Giulini -Warner/EMI Boxes

[Barbirollians]

I have always enjoyed the Giulini records I have bought over the years. As a great concerto accompanist for Perlman and Arrau, in Debussy's La Mer and Nocturnes at the very top of the tree , his DG Pictures at an Exhibition is so splendid I have never felt the need for another .His awesome Bruckner recordings have always struck me as particularly special .

I do not know his early EMI records from the 1950s and 60s but there sound like some absolute cracking records in the London box judging by the extracts played this morning and yet again I am struck by what enormous personality the Phlharmonia orchestra had in those days yet how they seemed always to put it at the service of the very different conductors they built relationships with.

I have most of the concertos so won't be getting that but the other boxes look very tempting indeed.

[Barbirollians]

Morrison's glib dismissal of the Perlman recordings is an example of the shabby trite views that pervade Radio 3 nowadays .

[slarty]

His dismissal of the Four Seasons recording also annoyed me - "one does not expect to hear it played in that performance style nowadays......." grrrrrrrrr.
Does he think that the only valid recordings these days are the ones from HIP exponents? Are all the rest to be consigned to the dustbins?
It is one reason why I rarely go to concerts nowadays where any repertoire can be affected by these people.
I would rather remain at home and listen to my own Un-hip recordings.

[Petrushka]

I saw Giulini a few times towards the end of his career and greatly wish it had been more. Of the boxes on offer I'm seriously tempted by the London set.

What with the Giulini sets and the Karajan boxes, warner are really milking the EMI legacy that they've taken on. Still seems strange to see the Warner logo on these issues.

[richardfinegold]

I saw Giulini a few times towards the end of his career and greatly wish it had been more. Of the boxes on offer I'm seriously tempted by the London set.

What with the Giulini sets and the Karajan boxes, warner are really milking the EMI legacy that they've taken on. Still seems strange to see the Warner logo on these issues.

I heard him guest conduct here in the last few years of his life. He had a preference for very slow tempos and I thought frequently had difficulty sustaining the musical line. I have to confess to nodding off during a Brahms First.
His recordings from his last decade or so, or at least the ones that I have heard, follow this same pattern. His earlier recordings are a lot more exciting, and the EMI box seems to feature the earlier phase of his career and would be interesting.

[richardfinegold]

I tried to check the contents of the box on Amazon and found that it was a useless effort. I had to resort to the Arkivmusic site. I feel guilty about using their wonderful site but refusing to pay their asking price for the music, which is twice that of Amazon. At any rate, I see that I already have about a 3rd of the recordings, so I think I will wait on this one.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

His dismissal of the Four Seasons recording also annoyed me - "one does not expect to hear it played in that performance style nowadays......." grrrrrrrrr.
Does he think that the only valid recordings these days are the ones from HIP exponents? Are all the rest to be consigned to the dustbins?
It is one reason why I rarely go to concerts nowadays where any repertoire can be affected by these people.
I would rather remain at home and listen to my own Un-hip recordings.

Whenever I rever to the Nouveau Musical Establishment coming out with these glib assertions, I manage to upset people, so I'll keep quiet.

Give me Giulini's Don Giovanni any time.

[slarty]

Whenever I rever to the Nouveau Musical Establishment coming out with these glib assertions, I manage to upset people, so I'll keep quiet.

Give me Giulini's Don Giovanni any time.

I'm with you on the DG ,and I don't mind upsetting a few hippers along the way. There was always room for different ideas even in those dim dark days when it was difficult to find stereo LPs and repeated passages in symphonies were not the norm, even in the concert hall, but this lot want it all their own way. Shame that I won't be around when the worm inevitably turns to hear the reviewers pouring scorn on the dreafully old fashioned idea of HIP

[Petrushka]

I'm with you on the DG ,and I don't mind upsetting a few hippers along the way. There was always room for different ideas even in those dim dark days when it was difficult to find stereo LPs and repeated passages in symphonies were not the norm, even in the concert hall, but this lot want it all their own way. Shame that I won't be around when the worm inevitably turns to hear the reviewers pouring scorn on the dreafully old fashioned idea of HIP

Another one in the non-Hip club.

[Barbirollians]

It makes me profoundly cross that he was so dismissive without any other reason than tempo The Beethoven Concerto won a Gramophone award .

I can appreciate entirely why people prefer quicker tempi in this concerto and I am an admirer of the Faust/Abbado in particular ( although the fully HIPP performances of this concerto I have heard have been a little underwhelming ( Chase/Goodman, Huggett/Mackerras) . The manifest wonders of both of those recordings - the slow movement of the Brahms I have rarely heard anyone come close to - were completely ignored in favour of a cheap crack.

[Barbirollians]

I have just listened to the Brahms again . Perlman is extraordinary in this , every note sings and such a wonderfully burnished Brahms sound from the orchestra and Giulini - has the oboe solo ever been played more beautifully ? I have a few more recent highly praised performances - Shaham, Vengerov and Hahn . None of them come close and judging by the extracts I have heard of Kavakos nor does he . Julia Fischer perhaps the closest.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

It makes me profoundly cross that he was so dismissive without any other reason than tempo The Beethoven Concerto won a Gramophone award .

It's an idée fixe, I'm afraid.

[Barbirollians]

It's an idée fixe, I'm afraid.

Yes his failure to even mention Perlman's playing made me almost wonder whether he had just looked at the back of the box rather than listened to them !

[Barbirollians]

The Beethoven concerto is not even that slow . Faust is in fact only a couple of minutes quicker overall ,Steinbacher , Chung and Mutter are slower as is Schneiderhan/Jochum and Oistrakh/Cluytens . His timings are roughly comparable with Batiashvili, Menuhin/Furtwangler, Stern/Bernstein and almost identical to Oistrakh/Ehrling .

[Ariosto]

Perlman was indeed an extraordinary violinist. Not everything he does is to my taste, but concertos like the Tchaikovsky (and many others) were brilliantly played. He is a very nice bloke too, and keen to help young players.

I'm going to get it in the neck, but, yes - most critics should be shot at dawn! No one in their right mind would in normal circumstances put up a statue to one. (I think Sibelius said that ...) (Critics always sound so smug and pleased with themselves on Radio 3 - with a couple of exceptions ...)