You got me listening to my Arrau Edition copy of the Beethoven Sonatas/Variations. I’m starting from disc 14 (side 27/28: the Variations), one disc per day, and working my way backwards.
Haochen Zhang’s Beethoven cycle is in the Perahia mold - lyrical and with an infectious poise. However, good as the Perahia remains, these performances show how much both recording quality and interpretation have evolved since the 80s. Zhang is just as stylish but adds many small touches through which he both illuminates passages and maintains long tension arches. He has a luxurious partner in the Philadelphia Orchestra and Stutzmann, and the recording is demonstration quality.
Cheers
EJ
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I received my copy of DG Classics The Original Source series of the Karajan/Berliner/Vienna Verdi Missa da Requiem, and am on side two. So far it is fantastic. What a beautiful work and performance, and no Karajan knob-fiddling screechy treble and lack of bass. Highly recommended. What a great reissue series this is becoming.
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The Cleveland Orchestra - Beethoven: String Quartet No. 15 - 2020 - SACD - Conducted Franz Welser-Möst
Going to play all three discs from this fabulous box set.
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I have those Karajan Verdi discs (among others) on order, due to arrive this week. You have made me impatient for it to arrive.
What a great collection of records DGG have put together for this series!
I assume from your comments that the pressings are good?
The first of DGG’s ‘The Original Source’ records that I have ordered arrived this morning - the classic account by Emil Gilels and members of the Amadeus Quartet of Schubert’s ‘Trout’ Quintet. It certainly looks the business.
I shall find my old LP of this same recording, and compare the two a bit later.
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The pressings have been great so far. I had an issue with my first copy of Mahler 5, but a replacement rectified that. Otherwise, the discs have all been perfect.
One surprise with the ‘new’ ‘Trout’ is that the original coupling, the ‘Quartettsatz’, has been left off the new LP. A note on the sleeve explains that it…‘is not included here because it was not taped in 4-track’. Very odd!
I don’t think that’s odd at all. The premise of the series is that it’s using the 1/2" four-track tapes as the source. They did the same thing for the Mahler 5. The original had the Kindertotenlieder on side four, but the new reissue omits it with the same note that it wasn’t recorded on four-track tape.
I think that’s the correct decision, not to conflate things with couplings that don’t qualify as part of the series.
Gardelli’s (unfinished) early Verdi series was supported by a dream cast including Placido Domingo, Jose Carreras, Carlo Bergonzi, Katia Ricciarelli, Montserrat Caballe, Jessye Norman, Piero Cappuccilli, Nicolai Ghiaurov… That some issues are better than others is because Verdi’s Galley Years output was variable - although I’d argue that even his worst works (Alzira, I Lombardi) are still very enjoyable.
I due Foscari, somewhat of a study for Simon Boccanegra, is the best of the series. It lacks the individually recognizable numbers that became Verdi’s characteristic as of Luisa Miller but the story is an excellent one and it’s short enough to not need any padding. And it has a young Sam Ramey as the villain!
Cheers
EJ
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Katia Ricciarelli is one of our all time favourite Sopranos. We have several recordings of our favourite Operas where she has sung the lead role.
We don’t have this one and I am not familiar with the Opera, but I will definitely be giving it a listen soon @EJS 
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Liatening to the Brahms piano quintet this morning, first by Pollini and the Italians, now Till Fellner and the Belcea. In terms of approach and tempi, these readings are very similar and the difference is mostly in the microcontrast in the Belcea, who play at a technical level unheard of 43 years ago. But Pollini is a better pianist than Fellner and especially in the slow movement he never sacrifices tension where Fellner is a bit square in comparison.
Cheers
EJ
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I’ve seen Pollini at the Royal Festival Hall and the (grotty) Barbican on a few occasions - a superlative pianist, and I got him to autograph my copy of the booklet of the DGG Beethoven Late Piano Sonatas.
I saw Emil Gilels just once - at the RFH on the evening that the SAS ‘took out’ the terrorists occupying the Iranian Embassy a few miles away.
I regret not having seen Sviatoslav Richter, but he developed a ‘shyness’ to going on the concert stage in his later years.
Excellent, Graham! I have Brendel’s autograph on his box of Beethoven sonatas, and Kovacevich on his! Seen Pollini many times in concert, but for some reason never managed to get his signature.
Pollini is one of my very favourite musicians, ever since I was indoctrinated into some of his early recordings when I was student at Oxford.
I don’t have any other musician’s autograph, but I do have a plectrum which I stole off Jeff Buckley’s microphone stand at the Junction Club in Cambridge!
Pollini’s set of Beethoven’s last 5 sonatas, from the 70’s, is one of the greatest recordings of Classical music ever. Never equalled IMHO.
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I wonder if those Pollini Beethoven recordings will make it into DG’s The Original Source series?
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It will be great if they do. They certainly belong, as the pianism is otherworldly.
On one of the discs you could hear Pollini breathing with the effort of hitting the keys as hard as he possibly can.
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Just received the Gilels/Brahms. Again really happy. So much detail and dynamics and a near silent pressing.
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