Recordings that you enjoy: Beethoven Symphony #9

[ajlee]

Fricsay is awesome!! His may seem kind of "plain" upon first listening, but afterwards you'll get that feeling of "natural-ness" that makes everything feels so right. It certainly is enjoyable for the long-run.

[knight66]

Leinsdorf seems to attract very contrasting opinions. There used to be a poster here who was clearly allergic to him. Seems though that he could be a hit or miss conductor. We had some of those in the UK, principally Sir Malcolm Sargent. I wonder what Leinsdorf's Beethoven 9th is like?

Mike

[Gurn Blanston]

Leinsdorf seems to attract very contrasting opinions. There used to be a poster here who was clearly allergic to him. Seems though that he could be a hit or miss conductor. We had some of those in the UK, principally Sir Malcolm Sargent. I wonder what Leinsdorf's Beethoven 9th is like?

Mike

Well, I have never heard him conduct anything (I'm sure that most people know by now of my allergy to dead performers). But my 9th collection is an exception to nearly all of my rules, so when Amazon put the advert in my page (maybe you would like this?) I figured 'why not?'. So we'll see, probably next Sunday rather than this one. I have no preconceptions beyond that the Boston band was world-class at that time. And maybe still are.

[knight66]

An interesting fetish you have been nourishing: No dead performers, no live composers.

Does this require a clear out as the passage of time culls generations of performers? Margaret Price just fell off her log....feel free to send the proscribed CDs over the pond. On the other hand Gorecki died fairly recently, so I imagine you are now scanning for bargains of his work.

Mike

[Gurn Blanston]

An interesting fetish you have been nourishing: No dead performers, no live composers.

Does this require a clear out as the passage of time culls generations of performers? Margaret Price just fell off her log....feel free to send the proscribed CDs over the pond. On the other hand Gorecki died fairly recently, so I imagine you are now scanning for bargains of his work.

Mike

  No, I'm not that active about it; status at the time of purchase lasts for MY lifetime. Although Gorecki sound interesting. Once I begin seeing disk stickers reading 'performed on period instruments' I will know enough time has passed.

[knight66]

I was once in choir for a Mahler 8th with Leinsdorf. I have a few of his discs, Butterfly, Walkure, Salome and then a Leontine Price disc of Richard Strauss, Hits and one conspicuous miss. I got rid of an Aida.

I will be interested in your opinion of his LvB.

Mike

[Scarpia]

Leinsdorf seems to attract very contrasting opinions. There used to be a poster here who was clearly allergic to him. Seems though that he could be a hit or miss conductor. We had some of those in the UK, principally Sir Malcolm Sargent. I wonder what Leinsdorf's Beethoven 9th is like?

Heard Leinsdorf live once, Mostly Mozart Festival in New York.  Did a good job on Mozart Symphony #39, as I recall.

[Gurn Blanston]

I was once in choir for a Mahler 8th with Leinsdorf. I have a few of his discs, Butterfly, Walkure, Salome and then a Leontine Price disc of Richard Strauss, Hits and one conspicuous miss. I got rid of an Aida.

I will be interested in your opinion of his LvB.

Mike

And you shall have it. That seems like a pretty good average on your list. I know a conductor takes ultimate responsibility for a production, but was that Aida failure his fault?  Just curious, an opera being such a sprawling affair...

[knight66]

I don't want to take you off-topic; but the Aida was frankly dull. Hie fault. The Mahler 8th was probably the least successful performance of it I was in. He looked really quite elderly and not really 'with' it by 1976 and I think the scale of it was overwhelming for him. He was only in his 60s, but seemed a great deal older.

I have really enjoyed a number of his other recordings and have felt he is underrated. Looking on Amazon, I was surprised to see just how much of his work is available.

Mike

[Gurn Blanston]

I don't want to take you off-topic; but the Aida was frankly dull. Hie fault. The Mahler 8th was probably the least successful performance of it I was in. He looked really quite elderly and not really 'with' it by 1976 and I think the scale of it was overwhelming for him. He was only in his 60s, but seemed a great deal older.

I have really enjoyed a number of his other recordings and have felt he is underrated. Looking on Amazon, I was surprised to see just how much of his work is available.

Mike

No, that isn't OT, this is about the performance of a large-scale orchestral/choral work, so something comparative is handy reference. As long as you aren't laboring under the delusion that a Mahler 8th, no matter how well performed, can even carry Beethoven's jock; well that would be OT...  

Anyway, I think it's interesting.

[RJR]

We watched the Leonard Bernstein's Sunday series in the early 60s. It was my first exposure to classical music. I was playing Oboe in my junior high school orchestra at the time. Erich Leinsdorf was the second conductor that I became familiar with. He recorded the Fourth and Fifth Piano Concertos of Beethoven with Artur Rubinstein. Both concertos were televised in 1967. I bought both recordings. I used to listen to them on headphones late at night when everybody else was asleep. After that it was Ancerl's Moldau, Krips complete Beethoven, then Furtwangler's Bayreuth 1951, which I bought for my birthday in 1970.

[chung]

Thanks for the welcome, Gurn.

On Leinsdorf, he gives a spirited reading of No. 9, and the last movement is definitely up there especially helped by Domingo in his solo. Yet I agree that he is fairly hit-and-miss (at least with Beethoven). I dislike his work with Symphonies Nos. 3 and 5 especially (No. 3 is played too slowly for me, while in No. 5 he seems rather disinterested) but like his work on Nos. 6 and 8 (in addition to no. 9). I'm indifferent to his take on the remaining symphonies.

