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From: greg@olivej.UUCP (Greg Paley)
Newsgroups: net.music.classical
Subject: Toscanini
Message-ID: <162@olivej.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 1-May-84 18:37:48 EDT
Article-I.D.: olivej.162
Posted: Tue May  1 18:37:48 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 4-May-84 00:13:43 EDT
Organization: Olivetti ATC, Cupertino, Ca
Lines: 61


For a long time, I've been finding many of the Toscanini
recordings, despite major flaws in the recorded sound, more
satisfying performances than more recent, better recorded
ones.

There is a very great danger in believing stereotypes without
proving them with your own ears.  The image of Toscanini
foisted on us by many critics and other writers is of a
martinet, driving ruthlessly forward with everything harsh,
rushed, and furious.  My ears tell me, even through the brash,
strident sound of the recordings, that although his tempi
were on the fast side, they were maintained with a marvelous
plasticity which allowed for subtlety of inflection within
a framework of musical continuity and cohesion.  This can be
heard on the sonically flawed recordings.  What cannot be heard
is what has been described to me by those who did hear him
conduct in the concert hall - the actual "sound" of the
orchestra (be it NBC, BBC, Philadelphia, or New York Philharmonic)
that was characteristic of his performances.  Several people
have described a transparency of texture and luminescence which
the recording setup adopted by RCA Victor (not to mention
broadcast airchecks) was unable to capture.

A number of his live radio broadcasts was available for a while
(and some are still floating around) as "private" issues of the
Arturo Toscanini Society.  These are highly variable in sound
quality but most, despite noise and distortion, enable one to
hear the greatness of the performances.

Of the recordings issued commercially, the best bets are the
(now out-of-print but still to be found in some shops) German
and English RCA Victrola Toscanini Series, with gold jackets
and serial numbers prefixed by "AT".  The sound on these is
substantially cleaner and more solid than on the domestic
RCA Red Seal and Victrola issues, or what I've heard of the
Japanese import pressings.  A recent Italian "half-speed
mastered" series is, for my taste, to be avoided because,
although no mention of this is made on either the jackets or
record labels, they are electronically reprocessed into
pseudo-stereo.  If you doubt this, listen with headphones.
This adds an artifical spaciousness and reverberation to 
the sound at a considerable cost in clarity and bass solidity.

I find it very interesting that performances of his from the
1930's do not sound "dated" musically, the way that contemporary
performances by Stokowski, Koussevitsky, de Sabata and others
do.  In many ways, Toscanini was a leader in promoting adherence
to the score and elimination of distortions and liberties that
were at that time accepted as tradition.  I find that the
expressive powers of Tchaikovsky, for example, come across much
more strongly when, as in Toscanini's hands, his music is played with
rhythmic precision and clarity of texture rather than the
sentimental quagmire it often becomes with the exaggerations
loaded on by other conductors.

	- Greg Paley