BaL 21.09.24 - Strauss: Don Quixote

[oliver sudden]

Karajan /Fournier is wonderful, (and what a marvellous sleeve illustration!) and also Fournier/Krauss, an old Decca LP produced in Vienna by Victor Olof.

Big fan of the Krauss DQ and indeed of his Heldenleben.

The DQ holds a very special place in my listening history. Like I suppose most people my age I didn’t listen to LPs for a good many years in the period when CD was pretty much the only game in town. One day I was visiting a friend I hadn’t seen in a while and he happened to have a very fine turntable setup. He put on this very record and I sat dumbfounded. Such a clear audio picture in front of me, I could almost see exactly where every instrument was coming from. An immediacy I’d never had from a CD.

And it was quite some years before the penny dropped that that was and is a mono recording.

[smittims]

All those Clemens Krauss Strauss recordings were classics and well-received at the time, culminating in Salome,the first complete recording of a Strauss opera. They were all recorded in the Musikvereinssaal by Victor Olof who was a Krauss fan, and who, like Walter Legge, had learnt how to make a mono recording suggesting space and depth.

Krauss' death was a major factor in Olof's move to EMI, where, when he could,he took them to Vienna ro record.

[Pulcinella]

Bumping, in readiness for today's instalment.

PS: 'Winner' added also to original post.

Recommended version:

Recommended version
Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Antonio Janigro (cello)
Milton Preves (viola)
Fritz Reiner (conductor)
RCA Living Stereo 09026 68170-2

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I listened to the broadcast today, as I struggled to get through the York bypass (A64). I nearly choked every time I heard the words “Don Quick Soat”.

[Pulcinella]

I listened to the broadcast today, as I struggled to get through the York bypass (A64). I nearly choked every time I heard the words “Don Quick Soat”.

Surely not from our esteemed makropulos?

[Retune]

Also in the final selection, Previn/VPO and Zinman/Tonhalle. Zinman was the top choice in Hugo Shirley's survey in Gramophone a couple of years ago, with Reiner as his classic choice.

[oliver sudden]

I listened to the broadcast today, as I struggled to get through the York bypass (A64). I nearly choked every time I heard the words “Don Quick Soat”.

I have to confess to being fairly unbothered by this… if I understand right the Spanish pronunciation of the x has changed since Cervantes’ time anyway, so I am personally quite happy Anglicising it.