Recordings of arrangements for chamber ensemble of the Fourth Piano Concerto and the Second Symphony by Beethoven himself are surprise additions here to what would otherwise be a straightforward repackaging of the cycle of five piano concertos and the Choral Fantasia which Robert Levin recorded on instruments of the period with Sir John Eliot Gardiner and the ORR between 1995 and 1997.
Though the cycle developed in all manner of interesting ways as it went along, it began unpromisingly with an ill-judged account of the Emperor Piano Concerto in which an 1812 Lagrassa fortepiano barely manages to register the notes, let alone the cosmic imaginings which lie behind them. The second release, devoted to the B flat and C major Concertos, was an altogether more brilliant and better balanced affair, with modern copies of a mid-1790s Anton Walter fortepiano sounding especially well. Where EG had been rightly 'disconcerted' by the recording of the Emperor (though not the splendidly articulated account of the Choral Fantasia that goes with it), HF could barely contain her excitement over the imagination, intelligence and sheer physical joy of Levin's playing of the two earliest concertos. She was left, she said, 'horribly impatient for the next instalment'.
This arrived in the summer of 1998. For some reason, it was not reviewed in these columns: a clear case of Murphy's Law in operation, since the disc (457 608-2AH) contains what I would tentatively suggest is as creative and musically illuminating an account of the Fourth Concerto as any the gramophone has yet given us.
It is a performance which declares its genius from the outset, with the Ossianic beauty of the fortepiano's arpeggiated first chord and Gardiner's mesmerizingly beautiful phrasing of the ritornello's opening statement. I am no great fan of fortepianos but Levin's playing of this particular instrument (a copy by Paul McNulty) of a Viennese fortepiano c 1805) is breathtaking. Levin is, of course, a great master of the medium, not least in two areas which crucially affect this concerto: the need for the finest of 'fine' dynamics, and the finest, freest kind of agogic control.
The playing of the first movement is a marvel, crowned by a cadenza of Levin's own devising of real vision and splendour. But, then, so are the two succeeding movements. Taking his cue from Beethoven's image of Orpheus taming the beasts with his lyre, Levin again gently arpeggiates the chord sequences. The effect, realized with the kind of soft, silvery single-string sound which you can only properly achieve on an instrument of the period, is as bewitching as the trilled return to the full three-string sonority (3'16'' ff) is terrifying.
There are similarly revealing effects in Levin's realization of the Third Concerto. Here, though, the work itself seems relatively indifferent to them, the slow movement apart. (What a cussed piece this is!) No, the performance of the Fourth Concerto is the thing. If I have dwelt on it at some length, it is because it is both remarkable in itself and a necessary yardstick against which to judge the version of the work for piano and string sextet, newly discovered and reconstructed by Hans-Werner Kuthen, which appears on the set's newly released fourth disc.
Since Beethoven made a significant number of alterations to the solo part of the chamber version (131 new solo bars, according to Kuthen), often making it difficult to the point of near unplayability, it is a reworking which will be of much interest to Beethovenians. How significant it is, is another matter. The commission came from the music-crazed Prince Lobkowitz. Indeed, it was his predilection for string instruments which seems to have determined the piano-and-strings dispensation. This is not a dispensation, however, which really suits the concerto. The sonority of the solo oboe (and, to a lesser extent, the solo flute) is crucial to the first movement's sound-mix. The introduction of trumpets and drums into the finale, after the strings-only slow movement, is another sonic masterstroke. I also wonder at the changes Beethoven made to the keyboard writing. Are they genuinely radical second thoughts or simply random acts of virtuoso naughtiness designed to shock the toffs?
Levin's approach to the playing of the revised solo part is itself predictably and revealingly different. The first-movement cadenza we have here is coarser, more melodramatic. It is as if he has sensed that the 'chamber' version is, paradoxically the cruder version: a version for public display that comes perilously close to denying the private vision. Consciously or not, the accompanying string group plays with a degree of in-your-face aggression (the recording doesn't help) which had me going back to the full orchestral version and Gardiner's inspired realization of it.
The Second Symphony, heard here in Beethoven's arrangement for piano trio, positively thrives on this unbridled aggression. Played with the vigour and rigour it is accorded here by Robert Levin, Peter Hanson and David Watkin, it emerges as a very dangerous piece indeed, less the Eroica's genial country cousin, more its emotionally unstable elder brother.
Since the new disc already comes with its own specially prepared booklet, Archiv should be encouraged to release it separately at the earliest opportunity.'