Here we are into a new year and yes I'm writing a review as I mentioned on our last edition I had some cds over Christmas and we'd be talking about them.
Beethoven is the second largest composer in order of works I have collected after Mozart and most of the original discs stemmed from around 1989 through 1994 starting initially with a couple of Naxos titles and later on taking in discs on Deutsche Grammophon that had stood the test of time in the Galleria and Privilege series.
I had replaced a few of those in 2010 for newly remastered versions that apart from sounding firmer being slim 2 cd sets, took less space too.
The last entry for Beethoven was in 2011 when we bought a five cd box set of symphonies.
The violin is an instrument I have a liking for and Beethoven wrote quite a bit for it.
I also like the piano so when the two instruments are played as a duo then I'm enraptured and that lead to getting a recording of Beethoven's Fifth and Ninth Violin Sonatas but the sound was lacking something. Yehudi Menuhin is one of the finest violinists of all time and recordings by him certainly are worth seeking out.
It also was the case I longed for a complete set of them and these two double cd sets give me that in performances that are hard to beat and indeed in his piano works many of us feel Wilhelm Kempff just got the right feel showing sensitivity, restraint and even soul in how on recordings such as this whole set, allowing them to speak directly to us.
The nineteen-seventy analogue sound has been carefully mastered so it sounds as fresh as many modern recordings.
Having got these that had been issued in a four cd set in the halycon days of cd in the mid nineteen eighties I feel upgrading and the same time completing this series of recordings makes sense.
Collecting classical recordings often seems daunting with many hundreds of recordings being issued over the decades and made available in differing forms. Beethoven was an early passion of mine from hearing many of his works on the radio or through borrowed discs.
To me at least there is a difference between seeking out outstanding versions of individual symphonies and finding a set to live with, and while there are undoubtedly performances of single symphonies available which could compete with the best, it is as a coherent and aesthetically consistent survey that Cluytens accounts - available in this set - are best considered .
I feel there is a rightness to his judgement which proves enormously satisfying on repeated listenings and there is a special interest in hearing the fruits of a combination of several stellar talents: the virile, robust sound of the pre-Karajan Berlin Philharmonic, the production genius of Walter Legge working in a congenial recording acoustic, the Romantic but never indulgent interpretations of am under-rated conductor who died all too soon, and the especially fine vocal contributions from an unusual team of soloists and the wholly committed choir of St Hedwig's Cathedral - wrapped up in a set available cheaply from the likes of Amazon.
In my teens I became acquainted with Beethoven's symphonies through these performances when they were available as budget LP's on the EMI Classics for Pleasure label collecting the complete set and was worried that many years later my judgement would be clouded by sentimental attachment, however having listened intently to a good many other versions, I find that this set stands up remarkably well. The Pastoral (my favourite of the lot) and the Ninth have long been praised but you will find equally enthusiastic endorsements of every symphony here in one review or you'll be hard pressed to find a discouraging word. They are not the last word in individuality, nor do they bear the stamp of a particular approach, but Cluytens seems to understand and appreciate the spirit and heart of this music. Absolutely no-one captures the cat-like tread of the opening of the Fourth the way Cluytens does; rhythms and accents are beautifully sprung and he pays close attention to dynamics. I was also especially pleased to discover that Nicolai Gedda, was much more impressive than I remembered him in the Choral, and the soaring refulgence of Gre Brouwenstijn's soprano is a special treat.
Herbert von Karajans recordings with the Berlin Philharmonic are often interesting but to me he's never conducted an even as set as this Cluytens set with the same orchestra.
The remastered stereo sound is warm and spacious preserving a sense of being present at the session; excellent for recordings made between 1957 and 1959.
Recently I've gotten some more classical music cds that I've been slowly working my way through and I hope to complete this entry about them in a few days time.
First off, I kind of got off on a lopsided approach to Beethoven, missing out on his Violin and Piano Sonatas completely plowing through the Symphonies and then Piano Concertos 2 and 5.
In the early 1960's DG had a stereophonic remake of Wilhelm Kempff's series of the complete piano concertos made again featuring the Belin Philharmonic Orchestra but this time featuring Ferdinand Leitner conducting.
They had been issued previously on cd in the DG Galleria series in 1987/8 but were remastered to good effect a few years back and issued in 2 cd sets.
This one has the first four piano concertos.
The fifth known as the Emperor was issued in a second pack with the Triple Concerto performed by Wilhelm Geza Anda on piano, Wolfgang Schneiderhan on violin and Founier on the cello coupled ith a second disc with Schniederhan's masterful 1961 account of the Opus 61 Violin Concerto.
Well, I got the first two discs in series of Wilhelm Kempff's masterful Piano Sonatas cycle from the mid 1960's that as recordings weren't unfamiliar to me as I'd borrowed tapes from the public library of them before. I think there was a big box with all thirty two of them but I kinda thought it would be overkill and have picked up a 2 cd set with the late Sonatas, numbers 27 through 32.
I eventually got the cd in the same series yesterday of Menuhin and Kempff's account of the Sonatas for Piano and Violin numbers Five and Nine from 1970 that remains one of the finest ever recorded. I also picked up used the Violinist Anne Sophie-Mutter's recording with Herbert von Karajan of the Triple Concerto from 1980 which was a full price disc issued 1985 with three overtures tacked on to fill up the disc.
Dvorák: Well I always had a soft spot from his work but outside of the odd Piano Sonata plus recordings of his Cello and Violin Concertos, hadn't gone beyond his famous Ninth symphony (the New World).
I bought a re-issue of a 1991 cd set packaged in a cardboard box and card sleeves of Rafael Kubelik's complete cycle of nine symphonies recorded 1968 thru'1973 for DG, something I'd always dreamt of getting as a kid which were amongst the strongest interpretations ever and anyway I've always loved theses performances having the Ninth on lp.
Finally to Brahms. Poor thing I kinda neglected him beyond the cat gut works and a recording of his Second and Third symphonies I inexplicably picked up in the early 1990's. I've finally added his First and Fourth symphonies as performed by Herbert von Karajan (1978 and 1988 respectively).
