Toscanini’s live “Pathétique” Symphony from April 1941 seems to have all the requisites that distinguish a great performance of this work. The unsentimental yet dramatic approach, controlled fire, virtuoso playing, rhythmic precision, swift tempos–all contribute to create the required “sound of inexorability”, as would say Agent Smith in The Matrix. Unfortunately, the recording, transferred from the best sources available, is too muffled, grayish, and compressed to make it a really enjoyable listening performance. Also, the huge vibrato of the brass and the sour sonority of the woodwinds can be disturbing in places. In contrast, the NBC Symphony strings sound amazingly good, compact, and in tune.
Although coming from the same concert, the sonics for the First Piano Concerto with Horowitz are in much better shape (a few clicks and drops notwithstanding), with a welcome supplement of presence and warmth–even if the balance clearly favors the piano. (The performance sounds very close to the studio recording made by these same performers.) Horowitz’s fiery temperament is nothing new, and here it comes out with bursting energy and a demonic sense of rhetoric. The virtuosity reaches transcendent heights, especially in the last movement, taken at hair-raising speed, with some “effets de manche” (the famous octave passage near the end, swallowed by Horowitz with uncanny voracity) that some listeners will consider vulgar. This is nonetheless an incredibly powerful reading, with plenty of poetry and excitement to sell. If you’re bored with the Tchaikovsky First Piano Concerto, give this one a try.
