PACM035: Sonata for Cello and Piano No, 1 in E minor - Brahms
German
Download

Buy MP3

FLAC lossless download

download
price

Price Code
Emanuel Feuermann, cello
Theo van der Pas, pianoforte

Recorded in 1934, released as UK Columbia LX8172-4
Matrix numbers: CAX7211-7215
All first takes excepts sides 3&4 - 2nd takes
Download ID: 213475, 434942
(Duration 19'55")

 

 

PACM035: Sonata for Cello and Piano No, 1 in E minor - Brahms

Play sample movement:

 

Of his two sonatas for cello and piano, it is the later second in F major (Op.99, written in 1886) which is usually preferred over this first sonata, composed between 1862-65, perhaps for its degree of passion. And yet, in the hands of a great cellist there too is much passion to be wrought from the Sonata in E minor.

There is little doubt about the abilities of Emanuel Feuermann as a cellist, and yet due to his untimely death following a minor operation in 1942, his name is almost forgotten by comparison to the likes of Pablo Casals. Indeed the latter was one of Feuermann's greatest admirers: ""What a great artist Feuermann was! His early death was a great loss to music."

An online biography of the cellist notes: "When Feuermann made his American debut in 1935, the hall was packed with fellow cellists, who had come to hear something truly extraordinary. Following the performance a critic wrote, "Difficulties do not exist for Mr. Feuermann, even difficulties that would give celebrated virtuosi pause."

"In 1938 an English reviewer wrote in The Strad, following a concert, "I do not think there can any longer be doubt that Feuermann is the greatest living cellist, Casals alone excepted...In Feuermann we have a spectacular virtuosic artist of the front rank, the Wieniawski, shall I say, of the cello." Feuermann was famous for his unbelievable facility in the upper registers of the instrument, and was said to be able to easily perform Mendelssohn's violin concerto on his cello exactly as written for the violin."

Note that this wonderful recording, which spanned five sides of very quiet UK Columbia 78s, was coupled with a side of Gluck, entitled Melodie, adapted from his opera "Orphée", again with ven der Pas at the keyboard. We have made this available in our Shorter Pieces section.

 

REVIEW OF: Schubert "Arpeggione" Sonata (Moore, 1937) and
Brahms: Cello Sonata #1 (van der Pas, 1934)

Emanuel Feuermann (1902-1942) was almost universally recognized during his brief lifetime as an unrivaled master of the cello. Artur Rubinstein said "Feuermann became for me the greatest cellist of all time". Jascha Heifetz accepted him as the first cellist worthy of serious collaboration, and would not play with another for nine years after his death. He was the cellist of choice for Toscanini, who described him as "the greatest" and said that "there is no one after him".

No cellist, not Casals, not Rostropovich, conveys for me the fire, the passion, the lyricism and the virtuosity of Feuermann. To me, his ur-recording is the great Brahms Double Concerto with Heifetz and Ormandy (1939) which has been my favorite for half a century. He died from easily preventable complications of a very minor surgery at age 39. His recordings are not many.

What is the nature of his greatness? It is not unlike that of Heifetz or Toscanini. Impeccable command and virtuosity go without saying. It is the underlying intensity--whether forte or piano or lyrical or martial, there is always the intensity of a musical life and sensibility that is always probing. There is no routine; every phrase, every note is informed with a vital spirit. Every note is pregnant with the next. Nothing is routine; nothing is repeated the same way. And there is the plangent tone--a bit thin and nervous compared to Rostropovich or Casals--that can either caress or whiplash, depending on the musical requirement. And how does one hear soft playing with such expression and underlying tension?

Suffice it to say that Feuermann knows how to be playful and dance as he does in the Schubert "Arpeggione" sonata. He opens the sonata with a light, somewhat sec tone, which announces that this is an early, light romantic work and not the C Major Quintet. He does not make heavy weather of the development, but keeps its dancing. Moore, perhaps the greatest accompanist who ever lived, is one with him. Feuermann's tone is a bit richer in the the lovely second movement, but he does not lean on the themes to exaggerate their importance. In the third movement, we are back to loose-limbed, insouciant joy.

In the Brahms, Feuermann begins the first theme a bit subdued with a mezzo tone that, without moving to doubleforte, conveys struggle and anxiety. There are flashes of rebellion but mood is more melancholy than tragic or angry. The tone is much brightened for the second movement, but there is still a hint of sadness hanging over it all. The articulatulation is very precise and the lovely sinuous second theme is played without the romantic afflatus that Rostropovich or Piatiagorsky brings to it. Feuerman is supreme in the knotty, contrapuntal third movement. He is everywhere at once commanding things. He makes the most of the lyric episodes to leaven this, one of Brahms' toughest textures.

The sound, while somewhat unresonant, is infinitely adequate to to convey the Fireman's gold.

Reviewer: Bill Rosen


Find out more:

 

Second movement
Allegretto quasi Menuetto; and Trio

About Brahms:

BBC Artist Profile
The Classical Music Pages
Johannes Brahms Websource

CD covers to print:
(NB. Disable Page Scaling before printing)

Download pdf CD cover

CD-writing cuesheet (save as .cue):
(Use this to split MP3 files - see here)

Cue sheet

Download our Full Discography
Printable text listings of all Pristine Audio historic releases
Restoration by Andrew Rose:


 

 

Google
 
Web Pristine Classical

 

 

Pristine Classical - DRM-free historic FLAC and MP3 downloads since 2005