Classical Music

The 46 songs that make up Wolf's Italienisches Liederbuch show the composer at his most captivatingly individual; and history has proven that only singers of the utmost artistry can do them justice. Dame Janet Baker and John Shirley-Quirk are such singers, taking the listener from the depths of pathos through frissons of ecstasy with searching perception. Together with pianist Stuart Bedford, who also devised a new sequence for the songs, the singers performed the set at the 1977 Aldeburgh Festival, where the warmth and ambience of the performance was captured in this BBC stereo recording.

SHOSTAKOVICH Symphony No. 10. TCHAIKOVSKY The Snow Maiden: Melodrama. RIMSKY-KORSAKOV The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitezh: Hymn to Nature; The Battle of Kerzhenets • Yevgeny Svetlanov, cond; USSR St SO • ICA ICAC 5036 (62:17) Live: London 08/21–30/1968


As mentioned in my review elsewhere of the Dvo?ák Cello Concerto in a three-CD set of live Mstislav Rostropovich performances issued by BBC Music, this recording is the other half of the famous—or perhaps notorious—Royal Albert Hall concert of August 21, 1968. Hours before, Soviet tanks rolled into Czechoslovakia to crush the Prague Spring effort to advance “socialism with a human face” that threatened to crack the solidarity of the Iron Curtain. Consequently, the contents of the program—the celebrated concerto masterpiece by the iconic master of Czech music, and the profoundly brooding symphony of the Soviet Union’s greatest composer—could not possibly have been more ironic choices. The irony is further compounded for us by subsequent knowledge that the symphony’s scherzo is Shostakovich’s musical depiction of the brutal dictator Josef Stalin, who imposed upon the Eastern bloc the repressive tyranny that the invasion was now enforcing anew.


When the Russian orchestra—whose members (unlike Rostropovich) most likely had no inkling of what had occurred—came on stage, instead of being greeted with the usual round of applause, they encountered an uproar of shouted political slogans by protestors seeking to disrupt the concert. The yelling and scuffling persist through the first several measures of the symphony’s first movement, almost obscuring the quiet, somber opening on the lower strings, before coming to a sudden halt. However unnerving the uproar may have been to the players, they show no signs of it in any loss of steadiness of musical execution. Much the same can be said of conductor Yevgeny Svetlanov, who I presume was cognizant of the situation. However fairly or unfairly—the matter is a subject of dispute—Svetlanov is often characterized as being something of a Soviet party hack; while his real musical abilities cannot be denied, it is sometimes asserted that he rose to his prominent positions in part through political intrigues, and was regarded by apparatchiks as being more politically reliable than figures such as Kondrashin, Mravinsky, or Rozhdestvensky. In any case, he too rises to the occasion. Long on visceral emotional impact but short on subtlety, as was his wont, Svetlanov here produces a powerful musical juggernaut that, akin to the army tanks then rolling into Prague, moves forward with an inexorable, implacable power that upon its close is rewarded with a tumultuous, roaring ovation from the audience. While not my favorite version of this, my favorite post-Sibelius 20th-century symphony—my two top choices remain live performances by Yevgeny Mravinsky with the Leningrad Philharmonic from March 31, 1976, and Herbert von Karajan with the Berlin Philharmonic (in Moscow) from May 29, 1969—it belongs in the upper echelons of recordings of the work, and should not be missed by anyone who values it.


The brief filler pieces of Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov concert-hall rarities are likewise given committed, heartfelt performances. The sound quality is a bit murky in spots and has some background tape hiss but is generally quite fine for a live recording of this vintage. The Rimsky-Korsakov excerpts are asserted to be in stereo, though I can’t hear any real difference between those and the monaurally recorded pieces. One wishes that the Shostakovich presented here and the Dvo?ák concerto published by BBC Music were issued as an intact concert in a single two-CD set on a single label; as it is, we can be grateful for the opportunity to acquire them as presently available. Strongly recommended.


FANFARE: James A. Altena


-------

How’s this for a page ripped from history? On the night of 20-21 August 1968 tanks from the Warsaw Pact rolled into Czechoslovakia, bringing the ‘Prague Spring’ to an end. In that raw, angry atmosphere it’s no surprise that Svetlanov and his Soviet orchestra were given a rough reception at the BBC Proms just hours later. Indeed, the opening bars of the symphony emerge from what sounds like a near riot in the hall, the music growing in strength as the clamour subsides. What irony that this symphony - written in the year of Stalin’s death - should be the curtain-raiser for another age of repression. And the cover photograph of Svetlanov - finger to his lips - is a strong visual metaphor for the day’s momentous events.
 
