Mendelssohn Meets Mitropolous

First published on Substack in 13.06.2024

Yesterday I hear a grand magician of conducting Dimitri Mitropolous in his account (though the word “account” is too small for what happened) of Mendelssohn’s Third Symphony subtitled the Scottish.

The recording was from August 1960 and the orchestra was the Berlin Philharmonic. It was recorded by German radio and the concert also included Schoenberg’s Variations (!) and the ever popular La Mer by Debussy which I’ll audition separately.

To say this was a forceful account is understatement - it was a massive rendering of the under-rated score, levered with great enthusiasm and little decorum. It was gorgeous. 

It required and deployed a great deal of artistry from both conductor and Orchestra. I don’t think the Berlin Phil would have been comfortable with any other conductor summoning up such gigantic force. Too many people is regarded as a bit of a lame sitting as it does in the movement of uncertainty between the classical and romantic period. Mitropolous broke the mould it was a proto-Wagnerian account - it was thrilling and had so many underplayed parts written loud. 

The playing was not sloppy, but maybe desperate at times, clinging on perhaps. The balance were not traditional - it was hard to distinguish some points because the sections were boosted re-imagining the glory of this music. We seldom hear it this way (Litton perhaps but his touch is light compared to DM) and it was good to hear the new perspectives. The reading was very fast and very forceful and very effective. I can’t think of a reading of Mendelssohn that I’ve heard, have so much life and so much detail.

It was certainly not the kind of reading one would hear ordinarily. I urge anybody to hear it if you consider Mendelssohn to be a little bit too polite or a little bit twee. The recording is adequate but sometimes a bit blown by the extremes of dynamics and there is audience applause at the end.

Interpretation: 9 

Performance: 8 (but hair raising in a good way)

Recording: 7 Mono std for the time