BRAHMS: 21 Hungarian Dances (arr. Joachim) – Oscar Shumsky, violin/ Frank Maus, piano
Nimbus NI 2552, 51:24 [Distr. by Allegro] ****:
Connoisseurs of the violin know the name Oscar Shumsky (1917-2000) to have been someone special in music, a world class prodigy, working musician and pedagogue of the first order. I first heard his sound on some rare 78s of four songs by Rachmaninoff with tenor James Melton, with Shumsky playing violin obbligato. When I informed Shumsky–who was then making a rare visit to perform with the Atlanta Symphony–that I had a taped transcription of that Rachmaninoff set, he offered to trade with me: a copy of the tape for a copy of his own unedited recording of the Brahms B-flat Major Quartet with the Primrose Quartet from 1941.
Brahms is the subject of this 1998 reissue from Nimbus: the complete Hungarian Dances that Brahms wrote–albeit on gypsy tunes–while under the spell of Hungarian violinist Eduard Remenyi circa 1869. Shumsky (rec. for MusicMasters) performs on his favorite instrument, his 1715 Ex-Pierre Rode, sometimes referred to as “The Duke of Cambridge.” The arrangements from two-piano scores Joseph Joachim completed with the full cooperation of Brahms himself, and many fine touches of rhythm and vocal inflection saturate the dances, some with heady counterpoint. Frank Maus, Shumsky’s pianist, was the staff pianist of the Berlin Philharmonic.
From the opening G Minor Hungarian Dance, we become transported to someplace between the Vienna Philharmonic and a gypsy cabaret. While only numbers 11, 14, and 16 are relatively original, Brahms took the borrowed folk tunes and infused them with verve and a classical, ternary form. In Shumsky’s wickedly strident and fanciful realizations, we can hear all sorts of beer-hall and polka rhythms, several of which–especially No. 15 in A Major— would influence Scott Joplin in his creation of Ragtime. Shumsky applies portamento, tempo rubato, ad libitum cadenzas, and various stretches of the musical bar-line to accomplish his dazzlingly fecund performances: just listen to edgy velocity he yanks out of the popular No. 5 in G Minor. Razor-sharp intonation and colossal double stops move the A Major No. 7, some of which might have touched Sarasate.
For metric irregularity and touch of a Chopin mazurka, try the No. 8 in A Minor. I find No. 12 in D Minor captivating in its busy phrases, classically balanced. The D Minor No. 14 in fact unveils some modal harmonies much closer to the Magyar spirit that would later define Bela Bartok’s idea of “Hungarian.” The aforementioned A Major No. 15 clearly takes its invention from Liszt, who used it in his Hungarian Rhapsody No. 14. With No. 17 we have a piece we can compare a version by another supreme master: Jascha Heifetz. Each has his own idea of rhythmic pulse, though I find Shumsky’s slashing line more vivid than the patrician Heifetz. The coy step-wise gait of No. 19 in A Minor benefits from pungent rhythmic jabs and tip of the bow intonation from Shumsky. The No. 20 in D Minor offers a symphonic sound, in double stops at first, then in jagged metrics and wicked syncopations that have him and pianist Maus working hard. Last, the E Minor–the Brahms key for valediction–here, an impish dance in cross rhythms that has some fine interchange between Shumsky and Maus, the last pages quite pointing to a sound Kodaly would simply relish.
— Gary Lemco
