Nathan Milstein: The American Columbia Solo Recordings, Volume 1 = Works by BACH; VITALI; VIVALDI; TARTINI ; NARDINI; PERGOLESI – Nathan Milstein, violinist, Leopold Mittman, piano – Pristine Audio PACM 125 (73:51, complete content listing below) [www.pristineclassical.com] ****:
Producer and Restoration Engineer Mark Obert-Thorn offers the first in a series of three volumes dedicated to the early 78 solo recordings by Russian virtuoso Nathan Milstein (1904-1982), here specifically documents 1935-1938. The series will embrace recordings for Columbia that Milstein cut until 1945, none of which has seen official, commercial release by Columbia or Sony. Obert-Thorn has assembled the Baroque repertory pieces Milstein championed, albeit in editions typical of the Romantic period taste with piano accompaniment – excepting the Bach unaccompanied sonatas and partitas.
While auditioning this latest historic survey from Mark Obert-Thorn, I recalled a brief interview I had in,1977 – at the Goethe Institute, after the recital – with visiting Austrian instrumentalist Eduard Melkus (b. 1928), a leading proponent of historically informed performance practice. I asked Melkus directly his opinion of Nathan Milstein’s solo Bach legacy. “Absolutely virile and commanding, but in a style quite different from my own,” Melkus responded without hesitation. “He enjoys an intuitive sense of Bach’s line and the various tensions required to maintain a fluid pulse. We feel his unerring, expressive rapport with his chosen instrument.” The Adagio from the G Minor Solo Sonata (rec. 21 February 1936) initiates us into such mysteries, projecting as it does a studied aura.
The ensuing Solo Partita No. 2 in D Minor (rec. 27&30 December 1935), Milstein’s earliest recording, exhibits his patented forward drive, given Milstein’s application of bow pressure and refined rubato to bring out the ornamental intensity of Bach’s Sarabande, then moving to the quick, vibrant agitation of the Gigue. Suddenly, we are cast into the throes of the commanding Chaconne, a structure as massive as some Gothic edifice. Milstein negotiates the tripartite form: minor – major – minor, with diatonic and chromatic harmonies in juxtaposition over the course of 64 variations, with a fervor and stamina that testify to his thorough assimilation of the technical demands in the service of graduated expression. Milstein’s tempos, though generally fast, do not smear Bach’s lines, so what may pass as “interior dialogues” among the competing voices has a natural gait and sense of closure. We feel Bach’s consistent abbreviations of the variants’ phrase lengths a natural course of acceleration to a preconceived, monumental conclusion.
It seems that Milstein recorded Vitale’s notable Chaconne in G Minor the very next day, 31 December 1935, with Leopold Mittman, in an edition by Charlier. This version departs from the Ferdinand David (1810-1873) version by deliberately emphasizing the virtuosic nature of the writing. While Mittman advances the basic structure of the bass line, Milstein’s line becomes ever more opulent and ardently expressive, without having sacrificed a palpable sense of intimacy. When the two participants move into the liquid variations, the effect becomes musically mesmerizing.
Ferdinand David, however, does provide the text for Antonio Vivaldi’s five-movement Sonata in A Major, RV 31, recorded by Milstein and Mittman 20 April 1936. The barely 6-minute piece features a sparkling rendition by Milstein, most optimistic in spirit. Only the tiny Adagio betrays any sense of a more serious pathos, soon dispelled by energetic motions of the Gigue: Allegro vivace, which flows effortlessly in pseud-martial cadences. Out of recorded order chronologically, Vivaldi’s Sonata in D Major, RV 9, has the emendations of Ottorino Respighi, from 23 February 1936. Once more, the easy fluency of the Milstein style captivates our attention, his peerless bowing and registration shifts, never losing sight of the fundamental, established pulse. The Largo third movement naturally injects a degree of contemplative beauty that for many devotees of Milstein define his persistent appeal. The Vivace finale enjoys a rustic sonority that places Vivaldi well within a folk idiom that might have charmed Franz Liszt.
Milstein and Mittman then play (rec. 21 February 1936) the so-called “Devil’s Trill” Sonata in G Minor by Guiseppe Tartini, purportedly composed in 1713, but ascribed to a later date around 1740, as indicative of the composer’s mature style. The Kreisler edition adds the cadenza prior to the final movement, Adagio. The abundance of double stops in the writing finds a willing executant in Milstein, who negotiates trills and arpeggiated triads, too, with equal aplomb. Tartini had claimed the music came to him in an apparition in which he lent the Devil his own violin. Milstein’s is a driven, slicing performance, especially in the cadenza, often acerbic in tone, except for the Grave section, in which his florid, vibrant tone makes magic.
The two remaining composers, Pietro Nardini (1722-1793) and Giovanni Pergolesi (1710-1736), come by way of suspect editions, here edited by David and Longo, respectively. Both the Larghetto from Nardini (rec. 31 January 1938) and the tiny Sonata in E by Pergolesi (rec. 29 March 1937) reveal a lyric, Neapolitan character, the latter particularly suited to Milstein’s penchant for quick figurations. The last movement of the Pergolesi obviously appealed to Igor Stravinsky for his Pulcinella. As “encores” to a particularly rich Baroque evening, they exemplify Milstein’s affinity for the style and its occasional digression into galant gestures.
—Gary Lemco
Nathan Milstein: The American Columbia Solo Recordings, Volume 1
BACH:
Sonata No. 1 in G Minor, BWV 1001:
Adagio; Partita No. 2 in D Minor, BWV 1004;
VITALI: Chaconne;
VIVALDI (arr. David):
Sonata in A Major, Op. 2/2, RV 31;
Sonata in D Major, Op. 2/11, RV 9 (arr. Respighi);
TARTINI (arr. Kreisler): Sonata in G Minor “The Devil’s Trill”;
NARDINI (arr. David): Larghetto from Sonata No 2 in D Major;
PERGOLESI (arr. Longo): Sonata No. 12 in E
Nathan Milstein, violinist
Leopold Mittman, piano
From Pristine Audio, restorations of Nathan Milstein on violin, playing baroque compositions. Classical Music Review by Gary Lemco.
