【古殿唱片音樂故事】被哥倫比亞錄了卻擱置不發行的「世紀經典」：約瑟夫·西格提(Joseph Szigeti,1892-1973)一生唯一的巴哈無伴奏全集
古殿殿主
一套被擱置發行的錄音
1955 年夏天到 1956 年 3 月，紐約第三十街一座由舊教堂改建的錄音室裡，一位 63 歲的小提琴家，把巴哈(Johann Sebastian Bach,1685-1750)的六首無伴奏小提琴奏鳴曲與組曲，從頭到尾錄了一遍。
他自 1938 年起就是美國哥倫比亞唱片的簽約藝人。錄音室是哥倫比亞的錄音室，這套錄音原本也是為哥倫比亞錄的。可是錄完之後，哥倫比亞決定：不發行。
這位小提琴家，是約瑟夫·西格提。這是他一生唯一一次錄下巴哈無伴奏全集。
一家唱片公司，錄下自家大師一生唯一的巴哈全集，卻沒有發行——今天聽起來不可思議。哥倫比亞為什麼這麼做？現存資料只記下了結果，沒有留下理由。我們只知道兩件事：同一時期他為哥倫比亞錄的好幾張莫札特奏鳴曲，也同樣沒有發行；而英國歷史錄音復刻廠牌 Pristine Classical 在西格提早年錄音專輯（PASC621）的解說中指出，他 1954–55 年重錄的韓德爾、塔替尼與莫札特奏鳴曲，比早年的 78 轉速度更寬、揉弦更寬，音準也更成問題。這兩件事之間有沒有關係，至今仍是一個問號。 後來發行這套錄音的，是紐約一家小唱片公司Vanguard 。半個世紀過去，它成了西格提最常被復刻、也最常被拿出來重新討論的巴哈，一套世紀經典。
一位「越聽越深」的怪傑
香港提琴界的教父級人物鄭延益，在《春風風人：鄭延益樂評集》中談二十世紀的小提琴大師：克萊斯勒(Fritz Kreisler,1875-1962)被公認為「提琴之王」，海飛茲(Jascha Heifetz,1901-1987)是凌駕眾人的霸主，而另一位擁有獨特地位的，是被他稱為「怪傑」的西格提。
西格提能與前兩人相提並論的，絕對不是技術，而是那種別人學不來的演繹藝術。看他演奏，起初會覺得奇怪：一個身形高大的人，用有點彆扭的姿勢架著琴；聲音不甜，甚至不討喜。但甜美音色的演奏者，往往聽久了會膩；西格提卻相反——一開始讓人困惑，越聽下去，越覺得意韻深長，背後有一股旁人沒有的醇厚味道。鄭延益甚至直說，他的技術是苦練出來的「硬技術」，但他的演奏藝術，無人可以取代。
聽西格提，就像倒吃甘蔗：越吃越甜，越聽越有味道；聽到後來，甚至會覺得，這音樂似乎本來就應該是這個樣子才對。這種『先困惑、後著迷、最後理所當然』的聆聽經驗，正是理解這套巴哈全集的鑰匙。
從姚阿幸面前走出來的少年
西格提 1892 年 9 月 5 日生於布達佩斯，本姓辛格(Singer)。幼年喪母，被送到喀爾巴阡山區的小鎮馬拉穆列什錫蓋特(Máramarossziget)由祖父母撫養，「西格提」這個名字，就從這座小鎮而來。
他是匈牙利小提琴學派宗師耶諾·胡拜(Jenő Hubay,1858-1937)門下最傑出的學生之一。胡拜的老師，則是約瑟夫·姚阿幸(Joseph Joachim,1831-1907)——十九世紀把巴哈無伴奏作品重新帶回音樂會舞台的那個人。少年西格提曾被胡拜帶到柏林，在姚阿幸面前演奏；姚阿幸邀他留下來隨自己學習，西格提出於對胡拜的忠誠，婉拒了。
1905 年，十三歲的他在柏林正式登台，從此展開漫長的歐洲巡演生涯。後來，比利時提琴大師易沙意(Eugène Ysaÿe,1858-1931)聽了西格提演奏巴哈的無伴奏奏鳴曲，受到啟發，寫下自己的六首無伴奏小提琴奏鳴曲——第一首，就題獻給西格提。
換句話說，1955 年站在紐約麥克風前拉巴哈的這個人，少年時曾站在讓巴哈無伴奏重生的人面前；而他自己的巴哈，又催生了下一代的無伴奏經典。
巴哈也是貫穿他一生錄音的一條線。西格提少年時代在倫敦的第一次錄音，錄的就是第三號組曲的〈前奏曲〉；四十八年後，這套全集的最後一場錄音（1956 年 3 月），錄的正是第三號組曲。一生的錄音史，首尾落在同一首 E 大調前奏曲上。
坐在第一排的人
在日本 King Record 發行版的封底，有一篇樂評家小石忠男寫的〈西格提的回憶〉。它讓我們看見錄音無法完整傳達的東西。