There’s no way of knowing what went through the minds of this conductor and his players that night, but there’s little doubt that these extra-musical tensions - added to the purely musical ones - spawned a gaunt, hard-driven performance of this great work that’s impossible to forget. Extraordinary circumstances aside, does this recording rank alongside those of Kondrashin, Järvi, Karajan et al? Emphatically, yes; unsparing and idiomatically rough-edged, it will grab you by the scruff and pin you to the wall for fifty relentless minutes.
 
The BBC sound isn’t bad either - I imagine ICA remastered it for this release - the martial second movement as lacerating as I’ve ever heard it; indeed, this music can so easily be heard as a grim accompaniment to the newsreel footage of the day. The darkly menacing bass drum in the next movement is especially well caught, as are the wobblesome winds. One can only imagine the tension in the hall that night, and no one could have known how the audience would react at the end. As it happens, the sheer guts and cathartic power of this performance silence all criticism, the hardy Prommers - not easily won over - responding with cheers and applause.
 
The fillers are barely that; signposted as ‘bonus’ items they’re pleasing enough. Blink and you’ll miss the Tchaikovsky, but the excerpts from Kitezh are most enjoyable; no evidence of extra-musical tensions in the band’s easeful playing. As I was reminded when listening to Svetlanov’s Rimsky box, this is natural territory for him. One could have wished for more, but the symphony takes centre-stage - and rightly so.
 
ICA must be congratulated for issuing so much intriguing, good-quality material in the short time they’ve been in business. I was very impressed by the Rozhdestvensky Tchaikovsky Fourth and look forward to more of the same. Indeed, their very active Twitter feed suggests we won’t have long to wait.
 
Taut Shostakovich, stretched to breaking point by contemporary events.
 
-- Dan Morgan, MusicWeb International

Rozhdestvensky is considered to be one of the greatest Tchaikovsky conductors today. Given his Russian background and his outstanding leadership of the Bolshoi in the past, it is not surprising that his performances of the composer's works are entirely idiomatic. This live performance of Tchaikovsky's popular Symphony No.5 comes from the 1978 Flanders Festival in Belgium and has been recorded in excellent stereo. It is both exciting and poetic, and it confirmed Rozhdestvensky's new appointment as music director of the BBC Symphony the same year. The fill-up consists of Jan+ícek's rhapsody Taras Bulba recorded at the 1981 Proms. This work is a new addition to Rozhdestvensky's discography. Taras Bulba is arguably Janacek's most powerful and dramatic work. Here, it is given a searing performance in superb stereo, which fully captures the large orchestra used, complete with organ, brass and percussion.

Garrick Ohlsson won the 1970 Chopin International Piano Competition just four years prior the solo recital performances of Chopin and Liszt featured on this DVD. Ohlsson recorded the Chopin Piano Concerto No. 2 with the BBC Symphony Orchestra under James Loughran at Royal Albert Hall in 1978. Since these youthful concerts Garrick Ohlsson has also recorded the complete works of Chopin to global acclaim and is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading exponents of Chopin.

Sound format: LCPM mono
Picture format: 4:3
Running time: 78’
Subtitles: n/a
Menu languages: English
Booklet languages: E/F/G
Region code: All Regions - 0

When I last saw Garrick Ohlsson live in concert in 2007, I was mightily impressed by the delicacy and contrast the ursine pianist brought to his performance of Rachmaninov’s third piano concerto. This DVD unearths performances given by a much younger Ohlsson some thirty years earlier, when he was less a bear and more a lion of the keyboard, complete with 1970s mane.

The main feature on this DVD is a BBC Proms performance of the Brahms Second Piano Concerto under the baton of that great Scottish Brahmsian, James Loughran, whose famous Halle recordings of the symphonies, last seen on Classics for Pleasure, have sadly been deleted from the catalogue.

Ohlsson, wearing a white coat like the leader of the orchestra and no one else on stage, strides out with Loughran to warm Proms applause. We are quickly underway. The first movement is nicely paced, flowing and big. Indeed “big” is the right word for this performance. Loughran knows what he is doing with this music. He draws a well blended, robust sound from the orchestra, right from the opening horn call. Ohlsson shares his dramatic conception of the concerto, moving from gentle rhapsodic playing to roaring climaxes with the ebb and flow of the musical narrative. The uncredited principal cellist brings grace and charm to the andante, which Ohlsson matches and exceeds, and the finale is smile-coaxingly playful, but never lightweight. The highlight of this performance is the second movement. Ohlsson is at his rhapsodic best here. There are occasional wrong notes and horn wobbles, but they matter little when the performance is as exciting as this one.

