Who is your Favorite Historical Conductor?


For discussion purposes I am limiting this to

1) Wilhelm Furtwangler

2) Arturo Toscanini 

3) Bruno Walter

 

feel free to introduce others.  I will be arbitrary and cut off Conductors who worked after the death of Leonard Bernstein.

  Furtwangler and Toscanini died just short of the onset of the stereo era.  They were however recorded with the best technology of the times, and the work of restoration technology of today has done wonders.  Walter recorded until 1962 but perhaps his best work was done in the mono era.

  Walter was renowned for his “humanity” Furtwangler for his near mystical ability to rechannel German/Austrian music, and Toscanini for his finely chiseled intensity

mahler123

@goofyfoot

Very nice all around. Your digital is top-class, very well assembled. Not familiar with your amp but your system must sound wonderful through the Quads.

I’m all tubes; Atma-sphere 30W OTL amp, Audio Note M3 preamp with phono, the AN DAC, Devore Gibbon Super 8’s. I’ll PM the details.

 

Edit... I just realised our virtual systems aren't displayed by way of your moniker.

 

@lowrider57 Wish I could hear that Atma-sphere amp, speakers too! Will look for PM, chilli'n.

Aren't we forgetting the Russian school? Evgeny Mravinsky, Kirill Kondrashin, Gennady Rozhdestvensky, to name a few.

Andre Previn's golden years at EMI/Angel are also worth a mention.

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