Try Dohnanyi / Vienna PO.
If you made it to Mahler 1, 4, 5 then Mahler’s 2nd is a must. That’s my favorite.
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Mine too. I think it’s the only one I’ve heard live.
Roger
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That’s the version in my library. I struggled with the music at one time but Fischer’s disc was one that opened the doors for me. I rate his Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta too.
Roger
The best Bartok Music for String, Percussion and Celesta I’ve ever heard is the RCA Living Stereo Fritz Reiner/CSO from 1960. Ditto for Concerto For Orchestra (from 1958). AP did excellent 33 RPM remasters on vinyl for the RCA Living Stereo series. Both are well worth having.
Thanks, I shall give it a go.
Thinking about it, I’m pretty sure I received the same advice the last time I asked, but that would have been the best best part of 30 years ago. I would have tried it and got lost/bored part way through. My tastes have evolved since then so I’m intrigued to find out how it goes.
I fell in love with the Concerto For Orchestra the first time I heard it on Radio 3 - probably the first bit of Bartok I ever heard - and the CD I then bought was this pairing. It’s one of the things that led me on to Bartok’s string quartets 
. I haven’t heard this piece for years, and I never ripped the CD either, so it must be languishing in a box somewhere upstairs. I am going to have to dig it out, aren’t I.
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Mahler’s Ninth is one of the great symphonies ever written, and transcends his earlier work.
It was first recorded in 1938 by Bruno Walter with the pre-WW2 Vienna Philharmonic, just as “the lights were going out across Europe”, with the Nazis’ rise to power in Germany. That used to be available on CD as an EMI GROC, but is now on a Dutton transfer.
Other great recordings are:
John Barbirolli’s EMI CDs with the Berlin Philharmonic, from 1964.
Herbert von Karajan’s studio, and slightly later ‘live’ account, both with the Berliners for DG.
Bernstein’s only ever concert recording with the Berlin Phil - which drove Karajan to despair, because of the bad habits (swooping and sliding by the strings) that Bernstein encouraged and Karajan hated.
Bernstein recorded a later ‘live’ account with Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, which is included in his huge DG Mahler LP box. (I prefer the Berlin account.)
Bernard Haitink recorded it in Amsterdam a couple of times, and once in Berlin, all for Philips.
Nearer our time, KlausTennstedt with the LPO (EMI) has his admirers (I’m not one).
And Abbado recorded the symphony in Berlin first, and then again ‘live’ with his hand-picked Lucerne Festival Orchestra.
Yer pays yer money, and yer takes yer choice!
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Thanks for this. I must admit “transcends his earlier work” frightens me off a little bit, so I think I might build up to the 9th by revisiting the symphonies I already know and getting no 2 under my belt.
I haven’t listened to any Mahler since putting in my subs last year, let alone giving him the benefit of the firepower of my 300 system so I should be in for a treat.
Karajan live is the one to get imho. 
It’s a good shout Roger. I picked this LP up the other day and listened to #20, K.466 earlier today. Perhaps the most I’ve ever enjoyed this wonderful work. Performance and recording are superb.
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Javier Perianes applies his usual cool, understated and precise style to Goyescas. Even in El amor y la muerte, he keeps things civil, but not so much as to stifle the piece or lose the sense of spontaneity. This sounds like the worst approach to this music on paper but I find the result fascinating.
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And seeing her playing is even more fascinating…
(Especially compared to the delusions of Lang Lang explaining this variation with the image of a plane taking off… 
)
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With such a beautiful cover, I’ll look for it however!
Totally seconded! I think I have almost all of Reiner’s recordings on LP, a collection I started in 1975. His Bartok is wonderfully proper, felt, accurate, affectionate and deeply respectful.
No wonder:
(photo taken by Reiner himself)
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Reiner’s Concerto for Orchestra is simply magical. The other one is very nearly as such.
Yep. Lang Lang has no idea what he’s saying and sadly doesn’t care.
There was a good pianist there (when very young ) before he decided to sell his soul to commercialism and the money. He became a bit of a joke in the Classical music world…but he’s rich and doesn’t care what someone like me or anyone else thinks.
