A Beethoven Program from Berlin

Paul van Kempen

Conductors and soloists who did not record in the stereo era are often forgotten. A good example is Fritz Lehmann, recently heard here in a Romantic overtures program. He died in 1956. Another is Paul van Kempen, who lived from 1893-1955 and was active as a conductor for little more than 20 years.

For longer-lived artists, their stereo recordings often overshadow worthy readings of the same pieces made in the mono era. This was the case with pianist Wilhelm Kempff and to a lesser degree violinist Wolfgang Schneiderhan.

So today we have a program of Beethoven featuring those three musicians in Deutsche Grammophon recordings from Berlin made in 1952-53, before the stereo era.

The program begins with the Consecration of the House Overture, continuing with the Violin Concerto and the Piano Concerto No. 4.

Consecration of the House Overture

The recordings all come from the Jesus-Christus-Kirche, DG's invariable recording site for the Berlin Philhamonic during this period. Van Kempen's Consecration of the House Overture from 1952 provides a hugely dramatic opening to the program in one of the most effective performances I have heard. The contemporary critics called it "imposing" and "forceful, idiomatic."

The sound here and throughout the program is excellent mono. These transfers all come from US Decca's licensed pressings from DG masters.

Violin Concerto

Like van Kempen, Wolfgang Schneiderhan (1915-2002) had a extensive career playing in orchestras before he began a full-time career as a soloist. The Vienna native had been the concertmaster of that city's famed Philharmonic from 1937-51. The next year he was to make a famous set of the Beethoven sonatas with Kempff. This recording of the concerto comes from the next year.

Wolfgang Schneiderhan

Schneiderhan's stereo recordings are far better known, not least because he had introduced his own adaptation of Beethoven's cadenzas for the piece. The composer did not write those cadenzas directly for the violin concerto, but rather for his adaptation of that work for the piano. But here we have what I believe are the cadenzas by Joseph Joachim. (Please correct me if I am mistaken.)

In her obituary for Schneiderhan, Anne Inglis wrote in The Guardian, "Wolfgang Schneiderhan’s first commercial recording of the Beethoven Concerto (under Paul van Kempen, for DG) was long considered a benchmark: its purity, dignity and sense of inner calm were often favourably compared with the more extrovert, even glamorous qualities claimed by its various rivals."

The truthful sound from 1953 is well in tune with the performance of Schneiderhan and the Berliners under van Kempen.

Piano Concerto No. 4

Wilhelm Kempff (1895-1991) elicited superlatives from the critics throughout his life and thereafter. Here's Dabid Mermelstein in the Wall Street Journal: "The German pianist Wilhelm Kempff was blessed with more attributes than any artist seems entitled to, even a great one like him. Intelligence, grace, tonal beauty, technical aplomb and interpretive rigor were hallmarks of his playing."

Wilhelm Kempff

Kempff recorded both mono and stereo Beethoven concerto cycles. "His stereo set from 1961, with Ferdinand Leitner conducting, still rightly sits prominently on many record shelves," Mermelstein wrote. "And were I sent to that proverbial desert island, I wouldn’t want to be without his mono survey from 1953, with Paul van Kempen on the podium. I cannot recall another cycle that possesses authority and poetry in such equal measure."

The pianist was inclined to ruminate about music. Here is what he said about the opening of the fourth concerto in 1951: "The orchestra is silent. But is not the piano also silent in its own way? These first bars should not really be played at all; it is just a listening to the soul ... There is infinite charm in this allegro moderato, in which Beethoven proves his genius as a composer. Everything is spiritual, and even the dramatic development only serves to show what peace of soul really is."

I am inclined to prefer the more straightforward approaches of Maurizio Pollini and Noel Mewton-Wood.

Ad in The Gramophone

But the Kempff-van Kempen recording is rightfully considered a classic, although not uniformly. The critic of The Gramophone, Malcolm MacDonald, complained that the first movement lacked "effortless repose" and that the cadenzas - which I believe are Kempff's own - were "unsuitable."

Here, too, the sound is excellent. These recordings come from my collection and Internet Archive.

LINK

Nutcrackers with Van Kempen and Lehmann

The Pacific Northwest Ballet production

For those of us who can never have too many Nutcracker Suites, here are two from leading mid-century conductors, Paul van Kempen and Fritz Lehmann.

Both maestros chose the suite as constructed by Tchaikovsky himself, designated as Op. 71a. It includes the Miniature Overture, the March, the Dance of the Super-Plum Fairy, the Russian, Arabian and Chinese Dances, the Dance of the Reed Flutes and the Waltz of the Flowers. 

Also on this blog, Op. 71a can be found as performed by the Chicago Symphony and Frederick Stock and the Royal Philharmonic and Sir Thomas Beecham. (The latter is newly remastered.) Finally, Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops came up with a different and equally delightful Nutcracker Suite No. 2 in 1949, available here.

More about the Van Kempen and Lehmann recordings below.

Paul van Kempen and the Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra

Paul van Kempen

The Dutch conductor Paul van Kempen (1893-1955) spent most of his career working in Germany, a fact that made him less than popular when he returned to the Netherlands for conducting engagements after the war. He was the principal conductor of the Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra from 1934-42, making this set for Deutsche Grammophon in 1939.

Despite being the second-ranked orchestra in its home city (the best known is the Staatskapelle Dresden), the Philharmonic did well here, as did DG's sound engineers. I would only question the leaden tempo for the Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy.

This transfer comes from what I believe is a postwar pressing on DG's main label; the original issue was on its Polydor imprint.

Fritz Lehmann and the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra

Fritz Lehmann

Fritz Lehmann (1904-56) was another busy conductor who died too young. An enthusiast of Baroque music and early advocate of period performance practices, much of his recorded legacy is from the classical and Romantic periods. DG kept him busy but he also recorded for other labels.

This Nutcracker Suite comes from a July 1951 DG session with the Munich Philharmonic. As with the Dresden Philharmonic, the Munich ensemble may be the second-best known orchestra in its home city. The Bavarian State Radio Orchestra perhaps has a higher profile internationally.

EP cover

Like Van Kempen, Lehmann was a highly skilled conductor whose performance with the excellent Munich orchestra will give much pleasure.

This transfer is from the original 78s; DG also issued the set on EPs and LPs with a variety of colorful covers that you can view in the download. One is at right.

Both of these sets were recent addition to the lossless files that can be found on Internet Archive. As always, I've cleaned them up for presentation here.

Van Kempen Conducts Brahms

Here's another release from American Decca's budget 4000 Series from the early 1950s, which I am presenting here occasionally.

Van Kempen

Much of Decca's classical output at the time originated with Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft, and this is an example. It is a good set of the Brahms Hungarian Dances led by Paul van Kempen, a talented Dutch conductor, who is not that well known today.

The German company recorded the Berlin Philharmonic in the Jesus-Christus-Kirche for this release, with the sessions taking place in September 1952. The sound is good.

Original DGG cover

Much of van Kempen's career was in Germany, including posts in Aachen and Dresden during the war, and so he was controversial in the Netherlands in the postwar years, with one of his concerts there reputedly disrupted by protests.

Van Kempen died at age 62 in 1955.