Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 3 (with Weber-Konzertstuck / Piano Sonata No. 1) (recorded 1941-47)

"This is an account that does Weber proud and should ever be available. The documentary nature of this disc makes it a mandatory purchase for those interested in the great work of Claudio Arrau."
(MusicWeb Nov 2007)

On 14 February Arrau played Weber's Piano Sonata No. 1 in C major, Op. 24, at Carnegie Hall and a few days later, on 20 February was at Victor Studio No. 2 in New York where he recorded the work. When reviewing the recital performance of this work Olin Downes wrote in The New York Times of Arrau's 'courtliness, wit, scintillation [and] chivalric flourish' in Weber.

Arrau continued to record for Victor in America during the war and in April 1946 recorded another work of Weber, the Konzertstück in F minor, Op. 79, a work he played throughout his career. The recording session was held on 13 April at Orchestra Hall in Chicago between 9.30am and 12.35pm. Arrau first recorded the Burleske by Richard Strauss for piano and orchestra (8.111265) and then the Konzertstück. His partners were the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and conductor Désiré Defauw, but unfortunately they do not match Arrau's lightness and fleetness of execution nor his elegance. Defauw (1885-1960), a Belgian, was appointed conductor of the Chicago Symphony in 1943, but left after only four seasons and subsequently was conductor of the Symphony Orchestra in Gary, Indiana from 1950 to 1958.

In the late 1940s Arrau changed record labels and began to record for Columbia in America. One of the first recordings he made was of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor, Op. 37, with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Eugene Ormandy. It was recorded on Christmas Eve 1947 in the Academy of Music, Philadelphia. This was only the third version of this piano concerto to be issued on LP and at the time of release criticisms were aimed at the balance and recorded sound (which has been improved for this release). A reviewer in Britain complained that, 'A harsh transatlantic gloss has spread over from the latest EMI sleeves, where perhaps it serves a practical purpose, to the quality of recorded sound, where it certainly does not; at least not on English machines'. An American reviewer was more critical of the actual playing, finding the whole affair rather lack-lustre. This may be debatable with hindsight and comparison with later recordings of this work. The performance is strong and forthright in the outer movements although the slow movement is rather short on expressivity.

After the success of his Carnegie Hall appearances in the early 1940s Arrau was in great demand in the United States and by 1943 was giving 67 concerts each season, 21 of which were with the major American orchestras including the New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony and Cleveland Orchestras. From this point Arrau's career was hugely successful for the next four decades. His success in America encouraged him to settle there. He performed the complete sonatas of Beethoven in London and New York, and continued to tour the world. By the early 1980s his amazing stamina enabled him to tour Europe, the United States, Brazil and Japan, by which time he was approaching the age of eighty. In 1984 he returned to perform in Chile after refusing to play there for seventeen years owing to the political regime and died in 1991 in the Austrian town of Mürzzuschlag.