The 1974 recital is fabulously 70s, from the font that flashes onto the screen to announce the recital in time to the opening chords of the Scherzo to the wavy beige studio backdrop. Ohlsson’s Chopin is superb. The Scherzo sparks with nervous energy and, under Ohlsson’s fingers, rings more with tragedy than mere melancholy. The Polonaise that follows is big and appealingly playful, like Hans Sachs merrily mending shoes with a large hammer. Funérailles is dark and menacing, seemingly powered by Ohlsson’s relentless left hand. The size of Ohlsson’s mitts is astonishing. If ever hands were built for the piano, his were.

The booklet note by Jeremy Siepmann lionises Ohlsson and says little of the music or the circumstances of its performance.

The mono sound, clear but constricted, prevents a general recommendation when so much of Ohlsson’s fine playing is available on disc in stereo. However Ohlsson’s fans and those who would see the young lion in his pomp need not hesitate.

-- Tim Perry, MusicWeb International

Kurt Sanderling conducts the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra with Carolyn Watkinson and John Mitchinson in works by Schumann and Mahler.

Rozhdestvensky was the first Russian conductor to perform and record all Mahler's symphonies in his country. Das klagende Lied is performed here live. The ICA version has been remastered, restoring the wide dynamics of Rozhdestvensky's magnificent performance. Janacek's the Fiddler's Child, from the 1979 Prague Festival, has never been issued before and is Rozdestvensky's only taping of the work.

Classical Music

Classical Music

Classical Music

Russian pianist Emil Gilels is regarded by many as one of the most significant pianists of the twentieth century and is universally admired for his superb technical control and burnished tone. The performance of Brahms's Piano Concerto 2 dates from 1971when Gilels was at his peak, and the live recital dates from 1974 featuring performances of Debussy and Prokofiev, both favorites of the pianist.

This series of DVDs will make the publicly broadcast BSO concerts from this era available for the first time since they were broadcast. This rare material represents some of the earliest televised concerts with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and William Steinberg, and has been restored using the greatest care and state-of-the-art techniques. It is of exceptional musical interest and historic value. The BSO's Music Director for just three seasons, Steinberg spent a great deal of time in the USA, having left Europe following Music Director positions in Cologne, Prague and Frankfurt. He also co-founded the Palestine Orchestra, later the Israel Philharmonic. His time with the BSO came at the end of his career following his position as the Music Director of Pittsburgh Symphony, which he held for over 20 years. Steinberg recorded a great deal of material with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra to great acclaim, but only a small selection of recordings with the BSO for DG. a live recording of Bruckner 8 with Steinberg and the BSO, from 1972, was issued as part of the orchestra's Centennial Celebration set, and has been described as a 'good, well paced and powerful reading, well played by the Bostonians'. Steinberg leads this Bruckner 8 performance from memory and with great subtlety and distinction in a sympathetic interpretation that provoked a rapturous response from the Boston audience.

BEETHOVEN Piano Sonatas: No. 6 in F; No. 29 in B?, “Hammerklavier.” SCHUBERT Impromptu in B?, D 935/3 • Wilhelm Backhaus (pn) • ICA 5055 (62:35) Live: Bonn 9/24/1959


This recital features Wilhelm Backhaus (1884–1969) near the end of his long career. The German pianist was known throughout his lifetime for his interpretations of Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, and Mozart primarily, though it should not be forgotten that he was the first person ever to record the 24 Chopin etudes back in 1928. This recording remains a remarkable document of the ease of execution and the elegance of musical interpretation he shared with certain members of that generation of pianists. His technique was formidable in his heyday and—perhaps even more astonishing—it remained so to the very end of his career.


