Brahms: Piano Concerto No. 1, Op. 15 [Horowitz 1936]

February 20, 1936: The Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (Live)
with Concertgebouw Orchestra conducted by Bruno Walter

An astonishing legacy of Horowitz in his early years. Horowitz had hardly played concertos during his career, especially after the great comeback, when recording technology was developed enough to record all his performances in better sound quality, and this concerto was also almost forever forgotten, like his renditions of Liszt's concertos, since he had never recorded this 'officially'.

A live with Bruno Walter was broadcast on the radio, and very fortunately, especially given that SP records were the best storage medium at the time and its cost was high, a recording of it has been preserved. It's valuable as it's one of few recordings of Horowitz playing piano concertos.

One can clearly notice the old school style from the first note. The orchestra never hesitate and produces a hard, rough sound that goes very well with Horowitz's lively style. The tempo of the 3rd movement is, in particular, rather fast compared to general that of modern. That's almost 100 years ago!

Its sound quality is wonderful given that it wasn't for an official recording and it was a live broadcast over the radio. The dynamic range is a bit lacking, but there is a wide frequency band and, especially little noise from nasty scratches, for a recording from 1936. I made some restorative adjustments to it and it became comparable to his concerto recordings from the 1940s. The problem was part of the first movement is lost. I patched it up on another radio recording of the piece with Toscanini from 1935.

The Horowitz's performance of this piece is little known as it has never been officially released. It's not necessarily a standard, but at least it's a valuable recording where you can feel the spirit of a young Horowitz. I hope you enjoy this special recording. Thank you for 3,000 subscribers.

00:00 Maestoso
18:26 Adagio
31:01 Rondo. Allegro non troppo