André Previn (1929-2019)

[adriano]

This fabulous universal musician died yesterday. He can be compared to Leonard Bernstein.
As a conductor of classical music he was excellent. His Rachmaninov, Korngold and Vaughan Williams recordings are great. I also liked him as a pianist and as a composer.
And I will never forget his quasi-totally improvised guest appearance in the 1971 Grieg Piano Concerto sketch of the Morecambe & Wise TV show :-)

[Alan Howe]

Yes: his LSO years in particular were fabulous. And how he kept a straight face in that M & W sketch I'll never know. He was never the same again...

[hyperdanny]

This was very sad news, he was one of the greats: his versatility was unparalleled, from Hollywood scores to conducting the Great Repertoire, via jazz pianism, plus composing some really good pieces (I like the piano and violin concertos very much).
And yes, he was one of my favorites, a self effacing, meticolous musician whose music making ways were actually very different from his glitzy life.
I am glad I was able to see him live a decent number of times in the early 00's, in London with his beloved LSO.
The last time was in 2013, just here, when he made his La Scala debut (at the fresh age of 83!).
I had read that he was quite frail, but i was a bit shocked nonetheless..he was "very" frail, I distinctly remember that, for a moment,  expectancy could be sensed in the audience  ..iike..is he going to make it to the podium ?
He slowly made it..and everything changed: he was suddenly in complete command of the La Scala orchestra (a famously diffident ensemble, which he had never conducted), and he gave us a really good concert in a rather taxing program (TWO Brahms symphonies, 3&4).
Many, many cd's from him remain in my collection as references..today, to remember him, I put on his fabulous, coruscating Korngold symphony with the LSO , and the Walton/Elgar cello concertos he did in Oslo with Muller-Schott, one of his last recordings if not the very last.
RIP Maestro.

[Gareth Vaughan]

I have all his VW symphonies  and I consider them marvellous performances.

[Alan Howe]

Seconded!

[eschiss1]

Also recorded the Conyus and Goldmark concertos with Itzhak Perlman (perhaps more Perlman's choices than Previn's, for all I know, but did record them) and- I believe- conducted the first commercial American (or English, eg with London Symphony Orchestra, or in some cases first outside-of-the-Soviet-Union, or.. etc.) recordings of a number of works (not all of them within our remit, admittedly) which have since become rather more popular.

[alberto]

He recorded also Goldmark Rustic Wedding Symphony, then (and now) much neglected; and also some R.Strauss concertos rather underperformed (Horn Concerto n.2, Idyll Concertino for clarinet and bassoon).
I am lucky to have seen him twice, the latter in London conducting a work much associated to him, Walton's First Symphony (outside the remit of this forum).

[Revilod]

Previn endeared himself to the nation when he appeared with Morecambe and Wise. Can you imagine Karajan agreeing to wear a bus conductor's uniform?! Chailly says, in the current "Gramophone", that all conductors have an ego but Previn's was smaller than most.
I also remember his BBC television series from the 1970s..."Andre Previn's Music Night". There was some unsung repertoire included. I'm sure I remember him conducting the scherzo from Scharwenka's first concerto with Earl Wild.

[adriano]

In the M&W sketch "The Grieg Piano Concerto", Previn wears a black suit with a tie over a white shirt with frills.
As a bus bus conductor he has a cameo apperance only - in the M&W 1972 Christmas Special sketch entitled "Buses on Screen".

Here he is rehearsing Rachmaninov:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=is84ss_Xc3c

and here Beethoven's 7th:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIJt0DnGto8

(As far as I remember, in his own "Carmen" film of 1967, Karajan has a cameo performance of a few seconds, dressed up as a smuggler in rags).

[kolaboy]

Love his piano concerto.

[Ilja]

In Previn's performances of the unsungs, let's not forget Sinding's Suite im alten Stil, together with Perlman (again) with the Pittsburgh Symphony. The recording (YT) is here.

[adriano]

... and don't forget that Previn also composed two operas. "A Streetcar named Desire" (conducted by the composer) and "Brief Encounter" (conducted by Patrick Summers) are available on DGG. I appreciate them very much. Rodney Gilfry in the part of Stanley Kowalski" in "Streetcar" ist fabulous. Also the orchestrations are great.

[hyperdanny]

hadrianus compared Previn to Bernstein, maybe he intended it mostly musically, because they were both so versatile and knew no boundaries.
To me, it's also very true in respect to his talent as a pedagogue.
I have several DVD's of a British program called "the Story of the symphony" where, with the help of the RPO (his 80's tenure) he would trace the story of the symphonic form through some important opuses: he would explain the piece with the RPO playing snippets, and then he would conduct the whole thing.
So many wonderful shows , fron Tchaikovky 6 to Shostakovich 5 ,ecc ecc, but my favorite is the one about Brahms 4.
It is the best explanation of this masterpiece that I ever encountered, detailed and profoundly cultivated, gems of music perception thrown at the listener with the utmost amiability to the point of nonchalance.
I have to go to retrieve it.

[semloh]

To me, Previn was a genius, who turned everything he touched into gold. Walton, Vaughan Williams, Gershwin, improvised jazz, and so it goes on, and he always played the right notes in the right order! His media image also did so much to make classical music attractive to the general public. His legacy is astonishing. 

[redieze]

I remember 2 discoveries thanks to radio or cd :-his  charming1974 stage musical "The Good Companions" (cd DRG15020) or his original1962 film score for "two for the seesaw" (cd KritzerlandKR20012-5) and I agree : he was that very american kind of musician ,like dear Lenny : musical polymath