The opening of the “Hammerklavier” Sonata is a bit slow and heavy, but this soon gives way to a torrent of energy and an upsurge in tempo just a few bars later. Backhaus seems to want to show that each theme, each section, has its own character, which needs an adjustment in tempo to best bring that out. The pianist makes the most of the diverse musical sections in the sonata, from the fluid and graceful scalar passages in the first movement, which sound like shimmering silky waves made of delicate musical fabric in his hands, to the big chordal passages, which are powerful walls of sound that surround and engulf the listener. Backhaus has no qualms about enhancing the effect of certain of these latter passages by adding extra sonority in the bass parts—most often just doubling the octave. The slow movement, one of the most difficult and sublime in Beethoven’s oeuvre, is emotionally taxing to even the most seasoned performers. Backhaus intelligently chooses a flowing tempo: never so slow as to drag, but never too fast as to trivialize the music. The finale is taken at a brisk pace. There may be a few wrong notes here and there (albeit not very many), but his sense of pacing is thrilling: There is more than just a sense of danger; there is in his interpretations the conviction that regardless of the obstacles, he will triumph in the end. There is as much fire in this “Hammerklavier” as the best of them.


The other works on the recital are well played as well, the Schubert being particularly inspired. The gentle way in which the pianist caresses the instrument betrays the age in which he matured: This is elegant and lyrical, and Backhaus shows that though this composition is in the same key as Beethoven’s grandest essay for the piano, it is in character lightyears apart. The Beethoven F-Major Sonata is no minor work, and Backhaus gives it all the respect and love that he does the rest of the program. The opening movement is playful in that Haydnesque vein, the fugato finale lighthearted yet filled with Beethovenian determination and drive. The quirky middle movement is perhaps my favorite in the sonata, though. Backhaus revels in the mysterious opening phrases, lightening the path through the middle section, bringing the piece to a wistful end. It is three and a half minutes of pure bliss.


This is a remarkable recital, one that grows on you the more you listen to it—one captured in remarkable sound given its vintage. For a live recital, one should expect a few wrong notes here and there. Backhaus at 75 plays as few as I’ve ever heard in a riveting performance of the “Hammerklavier.” This is no lightweight rendering of the piece, either; this is one to remember. That said, I have a few other favorites: Richter, Gilels, Rudolf Serkin. The one that I come back to more than any other, though, is Peter Serkin (on Pro Arte). There is in his playing the soaring of spiritual heights along with a real sense of structural logic. The fugal finale is brisk, light, rhythmic—almost jazzy—in his hands. But Backhaus is a welcome addition to my collection. If you are a fan of the “Hammerklavier,” then this recording should be welcome to yours as well.


FANFARE: Scott Noriega

This new release from ICA Classics presents the first recording of Antonio Pappano conducting Elgar with his Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome. For this program, Elgar’s First Symphony is paired with his Concert Overture ‘In the South,’ which was inspired by the conposer’s holiday in Alassio during 1903-1904. Both of these works had been out of the orchestra’s repertoire for more than a century until Pappano stated that he was “on a mission to bring this music back to its place of birth,” knowing that his performers had “natural Italianate passion and lyricism,” which would be perfect for these works. Pappano’s 2012 London season opened with Elgar. Reviewers had only positive things to say: “…His surging striving account caught all the nervous energy of this elegia work… Now he should take the symphony… to his own orchestra [in Rome].”

Classical Music

CHARLES MUNCH CONDUCTS HANDEL AND MOZART

George Frideric Handel: Water Music Suite (arr. H. Harty)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart:
Symphony No. 36 in C major, K. 425, “Linz”
Symphony No. 38 in D major, K. 504, “Prague”

Boston Symphony Orchestra
Charles Munch, conductor

Recorded live from Sanders Theatre, Harvard University on 12 April 1960 (Water Music), 8 April 1958 (Linz Symphony), and 3 November 1959 (Prague Symphony)

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: Enhanced Mono
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Menu language: English
Booklet notes: English, French, German
Running time: 62 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

Precious, unrecorded symphonies served up in vital, energising readings.

It sometimes seems as if WGBH-TV Boston had its camera crew surgically attached to the Sanders Theatre at Harvard. Maybe the crew emerged blinking from a surfeit of lectures, keen to get reacquainted with Charles Munch. The torrent of TV material now emerging on ICA Classics is both very welcome and very difficult to sift. What, usefully, should the critic do to suggest why you may or may not wish to buy this DVD, especially if the critic is me, one who suffers from a dual impulse; firstly to buy DVDs like this and then to despair of ever finding or making the time to watch them.
 
So, what’s in it for you when you consider this latest Munch DVD? I’m not saying ICA is being naughty but there’s no indication that this is black and white footage; most people will know this, but not everyone will, even if there’s a still of Munch (in black and white) on the box cover. So it’s black and white and in mono. The dates of the concerts are 1958, 1959 and 1960.
 
