@goofyfoot
Most of Furtwangler recordings are live concerts. He hated the studio and made relatively few recordings there relative to Stokowski and Toscanini, to cite two contemporaries of equal stature.
Van Beinum left few recordings, probably because he died relatively young
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I listened to Pristine Audio’s transfer of the wartime Furtwangler Brahms 4 last night. I think it may be from the same source as Music and Arts, as their is a fair amount of noise, like a generator hum, at the beginning that goes away about two minutes in. I’m guessing the first acetate must of have been compromised but the rest were better. The Germans were experimenting with the tape but I don’t know the origin of this recording and Pristine, contrary to their usual practice, doesn’t mention the original source.
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I had in mind Conductors who worked in the pre stereo era when I made the thread, but that is a weird cut off point, because many of the greats of previous generations worked so long that they straddled both eras. And I didn’t mean it to be comprehensive either, just thought those three would kick off a discussion.
I actually have seen Solti and Bernstein in concert, formative events in my listening history. I remember seeing Barbirolli and Klemperer on TV. So they all seem less remote than someone like Furtwangler or Mengelberg.
Interpret the rules as you wish!
The big Bruno Walter box has really boosted my love for him. I remember those recordings being available on the execrable vinyl of Columbia Budget label. Hearing them freshly scrubbed is a revelation.
we should also add Szell, Ormandy, and Koussevitsky to the list
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There is a good selection of Cantelli , both studio recordings and live concerts, on the Pristine Audio site. I particularly like the concert version of Stravinsky Chant of the Nightengale
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Willem Mangelberg?
I have only heard a few examples of him—Ein Heldenleben with the NYP and an Eroica with Amsterdam. The Eroica sounded like a little crystal meth may be been injected into proceedings.
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The tempo discussions by Mahgister are interesting. I heard Ricardo Muti give a talk from the podium that must of have gone about 15 minutes before the start of a work where he essentially makes the same points. It was difficult to understand him in the large concert hall, in his mixture of Italian and English and I remember thinking wouldn’t it be great to hear him give a master class in conducting and perhaps use a few examples.
I have heard many people look at film of Furtwangler conducting, critique his beat as imprecise and approximate at best, and wonder how he achieved his results, with his supple ebb and flow. He had to be the antithesis of George Szell, about whom his players would say “Even the spontaneity is rehearsed” yet Szell was reportedly a huge admirer of both Furtwangler and Toscanini.
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Most of my earliest record were Szell and Cleveland. $2.75 each at the Michigan Student union in Ann Arbor. I imbibed the Beethoven PCs, Symphonies , most of the great Richard Strauss works, the great Dvorak Symphonies. I never cared much for his Brahms, though.
Kna? those slow tempos always kind of stopped me at the gate, but some of his Wagner is pretty transcendent. Hitler is reputed to have detested Kina so that is a recommendation of sorts.
Boulez and Maazel were great Conductors, well represented in my collection. Since all their work is from the stereo era, and they haven't been passed that long, they don't seem to be historical figures to me, but depending on where someone is on the generational scale, they may appear to be Historical.
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My understanding is that he authorized them to be released after he died, so presumably he thought they had some merit?
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I know about Celi and his Zen Buddhism. Still, he had the power to guarantee in his will not to have recordings distributed after his death, instead of delegating that
decision to others. So my premise is that on some level he must of have cared, and wanted his performances disseminated, while simultaneously making a show of not caring.
Personally I can live without Celi. For my money he simply stretches and distorts the music until the line is unrecognizable. ymmv
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I have the Warner box. I am not saying that W.F. didn’t make studio rcordings, he made plenty of them, but most of the available recordings are either concerts or Radio Broadcasts. W.F. studio recordings are generally felt to be inferior as performances to his live concert recordings or Radio broadcasts. One of my favorite Furtwangler recordings is Bruckner Eight with the VPO from late 1944. I believe that there are at least two recordings from different days. One is the actual Radio Broadcast made with a very small audience, probably a few Nazi bigwigs, the day before the actual concert, which I believe was also recorded and subsequently both have found their way to CD. I have the one that is sans large audience and it is the most thrilling Bruckner 8 out there, and it really sounds good for that vintage. btw, the Furtwangler set to have is the DG SACD set, if you can find it.
Van Beinum--I haven’t listened to any of his recordings (except the odd bits that come on the radio) since the lp days. I believe the Eloquence Label put out a good collection recently
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@lowrider57
I have the Music and Arts Brahms Furtwangler set. Great stuff. The Second is the most fascinating, if only because we now know that W.F. was slated for execution by the Gestapo after the performance. Tipped off, possibly by Albert Speer, he escaped while taking his bows during the applause, which M&A preserves…one can hear the puzzlement of the clappers as he doesn’t reappear.
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@lowrider57
Yes, the subject of Furtwangler’s involvement with the Nazis has been examined thoroughly and could be a thread in itself. Do you remember The Sound Of Music and how the Von Trapp family escapes Austria after the Anschlus? The real story of their escape is less prosaic but it appears as if the book for the Play/Movie borrowed a few details from Furtwangler’s bio.
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@lowrider57
I have the M&A 1944 Eroica. This was actually my first introduction to B3, albeit on a budget lp that my older sister bought in 1972. That recording imprinted me; every other recording of the piece has never seemed as Life and Death as this one.
I did play a bit of the M&A after the last time that I listened to Pristine, and the differences weren't as significant as I thought they would be. The Pristine is preferable but I think the Fanfare reviews the Pristine regularly uses on their website doth protest a bit to much.
I actually bought the Pristine Digital Collection, and subscribe to the streaming service. If you do the latter then you get free downloads. The only problem with the streaming service is it doesn't work with most of the players that play Qobuz,Tidal, etc. You either need a computer or listen from a mobile device on the Pristine site. I use Chromecast from my phone to my Cambridge Audio streamer.
At any rate if you do the streaming service and download from their site once a month you basically have it for free, and there are enough recordings on the PA site to make it worthwhile, imo.
Speaking of Pristine Audio and wartime recordings from the Third Reich, I listened to the Walter Gieseking Beethoven Emperor recording from 1944 that was made in stereo. I had heard it previously when it was released, and aural memory is unreliable but the Pristine recording sounds amazing. btw there is a brief audible burst of antiaircraft fire
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The Russian….in their day Soviet…conductors had a reduced presence in the West. It was hard to judge some of them until they defected. They had decreased concertizing, decreased recordings (for the longest time, the only Mravinsky recordings generally available was the Tchaikovsky Symphony set). They never got to play Mahler or Bruckner. So at best I give them an incomplete.
I personally never cared for Mravinsky. He had all the warmth of a 10 year stint in the Gulag. Kondrashin and Rhazdo were more interesting to me and their legacy has grown as more material becomes available. Svetlanov could be hit or miss. I always viewed him as the Soviet Solti with lower Orchestral standards, but there are some recordings, such as the Tchaikovsky Manfred, where he hits all the buttons
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