Koussevitzky and Classical Composers

Serge Koussevitzky was known for his free approach to tempo, and his approach to the Classical-era composers was no exception. The final movements of both works presented in this week’s episode move more briskly than many 21st-century renditions. Andre Speyer, son of BSO English horn player Louis Speyer, reflected on this characteristic: “Koussevitzky was, I think, an extraordinary conductor in many ways—sounds he made, interpretations, some of which were most disputable, but they certainly raised the hair on the back of your neck.” Koussevitzky biographer Hugo Leichtentritt concludes that these idiosyncrasies are what make a Koussevitzky performance special: “When Koussevitzky takes a presto finale of Mozart or Haydn at a much faster pace than a listener has heard formerly, this tempo is right for Koussevitzky and the Boston Symphony Orchestra, because they can control it so well that the music fairly scintillates in a fascinating manner, the fastest passages come out with perfect clearness and apparent ease, and the lightness and gaiety, the humor, wit, and alacrity of the music are perfectly interpreted (Leichtentritt, H. (1946). Serge Koussevitzky, the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the New American Music, p.165).”  

One of the ways Koussevitzky successfully pulled off these tempi with the Classical composers was by employing smaller ensembles, especially for performances of Bach and Mozart. When gas and rubber rationing caused the BSO to cancel full participation in the Berkshire Symphonic Festival from 1942 to 1945, Koussevitzky’s patriotic response was to keep music alive in the Berkshires by relying on a student orchestra and chamber concerts at the Lenox Library in 1942-43, and for the summers of 1944 and 1945 he organized reduced orchestra performances of works by Bach and Mozart. This week’s radio broadcast of Mozart’s 23rd Piano Concerto with soloist Alexander Brailowsky is one of these wartime Mozart Festival performances that demonstrated Koussevitzky’s firm conviction that live concerts should prevail even during times of deprivation. This radio broadcast is unique in that as of 2024, the BSO has never commercially released a recording of Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23. 

Although Koussevitzky often terrified his musicians with his intensity on the podium, he was still capable of permitting a little humor in the concert hall. Koussevitzky once impersonated Josef Haydn, donning a frock coat for a 1939 pension concert performance of the Farewell Symphony (see photo above). In addition, Koussevitzky was particularly fond of this week's featured Haydn symphony. Of the 211 performances of Haydn works that Koussevitzky conducted during his tenure with the BSO, nearly half of those (93 in total) were of Symphony No. 88. Yet despite the 88th symphony being his most performed Haydn symphony, Koussevitzky never commercially recorded it with the BSO, and as of 2024, the BSO has not released it either.