The first thing that’s in it for you is that Munch never recorded the two Mozart symphonies in the studio. This makes this AV representation especially valuable. Another thing in it for you, should you be interested in such things (I am), is to see the Boston Symphony in action - the players, the faces, their responses, maybe to try to put names to the faces. To this extent I wish ICA and other companies (almost no one does this, so I’m not singling out ICA) would provide a personnel listing of the orchestra at the time. I appreciate it may not be wholly accurate but I think it would be a nice touch.
 
Things start with the Handel-Harty Water Music suite, a performance of Beechamesque brio and bravado. If you miss the days of such arrangements then Munch and the Boston won’t let you down. The basses are positioned behind the French horns, and the top to bottom sonority, despite the mono sound, is highly enjoyable. Even though Adolf Busch, Boyd Neel and countless others had trail-blazed in this repertoire, Munch makes no concessions, and nor should he have done. Munch is at his most animated in the Allegro finale, smiling very slightly, his baton swishing about fly-fisherman style in his exuberance. One notices that the director decided that a good idea would be a camera shot ‘stepping down’ the orchestral sections, reasonable in theory, but dodgy in practice, not least when the camera slips, as it does once. One also notices that the Boston was an almost all-male orchestra at the time, and that the average age of the strings, at least, must have been quite high. There are some especially patrician looking gentlemen in the first violin section.
 
The Linz Symphony is from 1958 and has by far the most degraded film of the three. Grainy and rather unclear, a critic should counsel gently on this point. It’s hardly unwatchable, but you will most certainly notice the difference. The performance is in Munch’s best, taut and linear style; I would suggest George Szell as a reasonable point of comparison in terms of expression. Though sometimes tense, it’s never driven and the wind phrasing throughout is a delight. The Prague was taped in November 1959, with footage comparable in quality to the April 1960 Handel. I sense, unless it’s the increased clarity of the film that alerts me to the upturned eyes directed toward Munch’s beat, that the orchestra follows him that bit more circumspectly in this symphony. He makes the briefest of pauses between the first and second movements, ensuring a kind of symphonic continuity to occur. The band is ready for him, and the unindulged Andante is all the better for his unsentimental approach. The only demerit is not musical but filmic; some mildly chaotic camera panning shots that disrupt things briefly.
 
Despite such imperfections, I enjoyed the DVD. It enshrines those precious, unrecorded symphonies, grants visual immortality to the Boston denizens, and serves up vital, energising readings. How often you will play it, however, is a question that only you can answer.
 
-- Jonathan Woolf, MusicWeb International 

Hartmut Haenchen was born in Dresden in 1943 and from the moment of his 1971 Carl Maria von Weber Competition victory onward, he has been a force of nature in the classical music world. These Mahler recordings are being released to commemorate Haenchen's seventieth birthday and a rich career conducting orchestras and opera companies worldwide.

This 5-disc set features four outstanding 20th century conductors, William Steinberg (1899-1978), Dimitri Mitropoulos (1896-1960), Igor Markevitch (1912-83) and Gennadi Rozhdestvensky (b. 1931) thrillingly directing several Great Choral Classics of the 19th century, including Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and Verdi’s Requiem. Sopranos Galina Vishnevskaya and Dame Janet Baker, among other stellar singers, feature prominently in these performances.

BRITTEN CONDUCTS TCHAIKOVSKY

Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky
Variations on a Roccoco Theme, Op. 33
Pezzo capriccioso, Op. 62
Romeo and Juliet – Fantasy Overture

Mstislav Rostropovich, cello
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten, conductor

Recorded live from Snape Maltings Concert Hall, Aldeburgh, 16 June 1968
Bonus:
BRITTEN, B.: Gloriana, Op. 53 (excerpts)

Peter Pears, tenor
Aldeburgh Festival Singers
English Chamber Orchestra
Benjamin Britten, conductor

Recorded at Snape Maltings Concert Hall, Aldeburgh, 5 June 1970

Picture format: NTSC 4:3
Sound format: Enhance Mono
Region code: 0 (worldwide)
Menu language: English
Booklet notes: English, French, German
Running time: 68 mins
No. of DVDs: 1

As the 2011 Proms seasons rapidly approaches, this DVD whisks us back thirty seasons to two fine Proms given by Gennadi Rozhdestvensky and the BBC Symphony Orchestra which, by coincidence, also hail from a season exactly twenty seasons before my first teenage Promenade. That first taste of the Proms magic also featured the BBC Symphony in Russian classics and was to be conducted by another great Russian maestro, Yevgeny Svetlanov; alas, he was ill and died the following year and I never got to see him. Rozhdestzensky is still with us but, for some reason, only a very occasional visitor to the UK and more's the pity; in his excellent booklet notes, David Nice asks 'Is Gennadi Rozhdestvensky the greatest ever conductor of ballet scores?', and, on the evidence of this Nutcracker, which is ideally paced at every turn, it's hard to disagree.
 
