Music
Beethoven and Two Orchestras
THE visits of foreign orchestras to London some years ago served to awaken a realisation of the low musical standard of our own. The example of what could be done aroused the will to do it, and there came into being two new orches- tras which proved that we were able to meet the visiting teams on equal terms, instead of playing under the handicap of indolence and indiscriminating good will. It was the creation of discrimination in the audience by the patently superior playing of such orchestras as the Berlin Philharmonic that gave Sir Thomas Beecham and Dr. Boult their chance. But standards once achieved are not to be maintained without continual effort on the part of the audiences as well as the performers. It is well that we should have occasional reminders of the quality of the best Continental orchestras, and for that reason alone the visit of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra is particularly welcome at this moment.
I am far from supporting the old ridiculous idea that any foreign artist or body of artists is necessarily better than any we can produce at home. Indeed the programme of the concert given by the Viennese orchestra on Monday was an extraordinary ill-assortment of hackneyed works, of which the chief was Beethoven's Symphony in C minor. The inclusion of this Symphony was, however, completely justified in the performance, which was as fine as any I have ever heard. It was not spectacular ; but then Dr. Weingartner is not a spectacular conductor. It was spacious, noble and, above all, alive. It was in fact Beethoven.
Apart from the grandeur of the interpretation, which, as it were, impressed once more a sharp image upon a well-worn coin, the actual quality of the playing was admirable. If this is not the best of orchestras, it is at least a very good one. It has discipline, balance and, above all, rhythm. Perhaps that rhythm comes from playing the Viennese waltzes, of which we were given a sample by way of encore, and playing them without exaggeration of their buoyant lilt. I have heard better string-tone, but not more solid and unanimous playing. The chording of the wood-wind was quite remarkable in its clean- ness and balance. The brass is, as usual with the German instruments, rather coarser in tone than ours, but I am inclined to think that this is the robust sound that Beethoven meant. And the drummer—that most important performer in this work—touched his instruments with all the sensitiveness of a fine pianist.
A great deal has been written about the Fifth Symphony, its form and meaning—much of it nonsensical. But I do not remember having seen any allusion to the fact that it is largely an essay in contrasting timbres, as the Seventh Sym- phony is an essay in rhythm. That was, at least, the impres- sion I got last Monday, and a glance through the score will show how much, at any rate of the first two movements, is built up upon the independent opposition of the wind and strings. Rhythm, of course, is as always the life-blood of the• work, but here colour is the more conspicuous element, whereas in the Seventh Symphony it is of rhythm that one thinks all the time.
Sir Thomas Beecham gave a performance of the Seventh Symphony at the Royal Philharmonic Society's concert a few days before, which was received with enormous enthu- siasm by the subscribers to that venerable institution. It must, of course, be much pleasanter, if you have bought a ticket and taken an evening out, to believe that you are enjoying a first-rate show than to listen carefully and without prejudice only to find disappointment. That is the critic's disagreeable duty, and I cannot help thinking that, if the audience had really listened, they would have been less exuberant in their applause. For the playing of the strings was ragged and their tone of poor quality, especially in its Jack of resonance below mezzo-forte. Nor, in spite of some admirable individual details, was there the kind of coherence —the invidious comparison can hardly be avoided—that marked the playing of the Viennese Orchestra. Sir Thomas Beecham seemed over-anxious to stress the rhythmical nature of the work, and, except in the Allegretto, raced the orchestra Off its feet. His !nay be the ideal tempo. for the Scherzo, but it was beyond the capacity of the players to keep it up with that precision and sense of effortlessness without which speed
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