1953 年，西格提第三度訪日，在寶塚與大阪舉行了三場音樂會。從少年時代就靠 SP 唱片反覆聽他巴哈與貝多芬的小石忠男，特地為其中一場獨奏會挑了正中央第一排的位子——只為了在最近的距離看西格提拉琴。
那一夜，西格提就站在幾乎伸手可及的地方。他把左手肘高高抬起，琴弓壓在弦上的力道很重；小石記得他用的是一把瓜奈里·德爾·傑蘇，聲音的骨幹極其強健，近聽時，有時會冒出讓人吃驚的粗糙摩擦聲。他聽得見西格提的呼吸，聽得見手指離開指板時弦的低鳴。在驚人的專注中，西格提的臉漲得通紅，斷掉的弓毛垂下來也顧不得。
可是沒過多久，那些粗糙就不再是干擾，小石整個人被拉進了西格提的音樂裡。
同一次訪日，小石又在寶塚大劇場二樓正中央，聽西格提與上田仁指揮的東京交響樂團合演布拉姆斯協奏曲。這一次，換了一個距離，聲音也換了一副面貌：西格提的琴音從管弦樂團中破空而出，像一道閃亮的銀線，筆直朝聽眾射來——剛健、密度極高，而且溫暖。
小石特別寫下這一段，是為了「避免誤解」：西格提的聲音近聽粗獷，稍遠便化為極美的音色。
所以，西格提的琴聲到底是粗糙，還是美？答案，取決於你站在哪裡。這套錄音是在一座以天然殘響著稱的舊教堂裡錄的；放下唱針的時候，不妨問問自己：麥克風替你選的，是第一排，還是二樓正中央？
小石最難忘的，是在大阪聽到的〈夏康舞曲〉。他說，即使在唱片裡也聽得出來：西格提拉開篇主題的和弦時，運弓迅疾如抽擊，一氣呵成。就目前查得的資料，西格提一生的錄音室錄音中，第二號組曲全曲與〈夏康舞曲〉，只存在於這套全集——小石在大阪聽見的那個聲音，在錄音室裡留下的唯一版本，就在這套錄音裡。
63 歲的巴哈：慢下來的人
美國樂評家傑德·迪斯特勒(Jed Distler)在 ClassicsToday 的評論中坦白承認：錄音時的西格提已過技術巔峰，弓聲偶有粗糙，音準偶有晃動；但他節奏的精細、音色與運音的層次，讓這套錄音的情感變化極大。快樂章的興奮感，不是靠速度，而是靠樂句的分組與精心安排的重音；阿勒曼舞曲與 C 大調奏鳴曲則採取寬廣的速度——那首〈賦格〉，封底標示長達 11 分 37 秒。
古殿手上，剛好有一組可以讓「時間」說話的對照。西格提 38 歲時（1931 年）曾在倫敦哥倫比亞錄下第一號奏鳴曲全曲（Columbia LX 127/8，古殿典藏的蟲膠實體唱片）；24 年後，他在這套全集裡又錄了一次：
- 慢板：1931 年 4:37 → 1955 年 5:10
- 賦格，快板：1931 年 5:17 → 1955 年 5:49
- 西西里舞曲：1931 年 4:24 → 1955 年 3:49
- 急板：1931 年 2:26 → 1955 年 3:36
- 時間來源：1931 年為 LX 127/8 的 Pristine 轉錄時間；1955 年為日本 King 版封底標示
除了〈西西里舞曲〉，晚年的三個樂章都明顯放慢，〈急板〉更多了將近一分鐘。一面 12 吋 78 轉唱片大約能容納四分半鐘，1931 年的〈急板〉只用了兩分半，所以這不是唱片長度逼出來的速度，而是詮釋本身變了。
同一個人、同一首曲子，38 歲與 63 歲——一個走得快，一個走得慢。慢下來的那個，未必是拉不動了；也可能是看見了更多，捨不得走快。
西格提被稱為「學者型小提琴家」，並非虛名——這套唱片封底上的文字，就是最好的證明。
封底上的巴哈：一位學者型演奏家的筆記
這套唱片的封底，除了小石忠男的回憶，還附上美國原版解說作者西德尼·芬克斯坦(Sidney Finkelstein,1909-1974)的文章日譯（村田武雄譯），三張各自對應它所收錄的曲目。這篇解說大量轉述西格提本人對巴哈的研究，讀起來，幾乎就是一份演奏者的工作筆記。
「沒有低音的奏鳴曲」 芬克斯坦認為，這六首作品與其叫「無伴奏」，不如叫「沒有低音的奏鳴曲」。巴洛克音樂裡，低音線在底下撐起和聲與律動，旋律與裝飾的線條織在上面；所謂「沒有低音」，並不是真的少了什麼，而是那條看不見的低音，必須藏在上方的旋律裡，讓聽者在不知不覺間自己把它補上。換句話說，這些作品要求的不只是演奏者，也是聽者——你的耳朵，得參與完成這首曲子。
