Jakob Gimpel plays Beethoven Piano Concerto No.4 in G Major Op.58 live in 1967

An April 24, 1967 broadcast performance of Jakob Gimpel playing Beethoven's Piano Concerto No.4 in G Major Op.58 at the Musikhalle Hamburg with the NDR-Sinfonieorchester conducted by Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt.

Gimpel was a superb pianist whose career seemed to have the ingredients of major successes - including many recordings on the Electrola label in the 1950s, as well as playing his own arrangements in the 1953 Tom & Jerry cartoon Johann Mouse (which would go on to win an Academy Award) - yet he found that the nth degree of success eluded him.

Fortunately a significant number of recordings - both sanctioned studio accounts and unofficial concert and radio broadcast performances - can provide present-day listeners with some marvellous examples of his inspired pianism.

Gimpel had set down a fine reading of Beethoven's G Major Piano Concerto with Arthur Rother and the Berlin Symphony Orchestra in 1960, yet this concert recording finds him in even more astounding form. While his tone, phrasing, and poise are always exquisite, we can hear in this account some utterly mesmerizing nuancing in the form of gentle but noticeable timing adjustments and some truly breathtaking dynamic shadings - among the most marvellous pianissimos I have heard (the first movement cadenza and the final measures of the 2nd movement are particularly glorious).

Many thanks to Francis Crociata for sharing this superb broadcast performance.

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