George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra

[Roehre]

I am sure that a big CO/Szell box is overdue from Sony which will delight some on this board (probably in truth not many) who have little or no Szell on their heaving shelves but it will frustrate the many if a big box appears with those gems they haven't got and are not otherwise available. Such are the joys of CD collecting!

Is Szell a composer then?

[cloughie]

Is Szell a composer then?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Szell

But I think you know the answer - I just wondered why you asked the question.

[HighlandDougie]

Don't know about the Pictures but the Kodaly and the Prokofiev positively fizz (and I see that there is a £0.01 copy available)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pictures-Exhibition-H%C3%A1ry-J%C3%A1nos-Lieutenant/dp/B000026SNN/ref=sr_1_2?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1404552616&sr=1-2&keywords=kodaly+hary+janos+george+szell

[Petrushka]

Very famous in its day, often overlooked, the brilliant Walton coupling of Symphony No.2 and the Hindemith Variations...

Szell was a great Mozartian - his Posthorn Serenade is an all-time classic; also the later Piano Concertos with Casadesus, K.364 with Druian/Skernick (Cleveland principals)... his Haydn is great of its kind - I find some of it just a little hefty now, well, more than a little... same goes for the Schumann.

Some years ago his earlier mono recordings (similar rep.) were issued on Urania and reviewed very well - but I didn't invest... pretty sure they'd be worth the effort if you found them.

Some of the best sounding: Brahms Piano Concertos with Fleisher on Masterworks Heritage (1997); the Early London Symphonies (Sony, 2009). And yes, that Prokofiev 5th again on Sony Heritage (albeit still with very tame tamtams and drums). Bear in mind though that Szell adds extra trumpet parts/doublings in the finale, including a scale in the very last bar; and, more seriously, makes a cut in the Bartok Concerto for Orchestra c/w the Prok 5 - that echt-Bartokian night music just before the coda. Yep, ALL of it. (Bars 426 - 555 according to the notes). Mind you - just listening back - Szell is rather prosaic in this finale anyway. Alright, just a bit dull really.

But the recordings sound so fresh for their age (1959, 1965) it doesn't matter one bit! does it?

Thanks for the warning. I don't do 'very tame tam-tams and drums' and I certainly don't do cuts in the Bartok Concerto for Orchestra. What on earth can Szell have been thinking of? Duly deleted off the wish list.

[Black Swan]

My 2 Favorite Szell Cleveland Recordings, I have both on LP and CD.
Mozart:

Sinfonia Concertante in E-Flat Major for Violin and Viola, K 364
Rafel Drulan, Violin
Abraham Skernick, Viola

Concerto in A Major for Clarinet and Orchestra, K622
With the magnificent Robert Marcellus, Clarinet
Cleveland Orchestra

Wagner Orchestral Selections from the Ring:

Entrance of the Gods into Valhalla
The Ride of the Valkyries
Magic Fire Music
Forest Murmors
Dawn and Seigfried's Rhine Journey
Seigfried's Funeral Music and Final Scene from Gotterdammerung

Cleveland Orchestra

[Roehre]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Szell

But I think you know the answer - I just wondered why you asked the question.

Apart from the fact that even Wikipedia doesn't mention any of his compositional works, and that of his orchestrating skills I only know the (really excellent) Smetana String quartet no.1 in Szell's disguise, I still am -and will continue to be- far less interested in whatever conductor is doing what with other people's compositions, than in those compositions and their composers themselves.
The classical repertoire is much wider than what (in general) the "great" conductors are covering.
Szell is without any doubt a great conductor (Sibelius 2/ Concertgebouw IMO unrivalled e.g., as is Walton 2), but the repertoire which will be covered in a big Szell box is on my shelves already and time and means are limited.

[slarty]

"Best of all" Szell's recordings or "best of all" recordings of these works, slarty? Either way, I don't agree - superb performances as they are, Szell retouches Schumann's orchestrations. Admitedly, these aren't as glaring as Mahler's, but Schumann's orchestral Music is best served by Schumann's orchestrations.

Either way,We will have to agree to disagree about that.

[Barbirollians]

One might hope to see such a box . The Prokofiev 5 does seem to be about but coupled with his cut Concerto for Orchestra .

On other labels there seems to be little about too - that legendary Tokyo Sibelius 2 seems never to have made it to CD other than on a expensive import over here and his fabulous CGO Sibelius 2 is only available second-hand.

Probably my favourite of all Szell records is his Tchaikovsky No 5 on Sony . Not sure whether it was this or his recording of the Fourth ( I think the latter as I recall it is a Culshaw story ) that the producer deliberately dulled the sound on a playback as he felt it was good but not as good as he thought they were capable of and a furious with himself ( and probably his poor players ) Szell went out and blazed it !

[Pabmusic]

...Schumann's orchestral Music is best served by Schumann's orchestrations.

Yes, absolutely. Of course it's interesting to see what some conductors do with Schumann, but X's re-orchestration (however good) can never be Schumann's. And here's the thing; if Schumann's orchestrations work for - say - Kubelik, Sawallisch or Boult (or Dausgaard, or …?), why bother with anything else?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Either way,We will have to agree to disagree about that.

Fairy Nuff - and I did mean the "superb performances" bit.

[makropulos]

Apart from the fact that even Wikipedia doesn't mention any of his compositional works, and that of his orchestrating skills I only know the (really excellent) Smetana String quartet no.1 in Szell's disguise, I still am -and will continue to be- far less interested in whatever conductor is doing what with other people's compositions, than in those compositions and their composers themselves.
The classical repertoire is much wider than what (in general) the "great" conductors are covering.
Szell is without any doubt a great conductor (Sibelius 2/ Concertgebouw IMO unrivalled e.g., as is Walton 2), but the repertoire which will be covered in a big Szell box is on my shelves already and time and means are limited.

One of Szell's original compositions here:

http://www.amazon.com/Szell-Heger-B%C3%BClow-Weingartner-Conductors/dp/B0017IE1WW

[richardfinegold]

When I started my record collecting, CBS had released most of the Szell recordings on it's budget label here and were my introduction to Beethoven, Brahms, Dvorak, Mozart, and Schumann. Russian and French music came from other sources, as did Haydn and Schubert and 20th Century music. I have re collected all of these recordings on CD. If reissued in a big box I would pass, and I imagine that many others in the States would do the same.

[Roehre]

One of Szell's original compositions here:
http://www.amazon.com/Szell-Heger-B%.../dp/B0017IE1WW

many thanks

[richardfinegold]

Yes, absolutely. Of course it's interesting to see what some conductors do with Schumann, but X's re-orchestration (however good) can never be Schumann's. And here's the thing; if Schumann's orchestrations work for - say - Kubelik, Sawallisch or Boult (or Dausgaard, or …?), why bother with anything else?

My lp set of Szell symphonies featured an Op-Ed written by the conductor that I belebe appeared in the New York Times.
I just tried unsuccessfully to see if I could pull it up on line. My recollection was that he defended the Composer against charges that he was an inept Orchestrator, but then went on to justify his own retouchings. I believe his argument was that modern instruments tend to blur the textures that the Composer envisioned and so he required some thinning out.

[hafod]

There is a 49 disc Szell box.

http://www.goodwinshighend.com/music/classical/Szell/George%20Szell%2049%20CD%20Box%20Set.htm

Available (expensively) here:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Edition-George-Szell/dp/B00BMKDQHQ/ref=pd_sim_sbs_m_h__1?ie=UTF8&refRID=0T3WF3CWA7W3B54P42VW