一條活的傳統 在巴哈的時代，只為一把小提琴寫奏鳴曲，並沒有今天想像的那麼奇特：泰勒曼(Georg Philipp Telemann,1681-1767)寫過只為小提琴而作的《十二首幻想曲》（1735）；西格提更指出，巴哈曾仔細研究比伯(Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber,1644-1704)的獨奏小提琴曲，也應該熟知德勒斯登宮廷樂長皮森德爾(Johann Georg Pisendel,1687-1755)的演奏風格與無伴奏奏鳴曲——巴哈寫這些作品時，皮森德爾約莫三十歲。芬克斯坦借西格提的說法作結：巴哈要實現的是一條古老的傳統，但在結構與表現上，卻沒有任何可以依循的範本。在西格提眼中，巴哈不是供在神壇上的雕像，而是一條活生生的演奏傳統裡，走得最遠的那一位。
西格提怎麼想〈夏康舞曲〉 在日版MZ-5112 的封底，轉引了一段西格提談〈夏康舞曲〉的文字，幾乎就是一份演奏說明書。他認為，演奏者與聽眾真正要面對的問題，是在巴哈驚人的變化之中，看見作品根本的統一：先是十五段小調變奏，接著九段大調，最後再回到小調；還要看見每一段變奏如何生出下一段，並讓聽眾也意識到這個過程。封底甚至印了兩行譜例，說明這首曲子的節奏要把重量放在第二拍上——否則整首夏康的構成就會失衡。中段大調與兩側小調之間的停頓，必須讓人印象深刻；回到小調時，要帶出遲疑、沉思的氣氛，與大調段落那種肯定、抒情、時而英雄般的氣質形成對照。最後他特別點出：巴哈作為改革者的力量，小提琴家們至今仍未充分認識——在大調段落裡，巴哈讓一個 A 音在三個八度上接連反覆敲響，就像管風琴的持續音，令人驚嘆。
這段文字珍貴的地方在於：它讓我們可以拿著西格提自己的說明，去聽西格提自己的演奏。放下唱針時，不妨只追三件事：第二拍的重量是否在那裡；大調來臨之前，那一口氣停了多久；A 音在三個八度上反覆時，琴聲是否真的像管風琴那樣撐開了空間。小石忠男在大阪聽見的那首夏康，西格提心裡的設計圖，就印在同一張封套上。
不是旋風般的速度 MZ-5113 的封底談到第三號組曲的〈前奏曲〉：這個樂章常被抽離出來，當作演奏會曲目，甚至改編給鋼琴；但芬克斯坦提醒，巴哈在意的不是旋風般的速度，也不是讓它成為音樂會上好用的曲子，而是它的表現與構成——他後來把這首前奏曲用作第 29 號清唱劇《我們感謝祢，上帝》的前奏，配上管風琴、三支小號、兩支雙簧管與打擊樂器。同一張封底也指出，C 大調奏鳴曲的〈賦格〉是巴哈最長的一首賦格，主題取自聖詠〈來吧，聖靈，主上帝〉的開頭旋律。一把小提琴，被要求承擔管風琴與整個教會的聲音——這或許也說明了，為什麼一位懂得這些的演奏者，會在 63 歲時選擇慢下來。
接下錄音的小公司
接下這套被擱置錄音的，是 Vanguard。1950 年，西摩·所羅門(Seymour Solomon,1922-2002)與梅納德·所羅門(Maynard Solomon,1930-2020)兄弟，靠著向父親借來的一萬美元，在紐約創立了這家公司；第一批唱片，是西摩帶著錄音機到維也納錄下的巴哈清唱劇，並為此創立了以巴哈為名的子品牌 Bach Guild。弟弟梅納德，日後成為以貝多芬、莫札特傳記聞名的音樂學者。
Vanguard 的唱片圓標上，至今印著那句口號：「為鑑賞家錄音」(Recordings for the Connoisseur)。1956 年，西格提的巴哈全集以 Bach Guild BG 627/9 三張一套的盒裝問世，只有單聲道，從未有過立體聲版本。
有一個巧合值得一提：1955 年，同樣在第三十街這座舊教堂裡，22 歲的古爾德(Glenn Gould,1932-1982)錄下了他震撼世界的《哥德堡變奏曲》。同一年、同一個空間，一老一少，對巴哈給出了兩種截然不同的答案——一個是光芒四射的新世界，一個是走了一輩子路的人，回頭交出的總結。
