Angel Records Mono Made in England
Stockholm Festival Orchestra conducted by Sixten Ehrling.
David Oistrakh's 1954 recording of the Beethoven Violin Concerto has been among the three or four best ever since it came out, in spite of some rather uninspiring orchestral playing. His new version is a little disappointing. Certainly the orchestral playing is very much better; though not quite as satisfying as it is on the Menuhin and Schneiderhan discs, it is big in feeling and worthy of a great violinist. Also it is very well recorded. But alas, when soloist and orchestra come together the balance largely undoes the good intentions of the players. Oistrakh is much too close to the microphone, so that he sounds screechy whenever he plays loud. Things are arranged so that he seldom drowns the orchestra (but listen to the passage around bar 260 in the finale), but the effect is so unreal, with the soloist making as much noise as all the first violins, that one can hardly attend to the music. Fortunately Oistrakh is so good a musician that he delights in playing softly when the composer asks him to, and the slow movement goes supremely well. But I found his intonation a shade worrying at a number of points, for instance after the first movement cadenza. He is a little ouk of tune in this passage in the old recording, but I have the feeling that this imperfection has increased with the years. This fact, if it is a fact, and the better balance of the 1954 recording make me doubtful of the superiority of the new one. I prefer the Menuhin, Schneiderhan and Milstein versions to either, even though all this makes me seem more disparaging of the new Oistrakh disc than I intend, and I must add that his wonderful breadth of vision and general grasp of the music come through in spite of the balance. R.F.
Side 1.
1. Allegro ma non troppo 23:03
Side 2.
2. Larghetto 9:07
3. Rondò, Allegro 10:08
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