From: dbarker@spang.Camosun.BC.CA (Deryk Barker)
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical
Subject: Re: Jascha Horenstein (Was Re: Mahler 9 (was Re: Mahler 1))
Date: 7 Oct 92 15:41:02 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Camosun College, Victoria B.C, Canada

In article <BvpvBJ.727@news.udel.edu> conrad@brahms.udel.edu (Jon Conrad) writes:
>I would agree to some extent.  Horenstein can be very persuasive, and I
>value many of his recordings.  But not all, and I think his admirers do
>him a disservice when they praise all his work equally.  (The same is
>true, of course, of the Toscanini-, Callas-, etc.-, worshippers.)

Undoubtedly.

>>Secondly Horenstein's Mahler can seem undercharacterised for someone
>>brought up with Bernstein's frequently hysterical view of the
>>composer. 
>
>"Hysterical" is a rather judgemental word, isn't it, for what is after
>all a valid view of a composer whose works compass emotional extremes.
>If Mahler filled his scores with such minute detail, he did probably
>intend them to count for something, right?

It may be a judgemental word, although surely no more so than many
others. I fail to see what minute detail has to do with hysteria or
otherwise though.

>>Horenstein brings an almost classical restraint to Mahler at
>>times, which to me can be far more persuasive. 
>
>"Can be" is the correct word.  I sometimes find it so, sometimes not.

Yup - his restraint in the 6th - much of it, I suspect, due to the
inadequacies of the Stockholm PO - makes the work less than convincing.

>>>I feel I have been burned by purchases of Horenstein performances,
>>>where the conductor's talents (which are not electrifying, at least
>>>not from what I hear in the Mahler 7th) have not overcome these
>>>other problems enough to give me a satisfying musical experience.
>
>>I feel this is your loss, but obviously you don't. Which other
>>performances did you feel 'burned' by?
>
>If I may answer a question directed at another:
>
>I wouldn't say "burned," because I knew it was a risk and I collect
>performances of this piece anyway, but the live performance of the
>Mahler 8th (which I bought on LP around 1986) is pretty disastrous.  He
>may have a great conception going on inside his head, but it didn't come
>out on this occasion.  Meanwhile people are often not even in the same
>measure at the same time, and it's a miracle that they can get back
>together after some of the debacles.  This recording is a "document," I
>guess, and what it tells us is that things went seriously wrong on this
>occasion in (1959?).  No musical pleasure to be had here.

Now this *is* an interesting viewpoint. I have yet to track this
recording down, but know of many critics - including at least one in
Fanfare - who count it the finest of all, a far cry from your own
verdict. Neville Cardus's verdict on the performance in the
(Manchester) Guardian - reprinted in 'Cardus on Music' - was also very
complimentary. Of course the performance was probably under-rehearsed
etc. etc. It comes down again to the 'conception' of the piece, which
sometimes you just have to help reconstruct in your own mind, yes?
Like your (I think it was your) view of Bernstein. Both of whose
recordings are just about adequate but not much more.

Deryk Barker, Computer Science Dept., Camosun College, Victoria B.C.