For Tim Page, Leonard Bernstein’s decision to make a career in America ‘had the same effect on our native musicians that Ralph Waldo Emerson’s lecture The American Scholar did on nineteenth-century literati. It was a declaration of independence’ ... even if, as Page also says, ‘only in Richard Wagner were the sublime and the silly so inextricably yoked’. It is in fact the final, principally European, stage of that career that is documented here, the great and the gauche jostling for attention in a seemingly random six-disc retrospective drawn exclusively from DG’s archive of live and live-ish material. The Bernstein legend may indeed live on, as the cutaway slipcase has it, but the present offering is a somewhat insubstantial contribution to it, unless its purpose is simply to whet the appetite for reissues to come.
Which is not to criticise much of what’s on offer here. It is especially good to welcome back the 1985 Harris Third Symphony, originally paired with an equally formidable Schuman Third and inaccessible for some time. But why couple it with Appalachian Spring and the Barber Adagio ? Both are well worth having, but then both remain available on single CD compilations in just about every price bracket. As the first, third and fourth discs have also been available separately (albeit at full price), some duplication for the collector would seem unavoidable. The inclusion of that first disc (of Bernstein’s last concert) was, I suppose, inevitable, despite the slightly ghoulish nature of the event. Page’s account of Bernstein’s near-collapse during the third movement of Beethoven’s Seventh is reprinted here from the original booklet. In the circumstances, criticism may be out of place, but this can’t compete musically with the 1964 New York recording (Sony Classical), one of the most exciting and energising ever put on disc, and easily the best of Bernstein’s four. The voltage here is lower, the last movement, ominously shorn of its repeat, more dogged than Dionysian.
By contrast, the Viennese Mahler Fifth is a terrific improvement on the earlier, orchestrally bedraggled New York version (Sony Classical, 5/93). Those for whom Bernstein is a byword for self-indulgence and impossibly slow tempos should urgently investigate this disciplined, intense reading which is still the one against which all others are measured. At a little over 11 minutes, Bernstein’s pacing of the Adagietto, sustained by the lustrous Viennese strings, is near ideal – deeply felt, yet without mawkish sentimentality.
No, for those intent on pressing charges, it is the two examples of Bernstein at the keyboard that provide the ammunition. Unlike, say, Andre Previn, Bernstein did not remain, in any real sense, a pianist. The 1982 Los Angeles remake of Rhapsody in Blue is famously (excusably?) wilful: that opening clarinet is so extraordinarily graphic that it’s difficult to be wholly critical. Anyone expecting halfway decent piano playing should nevertheless stick with the 1959 New York account (Sony Classical, 11/92). The Mozart concerto, taped in 1981, is new, though sonically dry and boxed-in. Unappealing piano sound exaggerates the unevenness of Bernstein’s trills and semiquaver runs. Worse, his improvisatory rubato becomes increasingly irritating on repeated hearing. The twin-speed slow movement, with solo passages taken slower – sometimes considerably slower – than the tuttis, is tolerable. The finale, however, turns grotesquely slow despite the vigorous start. Bernstein plays a conflation of the two cadenzas Mozart left for the first movement.
On the other hand, Bernstein’s grand, forceful account of the C minor Mass, one of his last recording projects, is something of a revelation. Bernstein is actually quicker than Harnoncourt (Teldec, 3/96) in the ravishing ‘Et incarnatus’ (7'46'' as against 8'16''), and for once the ‘Credo’ really is Allegro maestoso, where so many period- instrument bands sound inappropriately fey. The first soprano part is taken by Arleen Auger, who is exquisite (her ‘Christe eleison’ very discreetly decorated), though she is balanced too far forward in relation to the obbligato wind in the ‘ Et incarnatus’. This is what we used to describe as a great performance.
The Beethoven Emperor with Zimerman is more involving than I had remembered; Richard Osborne praised its ‘monumental and heroic’ qualities (11/92), and many will prefer it to Bernstein’s bullish 1962 account with Serkin pere (Sony, 11/92). Articulating with his customary precision, Zimerman sounds a little overawed (and over-miked), while the slow movement is palpably misrepresented by a balance that emphasises the violins’ saccharine vibrato. Still, this is a great deal better than the stodgy, crudely recorded Brahms Double Concerto, a bizarre inclusion.
Presentation is odd: there are two (why?) separate booklets, and those notes which haven’t been reprinted from the original releases are sometimes poorly translated or misleading, as in ‘his gramophone recordings were almost always live recordings taken from concerts’. Hence it’s not clear who this set is aimed at: aficionados will almost certainly have some of these relays, whereas those curious to investigate the Bernstein ‘legend’ would do better to choose selectively. And whatever happened to Bernstein’s own compositions? As an aficionado myself, I enjoyed revisiting these recordings immensely. Only let’s hope that this is not the end of the story.'