Shostakovich · Symphony No. 8 · LSO · André Previn
APE+CUE | Booklet | 252 MB
APE+CUE | Booklet | 252 MB
This, Andre Previn's second recording of the work, arrived just too late to be included in my Gramophone ''Collection'' survey (1/95) in which his earlier HMV version (10/73—nla) stood up remarkably well. Admirers of that youthful account may be disturbed by the extent to which Previn's view has changed, or rather slowed, in the intervening years. Whether or not it has deepened, the interpretation has lost some of its sense of urgency. In particular, that reckless second scherzo has been replaced by something more obviously 'faithful' to the letter of the score: the conductor's forceful sobriety nowadays recalls Bernard Haitink's. Elsewhere he can be positively glacial, generally closer to Kurt Sanderling in matters of tempo. Previn was and is reluctant to burden the discourse with the sort of interventionist phrase-making which sometimes comes with this territory, but so much of the spontaneity has evaporated that an impression of undue literalism is not always avoided. The present performance was recorded in October 1992, the sessions coming at the very start of his tenure as LSO Conductor Laureate, too soon to expect a full recrudescence of the old rapport (notwithstanding some radiant pianissimos from the strings).
The first movement is imposing yet not quite as immaculate as it might be to justify the ostensibly monolithic approach. Its central climax, opulent as sound, lacks emotional inevitability so that the cor anglais solo, eloquent as it is, has to function in a kind of limbo. While both scherzos are strong and confidently articulated, their potential for display is self-consciously repressed. The impact of the second is lessened by a curious mistake in its central episode, the first trumpet misreading an A flat as A natural in bar 305 (3'41'').
The Largo is now very deliberate, without however losing all sense of pulse and line—a risk even in less extreme readings. Here again, Previn elicits some wonderfully sustained quiet playing (there is a typically exquisite horn solo) and, if the consolatory mood suggests Leith Hill Place rather than Leningrad under siege, Eliahu Inbal is warmer still. Previn's finale remains cogent, attractively unforced in the earlier stages without perhaps developing sufficient momentum, though there is certainly no lack of weight. In the violin solo which leads into the mysterious C-D-C coda, he has abandoned the aberrant ascending line to be found in earlier editions of the score (two bars before fig. 172). But, strangely, he now ignores the comma which marks off the closing Andante as a discrete equivocation. Could this be because Mravinsky does the same thing? It seems unlikely—given the tenor of a sometimes marmoreal reading which (not untypically) consigns the forward-thrusting Soviet tradition of Mravinsky and Kondrashin to the dustbin of outmoded performance practice.
DG's recording was made in All Saints', Tooting and incorporates much more hall resonance than did Previn's analogue LP. The effect is darkly gorgeous and just a little lacking in freshness. Which you might think rather suits the character of the music-making. This is not by any means a bad disc and newcomers may well find it more appealing than its occidental rivals. For me it nevertheless comes as something of a disappointment.' Reviewed: Gramophone 3/1995
Symphony no. 8 in C minor, op. 65
London Symphony Orchestra · André Previn