The one recording you think everyone should bin

[Don]

I bin almost all my recordings. I only have a few box sets in the drawer of some hard to borrow stuff that I wanted to get to know, plus some minimalism for the car.

I don't like possessing stuff, and before all that long all hardware will be obsolete with all music ever recorded available on the internet...

Since I am the ultimate materialist, just send me all your possessions.

[Kullervo]

Just looking through this thread... what's with all the Kleiber-haters? 

[Renfield]

Just looking through this thread... what's with all the Kleiber-haters? 

Well, personally, I don't dislike Kleiber: I dislike the way he handles Beethoven's 5th symphony. It's too "Strauss-like", as Que suggested; too "glossed over" for me to rank it among my favourite recordings of the work, for all its fantastic articulation.

I mean, just put on the Toscanini 1930's 5th, and it's a different world. Much the same applies for the Klemperer, as well as (for me) the recent Vänskä , and of course the 1960's Karajan, which is my personal favourite 5th, "objective" quality set aside.

[Kullervo]

Well, personally, I don't dislike Kleiber: I dislike the way he handles Beethoven's 5th symphony. It's too "Strauss-like", as Que suggested; too "glossed over" for me to rank it among my favourite recordings of the work, for all its fantastic articulation.

I mean, just put on the Toscanini 1930's 5th, and it's a different world. Much the same applies for the Klemperer, as well as (for me) the recent Vänskä , and of course the 1960's Karajan, which is my personal favourite 5th, "objective" quality set aside.

I don't really buy into the "cult of the performer" so maybe that's why I'm confused as to why people are so vehemently opposed to his recordings.

[Que]

I don't really buy into the "cult of the performer" so maybe that's why I'm confused as to why people are so vehemently opposed to his recordings.

I counted only two posts on (Carlos) Kleiber in this thread and both contained comment on his recording of the LvB 5&7. You translate that to "vehement" opposition to Kleiber in general - as a conductor. I don't see any evidence of that, and I personally wouldn't subscribe to anything like that at all. BTW, any dissention on the status of a recording as "ultimate", "legendary" and "must-have" can't be equated to "hate".

Q

[Renfield]

I counted only two posts on (Carlos) Kleiber in this thread and both contained comment on his recording of the LvB 5&7. You translate that to "vehement" opposition to Kleiber in general - as a conductor. I don't see any evidence of that, and I personally wouldn't subscribe to anything like that at all. BTW, any dissention on the status of a recording as "ultimate", "legendary" and "must-have" can't be equated to "hate".

Q

Indeed. And even more so, Carlos Kleiber is a conductor I appreciate very much indeed, myself. I just don't like his reading of Beethoven's 5th enough to attribute to it any of the three above epithets ("ultimate", "legendary", "must-have"), or an equivalent.

In fact, there are very few recordings I would go as far as to describe as being "definitive", much less "ultimate", or "must-have". It's too dependent on personal preference to be otherwise, and I'm likely being subjective even about those "very few".

[M forever]

Carlos Kleiber as a conductor was a rare phenomenon which is very hard to describe in words, but many people, especially musicians, understood what he was about, and there is a good reason for why many top orchestras admired him and loved working with him - when he actually showed up. He even had the nerve of walking out on the Wiener Philharmoniker in the middle of a rehearsal. And they still asked him back.
It is really hard to describe in words, but his understanding of music and music making was extremely "to the point", concentrated and somehow absolutely "natural", and the way he was able to communicate his vision of the music to orchestras led to some very special events, as the few studio productions he actually did and the live recordings in circulation demonstrate. I only saw him live once, with the BP in 1994 (one of only two times he actually showed up in Berlin) with Coriolan, Mozart 33 and Brahms 4. One of the two or three typical programs he did in his later years. He had rehearsed the program meticulously with the orchestra (I went to one of the rehearsals), and the program was obviously as standard repertoire as it can get. But the concert was incredibly "spontaneous", Kleiber led the orchestra through the program with very elegant, fluent, but highly nervously charged gestures, and in many of the "right" moments, he stepped back and just let the orchestra play, added just a few "remarks" here and there. Which all totally registered in the playing. That ability to squeeze the very best out of an orchestra of that stature was one of the elements which made him such a good conductor. He clearly had some very serious issues, probably because he always felt the shadow of his famous father looming above him. But he was also extremely private, so he never talked about himself and his music making.
Here is an interesting recent article (in German only) from the news magazine Der Spiegel: http://www.spiegel.de/kultur/musik/0,1518,495249,00.html
There is also a new biography coming out in Germany in October.

