Jascha Horenstein in Brahms

I have written before in this blog about Jascha Horenstein, a great conductor who never had a permanent conducting post, never had a prestigious recording contract, but who – in his chosen repertoire, was fully the equal of his luckier contemporaries such as Furtwängler, Klemperer, Szell, Reiner or von Karajan. I was extremely pleased to meet him again in good recorded sound with a good orchestra. The new Pristine Audio transfer of his 1962 recording of the LSO has to be one of the best Brahms first symphonies ever recorded. All Horenstein's familiar attributes are there: an impeccable sense of dynamics, an intelligent knowledge of structure, a sure instinct for phrasing, and a sense of orchestral balance that sees the symphony sitting on a solid foundation from the bass line – a bit in the Furtwängler mode, and no doubt (!) helped by the fact that, in 1962, my father was a double bass player with the LSO. I saw Horenstein in person only once, at the Albert Hall in London in 1959 when he conducted the LSO and hundreds of others in Mahler's grotesque eighth symphony, but this image of a small, elderly man controlling vast forces calmly but imperiously has never left me. This is a Brahms first symphony to set alongside classics such as Furtwängler and Klemperer.

Also on the Pristine transfer is an excellent sounding 1962 recording of Horenstein and the LSO accompanying David Oistrakh in Bruch's splendid Scottish Fantasy. Alas, this has to be the dreariest recordings of this lovely work ever recorded. All concerned – soloist, conductor, orchestra – sound as though they are just going through the motions, at rehearsal speed in all four movements. I have never been a big fan of David Oistrakh; he was technically a truly remarkable violinist, but here his sound is so bland and uninvolved it could almost be Itzakh Perlman playing. We are a long way from the passion of a Heifetz, a Rabin or a Kogan. Thoroughly boring, and incredibly slow !