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Bruno Walter in New York, 1939

69.228.193.135

Posted by Brian Cheney on October 8, 2011 at 17:56:46

Walter was forced out of Germany, and then Austria, by the rise of the Nazis. He ended up in France, which gave him a passport, and in 1939 sailed to New York in order to conduct the NBC for four concerts at the invitation of his friend Arturo Toscanini. The April 8, 1939 concert, programming Wagner ("Faust" Overture, Siegfried Idyll) and the Mahler 1 appears on a Music and Arts CD which has been discussed here previously.

Studio 8H, while large (seating 1100 for concert broadcasts) suffered a notoriously dead acoustic, and Walter consulted extensively with NBC engineers on how to get a good sound in there. He settled on having his bass instruments and percussion play much louder than usual. As a result, this recording exhibits none of the bass reticence typical of Toscanini broadcasts from that era. Also, this CD is sourced from transcription discs, not airchecks, so the frequency range is quite wide and dynamics are well captured.

First to the Wagner: the "Faust" overture is well played and well paced. I had not heard the work before and found it excellent, if not on the level of later Wagner. The NBC :Siegfried Idyll" takes some time to settle down, and really does not approach the autumnal glow found on the studio recording made two years later with the NYPO. I have it on LP, but could not find a CD reissue.

Highlight of this CD is, of course, Walter's first recording of the Mahler 1. He had performed it for broadcast on an earlier NY visit, in 1933, with the NYPO, but by 1939 the NBC had not yet played a note of Mahler's music, and apart from two exceprts from the Seventh symphony under Steinberg a year later, played no more Mahler in all their 17 seasons of existence. The First was, therefore, new to them, and Walter was forced to school his players virtually phrase by phrase. This extra attention pays off in a rendition that seems fresh and new for everyone involved.

I have the early Fifties NYPO and 1960 CSO recordings of the First under Walter for comparison, but there is really none. Indeed, there is no Mahler First like the 1939 NBC on record. Timings in all four movements are faster (nearly three minutes faster in the Finale, for example, vs 1960 Los Angeles). The "Spring Awakening" section of the first movement is phrased in magical, otherworldly fashion that reminds me of similar parts of Stravinsky's "Rite" from a decade an a half later. The fast parts are very quick, explosive, and full of humor. I'm amazed the players kept up with Walter's tempi and sharp inflections.

In the Laendler, accents are sharper, rhythms stronger than either later recording. The Funeral March is sardonic, witty, and again very distinctively phrased, with a slow, tender mid section.

The Finale ("Moving stormily") opens with such vehemence I shot right out of my listening chair. Words simply do not describe the sense of world coming apart, and descending into the depths, like Walter does here. The mood is apocalyptic, and although its coda promises inevitable triumph over adversity, this last movement foreshadows the calamity of world war about to overtake humanity a few months after this concert. Words like "emotional", "heartbreaking", or "terrifying" hardly approach an adequate description of this composer and this orchestra do. It is astounding to me that mere sounds from musical instruments could take such hold over mind and spirit as happens here.

I agree with my friend and colleague Clark Johnsen that Walter's is the best of all Mahler Firsts on record. I will go further than that: in fifty years of record collecting and concert going, IMHO the NBC is the finest performance of any music, by anyone, ever.

As we careen blindly into world economic crisis likely to be as far-reaching and destructive as the events of 1939, I wonder if our species can prevail (as Mahler thinks we will) once more, or ever again.

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