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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
This is a terribly disappointing CD. Vengerov is a wonderful player - his old CD of the 'Spring' and 'Kreutzer' Sonatas show that he can certainly do Beethoven justice - and Rostropovitch was a great, lovable musician - so what has gone wrong? The tempi are slow, and the music is pulled about. There is a great deal of lingering, and the sense of forward movement is lacking again and again. In a Concerto like this, a classical Concerto where structure is paramount, this is disastrous. It is true that there are moments of great beauty, but the interpretation seems just that - a lot of moments stuck together, with little or no sense of direction or the whole. In places it is actually quite turgid. It doesn't matter who is to blame, though it is easy (and maybe unfair) to assume that the conductor, who was sometimes capable in his playing and his conducting of lingering too much, may have had a larger role in this than the soloist - but we don't know. The fact is that the music just doesn't work as it should, and it seems like an opportunity sadly missed.
17 of 21 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
Sorry, this just won't do. A very disappointing performance from both master musicians. Vengerov is a superb violinist, but he's out of his depth here, which I feel may be as a result of Rostropovich's conducting and or influence. The pace is slow and unmelodic, dynamics and phrasing highly questionable. Rostropovich plods along like he has nothing better to do, too much ritornando, all over the place (has he seen the score?). Vengerov's cadenzas are questionable too......show off by all means, but let's keep the identity of the music. The lovely 2nd movement is played with no feeling, emotion or love for the music, just notes on a sheet of paper. If you want a recording on how this magnificent concerto is to be played, please buy a recording featuring a violinist who can play this concerto such as Perlman, Mutter, Zehetmair, Tetzlaff, Oistrakh or Kremer and a conductor who knows how to present Beethoven. Give Vengerov to Barenboim, Haitink, Zinman, Harnoncourt or Rattle and we would have a much better, sound, authentic recording. The romances unfortunately are not much better. Dynamics, phrasing, melody all thrown out, stripped of any musical interpretation. A very poor performance from all concerned.
12 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Format:Audio CD
For once someone has been brave enough to try something different. It is getting very difficult these days to hear a CD of the canon where the artist has dared to give a whole new interpretation. Since Heifetz's definitive recording of the Beethoven it seems that all who come after attempt to emulate rather than stamp their own individuality on the work.
Come to this please with fresh ears, as if you are hearing it for the very first time, don't compare the tempi with those normally accepted as the 'right' way to play Beethoven, and then think carefully about what you have heard.
I hear more space, more care, more emotion and romanticism, and a pulse that emanates the feeling of a heartbeat, that conveys the notion of time inevitably ticking away that we are powerless, in the end, to overcome.
Vengerov, in my opinion, has produced a masterpiece that says, at last, new things about this piece. For once it is worth buying yet another version of this popular concerto, for this one dares to be radically different, and awesomely moving.
Come to this please with fresh ears, as if you are hearing it for the very first time, don't compare the tempi with those normally accepted as the 'right' way to play Beethoven, and then think carefully about what you have heard.
I hear more space, more care, more emotion and romanticism, and a pulse that emanates the feeling of a heartbeat, that conveys the notion of time inevitably ticking away that we are powerless, in the end, to overcome.
Vengerov, in my opinion, has produced a masterpiece that says, at last, new things about this piece. For once it is worth buying yet another version of this popular concerto, for this one dares to be radically different, and awesomely moving.
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