Mendelssohn Symphony—No. 1 in C minor, Op. 11. Symphony—No. 2 in B flat major, Op. 52, "Lobgesang" (with Elizabeth Connell (sop) Karita Mattila (sop) Hans-Peter Blochwitz (ten)). Symphony—No. 3 in A minor, Op. 56, "Scottish". Symphony—No. 4 in A major, Op. 90, "Italian". Symphony—No. 5 in D major, Op. 107, "Reformation". The Hebrides Overture, Op. 26, "Fingal's Cave". A Midsummer Night's Dream, Op. 21—Overture. The Fair Melusina, Op. 32—Overture. Octet in E flat major, Op. 20—Scherzo. London Symphony Orchestra / Claudio Abbado.

DG digital (Full price) (LP) 415 353-1GH4 (four records, nas) (Cassette) 415 353-4GH3 (CD) 415 353-2GH4. Booklet enclosed.

Selected comparison

BPO, Karajan (12/75) 2740 128

Claudio Abbado's 1968 coupling with the LSO of Mendelssohn's two most popular symphonies, the Scottish, No. 3 and the Italian, No. 4, has rightly been a staple item in the catalogue ever since Decca issued it (JB103, 7/82). It offers not just a generous coupling, but exceptionally stylish and fresh performances beautifully recorded. Here, with a change of label, Abbado and the same orchestra reinforce all the good impressions of that earlier issue in a comprehensive collection of Mendelssohn's mature symphonies plus three overtures and the orchestral arrangement (in shortened form) of the Scherzo from his String Octet, which at the first British performance in 1829 of the Symphony No. 1 Mendelssohn substituted for the Minuet third movement.

On CD at least, if you have a programming facility on your player, you can now quite easily insert that Scherzo instead of the Minuet, and the idea of having it as an appendix to the symphony, though not new, is a good one. As it happens, the only direct rival to this set, currently listed, comes on the same DG label (only on LP) from Karajan and the Berlin Philharmonic, who unlike Abbado has no extra items in his set and (very characteristically) observes none of the exposition repeats. On CD at least Abbado observes them all—as marked in Nos. 1, 3 and 4—but curiously the LP version of No. 1 omits the exposition repeat, an interesting case of the equivalents not being exactly alike. On his earlier Decca LP he fails to include the exposition repeat in the Scottish (where the side is already 36 minutes long) but did so in the much more important case of the Italian, where the repeat involves a lead-back of 23 bars, rarely if ever heard until the new taste for observing repeats encouraged recording artists to include them.

For these detailed objective reasons the Abbado set now supercedes the Karajan, and the excellent modern digital recording is far preferable to Karajan's Berlin sound, fair enough to Karajan's seventies Berlin sound, fair enough for its time but thinner and less realistic on high-violin tone. On performance there are many points where Karajan, masterly and individual, shows keener imagination than his plainer, more direct younger rival, and the Karajan set is still one to cherish, but overall the new one must plainly be preferred. Between CD and LP there are more advantages than that simple exposition repeat, for DG have managed to fit the whole of Symphony No. 2, Lobgesang ("Hymn of Praise"), a few seconds short of 75 minutes, on to a single CD, the longest I have yet encountered in the new medium. On LP, Lobgesang starts on Side 2 after The Hebrides Overture, and then stretches over Sides 3 and 4, with a break between the second and third instrumental movements, nowhere near so convenient an arrangement.

It is in that choral symphony that the advantage of the wide-ranging digital sound comes out most strikingly, in clarifying the big tuttis with choir, at the same time providing extra weight of sound, notably in the way that pedal notes on the organ come over in a rich and realistic way, particularly impressive on CD. As to interpretation, Abbado in the first instrumental movement is a shade slower than Karajan, and conveys a keener sense of joy with a wide expressive range. The yearning 6/8 movement is the more haunting too at Abbado's much slower speed, and though Abbado's slower speed for the Andante religioso brings obvious dangers of sweetness and sentimentality, he manages to avoid them completely with his warm but unmannered phrasing. Again, in the choral finale Abbado's speeds tend to be a degree more relaxed and the sense of joyful release is all the keener, when in response to the tenor's calls of "Huter, ist die Nact bald hin?" ("Watchman, will the night soon pass?") the soprano gives her radiant call of "Die Nacht ist vergangen ("The night has departed"). Elizabeth Connell, not a singer I would have expected here, is the more tenderly affecting by being placed at the point slightly at a distance, and then the chorus comes in with even more impact to signal the arrival of day. Earlier Connell and the second soprano, Karita Mattila, are nicely matched in the duet with chorus, "Ich harrete des Herrn" ("I waited on the Lord"). Though their voices by natural timbre are not so silvery or pure as one ideally wants, the recording helps to give them a sweetness just as apt for the music. Hans-Peter Blochwitz's tenor, not unlike Ian Partridge's, may be on the light side for the key tenor part, but the tonal beauty and natural feeling for words and phrasing are a delight. So too is the singing of the London Symphony Chorus, particularly beautiful in the chorale, "Nun danket alle Gott". If at the end Karajan draws together the threads of argument more powerfully than Abbado, Abbado's expansiveness and the more luminous choral sound on the new version makes for a richer result, which equally has one forgetting the obvious shortcomings of the work with its unavoidable element of Victorian blandness.

It is that avoidance of Victorian blandness which is striking in Abbado's accounts of Nos. 1 and 5. In No. 1 he is even tougher and more biting than Karajan in the C minor first movement, slower and simpler in the second, returning to a tough, dark manner for the Minuet and finale. This is a performance which has one marvelling that Mendelssohn could have ever have countenanced the idea of the Octet Scherzo as substitute, a piece so different in mood. The first movement of the Reformation finds Abbado more biting and dramatic than Karajan, and crisper and again quicker in the second movement Allegro vivace. Abbado then fails to match the beauty of Karajan in the slow movement, treating it more as a light interlude before his broad account of the finale.

In both the Scottish and Italian Symphonies Abbado's earlier versions clearly come into contention, but where in the Scottish the differences of interpretation are relatively unimportant—mainly a question of the slow movement being a little slower and heavier this time—those in the Italian are more striking. Here the outer movements are fractionally faster than before, but that difference brings just a hint of breathlessness in the playing of the LSO, where before it was so sparking. By contrast the noticeably faster speed for the second movement Andante this time sounds fresher, and I prefer the marginally faster speed for the third movement too. And whatever my disappointment over the outer movements, this is now the most centrally recommendable version of the Italian on CD, less distinctive than Sinopoli's with the Philharmonia on the same laber (410 862-2GH, 4/84) but avoiding the quirkiness of his third movement. As for the overtures they too bring fresh and attractive performances, very fast and fleet in the fairy music of A Midsummer Nights Dream and with the contrast between first and second subjects of The Hebrides underlined. This has been one of Abbado's biggest recording projects with the orchestra of which he is still Music Director, and its success, I hope, will encourage him to continue using London as one of his recording centres alongside Chicago, Vienna and Milan.
EG