Classic Archive: Itzhak Perlman - Elgar, Prokofiev & Saint-Saens

I ‘ I’ Х great advantage of DVD Is the opportunity to watch players at short range, an advantage taken at its best in a top-quality recording, where, if you get fed up with fiddly camera angles, you can always just close your eyes.To that extent, these BBC recordings make a frustrating disc.The earliest recording here, of Saint-Saens’s Introduction et Rondo capriccioso. dates from 1970, followed by the Prokofiev in 1980 and the Elgar in 1981, and listening to such comparatively modern recordings in mono is somewhere between a tease and really annoying. The quality of the playing is, of course, phenomenal, with the odd fiuff of a live performance irrelevant in the context of playing by a man at the height of his abilities, his deep involvement In the music and his joy in performing it to an audience clear to see.

The Prokofiev, performed in an unidentified hall (the information given is minimal), sizzles, the pyrotechnics dispatched with jawdropping ease, the melodies quarried out of the instrument.The first movement of the Eigar Concerto, recorded at a Royal Albert Hall Prom, is taken at a cracking pace,all fire and virtuosity.The Andante, too, is on the brisk side, and for all the richness of the playing sounds as if it could have benefited from a little more room to breathe. The Saint-Saens is great fun.

Musically this is a rewarding DVD, given the caveat above, but the real joy of it is to watch the magic close-up - and still not be able to see how it’s done.

You can buy this disc here