but yet were really an expression of how dark he felt life was. And got away with it! By the time the American performed the symphony, however, the Soviet Union was long gone, so Shostakovich was perfectly happy to see the piece played in a happier vein.

So that's about my take on it.

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Hey, I found your reply equally as interesting as well. Thanks for staying in touch. And quickly! I was amazed how fast you got back to me. I don't have any friends my age, I'm 28 who really are insterested in classical music, so I don't have anybody to really talk to about classical music, so just writing with you is exciting enough.

Like you mentioned, I don't expect everything in a recording to be exactly the way the composer wanted. I mean if I did I would buy the period instruments recordings. Conductors, do as they should add color. As I see it, nothing is ever perfect, and can always be improved, so it's the orchestra's job to improve on something, even if that does mean changes to tempo, and etc. But leaving out notes is a sin, at least I see it that way. Yes, Karajan is a fine conductor, and world reknown. It's just in this performance he left out some repeats, I think expositional recaps they are called.

On this subject, I have a box set of 33 cd's containing all 104 symphonies of Haydn, plus symphony A and B that don't have the traditional numbering. (I guess this means he really wrote 106 symphonies, but textbooks don't say that.) Adam Fischer conducts the Austro-Hungarian Haydn Orchestra in this box set, and in the liner notes someone asks him why they use modern instruments instead of period instruments. He replied that he wanted his musicians to play with instruments that they grew up with and that they need those instruments to express themselves. He went on to say that the personality of the player is more important than the question of which instrument he or she plays. Then he writes, "The vital point is that a concert should be exciting and convincing. A boring performance remains a crime, even if it is historically 'correct.'"

Adam Fischer wanted the music to come alive even better than it did 200 years ago. And that meant creating what he called their own "Local dialect" which was a flow of rubatos, accents, and so on, that give extra dramatic sense to the performance.

Anyways I kind of thought what he wrote was interesting. You mentioned an organ symphony and recordings where you couldn't even hear the organ. Wow, that's frustrating. You would think that if anything, if the organ is being featured, it would be heard. That's kind of the idea right? Come to think of it, I've never actually heard the organ myself in that piece of music. Mind you, I've only heard this piece a few times on AM radio in my city. AM radio is definately not the best way to hear classical music. I find it hard to believe an organ being drowned out because of how loud it is.

You mentioned Bill McLaughlin and Exporing Music. I take it you live in the states and can hear NPR's classical programs. I'm jealous. I live in Canada and about two years ago, Canada's classical network changed music formats, so there's not much on radio for me to enjoy anymore. They featured classical music and arts information for over thirty years and now bang, they play what every other radio station plays.

I will check out Toscannini's performance of Beethoven symphonies. I initially wrote him off because I have a couple records of his performances, and he seems to be an entertainer and conductor at the same time. He added extra notes to music that I've never heard anybody else perform. For example, with the Nutcracker suite, at the end of it, you hear all the strings plucking two final notes in unison. I've never heard anybody else do that. He also added about an extra thirty seconds to the beginning of the Les Toreadors movt of the carmen suite. Everybody else conducts starting with the clashing cymbals and loud orchestra, but he has this thirty second intro that builds into that which I've never heard anybody else do. I even showed that to a classical music radio show host and he said he doens't know what that is, he's never heard that before.

All that being said, I've noticed Toscannini adding more notes, even whole phrases here, but I must say I do like those additions, even though they weren't how the composer meant it to be and even if nobody else uses them. I don't mind older recordings, sometimes I prefer them. You mentioned the sound not being as good, but the sound quality of karajan's 1963 performance is great. So unless this is much earlier than 1963, it shouldn't be too much of a problem. Anyways, if you think that Toscannini doesn't add any extra notes to Beethoven symphonies, and if he doesn't ignore repeat signs, I'll check it out. I might even do that today, go to amazon and listen to some samples.

Alright, thanks for staying in touch.