[Valentino]

Thanks M, once again.
Your words describe what makes C. Kleiber such a special conductor to me, I think.

[BorisG]

C. Kleiber, the greatest part-time conductor?

A slim repertoire. One Mahler work (Das Lied von der Erde), no Bruckner, no modern.

[Mark]

Having heard Stephen Cleobury and the Choir of King's College, Cambridge, make a thorough pig's ear of Rachmaninov's sublime All-night Vigil, I thought it couldn't be possible to hear a recording of this work that would impress me less.

Then this plopped onto my doormat:



Having heard 22 versions of this work, let me assure you that this one is the most one-dimensional. The recording is flat (something I often find with Telarc discs, actually); articulation and details are lost in a bland, uniform choral sound which, while well-drilled, is utterly uninspiring; and the tempi choices are soporific.

If you love this work, avoid this CD.

[Drasko]

If you love this work, avoid this CD.

Guy from classicstoday loves it, the CD I mean.

http://www.classicstoday.com/review.asp?ReviewNum=8668

[Mark]

Guy from classicstoday loves it, the CD I mean.

http://www.classicstoday.com/review.asp?ReviewNum=8668

David Vernier clearly knows nothing. For him to compare Shaw's dire rendition alongside the astronomically superior (in EVERY way) Hillier recording and still conclude that he remains a 'Shaw fan' is ridiculous beyond this listener's belief. I must conclude that he has wooden ears on a tin head.

The following particularly riled me:

Many, many excellent choirs have performed and recorded this liturgical masterpiece, and overall the most impressive combination of emotional integrity, artful choral blend and balance, and sheer sumptuousness of tone belongs to the Robert Shaw Festival Singers (Telarc), whose sincerity of expression offsets the choir's decidedly non-Slavic vocal timbre.

My apologies at this point (parents, cover your kids' eyes), but that's total f**king b*llocks! He then goes on to say this:

The sound is a bit on the bright side, with some significant resonance that creates some harshness and messes with the otherwise fine blend and balance in the loudest passages.

Again, crap. The recording is damned near perfect, especially on SACD. I could point to several recordings of this work about which that comment might justifiably be made - Hillier's is most definitely NOT among them.

Now I remember why I stopped taking ClassicsToday reviews seriously.

[Drasko]

Now I remember why I stopped taking ClassicsToday reviews seriously.

Their opera reviewer, Levine something, is generally quite sane.

Having heard 22 versions of this work

Do you have Polyansky and Chernushenko?

[Mark]

Do you have Polyansky and Chernushenko?

The Melodiya and Saison Russe recordings (respectively)? Yes, sir, I do. Polyansky is wildly over-rated: he slows everything down so much that by the mid-way point, you're lucky if you're not asleep. Beautiful singing, mind you - marred only by bad engineering which causes some really grating peak distortion in louder, higher ensemble work. The Chernushenko (or, more correctly, Tchernouchenko) recording is good enough, but only that. Some interesting and colourful touches along the way (almost every recording of this work adds something to one's understanding and appreciation of it), but it wouldn't make my top five.

[Mark]

For the record, here's a picture from my media library showing 19 of the 22 recordings in my collection (the other three have yet to be converted to MP3).

[Bonehelm]

Any LvB symphony on Naxos.

[DavidW]

Any LvB symphony on Naxos.

Yeah check out that crap that Naxos puts out--

[Renfield]

Yeah check out that crap that Naxos puts out--

Yeah, the Lucerne one is so much better!

[Bonehelm]

Only get Furty on either EMI or Music & Arts. They are the only good transfers. Plus the 1942 recording is the only great performance of Furty LvB 9th to me.

[Peregrine]

Yeah check out that crap that Naxos puts out--

Yeah! And what about that legendary Toscanini 1939 Beethoven cycle? waste of space I tell ye...