STRAUSS Family: Waltzes and Polkas, Vol. I – Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra/Clemens Krauss
Opus Kura OPK 7008, 77:43 [Distr. by Albany] ****:
Clemens Krauss (1893-1954) retains an elite position–along with Fricsay, Knappertsbusch, Kleiber, and Krips–as the master of the Viennese style, an impeccable interpreter of the Strauss family, whether in the form of ballroom dances or operettas. No less gifted in the music of Beethoven, Richard Strauss, Brahms, and Wagner, Krauss bequeathed us relatively few commercial inscriptions, but the set of New Years’ programs he recorded for Decca remain essential reference points for any grasp of the Strauss ethos. Those whose record collections extend back in time to “Three Delightful Waltzes” on 78 rpm recall with what loving, crackling fervor the VPO rendered the Strauss “Morning Papers” in the inimitable Krauss manner.
The fourteen selections come from the Krauss baton 1950-1952, the programs intended to simulate the New Year’s concerts Krauss led as a matter of course after his “rehabilitation” two-year hiatus from conducting activities. We can easily relish the deliberately stylized pieces–particularly in the Hungarian manner–of such pieces as The Gypsy Baron Overture and the Eljen a Magyar Polka, with their sizzling modal harmonies and csardas rhythms. But no less beguiling are the Krauss moments of diaphanous, understated magic, as in Die Libelle (“Dragonfly”) Polka, the Pizzicato Polka, The Voices of Spring, and the utterly transparent zither and strings evolutions in Tales From the Vienna Woods. Whether the zither solo is from the legendary Anton Karas remains a mystery, although he did appear in a recording for Willi Boskovsky.
The other side of Johann and Josef Strauss, the militant and exotic, have their facile representatives in the Feuerfest Polka and the Egyptian March, the latter a brilliant moment of orchestral éclat a step away from Mozart and Beethoven’s janissary escapades. The Village Swallows of Austria Waltz swoops and swoons with bird colors in flute and woodwinds; and we literally vacation in tempered colors in Vergnueganzug, a polka of capering energies. The Moulinet Polka, with its clip-clop ostinato, sails whimsically across the boulevards of the imagination. The opening number, Mein Lebenslauf ist Lieb’ und Luest, rather says it all, its pomp and ceremony a sweeping paean to Viennese hedonism, which transcends its own luxuriant roulades in spite of itself.
— Gary Lemco