1950 年代是巴哈無伴奏全集錄音的第一個黃金時期：喬治・安奈斯可(George Enescu,1881-1955)、海飛茲 1952 年的 RCA 全集、米爾斯坦(Nathan Milstein,1903-1992)1954–56 年的 Capitol 全集⋯⋯在海飛茲與米爾斯坦那種技術完美的版本旁邊，西格提與安奈斯可的全集，代表的是另一條路：十九世紀出生的大師，用一生的積累回應巴哈。
大公司不發行，小公司接手。在唱片還能由少數「為鑑賞家錄音」的人做主的年代，這樣的錄音才有機會活下來。
從日內瓦的電報，到半世紀的接力
1956 年問世之後，這套錄音沒有被遺忘。它的出版史，本身就是一場接力。
1973 年，日本 King Record 把它收進 Vanguard「不滅の名盤系列」中〈西格提の芸術〉重新推出。封底打頭的，就是小石忠男的回憶文。他是這樣開頭的：晚年退出舞台、在瑞士教學的西格提，世人早已不期待他的新錄音，更不奢望再見他登台；然而，當路透社從日內瓦傳來他的死訊時，他感到心裡好像破了一個大洞。
西格提於 1973 年 2 月 19 日在瑞士琉森辭世，而這次發行的圓標與封底都印著 1973——它很可能是大師辭世後不久推出的紀念發行。同一系列還同時推出西格提與巴爾托克(Béla Bartók,1881-1945) 1940 年在華府國會圖書館的音樂會錄音。對當年的日本樂迷來說，這是一次送行；封底那篇文章，本身就是一份悼念文件。
接力並沒有在那裡停下。1977 年，美國以 Historical Anthology of Music 名義再版；1987 年起，日本、法國、南韓、美國相繼推出 CD；2020 年前後，南韓 Machang 以 Vanguard 的原始母帶重新製作，推出限量三百套的 180 克三張黑膠。而從 1956 年的初版一直到今天，它始終是單聲道——這份錄音，從沒有過真正的立體聲版本。
一套當年錄製它的公司沒有發行的錄音，在之後的半個世紀裡，被不同國家、不同世代的出版者，一次又一次重新端出來。每一次重新出版，都是有人再一次做出判斷：這個聲音，值得留下。
尺，與積累
哥倫比亞為什麼沒有發行，我們不知道；但如果當年衡量它的是「技術」那把尺，那麼 Vanguard 發行它、King 在大師身後重推它、樂迷半世紀來一再復刻它，用的顯然是另一把尺。
63 歲的西格提，已經不可能像 38 歲時那樣，把每一個音拉得完美。但他從胡拜、姚阿幸一路承接下來的身體記憶，加上一生研究比伯、皮森德爾的學養，在那個時刻累積到最厚。技術會衰退，積累不會；而溝槽，忠實地把兩者同時刻了下來。
當準確、乾淨、光澤，越來越容易被機器大量生產的時候，或許值得問自己一句：如果有一天，衡量你的尺只剩下「準不準、快不快」——你花了一輩子才懂的那些東西，要放在哪裡？
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[Gudian Record Stories] The “Classic of the Century” That Columbia Recorded and Then Shelved: Joseph Szigeti (1892–1973) and His Only Complete Bach Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin
A Recording Left on the Shelf
Between the summer of 1955 and March 1956, in a New York studio on 30th Street converted from an old church, a 63-year-old violinist recorded all six of Johann Sebastian Bach’s (1685–1750) sonatas and partitas for solo violin, from beginning to end.
