There are three Kempe Tchaikovsky Fifths: a Berlin Philharmonic studio recording from the late 50s (now on Testament), a Bavarian Radio live broadcast from 1974 (Orfeo), and this one, dating from 1964. All three are excellent but this one certainly stands as the most purely exciting, and we can clearly hear the London Symphony Orchestra finally emerging from its post-War doldrums to become the great ensemble of the Kertesz and Rowicki Dvorák cycles, the Markevitch Tchaikovsky series, Colin Davis’ Berlioz cycle, and numerous EMI recordings with Previn. Some frailties remain, particularly in the wind section, with its acidic oboes (slow movement) and less than ideally secure bassoons (third movement), but even they turn in a hugely committed, virtually note-perfect account of the score under a clearly inspired Kempe, and everyone else responds with music making beyond criticism.
The highpoints of this interpretation are too numerous to mention at length. In the first movement, there’s the urgent transition to the second subject, its intensely pungent woodwind timbres when it arrives, its thrillingly passionate continuation (all of course repeated in the recapitulation), the huge climax of the development, and the driving coda. And that just about covers the entire movement, doesn’t it? In the slow movement we have a nicely shaped opening horn solo (spoiled a bit by the sour oboe that comes in later), and Kempe’s hyper-dramatic treatment of the two loud interruptions by the symphony’s opening motto theme. The third movement waltz moves at a spanking pace with an amazingly disciplined and brilliant middle section. Kempe’s finale passes every test you might imagine with flying colors: after the introduction, he allows the fast opening theme’s second half (in the winds) to cut through the texture cleanly, blasts through the development’s chugging sequences with nary a hint of routine, raises the roof at the return of the motto theme in the triumphant coda and pushes the orchestra to its limits in the final pages. Good, clear stereo sound caps a truly special musical event.
Debussy’s Clarinet Rhapsody (from the same concert as the Tchaikovsky), on the other had, doesn’t cut it. There’s simply too much rough and ready playing (listen to the clanging triangle and tentative violins), and Gervase de Payer has real problems in his upper register, including some cracked notes and piercingly ugly tone. The Janácek (from 1974) is also a mixed bag. Given the possibilities for disaster, the BBC Symphony Orchestra manages rather well. The opening fanfare has only one moment of real uncertainty from the trumpets, but the second movement is too soft-edged and slow, the winds balanced too far back. Its central trumpet calls lack brilliance. Kempe simply misinterprets the climax of the following slow(ish) movement, cutting the tempo (at least) in half when the composer clearly indicates that the music should speed up to Prestissimo. The finale sports some strange balances between solo winds and strings before the return of the fanfares, but the concluding pages sound massively splendid in the huge Royal Albert Hall acoustic.
Part of the problem here does stem from the recording, which seems to have been made from a far more distant perspective than the Tchaikovsky (also captured in Albert Hall). This permits the brass the necessary amplitude, but otherwise makes the orchestra sound small and lacking in impact virtually everywhere else. Even Christopher Beunig’s notes are badly written and not entirely accurate in their musical description of the Janácek. Still, this Kempe rarity (his only version preserved on disc) is not a poor performance by any means, just a bit disappointing after the fantastic Tchaikovsky. So the rating is for the Fifth Symphony alone. The rest is a bonus; you be the judge of its value.
