Biddulph’s Tertis Survey has Better Choices

from the Amazon.com Web page for the recording being discussed

It is perhaps somewhat ironic that, after a considerable “famine of neglect” of the viola, Biddulph Recordings should release two Critics’ Choices for Viola collections on the same day (October 14) last year. The three-CD collection devoted to William Primrose was discussed on this site two days ago. However, while Primrose came to be fairly well-known thanks to his presence on many RCA albums, the English violist Lionel Tertis tends to be familiar to other violists and not many others. Thus, at the very least, the release of Lionel Tertis: Critics’ Choices for Viola provides one path toward making this violist better known among the current crop of music lovers.

In the interest of full disclosure, I should note that this release drew my attention specifically because I already knew about Tertis. I first became aware of him in the early Seventies, when my composition teacher, Ezra Sims, had me listen to his recording of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s K. 364 sinfonia concertante in E-flat major. I must confess that, at that time, I had not yet honed the necessary skills for really listening to Mozart; but Sims’ believed almost religiously that this was the only album of K. 364 worthy of attention.

Thus, while I had been more than a little skeptical of the “critics’ choices” made for the Primrose collection, I was eager to listen to the 1933 recording of K. 364 with what I felt was a better-informed “mind behind the ears.” This was the final selection on the three CDs in the Biddulph release, but it made the journey through the entire collection a trip well worth taking. Tertis was joined by violinist Albert Sammons and led by conductor Hamilton Harty on the podium of the London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO).

(I was a bit perplexed by the orchestra. Harty was best known for conducting the Hallé Orchestra and the London Symphony Orchestra, while the LPO was a much newer ensemble set up by Thomas Beecham and the young Malcolm Sargent. However, the recording of K. 364 has enjoyed several releases, all of which seem to credit the LPO as the ensemble.)

To be fair, I should confess that I enjoy the recording that Primrose made for RCA with Jascha Heifetz and the RCA Symphony Orchestra conducted by Izler Solomon. Furthermore, the LPO performance may raise some eyebrows among the congregation of the “historically informed.” As Tully Potter observes in the booklet for the Biddulph release, “Purists need to be warned that Tertis jettisons Mozart’s cadenzas and in the first movement substitutes one based on a concoction by Joseph Hellmesberger the Elder. He also make other emendations.” Given the liberties that Mozart is said to have taken in the cadenzas for his own keyboard concertos, my guess is that, had his ghost been present at this recording session, it probably would have sided with Hellmesberger, rather than those “purists!”

Over the course of the entire Biddulph collection, however, what seems most interesting is how many of the selections involve the viola playing music originally written for either violin or cello. The latter is more understandable, since the viola strings are tuned to the same pitches as those of the cello, only an octave higher. Thus it is no surprise to find violists playing the suites that Johann Sebastian Bach composed for solo cello, since the demands on fingering and bowing are basically the same for both instruments.

Nevertheless, there is nothing “out of place” in the sonorities one experiences when Tertis’ takes on the cello lines for the two significant piano trios in the collection, Franz Schubert’s first (D. 898) in B-flat major and Felix Mendelssohn’s second (Opus 66) in C minor. Sammons is again the violinist, joined this time by pianists Ethel Hobday for the Schubert and William Murdoch (no connection to the fictional Toronto detective) for the Mendelssohn. On the other hand Tertis rises to a higher challenge in taking on Edvard Grieg’s Opus 45 (third) violin sonata in C minor, but his performance is consistently convincing. The same can be said for Ernst von Dohnányi’s Opus 21 violin sonata in C-sharp minor and Frederick Delius’ second violin sonata. Only for that last sonata did Tertis have to prepare his own arrangements, rather than simply reading from the violin part.

As in the Primrose collection, there are a generous number of shorter selections, most of which probably served as encore pieces. However, it is in the multi-movement offerings that the attentive listener can best appreciate Tertis’ musicianship. There are other recordings available, including several released by Biddulph. Nevertheless, this new Critics’ Choice collection probably provides the best approach to getting to know the significance of this twentieth-century violist.