Cheap Brahms: Serenades Nos. 1 & 2 (Music) (Kertesz, London Symphony Orchestra) Price

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Customer Reviews of Brahms: Serenades Nos. 1 & 2

Kertesz At His Best
Both of the Brahms Serenades were written when the composer was in his twenties. The First Serenade is one of his most lyrical and engaging works - it's the sort of thing one might choose to inroduce a newcomer to Brahms' music. But the 2nd Serenade has always struck me as a bit turgid and uninspired. It really only springs to life in the third mvt. I have tried to remedy the situation by surveying a fairly wide variety of performances, but even Rosbaud (Mercury LP) and Bongartz (Eterna LP) - both of which I find marginally preferable to this Kertesz - fail to convince me otherwise.

Kertesz provides what I feel is the most successful pairing of Brahms' Serenades on disc. These are youthful works, and Kertesz plays them with ingenuous freshness and chooses tempos that strike me as well-judged.

So I can heartily recommend this disc to anyone who wants a well-played and congenial pairing. Unfortunately, the sound on this CD is inferior to the LP originals - it's rather hard and glaring and has some strange balances. Perhaps a re-mastering and re-issue is in order.

If you are primarily interested in the First Serenade - as I am - then watch for a re-issue of the wonderful Stokowski account with the Symphony of the Air (formerly Toscanini's NBC Symphony). It was originally on a Decca LP, but somehow found its way onto a short-lived MCA Classics CD. Stokowski could be a highly mannered and unpredictable conductor, but in this work he was on his best behavior - it's even more joyous and better played than the Kertesz, and it had better sound as well. It was quite simply the finest account I have ever heard - or ever expect to hear. Try to find a copy and I'm sure you'll see what I mean.

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Very fine Kertesz/Brahms, but sound deserves remastering.
These vital and charming pieces just keep growing on me. Years back, when I first started listening to them I was fairly conscious of some of the less mature aspects of Brahms' early compositional style. As time passed, however, repeated listening gave way to greater acceptance and appeciation of these serenades in their various parts and as a whole. In many places, especially in the First Serenade, Kertesz displays an exuberance that allows melodies to soar. An extroverted, outdoorsy quality often prevails as do moments of grandeur. I have a complaint about the sound quality, however. On this Australian pressing, Decca does not deliver up to its usual high standards. Reproduction on both the British lp and the cassette (both of which I have) has greater presence and better balance. In several passages, something needs to be done with the horns. In any event, listening to Mackerras' versions of these scores, where he uses a down-sized orchestra, ostensibly for a more realistic presentation, (since, we are told, this is how these pieces were originally performed), leaves me unimpressed. Additionally, in contrast to Kertesz, I find Mackerras' often slower tempos quite unsatisfying. Nor can he match Kertesz' elan and brilliantly rich contrasts of color and light and shade. These performances by Istvan Kertesz constitute an extremely fine offering from a marvelous conductor whose very promising career was cut short early in life by an accidental death. I feel they are among the elite accounts of his musical legacy.