These are radically subjective performances of Beethoven's Sixth Symphony and "Fidelio" Overture. This is only to be expected, since according to the recorded evidence Dutch conductor
Willem Mengelberg never felt constrained by either the score or performance tradition, and with his always faithful (if not always together)
Concertgebouw Orchestra, he could be counted upon to turn in performances that could not be mistaken for any other conductor's work. In these 1940 recordings, it's not just the tempos that are different, though
Mengelberg's tempos are extraordinarily flexible, turning and bending and pausing and lunging with complete freedom. Nor is it just the phrasing, though
Mengelberg's phrasing is exceedingly expressive, with crescendos and diminuendos and glissandos and portamentos added with total impunity. The same can be said of the heavily tinted colors, the skewed balances, the distorted rhythms, and the distended structures. Ultimately, it's that
Mengelberg transforms Beethoven into
Mengelberg/Beethoven, bespeaking a view of art that assumes the re-creative artist is greater than the creative artist, and that only by refashioning the music in his own image could
Mengelberg function as an interpreter. From Wagner until the Second World War, this view of the conductor/composer relationship was embraced as the highest aesthetic truth by many conductors and listeners. After the war, however, radical subjectivity was out and austere objectivity was in, and
Mengelberg/Beethoven, along with
Mengelberg/Tchaikovsky and
Mengelberg/Bach, was roundly rejected as fatally egocentric and terminally megalomaniacal. Recorded in cramped, boxy sound with plenty of audience noise and an extended episode of tuning up after the opening movement, this disc will appeal to those listeners who are already fans of the Dutch conductor -- but it is unlikely to make him any new fans among modern listeners.