It is not easy to explain to those who have not encountered Jascha Horenstein’s conducting just what it is that makes it special. He was less consistent, interpretively, through his career than other standouts of his era (Furtwängler, Mengelberg, Stokowski, Koussevitzky, Toscanini). But his was not an inconsistency born of lack of conviction—it was, instead, an ability to see music through different prisms at different times of his life. The only other conductor with such an interpretive range was Otto Klemperer, and in his case his manic-depressive condition had something to do with that. With Horenstein it was, I think, just a continual re-examination of scores, always looking deeper.

There are, however, certain performance traits that were always present with this conductor. One would be a very careful attention to balance, texture, chord voicing, and contrapuntal detail. Horenstein seemed able to perceive music both horizontally and vertically, without giving undue weight to either element. So one always hears all the voices that the composer utilized in a score, but with no excess prominence given to subsidiary lines. Another Horenstein fingerprint is a careful balancing between the lyrical and the rhythmic. When the music is supposed to sing, as in, for example, the last movement of Sibelius’s Second Symphony, it sings its heart out—but the rhythmic spine around which the melody is woven is always clear. A more detailed analysis of Horenstein’s conducting is to be found in the superb notes accompanying this set by Joel Lazar, Horenstein’s longtime associate (Lazar completed Horenstein’s recording of Nielsen’s Saul and David after the conductor’s death in 1973).

The recorded quality varies, ranging as it does over 14 years, but for the most part it is excellent monaural broadcast sound. The Ravel Concerto suffers from a bit of distortion, and a shallow piano sound—and I find the performance a bit more earthbound than most of the contents here. The same disc contains another performance that fails to convince at least this listener—the Beethoven Seventh Symphony from 1966. The first three movements are fine, though not really special, but the finale is labored and heavy-handed.

On the other hand, there are a number of terrific discoveries here. The Mendelssohn “Italian” Symphony is lithe, sparkly, and joyous; La mer is more subtly colored and shaded than most performances; the Sibelius Second is grand, long-lined and, at the same time, richly detailed; and this live Brahms First grabs from the opening measure and sustains the tension for all 45 minutes.

This is a set for the Horenstein collector more than the general collector. It would be difficult to maintain that any single performance is the recommended version of that particular piece. (Frankly, the older I get and the more I listen, the less I believe in that kind of numerical ranking). But the overwhelming majority of these performances are readings of power, beauty, and dignity, and those sympathetic to Horenstein’s art will find much here to love. The general level of performances is extraordinarily high and the orchestral playing generally fine (though occasionally scrappy strings or ill-tuned winds intrude). Our knowledge of Horenstein’s art is considerably broadened by the contents, and Music & Arts should be commended for engaging Mr. Lazar to provide the notes, and giving him the freedom to write extensively.

Henry Fogel , FANFARE