It is a pity for Philips that the Julian Lloyd Webber version, recorded in Prague last year, was not ready, as planned, in time for the recent Independent Television film on the composition of this masterpiece, with which this recording was associated. As it is, it allows me to make a more fruitful assessment comparing and contrasting that Philips issue with the new Chandos version featuring another of the current outstanding generation of British cellists, Raphael Wallfisch. I have also been delighted to renew acquaintance after many years with the classic Casals/Szell version recorded for HMV in 1937, and now reissued by Pearl in CD transfer.
First to say that both Wallfisch and Lloyd Webber give strong and sympathetic readings of this supreme work, taking fewer expressive liberties than some but presenting performances as rich and compelling as any, both with superb orchestral contributions under conductors who are specialists in the Czech repertory. The opening tutti, even before the soloist enters, already provides a fascinating comparison. The Philips has the benefit of being played by native Czech musicians, and the orchestral attack has fine bite, but the impact of the playing of the LSO under Mackerras is even sharper, partly due to the Chandos sound, which has more bloom on it and a vivid sense of presence, and partly due to the extra panache of the playing. I also prefer the British horn-player in the great melody of the second subject to his Czech counterpart who has a fruitier, slightly whiny tone. I note that the Czech Philharmonic first horn of 1937 had a very similar tone indeed. Mackerras comes closer than anyone I can remember to Szell in the dramatic bite of the performance, which provides the most powerful preparation. Neumann is first rate too, but the more opaque, rather more distant recording detracts from his impact. Szell incidentally, exceptionally crisp on dotted rhythms in that tutti, is faster than either of the others without seeming at all rushed, well over two minutes faster over the whole of the first movement than Lloyd Webber and Neumann, and a minute and a half faster than Wallfisch and Mackerras.
That is partly a question of the urgency of Casals's playing, for at that period his expressiveness consistently tended towards stringholds, tautening the pulse. He also observes the instruction to keep the speed the same in the second subject melody, something which is hardly ever done nowadays. If both Lloyd Webber and Wallfisch ease the tempo at that point, they are notably less self-indulgent than some. Lloyd Webber with rich vibrato is the grander, but it is Wallfisch who, lightening his tone, gives a more tender, more subtle account, as he does too when in the development the melody reappears in A flat minor, here given an inner, hushed quality. Lloyd Webber conveys the full poignancy of that key passage too, and neither indulges in the sort of portamento that flaws Yo-Yo Ma's CBS reading, for example.
Lloyd Webber and Wallfisch also avoid self-indulgence and excessive underlining in the bravura writing, both when the main theme first appears and elsewhere, and the playing of each is marked by excellent intonation in even the most demanding doublepassages. Yo-Yo Ma and Tortelier (EMI) for example may be more volatile, but their emphases come near to distortion. Heinrich Schiff, whose Philips version I chose as a best all-round recommendation on BBC Radio 3 ''Record Review'' a couple of years ago, is commendably straight, and that is the quality I find myself responding to if anything even more in Wallfisch's reading. With him the tension of his first solo is electric, taking up from the impact of Mackerras in the tutti, and there is none of the stress that marks most other readings, when he keeps rhythms undistorted and tone rich and firm. Lloyd Webber's playing of the bravura writing is satisfying too, but he shows the pressure noticeably more, as in the semiquaver passage (cue 4'28''), where the tempo and tension seem to slacken a fraction. Wallfisch, like Rostropovich (DG) among others, satisfyingly tautens the tension here at the beginning of a new passage, as the music seems to demand.
The contrasts in the other two movements are broadly similar. Lloyd Webber's timings are consistently a degree slower than those of Wallfisch, but both overall take a middle-of-the-road view, never matching the urgency of Casals in 1937 but never becoming self-indulgent in expansiveness as for example Rostropovich latterly has. Both are very satisfying readings, but it is the Wallfisch that brings more memorable moments, not least when his sharp, clean attack and control of bravura leads superbly into tuttis of tingling impact, with the natural rasp of the LSO brass thrillingly caught. I think of the notoriously tricky lead-in to the recapitulation in the first movement, with the soloist rising on a long chromatic scale, the fortissimo entry of the middle section of the slow movement; and of Wallfisch's yearningly beautiful, rapt account of the final epilogue, rounding off on a thrillingly, extended crescendo on the last cadence, making the scalp prickle before the snap of the orchestral pay-off.
This new Chandos is a performance which in the co-ordination of soloist, conductor and orchestra gives the work a rare unity. Davis and the Concertgebouw for Schiff are similarly compelling, but the extra richness and fullness of the Chandos sound make me now prefer the new issue, though remember that Schiff has an exceptionally generous coupling in his fine, if restrained, account of the Elgar Concerto.
Wallfisch's coupling is a delightful rarity, the first ever complete recording of the Konzertstuck of Dohnanyi, easily lyrical in its outer sections based on themes in barcarolle rhythm. A slow movement is inserted after the opening exposition with material which is then finally recapitulated along with that of the main Allegro. It is not a great work, but it is a substantial one (24 minutes) with plenty of rich, warm ideas that haunt the mind, not least a theme in the slow movement all too close to Pale hands I loved beside the Shalimar. The recording is not quite so clear and vivid as in the Dvorak, but it is still of fine Chandos vintage.
The all-Dvorak, non-cello couplings for the Philips disc would have seemed generous enough a year or so back, but now seem a little parsimonious. The Carnival Overture is brilliantly done bright and idiomatic, though clearer sound would have added to the impact. What I love is the little Polonaise from Rusalka, party music based on delicious dance rhythms, presented with fine flair.
The Pearl coupling for Casals's Dvorak recording is very welcome too, the searching performances he recorded in London a year before the Dvorak of the spurious Boccherini/Grutzmacher concerto and Bruch's Kol Nidrei both full of his individual magic. Pearl's transfers are refreshingly straight, lacking the final subtleties of a Keith Hardwick transfer and with intermittent hum and rumble, but making these classic performances sound involvingly vivid.'