This Eroica performance finds Kempe sounding noticeably more Beethovenian than he did in a companion Testament release of the composer’s overtures. His is a big, broad shouldered interpretation, with spacious tempos and long-lined phrasing. But so are Wand’s, Giulini’s, Jochum’s, Klemperer’s, Bernstein’s and Barenboim’s–and every one one of them generates more tension and excitement than Kempe does here. He’s clearly more attuned to the music’s vertical dimension (i.e., he’s a chord guy), leaving the horizontal to more or less fend for itself. Thus, the first movement climaxes never build up a real head of steam, especially the coda, which here sounds anticlimactic. Kempe’s second movement (his most effective) benefits from the Wagnerian style drama he brings to the funeral march. The finale also impresses as Kempe stirs up considerable kinetic energy in the central fugue. The Berlin Philharmonic plays with a sense of relaxed virtuosity (not the more gripping variety they provided for Karl Böhm in his DG recording), but that is not enough to make this an Eroica that lingers in the mind. Stick with the above mentioned alternatives. Kempe displays more dramatic fire in the coupled Schumann Manfred overture, with the Berlin players also ratcheting up the tension. EMI’s recording presents the orchestra in a reverberant, large acoustic setting, albeit with somewhat opaque high frequencies.
