Search - Stern :: Violin Concertos Nos. 1 & 2

Stern vs Stern - close match

Discophage | France | 09/17/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Isaac Stern must be the violinist who made the most studio recordings of Prokofiev's two Violin Concertos: three in all. Ruggiero Ricci made two (with Ansermet in 1958, Prokofiev: Symphony No. 5; Romeo and Juliet, Suite No. 1, and later, on the budget label Vox, with the lesser Luxembourg Orchestra under Louis de Froment, Sergei Prokofiev: The Concertos), Perlman three (the first one was his premiere recording, Sergei Prokofiev:Sonatas for Violin/Concerto No. 2, and the last one is in fact a live recording, Stravinsky: Violin Concerto; Prokofiev: Violin Concerto No. 2) but only of the 2nd Concerto (with only one of the first, Prokofiev: Violin Concertos). All the others - Szigeti, Heifetz, Oistrakh, Milstein, Kogan, Szeryng, to limit myself to the historical ones, have done maximum two, and usually of only one of the two Concertos. So obviously Stern had a special affinity with these two compositions.



I haven't heard Stern's last recording, with Mehta (Prokofiev: Violin Concertos Nos. 1 & 2). This one, made with Ormandy in 1963, is considered the "classic" account, and justifiably so. It is superb. The Philadelphia Orchestra under Ormandy is lush but precise and many details come through (although some tend to get drowned under the slightly too resonant bass). Stern plays with magnificent tone and a perfect mixture of bite and lyricism. He can make his tone sound raucous when the character of the music calls for it (as in the passage between 4:39 and circa 6:20 in the first movement of the 1st Concerto), but it is never ugly. The finale of Concerto #2 has great sweep and drive. In the first movement of the same Concerto Stern takes the approach that has become standard, and I've expressed in other reviews my misgivings about it: by exaggerating the contrasts of tempo indicated by the composer, it gives the impression of a sectional composition, and also leads to applying tempo changes that are simply not indicated in the score. Although he is not entirely observant of Prokofiev's metronome marks either (it'll come as no surprise that he plays faster), I believe that Heifetz is closer to the composer's intentions, here, and so is Ricci with Ansermet, but his insecure intonation and plodding finale put HIM out of the running. But still, taken on its own terms, independent of the score, this "standard" approach exemplified by Stern works perfectly well and is entirely legitimate. Nobody would object if Prokofiev HAD written it that way.



Nonetheless, I do retain a soft tooth for Stern's first recording - the first Concerto was made with Mitropoulos in 1958 and the 2nd with Bernstein a year before. They've been reissued in the superb 3-CD set of Early Concerto Recordings vol. 2, one of the first installments of the great Isaac Stern Collection (Early Concerto Recordings, Vol. 2). All the characteristics of Stern's interpretation in 1963 are already present. True, in the first movement of the 1st Concerto there is an added and welcome spaciousness in the later recording - it is more pressed and urgent in 1958, because of Mitropoulos maybe, a conductor certainly more tight-fisted than the mellow Ormandy. On the other hand Stern and Ormandy in 1963 don't quite emulate the hair-raising forward dash of Stern and Mitropoulos' middle scherzo - the only version I heard that had similar intensity was Oistrakh with Kubelik, live in Prag in 1947, but in dismal sound (Concertos - Liszt/Prokofiev/Khachaturian). But the plus from the earlier versions is the 2nd Concerto's slow movement: in 1957 Stern took it significantly slower (overall 10:19 to his 9:30 in 1963) and, as fine as the later reading is, the effect of that "longer breath" in 1957 is, I find, ineffably beautiful.



When it was published in 1963 Stern's new version was obviously going to be favored if only for sonic reasons (although, inexplicably, on this reissue there is a short passage at the end of the 2nd Concerto's finale, between 5:23 and 5:32, where the recording jarringly jumps to mono). But, as the CD transfers amply prove, the later version's sonic superiority had more to do with the earlier pressings and LP surfaces than with the recording itself: as remastered on the "Early Concerto Recordings" they sound stupendously good, with spacious sound and almost as many orchestral details coming out (not the important tuba theme in the 1st Concerto's scherzo, unfortunately, and I might have wished for more clarity in the tuba-trumpet dialogues after 4:26 in the finale).



The Great Performances reissue also has a rather stingy TT of 47:13, while the discs from the 3CD set average 65 minute each. I am happy to have both recordings in my collection, but if - God forbids! - I had to keep only one it would be the earlier recordings, for this unique "Andante assai" of the 2nd Concerto. And as I hope my review has made clear, this doesn't diminish the musical value of these versions with Ormandy.

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