Catalogue | Solo Concerto

Edition Ferenc Fricsay (X) – J. Brahms: Violin Concerto & Symphony No. 2

• Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D major, Op. 77
• I. Allegro non troppo (23:15)  
• II. Adagio (10:23)  
• III. Allegro giocoso, ma non troppo vivace (08:41)  

• Symphony No. 2 in D major, op. 73
• I. Allegro non troppo (14:34)  
• II. Adagio non troppo (09:07)  
• III. Allegretto grazioso (quasi Andantino) – Presto ma non assai (05:25)  
• IV. Allegro con spirito (08:41)  

recording date: 1951 / 1953

“Her performance of the Brahms Violin Concerto in the early 1950s, under Ferenc Fricsay, was pervaded by a delicate lyricism and a romantic sorcery rarely encountered elsewhere.”
Joachim Hartnack about Gioconda De Vito

Gioconda De Vito, one of the great violinists of her time, was considered a Brahms specialist. The only evidence to date of her work with Ferenc Fricsay and the RIAS Orchestra is the above mentioned quote. Precisely this collaboration was captured in a superb monaural recording by the RIAS broadcasting company in Berlin – a stroke of luck, for De Vito had an aversion to the recording studio. Gioconda De Vito, Ferenc Fricsay and the RIAS-Symphonie-Orchester produce an exemplary realization of the concept of the “symphonic concerto”. A great deal of the cogency of this realization is owed to the precise dovetailing of soloist and orchestra, even in those passages in which De Vito grants herself a liberal use of rubato. With wonted translucence, Fricsay allows the solo instrumentalists in his orchestra to share the limelight with the violinist.
The recording reveals all of Gioconda De Vito’s strengths. She unfolds a large, singing tone, at once brilliantly radiant and warm. This accurate, crisply recorded performance by the RIAS-Symphonie-Orchester under Fricsay also brings out the very deliberate rhythmic organization with which she shaped her cantilenas.

Under Fricsay, the RIAS-Symphonie-Orchester also succeeds in turning their recording of Brahms’s Second Symphony into a touchstone of Brahmsian “orchestral chamber music.”

There is a “Producer’s Comment” from producer Ludger Böckenhoff about this production available.

The production is part of our series „Legendary Recordings“ and bears the quality feature „1st Master Release“. This term stands for the excellent quality of archival productions at audite. For all historical publications at audite are based, without exception, on the original tapes from broadcasting archives. In general these are the original analogue tapes, which attain an astonishingly high quality, even measured by today‘s standards, with their tape speed of up to 76 cm/sec. The remastering – professionally competent and sensitively applied – also uncovers previously hidden details of the interpretations. Thus, a sound of superior quality results. CD publications based on private recordings from broadcasts cannot be compared with these.