He had been an American Columbia artist since 1938. The studio was Columbia’s studio, and the recordings were made for Columbia. Yet once they were finished, Columbia decided not to release them.
The violinist was Joseph Szigeti. This was the only time in his life that he recorded the complete set.
A record company makes a complete Bach cycle with its own great artist — his only one — and then does not release it. Today that sounds hard to believe. Why did Columbia do it? The surviving sources record only the outcome, not the reason. We know just two things. Several LPs’ worth of Mozart sonatas he recorded for Columbia in the same period were not released either. And Pristine Classical, the British historical-reissue label, notes in the booklet of its album of Szigeti’s early recordings (PASC621) that his 1954–55 remakes of sonatas by Handel, Tartini and Mozart have broader tempos, a wider vibrato and more problematic intonation than his earlier 78s. Whether these two facts are connected remains an open question.
The recordings were eventually released by a small New York company. Half a century on, they have become the Szigeti Bach most often reissued, and most often brought back into discussion.
An Eccentric Genius Who Grows Deeper with Every Hearing
Zheng Yanyi (鄭延益), a revered figure among Hong Kong violinists, writes in his collection of music criticism Chunfeng Fengren about the great violinists of the twentieth century: Fritz Kreisler (1875–1962) is universally acknowledged as “the King of the Violin,” Jascha Heifetz (1901–1987) the overlord who towers above everyone else, and the one other violinist with a unique standing is Szigeti, whom he calls an “eccentric genius.”
What puts Szigeti on a level with the other two is certainly not technique, but an interpretive art no one else can imitate. Watching him play, one is puzzled at first: a tall man holding the violin in a somewhat awkward posture, with a sound that is not sweet, not even ingratiating. But players with a sweet tone often grow tiresome after a while; with Szigeti it is the opposite. He puzzles you at first, then the longer you listen, the deeper the meaning seems, with a rich, mellow flavor behind it that no one else has. Zheng even says plainly that Szigeti’s technique was a “hard technique” won through sheer practice — but that his art of performance is irreplaceable.
Listening to Szigeti is like eating sugarcane from the tip down, as the Chinese saying goes: each bite sweeter than the last, each hearing richer. In the end you even feel that the music surely ought to be exactly this way. This experience — first puzzlement, then fascination, finally a sense that it could not be otherwise — is the key to understanding this complete Bach set.
The Boy Who Played for Joachim
Szigeti was born in Budapest on 5 September 1892, with the family name Singer. His mother died when he was small, and he was sent to be raised by his grandparents in Máramarossziget, a small town in the Carpathians — the town from which the name “Szigeti” comes.
He was one of the most outstanding pupils of Jenő Hubay (1858–1937), the founding master of the Hungarian violin school. Hubay’s own teacher was Joseph Joachim (1831–1907) — the man who, in the nineteenth century, brought Bach’s solo violin works back to the concert stage. As a boy, Szigeti was taken to Berlin by Hubay to play for Joachim. Joachim invited him to stay and study with him; out of loyalty to Hubay, Szigeti declined.
