The Missa I bought was from the BBC Legends series, Toscanini at the end of his journey, interpreting music from Beethoven at the end of his. The liner notes were so tiny that I had to OCR them to read them. Here they are:
A Light from Heaven
Although Arturo Toscanini was the most celebrated conductor of the 20th century, his career until he was past 60 unfolded mainly in Italy, the United States and, to a lesser extent, Argentina. Most British music-lovers, for instance, were unable to hear him "live" until 1930, when he performed in London with the touring New York Philharmonic. And not until 1935 did Toscanini, then 68, work with a British ensemble - the five-year old BBC Symphony Orchestra, at Queen's Hall. The remarkable performances heard here were recorded during his first and last series of BBC concerts.
“I think we all felt that Toscanini's coming was the culmination and goal of the BBC. Orchestra's career" recalled Sir Adrian Boult, the ensemble's founder introduced the orchestra to him, and said something about our achieving the desire of every one of us, using the word 'greatest'. At this the Maestro gave me a hearty thump on the shoulders: 'No, no, no, no, no. Not that at all: just an honest musician.' So we all laughed and I left them to it, chose a seat In the circle and waited for the first explosion, wondering what on earth to do when It came. It never came. In fact, the two middle movements of the Brahms E minor [Fourth Symphony] went through without interruption. 'Bene, here, pene,' he said, 'just three things.' He then found three passages, put them right, and went straight on. Toscanini never believed in 'ploughing through' after a thing was once right. [...] Needless to say, the orchestra worshipped the Maestro from that first rehearsal”
The feeling seems to have been mutual, because, during the following four years Toscanini returned to the BBC Symphony four times, for a total of 22 concerts (the repertoire ranged from Corelli to Shostakovich) and seven recording sessions. There would no doubt have been further Toscanini-BBC collaborations had the war not intervened; in the event, the Maestro did not return to London until 1952, when, at the age of 85, he bade Britain farewell in two concerts with the Philharmonia Orchestra at the new Royal Festival Hall.
Toscanini's career had begun in 1886, half a century before the present performances, but only one of the works heard here had figured in his repertoire for more than half of that period: he had conducted Mozart's "Haffner" Symphony as early as 1908, with the Scala Orchestra, and he later performed it with the orchestras of Turin, New York, Vienna, Philadelphia and the NBC. He also made two studio recordings of the piece - a lyrical, flexible (indeed, highly Romantic, by current standards) version with the New York Philharmonic, in 1929, and a somewhat hard-driven one with the NBC Symphony, in 1946. The 1935 BBC performance is close in concept to the Philharmonic version.
Toscanini first conducted the overture to Cherubini's opera-ballet Anacreon in 1925, with the Scala Orchestra, and he subsequently programmed this brilliant if not particularly distinguished piece with eight other orchestras - After the conductor's death, RCA issued a recording of the overture culled from a 1953 NBC Symphony broadcast,
Beethoven's Seventh Symphony did not enter Toscanini's repertoire until he was 49, whereas he had performed all of the other Beethoven symphonies except the Second and the Eighth one to two decades earlier, He conducted the Seventh frequently during the Scala Orchestra's marathon tour of Italy and North America in 1920-21, and he performed it often thereafter throughout Europe and the United States. His 1951 studio recording with the NBC Symphony is well known, and justifiably so, but a 1936 version with the New York Philharmonic is even more justifiably considered one of the greatest symphonic recordings ever made. As with the "Haffner" Symphony, so in this case: the 1935 BBC version is similar in concept to the Philharmonic version, and the orchestra - which had beer working with Toscanini for only two weeks when this performance took place - comes remarkably close to matching the extraordinary virtuosity and unity of intent that the Philharmonic had achieved after ten years with the Maestro. The performance is breathtaking, and the sound quality is excellent for its day.
Toscanini first performed the Missa Solemnis in 1934, with the New York Philharmonic. He conducted it again with the same ensemble In 1935 and 1942, with the Vienna Philharmonic In 1936, the BBC Symphony in 1939 and the NBC Symphony in 1940 and 1953. Like the 1940 NBC version, which has appeared In several unauthorized editions, the BBC performance heard here is brilliantly conceived and realized, but the superior microphone placement used for this recording gives it an edge over its American counterpart, which suffers from an annoying overbalance of trumpets and timpani. Zinka Milanov, the soprano in both versions, blurts out a highly audible wrong note 23 bars before the end of the Credo in this recording, but she is otherwise excellent, as are her colleagues.
The authorized 1953 NBC-RCA studio recording is better, with respect to sound, than any of Toscanini's other Missas, but the performance frequently lacks the breadth of the earlier versions - and the truth is that the Maestro at 86 no longer possessed the astonishing technical control that he had had as a mere septuagenarian. Mary of Toscanini's tempi in the BBC performance are considerably slower than in the 1953 recording but somewhat faster than in the 1940 version. The 1939 version of the Agnus Del, however, is the broadest and, arguably, the most beautiful of the three: this "prayer for inner and outer peace" - thus Beethoven described the final section of the work was Toscanini's last offering to Britain, three months before the war broke out.
Toscanini's interpretation of the Missa Solemnis impressed but also shocked musical London. The Times's critic, for instance, admitted, in an article dated 27 May 1939, that Beethoven had treated voices symphonically in the Mass, but he added: "Many conductors have tried to soften that extravagance, and their audiences have been grateful to them Toscanini exults in it. [ ... ] A staccato is marked in the wind parts of the 'et vitam venturi' theme. The voices were made to imitate the marking in a way which scarcely added to the dignity of the theme, When the 'Allegro con moto' was reached the singers were fairly swept off their feet. It may be questioned whether this extreme devotion to what Beethoven set down is the way to reach to what he imagined. Surely Beethoven made some miscalculations In his score!" But Toscanini, far from gloating over the score's idiosyncrasies or chaining himself to the letter of the musical text, had merely accepted the challenge of Beethoven's startling treatment of musical concepts and emotions. More than a liturgical setting, the Mass in D is a humanistic spiritual quest recounted through complicated, abstract musical symbols. Even when its textures are transparent, its content is so dense that any attempt at a complete, or nearly complete, realization of the work 'is impossible, Toscanini knew this, but he continued to make the attempt - and with a degree of success rarely if ever reached by other interpreters.
Boult said that Toscanini had told him of his "terrific anxiety about the danger of covering the solo violin in the Benedictus. He actually consulted me as to whether he might cut out the sforzandos in brass and timps." But in discussing the Praeludium of the Benedictus, Toscanini also told Boult: "It is so wonderful. I close my eyes when I conduct it - I close my eyes and then the organ comes in at the end and it is a light from heaven." Today's listeners might well use a similar metaphor to describe this entire, riveting and revelatory performance of one of the great masterpieces of the choral-orchestral repertoire.
© 1999 Harvey Sachs
5:37:34 PM 
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