Reviews for CD 2290 Brahms Requiem

Fanfare – November/December 2004

BRAHMS A German Requiem - Toscanini / Janssen, Della Chiesa / Westminster Choir / NBC SO
GUILD GHCD 2290

As in the past, I am confining my choices here to historical reissues that I have not had the opportunity to review in these pages. Paramount among them are two significant items from Guild devoted to Toscanini. The prize of the two is a 1943 broadcast of the Brahms German Requiem, the conductor's only performance of the score with the NBC Symphony. Sung in English, it has had previous CD releases from Naxos and Memories, but neither comes close to the sonic splendor of this transfer, which is apparently drawn from a pristine set of NBC acetates. With its untraditional pacing (sometimes slower, sometimes faster than the norm), it makes an especially compelling case for the score.

Mortimer H. Frank

International Record Review – December 2004

Legendary Conductors

Only one recordings exists of Toscanini conducting Brahms’s German Requiem, sung in English on January 24^th, 1943 with baritone Herbert Janssen, soprano Vivian della Casa. Robert Matthew-Walker’s note outlines how Brahms was a particularly important composer in Toscanini’s firmament, and argues the case very strongly for this performance. I urge you to hear it: a most original view of the work (the second movement in particular is immensely impressive), albeit one with the drawback of some warbly choral singing and sound that is far from ideal. It’s typical of Toscanini: gripping, intense and a shade dogged.

Nigel Simeone

MusicWeb – September 2004

It was a surprise to read that Toscanini performed the German Requiem so infrequently. This NBC inscription was fortunately preserved because this is apparently the only time he performed it with the orchestra – there were a smattering of performances with the Philharmonic-Symphony in New York, Vienna Philharmonic and BBC Symphony. It also represents the only known example of Toscanini’s way with the work on disc – he left no commercial recording of it. The concert was part of a Brahms cycle given in 1943 and has been released twice before on CD, to my knowledge – by Memories and by Naxos.

Firstly Guild has utilised copies from Toscanini’s own collection, which he gave to a favoured engineer, Richard Gardner. They differ from the Naxos and Memories sources – notably in the case of Memories’ release, which was afflicted with stereo reverb. Naxos’ release was rather muffled and scratchy. So this is now the best sounding transfer on the market and will be of especial interest to admirers of the conductor’s (I think only Americans call Toscanini the Maestro) way with Brahms.

It’s sung in English; perhaps the sentiment was against German language performance but it will certainly weigh in one’s mind. The opening movement is curiously soft grained but Behold, all flesh is as the grass (as I suppose one should put it) whilst beginning quite emphatically is full of powerful direction and clarity – sectional discipline is tight – even though I must say I find some of the direction wilful and the occasional elasticities unnatural sounding. The Westminster Choir – an off/on body that could be splendid on its day – was on very variable form on that January evening, with the tenors going awry in How lovely are thy dwellings and entries not quite together elsewhere, however sonorously they sing. The NBC strings shine in And ye now therefore have sorrow as does the principal clarinet. Janssen impresses, not least because he has to sing in English, even if Della Chiesa is not his equal.

Some of the printed text is at variance from what is sung (try Janssen’s singing of Lord, teach me and the choral For here we have no continuing city)– which makes me wonder which translation was being used. Otherwise Guild preserve the announcements – they’re always keen to do this – and the presentation is fine; sound, as I said, a real improvement. Performance – for me, uneven.

Jonathan Woolf