In 1905, aged thirteen, he made his formal debut in Berlin, beginning a long career of touring across Europe. Later, the Belgian violinist Eugène Ysaÿe (1858–1931) heard Szigeti play Bach’s solo sonatas and, inspired, wrote his own six sonatas for solo violin — the first of them dedicated to Szigeti.
In other words, the man who stood before the microphone in New York in 1955 to play Bach had, as a boy, stood before the man who revived Bach’s solo works; and his own Bach in turn gave rise to the next generation of solo-violin classics.
Bach is also a thread running through his whole recording life. According to the research compiled by Gudian, Szigeti’s very first recording, made in London in his youth, was the Preludio of the Partita No. 3; forty-eight years later, the final session of this complete set (March 1956) was devoted to that same Partita No. 3. His recording career begins and ends with the same E-major Prelude.
The Man in the Front Row
On the back cover of the Japanese King Record release is an essay, “Memories of Szigeti,” by the critic Tadao Koishi. It shows us what a recording cannot fully convey.
In 1953, on his third visit to Japan, Szigeti gave three concerts in Takarazuka and Osaka. Koishi, who had listened again and again to his Bach and Beethoven on SP records since boyhood, deliberately chose a seat in the centre of the front row for one of the recitals — just to watch Szigeti play from as close as possible.
That night Szigeti stood almost within arm’s reach. He held his left elbow high, and the bow pressed down on the strings with great weight. Koishi recalled that he was playing a Guarneri del Gesù, whose sound had an extremely strong core; heard up close, it sometimes produced surprisingly rough scraping sounds. Koishi could hear Szigeti breathe, and hear the faint hum of the strings as his fingers left the fingerboard. In his astonishing concentration Szigeti’s face flushed red, and he paid no attention to the broken bow hairs hanging down.
Yet before long that roughness stopped being a distraction, and Koishi was drawn completely into Szigeti’s music.
On the same tour, Koishi heard Szigeti again from the centre of the second balcony of the Takarazuka Grand Theatre, playing the Brahms concerto with the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra under Masashi Ueda. This time, at a different distance, the sound took on a different face: Szigeti’s tone broke out of the orchestra like a gleaming silver thread, shooting straight at the audience — robust, extremely dense, and warm.
Koishi wrote this passage specifically “to avoid misunderstanding”: up close Szigeti’s sound was rugged, but from a little further away it turned into an exquisitely beautiful tone.
So is Szigeti’s sound rough, or is it beautiful? The answer depends on where you stand. These recordings were made in an old church famous for its natural reverberation. When you lower the stylus, ask yourself: has the microphone placed you in the front row, or in the centre of the second balcony?
What Koishi remembered most was the Chaconne he heard in Osaka. Even on the record, he says, you can hear it: as Szigeti plays the chords of the opening theme, his bow moves as swiftly as a lash, all in one stroke. As far as current sources show, the complete Partita No. 2 and the Chaconne exist among Szigeti’s studio recordings only in this set — the only studio trace of the sound Koishi heard in Osaka is in these recordings.
Bach at 63: A Man Who Slowed Down
The American critic Jed Distler, reviewing the set for ClassicsToday, frankly acknowledges that Szigeti was past his technical prime at the time: his bow tone is sometimes rough, his intonation sometimes wavers. Yet the subtlety of his rhythm and the layering of his tone and articulation give the recordings an enormous emotional range. The excitement of the fast movements comes not from speed but from the grouping of phrases and carefully placed accents; the Allemandes and the C-major Sonata take broad tempos — the Fuga is listed on the back cover at 11 minutes 37 seconds.
Gudian happens to own a comparison that lets time speak for itself. At 38, in 1931, Szigeti recorded the complete Sonata No. 1 for Columbia in London (Columbia LX 127/8, a shellac set in the Gudian collection); 24 years later he recorded it again for this complete set:
- Adagio: 1931, 4:37 → 1955, 5:10
- Fuga, Allegro: 1931, 5:17 → 1955, 5:49
- Siciliana: 1931, 4:24 → 1955, 3:49
- Presto: 1931, 2:26 → 1955, 3:36
- Sources of timings: 1931 from Pristine’s transfer of LX 127/8; 1955 as listed on the back cover of the Japanese King edition
Apart from the Siciliana, the late versions of the movements are all markedly slower, and the Presto is nearly a minute longer. One side of a 12-inch 78 could hold about four and a half minutes, and the 1931 Presto took only two and a half, so this was not a tempo forced by the length of a side — the interpretation itself had changed. (The timings on the back cover are not necessarily precise, and speed correction in 78 transfers also affects timings; these figures still need to be confirmed by listening.)