Although proportioned something like a conventional concert programme, this selection of performances actually derives from two 1981 Proms, during Rozhdestvensky's relatively brief tenure as chief conductor of the BBC Symphony. The 2nd Act of the Nutcracker was filmed at the end of July and was preceded by a choral version of Mussorgsky's Night on Bare Mountain (the choir can be seen seated behind the orchestra during the Tchaikovsky), Prokofiev's Ugly Ducking and Scriabin's Prometheus. The Glinka items are extracted from a daring programme, mixing Viennese waltzes with double piano concertos, including Bartók's Concerto for two pianos and percussion. A punchy and swift performance of Glinka's Overture to Ruslan and Lyudmila opens the programme, followed by three wonderful dances from his opera A Life for the Tsar, the second of which has an energetically skipping rhythmic quality and which I recall fondly from its use in the climactic ball sequence from Alexander Sokurov's film Russian Ark, a remarkable single-take trawl through Russian history.
 
One of the advantages of seeing rather than merely hearing a performance such as this is the chance it affords to study the conductor's technique, and Rozhdestvensky's manner throughout the programme is minimal but precisely calibrated. The camera frequently cuts to an inert Rozhdestvensky, apparently doing nothing at all, but he is the master of conveying a world of meaning with a raised eyebrow and his hands can suggest a sculptor at work when he wishes. As already noted, tempos are perfectly judged in the Tchaikovsky, treading a fine line between grandeur and excitement and the BBC Symphony Orchestra's playing is every bit as plush and lively as one would expect from a Russian orchestra. Rozhdestvensky's speeds are adjusted for the concert hall: some of them would be tricky to dance to, such as a sweeping but forward driving Pas de deux (The Prince and the Sugar Plum Fairy). It's only a shame that we couldn't have the complete ballet; Rozhdestvensky in the full score does appear on a pricey Melodiya set (MELCD1000665), but it's terrific to have at least half and it's a performance I can imagine returning to often.
 
-- Andrew Morris, MusicWeb International


Gennadi Rozhdestvensky at the BBC Proms
Mikhail GLINKA (1804-1857)
Ruslan and Lyudmila – Overture [5:53]
Three Dances from A Life for the Tsar [16:27]
Pytor Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)
The Nutcracker – Act 2 [42:40]
BBC Symphony Orchestra/Gennadi Rozhdestvensky
rec. 27 July 1981 (Tchaikovsky), 14 August 1981 (Glinka), Royal Albert Hall, London
Producer (original broadcast): Rodney Greenburg
Picture format: 4:3/NTSC
Sound: Ambient Mastering/LPCM Stereo
Region: 0 (worldwide)

This is volume two of Ingrid Jacoby's complete set of Beethoven Piano Concertos. This strongly projected performance of Beethoven's Concerto No.5 is complemented by an all-Beethoven recital which Jacoby recorded in 1991/92, featuring sets of variations, the Andante favori and the op. 119 Bagatelles.

Classical Music

This spine-tingling account of Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto No.1 has never been issued before. It is a 'live' studio recording from 1958 with the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra - accompanied by Geza Anda's fellow Hungarian Georg Solti! This historic performance generates enormous electricity between the two artists.

Classical Music

Sir Thomas Beecham caught ‘live’ often showed the mercurial side of his character, and no performance was the same either in the studio or in the concert hall. ‘What Beecham sought at all times was freshness, and his unpredictability was a way to achieve this’ (David Patmore). All the performances included here from the Edinburgh Festival, London’s Royal Albert Hall, Royal Festival Hall and the BBC Studios are from Beecham’s final years, from 1954 when he had fully established the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and himself as central figures in England’s musical life, to 1959 when he conducted an extraordinarily memorable account of Brahms’s Symphony No.2. Every broadcast is captured here in exemplary sound for the time, and apart from the Liszt and Haydn Symphony No.101, none of the performances in this set have appeared on an album before, which makes it extremely important for all collectors of the conductor.