Myra Hess (piano)
BBC Symphony Orchestra
(Leader, Paul Beard )
Conductor, Sir Malcolm Sargent
Beethoven
Overture: Coriolanus
7.41 app. Piano Concerto No. 3, in C minor
8.19 app. Symphony No. 4, in B flat
From the Royal Albert Hall , London
The ' Coriolanus ' Overture, which belongs to the year 1807. was inspired not by Shakespeare's Coriolanus, but by a play on the same subject by Hemrich von Collin, an Austrian dramatist. Like Shakespeare's play, this was based on Plutarch, though it took the form of a dramatic discussion rather than a play of action.
Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto, written in 1800, is the work of a young man rejoicing In his strength. The opening movement, sturdy and forthright, is followed by a Largo, in the remote key of E major, which has a magic all its own. The final Rondo abounds in energy and high spirits, and culminates in an irresistibly gay Presto in six-eight time.
In the introduction to Beethoven's Fourth
Symphony grey clouds seem to drift across the sky and the mood is one of uncertainty. But the sun soon breaks through, bringing ' glad confident morning ' ; and the main theme of the Allegro vivace scampers along, buoyant and carefree. The Adagio is so tender and deeply felt that commentators are almost unantmous in ascribing its inspiration to Countess Therese von Brunswick, with whom Beethoven was in love. ' One is seized, from the first bars,' said Berlioz, ' with an emotion that by the end becomes shattering in its intensity.' But besides its loveliness and passion the movement reveals a supreme mastery of the problems of design. A Minuet follows, but no such music, strenuous and peremptory, was ever heard at the cultivated court of Louis XIV. As for the finale, its energy is inexhaustible; the spirited phrases scurry by, endearing themselves in their course, and pausing only at the end to bid us a playfully touching farewell. Harold Rutland