The same man, the same piece, at 38 and at 63 — one walks fast, the other slowly. The one who slowed down was not necessarily unable to go faster; perhaps he had come to see more, and could not bear to hurry.
Szigeti’s reputation as a “scholar-violinist” is well earned — and the text on the back covers of these records is the best proof.
Bach on the Back Cover: Notes from a Scholar-Performer
Besides Koishi’s memoir, the back covers carry a Japanese translation (by Takeo Murata) of the notes by Sidney Finkelstein (1909–1974), author of the notes for the original American release, each of the three back covers covering the works on that record. These notes relay much of Szigeti’s own research on Bach, and read almost like a performer’s working notebook.
“Sonatas without a bass” Finkelstein suggests that rather than “unaccompanied,” these six works would better be called “sonatas without a bass.” In Baroque music the bass line supports the harmony and rhythm from below, while melodies and ornamental lines are woven above it. “Without a bass” does not mean that something is really missing: the invisible bass has to be hidden inside the melody above it, so that the listener fills it in without even noticing. In other words, these works make demands not only of the performer but of the listener — your ears have to take part in completing the piece.
A living tradition In Bach’s time, writing sonatas for a violin alone was not as strange as we might imagine today. Georg Philipp Telemann (1681–1767) wrote Twelve Fantasias for violin without bass (1735); and Szigeti further points out that Bach had studied the solo violin works of Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber (1644–1704) closely, and must have known well the playing style and the unaccompanied sonata of Johann Georg Pisendel (1687–1755), the Dresden court concertmaster — who was about thirty when Bach wrote these works. Finkelstein concludes, borrowing Szigeti’s words, that Bach set out to realize an old tradition, yet in structure and expression there was no model he could follow. In Szigeti’s eyes, Bach was not a statue on a pedestal, but the one who went furthest in a living tradition of violin playing.
How Szigeti thought about the Chaconne The back cover of the Japanese MZ-5112 quotes a passage in which Szigeti discusses the Chaconne — practically a set of performing instructions. The real problem for performer and listener alike, he writes, is to grasp the fundamental unity of the work amid Bach’s astonishing variety: first fifteen variations in the minor, then nine in the major, then the minor again; and to see how each variation gives rise to the next, making the listener aware of this process too. The back cover even prints two lines of music to show that the rhythm must place its weight on the second beat — otherwise the whole construction of the Chaconne falls out of balance. The pause separating the central major section from the minor sections on either side must be impressive; and the return to the minor must bring a change of mood, doubting and meditative, in contrast to the affirmative, lyrical and at times heroic character of the major section. Finally he points out that Bach’s power as an innovator is still not fully recognized by violinists — in the major section Bach has a single A struck again and again across three octaves, like an organ point, to astonishing effect.
What makes this passage precious is that it lets us take Szigeti’s own explanation and listen to Szigeti’s own performance. When you lower the stylus, try following just three things: whether the weight falls on the second beat; how long the breath is held before the major section arrives; and whether, as the A repeats across three octaves, the violin really opens up the space the way an organ does. The Chaconne Tadao Koishi heard in Osaka — and the blueprint in Szigeti’s mind — are printed on the same record jacket.
Not a whirlwind tempo The back cover of MZ-5113 discusses the Prelude of the Partita No. 3. This movement is often detached and used as a concert piece, even arranged for piano; but Finkelstein reminds us that what mattered to Bach was neither a whirlwind tempo nor making it a handy concert number, but its expression and construction — as shown by his later use of the Prelude as the sinfonia of Cantata No. 29, Wir danken dir, Gott, wir danken dir, scored with organ, three trumpets, two oboes and percussion. The same back cover notes that the Fuga of the C-major Sonata is the longest fugue Bach wrote, its subject taken from the opening of the chorale Komm, Heiliger Geist, Herre Gott. A single violin is asked to carry the voice of the organ and of the whole church — which may also explain why a performer who understood all this chose, at 63, to slow down.
