VA - A Tribute to Fritz Kreisler (2012)

Deutsche Grammophon’s tribute to Fritz Kreisler on the 50th anniversary of his death (only several days away as I write) begins with a program recorded by Ruggiero Ricci and Brooks Smith in 1961. Kreisler himself never recorded his Praeludium and Allegro, often mentioned as his best piece (Carl Flesch suggested that the composer didn’t take the Allegro too fast—only at about MM = 120). Ricci’s reading sounds very much like Zino Francescatti’s, not only in taking the Praeludium’s quarter notes quickly but in the Allegro as well. Not everybody played Kreisler well, but Francescatti did, and his recording of short pieces might have added illuminatingly to this whole. Nathan Milstein played Kreisler well, too, but he didn’t make a better impression in the Sicilienne and Rigaudon than does Ricci (Ricci also played Eugène Ysaÿe’s solo sonatas with special insight). The first segment continues with Ricci’s warmly genial (yes, genial, not only for swashbuckling Ricci but for anyone) readings of he Chanson Louis XIII and Pavane and of the Rondino on a Theme of Beethoven. (Francescatti’s seems pointed and arch by comparison—but might the piece not have been intended that way?) The Variations on a Theme of Corelli combines stylish authority with virtuosity (although the last variation, chordal, betrays some of Ricci’s characteristic roughness—as do the double-stops in the Scherzo-Caprice and in Liebesfreud ). And if he seems to press Schön Rosmarin and La Chasse (the latter beyond the limits of his ability to control the double-stops’ intonation) too hard, the same approach makes La Gitana sizzle.

Kreisler’s own recordings come from 1910–12, years in which it could hardly be said that Kreisler wasn’t yet Kreisler but well before he had ceased to be Kreisler (arguably the best concerto recordings would come in the 1920s, and the Beethoven sonatas with Franz Rupp in the mid 1930s). His contribution to the program includes the three “Lanner” waltzes, Liebesfreud, Liebesleid , and Schön Rosmarin , in the first of which he takes the middle section with more decision than do many who followed him, and in the second of which he introduces unashamed slides into the corresponding section. Unlike Ricci’s, Kreisler’s own version of Schön Rosmarin (from 1912) certainly doesn’t press too hard, and his Tambourin Chinois sounds more atmospheric than virtuosic (I remember an old recording made by future longtime Philadelphia concertmaster Norman Carol, on LP, RCA Camden 419, that sounded very similar). Kreisler’s reading of the Andantino gives occasion to reflect whether a first-time listener to Kreisler’s own recordings might not consider his playing simply old-fashioned rather than quintessentially charming. Tully Potter suggests in the notes that few modern teachers play old recordings for their students, and that recalls a conversation I had a generation ago with a recipient of a graduate degree in performance from a major Midwestern conservatory, who gushed, “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could actually hear recordings of Kreisler playing his own music?”

There’s certainly nothing old-fashioned about Jascha Heifetz’s playing of Gluck’s Mélodie (in a recording made with Emanuel Bay in New York’s World Broadcasting Studio in 1945). In contrast to the way Kreisler himself beguiled listeners, Heifetz pierced them with so many sonic lasers. Yet there’s no lack of subtlety; Heifetz also played Kreisler well, despite their differences. And Heifetz achieves a similar effect in Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s Hymn to the Sun. David Oistrakh sounds similarly intense, although with a somewhat softer edge, in his recording of La Gitana , from 1949 with Vladimir Yampolsky (Kreisler reputedly admired Oistrakh’s playing).

Christian Ferras plays the next set of pieces, including a warmly sinuous if slightly spotty reading of Humoresque , and a richly characterized one of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Hindu Song. Despite the high temperature of his rendition of Manuel de Falla’s Danza española , however, the accentuation may seem to some listeners too strong for the musical message to bear.

Violinist Shlomo Mintz contributes nine pieces, which he plays with amiable subtlety with Clifford Benson (from 1980), including particularly genial ones of Polichinelle and Isaac Albéniz’s Tango, to the latter of which Arthur Grumiaux brought special poignancy. Mintz’s tone exhibits a slight edge (perhaps more than an effect of the recorded sound) that makes it resemble Francescatti’s, although his manner may seem light-years removed. The manner, too, seems tart and technically alert, as in the Gypsy Caprice , and he spits the pizzicatos in Henri Wieniawski’s Caprice. His reading of Alexander Glazunov’s Sérénade espagnole , despite its energy, doesn’t press forward with such élan as does Kreisler’s own with Michael Raucheisen from 1930.

Gidon Kremer plays the Syncopation with a ingratiatingly quirky lilt (in his recording with Oleg Maisenberg from 1995), a quality that also characterizes his reading of Marche miniature viennois . The program concludes with selections by Anne-Sophie Mutter, including blockbusters like Schön Rosmarin, Caprice viennois , and Liebesleid , as well as Felix Mendelssohn’s Frühlingslied . The sequence of tracks highlights the difference between Mutter’s more straightforward (although hardly prosaic) manner and Kremer’s kinkiness. Still, Mutter in 2002 (the first three pieces) already displayed signs of an eccentricity that, unlike Kremer’s, may not strike all listeners as adding an extra dollop of stylishness or insight to the performances. If Kreisler sounds occasionally old-fashioned, he never sounds simply willful, as Mutter may seem to many to be in Liebesleid.

Those who revere Fritz Kreisler and don’t already possess all the recordings included in the set can’t go wrong. Urgently recommended.