INTERNATIONAL RECORD REVIEW

February 2006

Robert Matthew-Walker

 

New Queen's Hall Orchestra

Brahms Symphony No. 2 in D, Op. 73.

Elgar Salut d'amour, Op. 12.

Mozart Le nozze di Figaro - Overture.

Weber Oberon - Overture

The New Queen's Hall Orchestra/John Farrer

The NQHO's Own Label

GLM/NQ-1-01 (medium price, 1 hour 9 minutes)

Interactive enhanced CD for PC/Mac includes video footage of rehearsals, an interview with John Farrer by Colin Anderson, enhanced booklet notes, and web links. Also includes bonus track: preview of forthcoming release of Mozart's Serenade No. 10 in B flat, K361/K370a, 'Gran Partita' - finale: molto allegro. Website www.nqho.com. Producer John Boyden. Engineer Tony Faulkner. Date live performances at Fairfield Halls, Croydon, Surrey on January 29th. 2005.

 

Comparisons

Brahms:

BPO/Fiedler (Biddulph) WHL003/4 (1931, two discs)

Concertgebouw Orch/Mengelberg (Telefunken) 0927-42662-2 (1938)

Concertgebouw Orch/Mengelberg (Biddulph) WHL057 (1940)

San Francisco SO/ Monteux (RCA) 74321 84588-2 (1945, two discs)

VPO/ Monteux (RCA) SB2110 (1960, LP)

LSO/Monteux (Philips) 442 544-2 (1962, five discs)

LPO/Weingartner (Columbia) LX899-903 (1940, 78s)

 

A fascinating recent book by Robert Philip, Performing Music in the Age of Recording (Yale University Press), is concerned with the changes in orchestral and chamber music and instrumental playing from recordings dating back almost 100 years. This legitimate field for study raises certain questions. Do modern instruments, as opposed to those made a century or more ago, oblige players to play differently? Has the technique of playing thereby changed, and what difference does that make to the sound of the music? In addition, since many European opera houses, conservatoires and concert halls were destroyed in the Second World War, what about those lost acoustics, which we can experience - not always entirely faithfully - only on recordings made in those venues before 1940? What about the general rises in pitch in the twentieth century? In listening to music composed before, say, 1940 and played by modern orchestras in modern conditions on modern instruments, what differences do these factors make with regard to our perception of performances? As we are talking about music, they can make a great deal of difference: music is sound, although sound isn't necessarily music, and altering the sound obliges us to alter our perceptions, albeit unwittingly.

 

Recordings by The New Queen's Hall Orchestra are different from those made by other orchestras that seek to reproduce the orchestra of 100 years or so ago. It has made some records in the past, not all of which are currently available; this new CD, the first release on a new label, is certainly different - different in sound, different in approach, different from that which we have become used to hearing, and I suggest that if you are at all interested in orchestral music, you should hear and study these differences. Whether it brings you nearer to Brahms is another matter, but I found listening to this record both challenging and enlightening.

 

The rationale behind NQHO recordings is stated by its founder, John Boyden, in the booklet notes. These are complete performances, with absolutely minimal editing. He feels that whereas recordings used to attempt to capture on disc performances such as were given in concert-halls (and occasionally were so recorded), seamless modern-day technology which enables edits to be made until every note is correctly in place has led concert-goers to expect such pluperfect (and therefore inherently unnatural and unmusical playing) playing in the concert-hall - to the virtual exclusion of everything else - even in recordings by 'authentic-instrument' ensembles. Boyden feels that much is lost by our insistence on perfect results, and, unlike many so-called 'live' recordings (which are often patched from rehearsals or performances from days apart) those on this disc are truly 'live': i.e., complete, and played entirely on 'period' instruments.

 

The performances on this CD are taken from a concert given in January 2005 at Fairfield Halls, Croydon and are very well recorded. The largest work here is Brahms's Second Symphony, and the first thing that strikes the attentive listener is the difference in orchestral sound: is that really the kind of sound - not just with regard to individual instruments, but of orchestral blending and inner balance, with which Brahms would have been familiar? The answer, of course, is yes, and on those grounds alone this deserves the attention of the serious record collector.

 

But do we know whether John Farrer's performance accurately reproduces the musical character of the work of which Brahms would have approved? In the last analysis, of course, we do not, but of the disciples of Brahms who knew him, being part of his circle, and who later made recordings of his music, there were four such conductors who recorded the Second Symphony - Max Fiedler, Wiengartner, Mengelberg and Monteux - and what cannot be denied is that, idiosyncrasies of individual performances apart, there is an undoubted similarity of approach from all of them, an approach which Farrer shares without in the least duplicating one or the other of those recordings (Monteux recorded the symphony on three occasions).

 

It is this almost indefinable sense of what one might term the re-creation of a virtually lost living tradition in Farrer's performance that occasionally makes this a version to be heard. There is a deep respect for the music, without point-scoring or glamorizing, that may strike some listeners, long used to this or that international conductor's version, as somewhat lacking in character, but I have played this performance more than a dozen times, with breaks of several weeks in between and my appreciation of it has deepened. It is certainly a real, living performance, not polished to perfection with computer software (which can make anything sound good), and I commend it to all who take their music seriously. This release is very much of the first decade of the twenty-first century, for this enhanced CD has video footage of the rehearsal, a discussion with John Farrer and others associated with the project, photographs of the concert, and other material. As Brahms was the first great composer to make a record, in 1889, we may feel he would have approved of this relevant use of modern technology.

 

There are three other short pieces from the concert on this disc, all very well played, but the main attraction is the Brahms Symphony. However we appreciate this version, or whether we agree with the approach or not, we can all surely echo Silvia in Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act 4 scene 2, 'I thank you for your music, gentlemen,'

 

Robert Matthew-Walker

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