Early Tocanini vs. Late Toscanini

[greg lee]

Agree/disagree with Haggin's description?:

Early T.(NY Philharmonic years) = Relaxed, expansive, articulating and
organizing and shaping the substance of a piece with much elasticity
of tempo, and molding the phrase with a great deal of sharp
inflection,

Late T.(NBC Symphony years) = Simpler, tauter, swifter, setting a
tempo that was maintained with only slight modification, and giving
the the phrase only subtle inflection.

[David Royko]

On May 22, 3:20 am, greg lee <music031...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Agree/disagree with Haggin's description?:
>

> Early T.(NY Philharmonic years) = <snip>
> Late T.(NBC Symphony years) = <snip>

We'll never know. He was in his 50s when he made his first recordings,
and those were acoustics that don't tell you that much, and almost 60
when he started making electrical recordings. And Dudamel has nothing
on him -- AT was a professional conductor by age 20. I'd love to be
able to hear "early" Toscanini, but he was already a grizzled veteran
by the time he was giving us any recorded evidence of who he was, so
the best we can do is hear how he might've changed in his late
maturity.

Dave Royko
http://www.davidroyko.com is Dave Royko's site for info about:
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[jrsnfld]

On May 22, 9:29 am, David Royko <davidro...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On May 22, 3:20 am, greg lee <music031...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Agree/disagree with Haggin's description?:
>
> > Early T.(NY Philharmonic years) = <snip>
> > Late T.(NBC Symphony years) = <snip>
>
> We'll never know.

True, but we already know that Haggin's dichotomy, is an exaggeration,
even for the NYP v. NBC years.

--Jeff

[gggg...@gmail.com]

According to the following:

- Mechanical precision and superhuman technique supplanted emotion and humanity...

http://www.classicalnotes.net/features/toscaweb.html#legacy

[Mike]

If you like Toscanini, you use descriptors like precise, propulsive, inherently rhythmic, reveals inner voices...

If you don't, you use nonsense like rigid, machine-like, unmusical, autocratic, metronomic...

[gggg...@gmail.com]

On Sunday, May 10, 2015 at 12:40:39 AM UTC-10, Mike wrote:
> If you like Toscanini, you use descriptors like precise, propulsive, inherently rhythmic, reveals inner voices...
>
> If you don't, you use nonsense like rigid, machine-like, unmusical, autocratic, metronomic...

According to the following:

- At worst, a soulless efficiency creeps in.

http://hudsonreview.com/2013/03/the-complete-toscanini/#.VU88sGdATIU

[Edward A. Cowan]

The writer of the Hudson Review article about the career and recordings of Arturo Toscanini seems to be unaware that there exists (still?) a complete recording of a Wagner opera (Die Meistersinger) performed at Salzburg in 1937. I have it on the Andante label. This item and another Salzburg performance of Mozart's Die Zauberflöte, also from 1937, add two more to the seven operas AT conducted at NBC. There is also a 1937 Salzburg recording of Verdi's Falstaff which offers a very distinguished performance in the somewhat indifferent recorded sound of live recordings of that time.

The remark of AT's alleged stiffness in Mozart may be derived from his prewar 78rpm recording of Mozart's Symphony no. 40 in G-minor, which is indeed breathlessly over-fast. But there exists a much later (post WW-II) recording by AT of the same work that is closer to a "normal" reading than the prewar recording presents. A similar performance of that work may be seen and heard in one of the AT NBC videos. --E.A.C.

[Willem Orange]

The writer says that Toscanini never recorded a complete Wagner opera commercially and he is absolutely correct. As for the Salzburg operas, why would he discuss them in an article about a set of commercially issued recordings by Toscanini????? they also were not recorded for commercial release

[weary flake]

Toscanini was supposed to have conducted the
slowest Parsifal ever in Bayreuth in the early
1930s; was this recorded in any way?

[Willem Orange]

Unfortunately no

[Saint Russell]

None of Toscanini's recordings of complete operas were made originally for commercial release. He did record some material to be patched into the recordings of some NBC broadcasts that were issued by RCA Victor.

[gggg...@gmail.com]

On Tuesday, May 21, 2013 at 10:20:23 PM UTC-10, greg lee wrote:

According to the following:

- Dyment's paradigm here seems to be the Toscanini 1935 BBC recording of the Brahms 4. Here Toscanini finds a flexibility and lyricism that he didn't always achieve in his later NBC performances, magnificent as many of these are.

http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2017/Nov/Brahms_conducting_book.htm

[dn.md]

Toscanini's 1951 recording of Brahms Symphony 4 is stunningly lyrical, I wouldn't believe it was a recording from his later years if I hadn't already known that.

[gggg...@gmail.com]

- ...While the late recordings still impress with their musical integrity and would do honor to most other conductors, they lack the revelatory quality of Toscanini in his prime. None of the late records is bad or even uninteresting, but their energy, drive and precision remain too close to the surface and only rarely enter the depths that Toscanini plumbed in earlier years and in the concert hall.

http://www.classicalnotes.net/features/toscaweb.html

[chriskh...@gmail.com]

When people talk about Toscanini's "earlier years" they invariably mean his "middle years". The first recordings we have of him were made when he was well in his fifties with some thirty years' career behind him. Our knowledge of his "early years" is limited to a reading of what critics wrote about him.

[gggg...@gmail.com]

On Tuesday, May 21, 2013 at 10:20:23 PM UTC-10, greg lee wrote:

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.music.classical/mjlavnNKhA8