This morning, my listening post is the cafeteria of a local grocery store chain, a Starbucks Blonde Roast (“That’ll be a pour over. Is that okay?”) and a blueberry muffin (“It’s good warmed up a little”) on my right. Nothing but a sunny day streaming in on my left.
The sun.
Wow. What is that luminous orb in the sky?
I believe I’ve mentioned before, but it’s worth repeating: a local meteorologist reported the month of November in Michigan featured sun only 10% of the time. To put that in more depressing terms, it is cloudy in Grand Rapids 90% of the time.
We might as well live in Seattle.
So while I sit here basking in sunshine for the first time in many weeks, sipping on an overpriced coffee, I’m listening to Austrian conductor Herbert von Karajan (1908-1989), Berliner Philharmoniker, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 8 in F major.
I’ve been wary of Maestro Karajan from the get-go, not wanting to succumb to the Cult of Karajan, or Karajan Worship Syndrome (KWS, for short). So many people with whom I’ve spoken either love Maestro Karajan or they hate him, with most – especially in online posts – revering him to the point of attaching god-like status to his performances.
So I was very wary, and quite strict. I only awarded “Huzzah!” ratings to his performances when I was truly blown away, when my head bobbed, my heart stirred, and my toes tapped.
I’ve encountered Maestro Karajan’s legendary 1963 cycle seven times previously to this morning, on…
Day 10. Rating: “Huzzah!”
Day 28. Rating: “Huzzah!”
Day 46. Rating: “Huzzah!”
Day 64. Rating: “Huzzah!”
Day 82. Rating: “Meh!”
Day 100. Rating: “Huzzah!”
Day 118. Rating: “Meh!”
Even with me trying my best not to like Maestro Karajan, I still managed to rate his performances “Huzzah!” five times out of seven.
What will this sunny day bring? Will my spirits be so buoyed by the sunshine that I’ll think more highly of this performance than is warranted? Possibly. That’s how subjective music is.
Before I go any further, I’d like to offer a brief excerpt from Richard Osborne’s super liner notes:
Few symphonies are launched in a more exhilarating fashion than Beethoven’s Eighth. Like the poet Donne, Beethoven tosses his material down before us with irresistible plainness.
No wonder that Goethe, when he encountered Beethoven for the first time, though him “an entirely un-controlled person”! Artistically, though, Beethoven is thrillingly in control.
Herbert on Karajan, whose reading of the Eighth has always been intensely thrilling, a performance which abates no jot of the outer movements’ inexorable energy, yet which is wonderfully easy and assured within.
Beethoven wrote his symphonies in four parts (except for the Sixth, which is in five). The time breakdown of this particular one (Symphony No. 8 in F major), from this particular conductor (Karajan, at age 54) and this particular orchestra (Berliner Philharmoniker), at this particular time in history (January 1962) on this particular record label (Deutsche Grammophon) is as follows:
I. Allegro vivace e con brio…………………………………..9:17
II. Allegretto scherzando…………………………………….3:54
III. Tempo di menuetto……………………………………….5:54
IV. Allegro vivace………………………………………………….7:07
Total running time: 26:12
My Rating:
Recording quality: 5 (slight tape hiss and ambient sounds; yet, a very fine recording despite its age of over 50 years, typically good DG-label quality)
Overall musicianship: 5 (a tad quick, but boisterous, dynamic, playful, and robust)
CD liner notes: 5 (Nice, thick 54-page booklet with lengthy essays by Richard Osborne about each symphony, translated into English, German, and French, and all pertinent technical info)
How does this make me feel: 5 (“Huzzah!”)
I was hooked from the first 60 seconds.
The orchestra sounds the way I want an orchestra to sound.
I think it has to do with the violins, how they’re recorded.
I respond best to an orchestra recorded with soaring violins that sound like they number in the hundreds of players, a big sound that gives me chills.
Yes. That might be it: the violins.
Overall, this is a fine recording. Only a little tape hiss. Otherwise, crisp and highly engaging.
Movement I is the winner here. That and Movement IV. Both are energetic to the point of muscular, yet compelling, with moments of sweetness and delightful melody.
This is an inspired, magical, worthy performance.
“Huzzah!”