Customer Reviews

Toccata & Fugue in D Minor

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I am trying to work out why my reaction to this live concert from 1972 is so much more positive than my response to the EMI Bach Stokowski disc recorded in 1957-8. They offer three items in common, without two of which no programme of Stokowski's transcriptions would be complete: the Passacaglia in C minor and the Toccata and Fugue in D minor. I should resent the fact that EMI gives us 71 minutes of music whereas Decca manages only 44 - but I don't, mainly because the quality of both sound and performance in the latter are markedly superior and you can pick it up for pennies on Marketplace.

I found the performance on the EMI disc to be both lugubrious and saccharine, whereas the extra verve and edge provided by the Czech Philharmonia live raises the temperature, while the New York Philharmonic in disguise seem to be playing while either holding their noses or withholding their full commitment. The rasp of the Czech woodwind and the resiny twang of their strings impart much more character to these showpieces and help the listener to forget whether Bach would have approved and simply revel in the buzz of the occasion.

EMI boasts "Full Dimensional Sound", whereas Decca is of course rubbing the listener's nose in the orgy of close-up multi-miking that was Phase 4. You can hear the flautists gasp for breath, the harpists are sitting a yard away from your seat, every instrument is mercilessly spotlight - and I love it, given that it's no more artificial that any other attempt to capture the impact of live sound, which is always doomed owing to that miracle of human physiology, the human ear; as a compromise it's as good as any and it is certainly apt as a vehicle for Stokowski's merry-go-round of instrumental colour, with every section taking its turn in the limelight.

So it is to this disc I shall return when I want a wallow in the Old Magician's heterodox homage to the Old Master.

"The entire human race, both present and future, is condemned to death. All the cities that have ever held dominion or have been the splendid jewels of empires . . . some day men will ask where they were. And they will be swept away by various kinds of destruction: some will be ruined by wars, others will be destroyed by idleness and a peace that ends in sloth . . . All these fertile plains will be blotted out of sight by a sudden overflowing of the sea or the subsiding of the land will sweep them away suddenly into the abyss."

So speaks Seneca in his LXXI Moral Epistle. Who would not aver his prediction? Pompeii, Timgad, Leptis Magna, Ctesiphon, New York, London and what the hell, Dandenong. Some might say that for all his farsightedness, Seneca would have been wiser if he had focused on more immediate threats. After all, 'the closer to Caesar, the greater the fear', particularly when a Nero wears the purple . . . . .

On that day when homo sapiens is no more, if someone asks, "what of this destructive little species - did they leave anything of value behind?" hopefully a tattered copy of the Passacaglia and Fugue, BWV 582 will come into view. It is an ornament of mankind. It is reparation in itself for our follies and crimes. Theologians inform us that all dogmas and creeds fall short of God who is inexpressible in mere words. In this one work, Johann Sebastian Bach comes closer than anyone to netting the presence "who walks in the Garden in the cool of the evening."

Stokowski, the old magician, is an acquired taste. One would not dare to mention his name in the august presence of John Eliot Gardiner: he gets rather snooty about such things. If you are not allergic to Stokowski's wizardry, this is the collection to have. It is Miltonic from the first note to the closing bar. The scale and fury of D Minor Toccata and Fugue bring Paradise Lost to mind:

"Forthwith upright he rears from off the Pool
His mighty Stature; on each hand the flames
Drivn backward slope thir pointing spires, and rowld
In billows, leave i'th' midst a horrid Vale.
Then with expanded wings he stears his flight
Aloft, incumbent on the dusky Air
That felt unusual weight, till on dry Land
He lights, if it were Land that ever burn'd
With solid, as the Lake with liquid fire;
And such appear'd in hue, as when the force
Of subterranean wind transports a Hill
Torn from Pelorus, or the shatter'd side
Of thundring Ętna, whose combustible
And fewel'd entrals thence conceiving Fire,
Sublim'd with Mineral fury, aid the Winds,
And leave a singed bottom all involv'd
With stench and smoak: Such resting found the sole
Of unblest feet.

The Czech Philharmonic play accordingly: they have never made a better record. And if you listen closely to 8'16" of the Passacaglia and Fugue, one is afforded a vision that Plotinus attained only twice in his lifetime.

Marvellous stuff for those whose who have ears to hear.

I know what you're saying. Another Bach orchestral transcription record by Leopold Stokowski? It seems like he played and recorded this music countless times before. The inspiration for this survey came from Decca's Phase 4 stereo recording technology in the 1970s. Phase 4 is notable for it's obsessive multi-miking and extreme separation of instrumental detail. It sounds like the entire orchestra is on top of you and assaulting your ears from every angle. It is gaudy and garish and extremely over the top, continuing Stokowski's reputation for being a showman and entertainer.

Most of the program is devoted to J.S. Bach but with some additional shorter pieces as encores. A Pavane by Willam Byrd, a march by Jeremiah Clarke, a song transcribed from Duparc and orchestral versions of piano pieces by the likes of Schubert, Chopin, Tchaikovsky and last but not least Rachmaninov and his Prelude in C sharp minor.

It is the music of Bach that makes a monumental impression. The famous Toccata and Fugue in D minor here is not as suave as on Stokowski's EMI collection but it makes up for that due to it's crushing weight of sound. Ths shorter Bach prelude and chorales play as interludes between the other titanic behemoths, the Prelude and Fugue in A minor and my absolute favorite selection, the Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor. It's probably the most spectacular performace on the disc, multi-miked to excess with every woodwind and brasswind instrument garishly spotlit, all with the support of the strings and percussion. This is truly revolting if you're a Bach purist and yet it's such a dramatic good time that you can forgive Stokowski for his mannerisms and showmanship. The orchestra for all the Bach pieces is the Czech Philharmonic and their characteristic reedy, raspy woodwinds are on full display. The London Symphony Orchestra plays all the encores. This Stokowski collection is not for the faint of heart or those who can't take sensationalism for it's own sake. I consider myself a purist so I will always prefer the original organ versions. However, if you want the walls of your house to shake and the neighbors to run in fear, this is ideal listening material.