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MAESTRO FURIOSO By Lee Alperin   "Don’t ever think you’ve succeeded. Always try to do better – otherwise, drop dead." Arturo Toscanini, 1946 La Scala He had been considered a god, also an indulged, rigid tyrant.&nbsp

MAESTRO FURIOSO


By Lee Alperin

He had been considered a god, also an indulged, rigid tyrant.  For most people, though, especially those who knew practically nothing about him, Arturo Toscanini [1867-1957] had been synonymous with conducting the way Caruso was for opera and, one suspects, Callas for temperament.  It has been more than fifty years since Toscanini conducted his final concert, ending an unparalleled performing career of close to seventy years, one that began in 1886.  The year 2007 marked the half century anniversary of his death.

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Yearning for the Unattainable: A Comparison of Jussi Björling's Four Recorded Performances of Beethoven's "Adelaide" By Carla Ramsey If you want a lifetime companion of the feathered variety, all you have to do is show up when a duc

Yearning for the Unattainable: A Comparison of Jussi Björling's Four Recorded Performances of Beethoven's "Adelaide"


By Carla Ramsey

If you want a lifetime companion of the feathered variety, all you have to do is show up when a duckling hatches. By a neural process known as "imprinting," the baby bird will bond to and faithfully follow the first object it sees -- whether it's mama duck, a human, or even the family dog -- upon emerging from its shell. Perhaps you have had a similar experience with a favorite piece of music: you became "imprinted" by the first performance you were exposed to, to such an extent that it subconsciously became the standard by which you judge all others. In my case, a first exposure to Beethoven's "Adelaide" (and to JB) was via a CD of his 1958 Carnegie Hall concert. Having fallen in love with this miraculous voice, I soon thereafter purchased the four-CD EMI set through which I discovered JB's 1939 version of the song. But what a difference! Compared to the 1958 performance, this rendition sounded to my ears somewhat sentimental and overwrought. Had I, like the baby duckling, simply become "imprinted" by the first version I was exposed to, irrationally preferring it to all others? Or was my musical intuition correct in telling me that the 1958 performance was, indeed, superior? Were there intermediary interpretations in the years between the two performances? These were the questions I decided to explore by investigating the four extant versions of the song in JB's recorded legacy.

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