Answer
Hello, Darrin,

It's interesting what you told me about Toscanini. A lot of recordings have been processed to improve sound quality. So it may not be a problem. But considering that it was common at the time many composers lived for people to improvise in a performance, and that's why the cadenza exists, I don't see any reason why adding to the music would be invalid as such. :) As for repeats, not desirable if they're missing, but personally, I find other things much more annoying. Just think of it in terms of the performers adding their own personality to a piece, a perfectly valid thing to do, and very desirable. Heck, even Bach wouldn't roll over in his grave if someone played some of his pieces on totally different instruments; The Art of the Fugue was INTENDED for that purpose. So the fact that Walter/Wendy Carlos played some of Bach's pieces on synthesizer would not have bothered Bach at all! In fact, the first music synthesizer was the organ! And then there are the memorable orchestrations by Stokowski of Bach's most famous organ works, which I dearly love. And the Ravel orchestration of Pictures at an Exhibition (and other orchestrations as well, less commonly heard).

As for period instruments, lots of people are playing them these days. I think the main problem isn't being able to play them well, but getting one and getting used to it. There would be less difference between the technique of a pianoforte as opposed to a fortepiano, than there would be between a piano of any kind and an organ, but I didn't have any trouble adapting. The only difficult part is learning to play the pedals, something I'm still not that good at. But then, I have never really had an instrument for any length of time to practice on. Same thing with a harpsichord. I only played a harpsichord once. I was at a concert, and it was intermission, and I helped myself. Some time back I had attended a master class by Anthony Newman (and his performances of organ pieces are downright thrilling; he plays them so fast you can't see how any human being could play them that fast, and he does a short detach between notes so that they're not toally legato, and that produces a very vibrant sound). In the class, he pointed out that during the baroque period, since there were no dynamics of volume in early instruments like harpsichords and organs, so expression was by finding the measures that were particularly noteworthy (I forget the term he used, but it meant the ones that introduced a new musical idea such as a key shift or another chord or whatever) and prolonging them slightly. So I sat down, and started playing a piece by Bach, and I did prolong the appropriate measures slightly. And someone (I think she was in the group that was performing) came up to me and told me I had talent! LOL. It was simply a matter of knowing something a lot of people don't know! I had no trouble adapting to the harpsichord.

The main difference with fortepianos is that their tone doesn't ring as long, and they go out of tune more quickly, so they tend to sound "tinny", but that's part of their charm. One time I went to a local used bookstore. They have an antique piano there, with silver strings. It needs to be tuned about once a week, and they do it. However, on that day, it was about an entire tone flat! And that totally wrecked my ability to play a fairly simple piece that I knew very, very well! In fact, it so happens that it was the very same piece I later played on the harpsichord.

In the organ symphony, there are a few prominent chords that you can always hear. It's the rest of the organ part that gets muffled. I truly think the problem is poor mike placement, and they had to learn how to do it right, so the later recordings tend to be better.

If you happen to have a DSL connection to the internet, or broadband or something like that, you can get streaming classical music online. I have a bit of a beef with the station at the moment, and they're being unresponsive, but in general they would be reasonable to listen to. The best classical station in the world that can be received online is WCPE, located in North Carolina, and you can get it by going to http://theclassicalstation.org/ . If you are very much in the southern part of Canada, you also may be able to get it by satellite. It costs about $400 to set up, probably, but after that, it's free. There is information on their site. There are other classical stations that send out streaming audio, but to be honest, I don't care for NPR for a lot of reasons. So I stay clear of them. I only listen to NPR when I am out in the car. I got so disgusted with them, that I went looking on the internet, and that's when I found WCPE. I hope you will be able to get it.

I really won't have time for a prolonged conversation, but I'm sure there are groups on the internet made up of people who like to discuss it, like you do. Look around. Yahoo!, for instance has groups, and it is likely they have some for classical music. Check it out.

And since you are alone so much, why not learn to play an instrument or something? If you think you're too old, have another think. Read a book called Never Too Late by John Holt. He took up cello when he was in his 40's, and he admits he never became a virtuoso, but he was able to get involved in an amateur string quartet, and he had a lot of fun. The imagination has a way of supplying what is lacking in ability. I know this from experience. And remember, instruments like the cello are much more difficult to play than many other instruments because you have to be able to play in tune, and other instruments supply that for you.

Good luck!