Multiple CD editions of 78-era recordings continue to flood the historic reissue bins while collectors go nuts trying to figure out which transfers are the ones to get. And now the busier transfer agents are actually remastering certain items that they transferred years ago for other labels. Just as we can compare at least six Herbert von Karajan-led versions of the Beethoven Seventh, we can measure Ward Marston’s Naxos Caruso transfers against his earlier Caruso edition for Pearl, or even A/B Seth Winner’s two separate Pearl transfers of the acoustic Mendelssohn Piano Concerto No. 1 with Benno Moiseiwitsch. Mark Obert-Thorn’s new Naxos transfer of Joseph Szigeti’s justly famous 1932 Beethoven is another case in point. It markedly improves upon Obert-Thorn’s transfer of the same recording issued by Pearl in 1990.
Surface noise is considerably reduced yet the instrumental choirs bloom with greater clarity in relation to the solo violin (compare both transfers in the first few minutes of the Rondo and you’ll hear what I mean). With more openness on top, the pungency of Szigeti’s tone hits closer to home, especially in lyrical, sustained passages. This first of Szigeti’s three commercial Beethoven Concerto recordings preserves the great violinist’s most fluent, lustrously projected, and technically secure traversal of the solo part, along with modified versions of Joachim’s cadenzas. I still find Bruno Walter’s support overly deferential and relatively shapeless in comparison to his firmer, symphonically oriented New York Philharmonic account, albeit with a more tremulous, technically frayed Szigeti in tow.
Likewise, the Szigeti/Beecham Mozart D major Concerto sounds altogether rosier, less strident and nasal than in an EMI CD transfer effected from superior source material. Beecham, as you may know, recorded this work with Jascha Heifetz 15 years later, and it’s interesting to contrast Heifetz’s laser-like sonority and inhumanly even vibrato alongside Szigeti’s more astringent yet expressively varied palette. Szigeti makes the best case for Joachim’s curiously elaborate and not-too-stylish cadenzas. Even if you already own these performances, Obert-Thorn’s upgraded transfers are well worth Naxos’ paltry price. Let’s hope the great 1928 Szigeti Brahms Concerto with Hamilton Harty will appear on this label soon.
