One of a handful of salon-type pieces for violin and piano that Fritz Kreisler, at one point or another, arranged for violin and orchestra, the Marche miniature viennoise is not one of Kreisler's better-known truffles. But perhaps it should be. Truly, the recording Kreisler made in 1945, with Donald Voorhees and the Victor Symphony Orchestra (it would be renamed the RCA Victor Orchestra the following year), must rank among his most delightful discs. That recording is also among his very last; Kreisler was over 70 when it appeared. After hearing the woodwinds whirl and spin their way around the solo violin's mock-serious Viennese civil-march tune and after enjoying the transparent commentary of the celesta and the sparkling spiccato obbligato of the section violins, one can hardly imagine the same music existing in a form for violin and piano. Like the Viennese Rhapsodic Fantasietta for violin and orchestra (the 1946 recording of which happens to be Kreisler's very last recording), this is music stuffed with Kreisler's own nostalgia for the magical warmth and ways of Vienna at the turn of the century—always home to Kreisler's heart, something forever lost to time and progress.

© All Music Guide