[Gurn Blanston]

Thanks for the welcome, Gurn.

On Leinsdorf, he gives a spirited reading of No. 9, and the last movement is definitely up there especially helped by Domingo in his solo. Yet I agree that he is fairly hit-and-miss (at least with Beethoven). I dislike his work with Symphonies Nos. 3 and 5 especially (No. 3 is played too slowly for me, while in No. 5 he seems rather disinterested) but like his work on Nos. 6 and 8 (in addition to no. 9). I'm indifferent to his take on the remaining symphonies.

Thanks, Chung. As you saw later on, Leinsdorf is a great unknown to me, so it's good to have a basis to pick and choose a few disks. 3 & 5 would have been on my list, so I can save the $$ and feel better already!   

Yesterday,. I listened to Chicago/Solti 1972. While not my favorite performance, it is very good quality playing and especially work from the soloists. I can't say exactly what it is that brings it down for me; perhaps all the rave reviews have raised my expectations beyond possibility!    Anyway, certainly no disappointment, it was a very nice Sunday AM.

[asin]B00000I933[/asin]

[MishaK]

perhaps all the rave reviews have raised my expectations beyond possibility! 

Are you sure the rave reviews were about this recording? I think the 1986 recording is superior.

[Gurn Blanston]

Are you sure the rave reviews were about this recording? I think the 1986 recording is superior.

I have read any number of times that the 1972 is supposed to be far superior. As it happens, I prefer the 1986 too, although to be fair, it was my first recording of this work, so I don't trust my judgment. But read around at posted reviews and to a person, they lean towards the earlier version.

[Gurn Blanston]

The late 1960's was a watershed era for performance of the Ninth, IMO. Conductors were starting to shed some of the post-Romantic orchestral trappings that had dominated performance for the previous 75 years, and were playing leaner, soundwise if not size-wise. One of my favorite recordings from that era (1967 or 68, hard to tell from the liner notes) is the Czech PO / Paul Kletzki. And that was my most enjoyable treat today.



If you get a chance to pick this one up (it's a double disk with a very nice 7 & , by all means take up the offer. It's a peach!



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Now playing:
Czech PO \ Kletzki - Op 125 Symphony #9 in d 4th mvmt - Presto - Allegro assai - "Ode to Joy"

[Dancing Divertimentian]

The late 1960's was a watershed era for performance of the Ninth, IMO. Conductors were starting to shed some of the post-Romantic orchestral trappings that had dominated performance for the previous 75 years, and were playing leaner, soundwise if not size-wise. One of my favorite recordings from that era (1967 or 68, hard to tell from the liner notes) is the Czech PO / Paul Kletzki. And that was my most enjoyable treat today.



If you get a chance to pick this one up (it's a double disk with a very nice 7 & , by all means take up the offer. It's a peach!

Cool, Gurn! I feel almost like a proud father seeing that Kletzki ninth turn up in your esteemed thread!

[Gurn Blanston]

Cool, Gurn! I feel almost like a proud father seeing that Kletzki ninth turn up in your esteemed thread!

Yes, DD, I might have been a long time running across this if it hadn't been for your rec. This is a highly recommendable account that anyone should enjoy, thus completely filling the aim of this thread.

[Gurn Blanston]

And now to Schuricht and the French National Orchestra.



Ordinarily, when I get a new 9th, as I did this one yesterday, I prepare it for the upcoming Sunday and leave it alone. This one intrigued me though, because the file size was so small. The total flac size was barely larger than what a typical 9th is in MP3 format, and the MP3's total only 65 megs. Little alarm bells went off, and so I listen today instead. So now I see; I bet that when this was played 'live' in 1954 at Montreaux, everyone who heard it was delighted. At least through 3 movements it is well played, nice tempos, really an acceptable performance for that time. However, there is nothing there for the sound engineer to work with. Different parts move to the fore and then fade to the back (worse at the beginning), and the overall sound experience is a bummer.    Well, you can't win them all. If I am disappointed with it, it is only because such a nice performance deserved to be better recorded. But then, it was 57 years ago...

I brought this comment over from yesterday's "What are you listening to?" thread, since it disappears from there so quickly. I am interested in any comment that Someone may have, especially those of you who champion historic recordings. Not that I want to argue with you, I am actually curious whether I have just been lucky so far in not getting more disks with this sort of sound issue, or whether it is clearly the exception rather than the rule.

Today, I pulled out Herb Blomstedt and the wonderful Staatskapelle Dresden.



As I understand it, they did this for the record more than once, although I haven't run across a different recording yet. Anyone know any details about that?  In any case, this one is very good, although the Baß, Karl-Heinz Stryczek, seems a bit overwhelmed by the whole thing from time to time. For an inexpensive LaserLight special, it is a nice recording to have on hand.




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Now playing:
USSR Symphony Orchestra / Svetlanov - Glazunov Op 87 Symphonic Prologue - 'To the Memory of N Gogol'

[Brian]

I'm trying Norrington/Stuttgart. Really pleasantly surprised after several years away from this recording; spunk and vigor and intelligent shaping of phrases. No trademark Norrington wackiness, either.