Brahms, Tchaikovsky Violin Concertos

Heifetz, Jascha

album cover

A Master Instrumentalist, a Polarizing Figure

People talk about the coldness of masters. How someone who has consummate command of an instrument can come off haughty, or disdainful, or otherwise unimpressed with the music he's bringing to life. In recent years this charge has been leveled at several classical performers of the mid-twentieth century, including Jascha Heifetz, the peerless (and polarizing) violinist. The logic goes like this: Listen to these Calamity Jane tempos! The flashy displays of technique! What a snob!

This recording is often held up as an example of this coolness—particularly the Brahms, which has lots of high-register hijinks. Sure enough, in the first movement Heifetz seems detached, and more than a little haughty. But check out what happens when the tempo slows down, at the start of the second movement: Here the shimmering Heifetz tone warms up, begins to glow. The violinist, who was born in Russia and became an instant sensation after his Carnegie Hall debut in 1917, goes from note to note with great caution. Heifetz pays attention to the placement of notes and their emphasis in a way that suggests the care of a rock climber stretching just a bit beyond arm's length to find secure footing. And like a master climber, he brings all of his skill, as well as his instincts as a human being, to the task. He's never going to be confused with a sappy romantic, but he knows how to set Brahms's flowing thoughts free.

Heifetz studied with Leopold Auer, the noted Russian teacher for whom the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto was written. As on the Brahms, Heifetz plays the Tchaikovsky like a chase scene, though he adds slight ornamentations to the first movement that help him stamp the piece as his own. The remainder of the concerto is rendered with a cool, evenhanded, maybe even dispassionate precision—exactly the type of authoritative execution that some find thrilling and some find soulless. Follow Heifetz through these meticulous, carefully shaped lines, and you may come to appreciate his mastery as an end in itself, the klieg light that brings clarity to every corner of the music.

Genre: Classical
Released: 1957, RCA
Key Tracks: Brahms: second movement. Tchaikovsky: first movement.
Another Interpretation: Tchaikovsky: David Oistrakh, Dresden Staatskapelle (Franz Konwitschny, cond.)
Catalog Choice: Beethoven: Violin Concerto, Boston Symphony Orchestra (Charles Munch, cond.)
Next Stop: Beethoven, Sibelius Violin Concertos, David Oistrakh
Book Page: 353