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FRANTISEK STUPKA

1879-1965

Some excellent Czech conductors, Talich, Kubelik, Ancerl, made international careers, and there are also the excellent ones, relatively difficult to track down, who did their thing at home. One of these, who surfaces now and then on record, is Frantisek Stupka who shared the Czech Philharmonic’s podium with Václav Talich between the wars. What a find! Dvorak’s Eighth in Stupka’s hands is velvety and visionary, it dances on air, one thinks of a Czech incarnation of Clemens Krauss. There’s also a Dvorak cello concerto with André Navarra, a performance of delightful spurts and lingers, a showbiz snappiness, a feeling for phrases emerging with an almost improvisatory quality. And a Tchaikovsky 1812 Overture featuring swiping violins and stinging trumpets.