The Small Company That Took the Recordings On
The company that took on these shelved recordings was Vanguard. In 1950 the brothers Seymour Solomon (1922–2002) and Maynard Solomon (1930–2020) founded it in New York with ten thousand dollars borrowed from their father. Its first records were Bach cantatas that Seymour recorded in Vienna, taking a tape recorder with him, and for them the brothers created a sub-label named after Bach: the Bach Guild. The younger brother, Maynard, later became a musicologist renowned for his biographies of Beethoven and Mozart.
Vanguard’s labels still carry its motto: “Recordings for the Connoisseur.” In 1956 Szigeti’s complete Bach appeared as a three-record boxed set, Bach Guild BG 627/9, in mono only; there has never been a stereo version.
One coincidence is worth mentioning. In 1955, in the same old church on 30th Street, the 22-year-old Glenn Gould (1932–1982) recorded the Goldberg Variations that would shake the world. In the same year and the same space, an old man and a young man gave two utterly different answers to Bach — one a dazzling new world, the other the summing-up of a man looking back over a lifetime’s road.
The 1950s were the first golden age of complete recordings of Bach’s solo violin works: George Enescu (1881–1955), Heifetz’s 1952 RCA set, Nathan Milstein’s (1903–1992) 1954–56 Capitol set… Beside the technically flawless versions of Heifetz and Milstein, the sets by Szigeti and Enescu represent another path: masters born in the nineteenth century, answering Bach with the accumulation of a lifetime.
The big company did not release it; the small company took it on. Only in an age when records could still be decided by a few people who “recorded for the connoisseur” did a recording like this have a chance to survive.
From a Telegram in Geneva to Half a Century of Relay
After its release in 1956, the recording was not forgotten. Its publication history is itself a relay.
In 1973 King Record of Japan reissued it in Vanguard’s Immortal Classics Series, under the heading “The Artistry of Joseph Szigeti.” The back cover opens with Tadao Koishi’s memoir, which begins like this: Szigeti, who had retired from the stage and was teaching in Switzerland in his last years, was no longer expected to make new recordings, still less to appear on stage again; and yet, when Reuters sent word of his death from Geneva, Koishi felt as if a great hole had opened in his heart.
Szigeti died in Lucerne, Switzerland, on 19 February 1973, and the labels and back covers of this release are marked ℗ 1973 — it was very likely a memorial issue brought out shortly after the master’s death. The same series also brought out the 1940 Library of Congress recital in Washington by Szigeti and Béla Bartók (1881–1945). For Japanese music lovers at the time, this was a farewell; the essay on the back cover is itself a document of mourning.
The relay did not stop there. In 1977 the set was reissued in the United States under the name Historical Anthology of Music; from 1987 onward CDs appeared in Japan, France, South Korea and the United States; and around 2020 the Korean label Machang remastered it from Vanguard’s original master tapes as a limited edition of 300 three-LP sets on 180-gram vinyl. And from the 1956 first issue to the present day it has always been mono — there has never been a true stereo version of this recording.
A recording that the company which made it chose not to release has been brought out again and again over the following half century, by publishers in different countries and different generations. Each new release is someone judging, once more, that this sound deserves to be kept.
The Measuring Stick, and Accumulation
Why Columbia did not release the recordings, we do not know. But if the stick it was measured against back then was technique, then Vanguard in releasing it, King in reissuing it after the master’s death, and listeners in reissuing it again and again for half a century were clearly using a different stick.
At 63, Szigeti could no longer play every note to perfection as he had at 38. But the bodily memory he had inherited through Hubay and Joachim, together with a lifetime’s scholarship on Biber and Pisendel, had at that moment reached its greatest depth. Technique declines; accumulation does not. And the grooves faithfully engraved both at once.
At a time when accuracy, cleanliness and polish are ever easier for machines to mass-produce, perhaps it is worth asking yourself: if one day the only measure applied to you were “is it accurate, is it fast” — where would you put the things it took you a lifetime to understand?