|
|
 |
CD-1206(1) PAUL BADURA-SKODA PLAYS CHOPIN PIANO CONCERTOS. Vienna State Opera Orchestra cond. Artur Rodzinski Concerto No. 1 for Piano and Orchestra in E-minor, Op. 11; Concerto No. 2 for Piano and Orchestra in F-minor, Op. 21 Recorded in the Konzerthaus, Vienna, June 27 - July 11 1954; originally issued on Westminster LP ML 5308. Disc to digital transfer by Wolfgang Neubacher; audio restoration by Aaron Z. Snyder (2007). Notes in English and German. AAD. Total: 62:57 UPC# 017685 120626 BUZZ: Paul Badura-Skoda has earned a richly deserved reputation as one of the great classicists of his generation. It is a profile solidified by multiple recordings of the masterpieces of Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven and Schubert, as well as pioneering period instrument performances and important scholarship. The average piano music fancier, especially in America, would be forgiven, then, to be unaware of his tremendous enthusiasm for the music of Frederic Chopin, as reflected in his Westminster recordings of the Polish composer’s Concertos and Etudes. Chopin has never left the repertoire of Badura-Skoda. The Etudes, which he plays with extraordinary passion and vigor, are nearly as important to his career as a performing musician in Europe, as are the Beethoven sonatas. He is very proud to have been asked to judge at Chopin competitions, and believes that his reputation as an artist in Poland has been made more as a Chopin player than as a master of the Viennese classics. Here is his celebrated Westminster recording of the two Concertos with the Vienna Philharmonic (playing under a different name for contractual reasons), lovingly refurbished using the revolutionary new harmonic balancing system. |
 |
CD-1208(1) CHARLES MUNCH IN NEW YORK. Complete Concert With the NBC SO Given 28 March 1954. DEBUSSY: Iberia. RAVEL: Le Tombeau de Couperin. ROUSSEL: Bacchus et Ariane Suite No. 2. Bonus track: Excerpt from the concert with the NYPSO, 2 Jan 1949: RAVEL: Daphnis et Chloé Suite No. 2. Total time: 68:13 AAD Restoration: Andrew Rose (Pristine Audio). Notes in French and English. UPC# 017685 12082-4 BUZZ: The Alsatian-born Munch was in his fifth season as Music Director of the Boston Symphony at the time he gave this concert -- his sole appearance with the NBC Symphony. For the occasion he selected three of his French specialties. Munch made two commercial recordings of Ibéria, one with the Boston Symphony, the other with the French radio’s Orchestre Nationale. In the NBC performance, which predates either of those, he appropriately adopts an extremely languid approach in the second section, "The Perfumes of the Night," more so than in the later recordings, while much of the finale, "The Morning of a Holiday," is a bit faster than usual. Munch was a very mercurial conductor, responding to his impulses of the moment. Thus there would often be marked tempo differences from one performance to the next of the same piece, unlike, for example, in the interpretations of Toscanini and Monteux, who were more consistent. His live performances are therefore always original and fresh. While Munch recorded commercially most of the major works of Ravel, strangely enough Le tombeau de Couperin was not one of them, which makes the NBC version unique in his discography. |
|
|
|
|
Copyright © 2005 Music & Arts Programs of America. All rights reserved.