The main question here is how BMG's new 20-bit remasterings compare to those in their 1990 Toscanini Complete Edition. Both ends of the dynamic spectrum are considerbly opened up, which intensify the Maestro's stinging accents and point up the carefully sculpted cantabile phrasings to an unprecedented degree. I also detect smidgens of artificial reverberation: tastefully applied, but frankly superfluous. The Schubert symphonies boast relentless forward momentum, which pushes the NBC Orchestra to the edge of its collective virtuosity. I prefer Toscanini's weightier 1940 Schubert "Great", featuring the more tonally alluring Philadelphia Orchestra. By contrast, the Mendelssohn works benefit from Toscanini's slightly looser-limbed expansiveness in the slow movements, and the solo work is more relaxed. The performances, incidentally, date from between Toscanini's 83rd and 87th years, and reveal the Maestro's unflagging energy and fervent committment in each and every bar.
Leopold Anthony Stokowski was an English conductor of Polish descent. One of the leading conductors of the early and mid-20th century, he is best known for his long association with the Philadelphia Orchestra and his appearance in the Disney film Fantasia. He was especially noted for his free-hand conducting style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from the orchestras he directed. The NBC Symphony Orchestra was a radio orchestra conceived by David Sarnoff, the president of the Radio Corporation of America, especially for the celebrated conductor Arturo Toscanini. The NBC Symphony performed weekly radio concert broadcasts with Toscanini and other conductors and served as house orchestra for the NBC network. The orchestra’s first broadcast was on November 13, 1937 and it continued until disbanded in 1954. A new ensemble, independent of the network, called the “’Symphony of the Air’” followed. It was made up of former members of the NBC Symphony Orchestra and performed from 1954 to 1963, Stokowski was a champion of Sibelius’s music, giving the US premieres of his last three symphonies and recording many of his works. He brings his own vision of Nordic grandeur to the first two of the Finnish master’s symphonies in these recordings.
Holst: Savitri; The Planets; The Perfect Fool Ballet Suite
SOMM Recordings
CD
$29.99Aug 16, 2024
SOMM Recordings is pleased to release this set of delightful never-before-released recordings of the music of Gustav Holst in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the composer's birth. Here are works of grand and intimate scale, for orchestral and chamber forces, with and without singers, offering a vivid sampling of his oeuvre in meticulous restorations of recorded live performances given in the 40s, 50s and 60s. Chronologically, the earliest recordings are those on Disc 2, curated by Producer Lani Spahr. The live performances of The Perfect Fool suite and The Planets were recorded from New York's Radio City Studio in 1945 and Boston's Symphony Hall in 1946, respectively, with British conductors leading orchestras from "across the pond", where Holst had devoted much time in his later years conducting, lecturing and teaching. The recordings on Disc 1 are in various ways the result of Imogen Holst's championing of her father's music. A composer in her own right, arranger, conductor, teacher, musicologist and festival administrator, it was in the last capacity, especially, that she came to work at Benjamin Britten's side on his annual Aldeburgh Festival, becoming co-artistic director in the season of 1956. This recording of Gustav Holst's chamber opera Savitri dates from that summer and comes from the collection of Music Preserved. Nearly a decade later Imogen Holst, who by then was acclaimed for her founding and leadership of the Purcell Singers, a choir whose performances became a regular fixture at Aldeburgh, curated a series of broadcasts on BBC's Third Programme to feature works by her father and other composers. Some of the Gustav Holst pieces, like the Third Group of Choral Hymns from the Rig Veda and Hammersmith: Prelude and Scherzo for orchestra, were broadcast live from public performances at the Cheltenham Music Festival in July of 1965, Cheltenham incidentally being Gustav's birthplace. Others, like the 4 Songs for soprano and violin and The Evening-Watch for mixed chorus, must have been pre-recorded in closed sessions that summer for use later in Imogen's series of programmes. These two recordings were aired on 31 October 1965. All of the Cheltenham '65 recordings come from the collection of Stephen Crane of ARS Recorded Editions. Disc 1 has been fastidiously polished by Restoration Engineer Paul Baily. His restoration of the recent Sir Adrian Boult Conducts (ARIADNE 5024-2) was honoured with the Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik (German Records Critics' Award) in the Historical Recordings category. Restoration Engineer for Disc 2, Lani Spahr's previous SOMM releases include the lauded four-volume sets Vaughan Williams Live (ARIADNE 5016, 5018-20) and Elgar Remastered (SOMMCD 261-4), as well as two Gramophone Editor's Choice picks: Elgar from America Vol.3 (ARIADNE 5015-2) for "superb audio restorations [bringing] performances fully to life" and Bruckner from the Archives Vol.1 (ARIADNE 5025-2) for the "high standards achieved here, where expert audio restoration and remastering is by Lani Spahr".
Toscanini Conducts Two Choral Masterpieces By Beethoven
Music and Arts Programs of America
CD
$32.99Oct 01, 2003
When this two CD set was originally issued in 1986, here is what William H. Youngren said about it in The Christian Science Monitor: "...I can think of no better introduction to Toscanini for a listener who is curious to know why so many considered him the greatest conductor of his time." If that does not say it all, I do not know what does.
