Piano Concerto No. 3 (Vac, Vsoo, Somogyi, Barenboim [Original recording remastered]

Maybe a pure casualty, but something inside me tells me is not; Barenboim recorded this superb Concerto at the same age Beethoven composed it (22). Let me tell you the majuscule astonishment experienced when this listener heard about it the last Sunday. It's surprisingly admirable the impressive sense of total domain of this score for a man so young. He understood the essential core of this Op. with majestic intensity; moreover Daniel seemed to ensoul to a Concerto o many times played but few times entirely understood. The epic gesture, the struggling path, the infinite noblesse expressed in this cosmic Adagio and that indeclinable and untamed Promethean spirit are superbly expressed along the way.

Of course don' t expect any close romantic approach around it. To my mind there are six unbeatable versions of this piece, (and this one of them) , the other five would be Ivan Moravec, Vaclav Neumann and the Czech Philharmonic (my favorite choice, by far), a legendary version of Wilhelm Kempff from the fifties under Van Kempen conduction (my second choice), a monumental performance of Marguerite Long with the Paris Conservatoire under Felix Weingartner baton recorded in June 10 1939, label Koch (3-7128-2 H1) , a revealing performance with Andrei Gavrilov under Yuri Termirkanov with the State Symphony Orchestra recorded on 28 December 1981 and the well reminded performance of Arthur Rubinstein under Arturo Toscanini conduction in the forties. I have them all and frequently use to compare distinct aspects of the interpretation with fellow friends.

But additionally there is more; Barenboim shone with this admirable version of the Coral Fantasy, a solid Op. of Beethoven unfairly few recorded and less played.

So please don' t hesitate and go for this record. It will reward you.

The return of some of the classic recordings from the Westminster label to the DG/Universal catalog over the last few years has been quite welcome. This CD finds a young Daniel Barenboim doing what he does best -- sitting on the piano bench instead of standing at the podium. Here he plays magnificently with Laszlo Somogyi and the Vienna State Opera Orchestra on Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 3 and the Choral Fantasy. Interestingly, Barenboim would record these same works again in a couple of years (along with all the piano concertos) with Otto Klemperer and the Philharmonia Orchestra for EMI. Both recordings are well worth having (though you can only get the EMI Emporer and Choral Fantasy as a single disc -- to get the other Klemp/Barenboim EMI performances you must buy the box set of the symphonies and concertos), and should be preferred hands down to Barenboim's Beethoven Concerto recordings on EMI Seraphim.

I don't have this specific DG/Westminster reissue but an earlier BMG/MCA/Millenium Classics release from 1996, apparently not listed on this website (you'll find it under ASIN B000024CGU on the European sister companies). MCA wasn't entirely candid about it: they indicated nowhere the dates of the recordings. Judging from the other reviews DG/Westminster was more open (there was indeed nothing worth hiding): these were made in 1964 - Barenboim was 22 then -, for Westminster, in Barenboim's pre-EMI days. He went on, of course, to record the complete concertos and Choral Fantasy with Klemperer and the New Philharmonia (Beethoven: Piano Concertos 1-5/Choral Fantasia - Daniel Barenboim, Otto Klemperer, New Philharmonia Orchestra & John Alldis Choir), and then, later, with the Berlin Phil and himself conducting (Beethoven - Triple Concerto ~ Choral Fantasy / Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, Berliner Phil., Barenboim, Piano Concertos 2 & 3, Beethoven: Piano Concertos Nos. 5 & 4, and if you want #1 also you'll have to pay a price and duplicate 5, Beethoven: Piano Concertos). MCA's remastering was fine, with tape hiss almost inaudible, and the stereo from the original recording sounded suitably spacious, although the important antiphony between first and second violins in the Choral Fantasy didn't really register. The strings from the Vienna State Opear Orchestra were surprisingly silky, but some woodwind details were covered in the piano's more pounding moments. That was MCA and I obviously can't comment on the sonics of this DG/Westminster disc, other than indicating that some other DG/Westminster reissues of material first reissued on CD by MCA have been sonically great. Anyway I suppose that music lovers will be attracted more by the notion of hearing young Barenboim than by any digital, HI-FI wizardry.

Barenboim's pianism here is already admirable, eliciting a range of colors and a variety of articulation, including great subtlety in the softer dynamics and a rather abudant staccato that is never percussive, as it can be with Rudolf Serkin. The tempos in the 3rd Piano Concerto are middle-of-the-road and do not attract attention to themselves, but Barenboim is let down unfortunately by Somogyi's uninvolved and excessively mellow conducting, with Beethoven's numerous sf accents in the outer movements hardly registering. This is not so detrimental in the middle Largo, which is as beautiful as anybody's.

In the introductory solo cadenza of the Choral fantasy, Barenboim paradoxically combines a disputable choice to keep the sustaining pedal depressed during the big chordal passages, presumably to lend them grandeur, but only thickening the textures, and an admirable delicacy in the staccato runs. The orchestra enters with a welcome crispness, but again Barenboim's and Somogyi's tempos are inconspicuously middle-of-the road, even laid-back at times (as in the statement by the piano at 5:24 of the famous theme announcing the 9th Symphony's Ode to Joy, followed by the chirping woodwinds), underscoring the music's lyrical strain rather than its dynamism, an impression reinforced by the lack of pungency of the brass in the climaxes and a Marcia (13:56) that is so pedestrian and lacking enthusiasm and bite you would easily think Somogyi was beating time while watching on TV a documentary on fish life. Too bad, as the final chorus is truly excellent, with soloists presumably from the chorus since they are not credited, but excellent, not big voices but sounding young and fresh.

Nothing infamous then, good recordings even of both pieces (and the Choral Fantasy is better than the ponderous remake with Klemperer, see my review of Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5/Choral Fantasia), but even in 1964 there were more exciting choices for these two works: Serkin and Katchen in the Choral Fantasy, and so many in the 3rd Piano Concerto that they can't be mentioned - but Serkin and Katchen among them: Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Minor, Op. 37 / Choral Fantasy, Art of Julius Katchen 1, Art of Julius Katchen 2.