Symphonies Nos. 3 & 4

In his autobiography, EMI producer Fred Gaisberg recalled that conductor Felix Weingartner and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra were not on good terms at the time this recording of the "Eroica" was made. Factions and intrigues, typical of Vienna, were making it difficult for Weingartner to retain his five year contract at the Opera. Few members of the orchestra were in sympathy with his decision not to resign. Accordingly he treated the orchestra with "frigid detachment and they responded with grudging correctness".

In this emotional climate, and in the superb Vienna Musikvereinsaal, a great recording of Beethoven's "Eroica" Symphony was made in May 1936. To listen to just a few minutes of the first movement is enough to demonstrate that every score marking, every matter of balance, and every relation between detail and complete structure has been correctly judged. Nowhere is Weingartner's reputation as a tasteful, scholarly and cultured Beethoven interpreter better displayed.

His recording of Beethoven's Fourth Symphony was made in London three years earlier with the newly-formed London Philharmonic Orchestra. This is also a classic performance, with some especially fine playing from the orchestra's wind section.

Restoration producer Mark Obert-Thorn comments in the notes included with this CD that the "Eroica" is one of Weingartner's best sounding recordings, and explains that he has added a little reverberation to offset the close miking and "boxy" acoustic that originally characterized the recording of the Fourth.

This is the finest transfer of Weingartner's classic "straight" Eroica that it has been by pleasure to hear. While there is no getting around the excessive reverberance of the Vienna concert hall, this excellent transfer by Obert-Thorn is even better than the Brian Crimp effort once on an EMI LP set devoted to "The Art of Felix Weingartner." While I marginally prefer the Opus Kura (Japan) transfer of Weingartner's Beethoven 9th, this Naxos CD provides just about all we can expect to hear from the Eroica (the Opus Kura here is just too cavernous and noisy, even though the orchestral sound is at times more immediate).

I continue to marvel at how much variety of expressive nuance Weingartner achieves here within a single, rather uptempo pulse. Of the other "classical" conceptions of this work on CD, only Fritz Busch and Carl Schuricht are in the same league. Perhaps the closest to Weingartner in over-all approach - lean, direct, and rhythmically supple - was the Lovro von Matacic account with the Czech Philharmonic. That was once available on a stereo Parliament LP - I don't believe it has yet had a CD transfer from Supraphon.

Of course, there are also several superb "personalized" readings of the Eroica that deserve a hearing - among my favorites are those by Furtwangler, Abendroth, Kabasta, Knappertsbusch, Scherchen and Mengelberg.

This transfer of the 4th Symphony is also superb - it's a big improvement over the old Columbia Entre LP (coupled with the 2nd) that has served me well all these years. It's also a wonderful performance: along with the Schuricht, I would say it's the benchmark for the "straight and true" approach to this work. Again, there are also some remarkable, more "romantic" interpretations that merit a hearing: most notably, Furtwangler, Abendroth, Mengelberg and Georgescu.

Very highly recommended!

Weingartner's "Eroica" has long been considered to be one of his two greatest recorded achievements (the other being the Ninth, although I would personally extend this list, somewhat). Here, it comes alive in probably the best transfer it has received, on CD or LP (the Preiser comes close, but the Naxos has a little more "top." The performance is very flexible and spontaneous in tempo, while maintaining the forward thrust and architecture that holds the work together. The Fourth Symphony is every bit as good, especially the moderate tempo for the Finale, which allows for the interplay of the chattering string figurations played against the rather leisurely pace; something similiar can be found in the Finale of Mozart's 39th Symphony, in Weingartner's London Philharmonic rendition. The sound of the Fourth is much improved in this transfer, with the rather dull and boxy sound of the original suitably brightened up. I understand that one regular reviewer regards this as his favorite "Eroica"; I would not argue with anyone over that sentiment. Incidentally, Christopher Dyment, in his "Weingartner: Recollections and Recordings", speaks a great deal about this performance of the "Eroica" and remarks on how it resembles Richard Wagner's performance, as described by Eduard Hanslick. It seems that Weingartner, far from being a "modernist" in the sense of Toscanini, actually followed a rather strict Wagnerian course of interpretation; it is well known that Wagner warned about arbitrary and random tempo fluctuations, as seeming practiced later on by his disciple, Hans von Buelow, whom Weingartner criticized for his mannered way with the classics. At any rate, here is another of the great Weingartner Beethoven recordings, one that belongs in every music lover's CD collection.