Paganini: Violin Concertos Nos. 1 and 2; 24 Caprices; Rossini Variations; the Carnival of Venice.(Sound Recording Review)

Paganini: Violin Concertos Nos. 1 and 2; 24 Caprices; Rossini Variations; The Carnival of Venice. Michael Rabin, Yehudi Menuhin, Frank Peter Zimmermann, and Salvatore Accardo, violin; Sir Eugene Goossens, Alberto Erede, and Franco Tamponi, conductors; Philharmonia Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. EMI Classics 7243 5 75332-2 (2-disc set).

Good things come to those who wait. I just never expected to have to wait 20 years.

When the CD Age dawned in the early eighties, I had a long list of things I wanted to get on compact disc. Over the years the list shortened, and by just last year it was down to only two items. Now it's down to one.

Michael Rabin recorded his remarkable performance of Paganini's First Violin Concerto way back in 1960 with Sir Eugene Goossens and the Philharmonia Orchestra. I didn't come to it until the late sixties, however, by which time it had gone on to the budget label, Seraphim, and later I managed to find it on an EMI Electrola German issue. The sound wasn't so hot, but the interpretation was the best I had ever heard, and the best I've yet to hear. In its opening movements Rabin's violin sings lyrically and melancholically and plaintively, and in the final movement it struts and dances, the cock o' the walk. Never have I heard such verve, such exceptional vibrancy and wit and energy, as in Rabin's reading. Indeed, the only minor drawback for some listeners may be the traditional cuts Rabin makes in the score, but the very conciseness of the result for me works in its favor, rendering every note all the more succulently.

But that's not all. I had never expected the sound to be much more than passable; it was the performance I cherished. Besides, the later recording by Itzhak Perlman, also on EMI, was sonically splendid enough if it were just sound I was after. Imagine my surprise and delight to discover that this first-time transfer of Rabin to CD also sounds magnificent! In fact, in many ways it ...