That says it all. All they’re interested in is squeezing another few dollars out of the music lover, but I cannot imagine any music lover would buy it if they’ve split it over two sides. Crazy.
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Thankfully we dont have 78’s anymore, several discs in a folder that weighed a ton to play a symphony
Just imagine Wagner’s ‘Ring’ on 78s. It usually stretches to around 18 or 19 LPs.
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Oooh!..No!..dont titter!
Was it ever made available on 78s, I wonder?
I imagine that there were any number of ‘bleeding chunks’ recorded on 78s, but Solti’s was - famously - the first ever recording of the cycle.
EMI had plans to have Furtwængler record it, and made a (very fine) set of ‘Die Walküre’, but the conductor’s sudden death precluded that.
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I do have a complete cycle from Furtwängler on EMI. The sound isn’t great, so I’ve only listened to it once. I have several other cycles, which I would choose before that one.
I also have three versions of the Solti set, so haven’t purchased the latest incarnation.
The Furtwængler ‘complete’ ‘Ring’ is taken from an Italian (‘RAI’) radio broadcast, with -apparently - pretty indifferent sound (I’ve never heard it).
But the ‘Walküre’ recording is a studio affair, which was intended as the start of a complete recorded cycle. It’s a great recording too, which makes it all the more frustrating that it was never completed.
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I’m a big fan of Wilhelm Furtwangler and love his Bruckner recordings.
Tim
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I have received recently a number of Furtwængler’s Beethoven Symphonies (recorded for EMI) on brand new German LPs, and I need to find a few uninterrupted hours to play them through.
Nice, would you mind letting me have the details as I might like to purchase as well.
Thanks
Tim
Have a look on the German Amazon site (amazonDOTde). They are all packaged in a rather unprepossessing shade of brown.
The first (with Symphonies 1 and 3) is on a 2LP set with catalogue number 0190295102029.
The blurb on the back cover says that the LPs are ‘newly remastered in 24-Bit/192kHz from original tapes at Studio Art & Son, Annecy’.
You seem to have to buy the LPs separately, as I can’t find a boxed set.
The LPs are 180gr pressings.
All very impressive BUT I haven’t listened to any yet.
Excellent, thank you. I’ll head on over there right now.
Tim
Good luck!
Thanks, it looks interesting so I have ordered a copy. Ideally I would like a super duper version of symphony 5. Most of the stuff I have is recorded from Cairo Radio in mono, but I very much enjoy listening to it.
Tim
If you want an extraordinary recording of Beethoven’s Fifth, Carlos Kleiber conducting the Vienna Philharmonic is streets ahead of anything else. It is due to be re-released soon as part of DGG’s back-to-analogue ‘The Original Source’ series, but numbers of LPs pressed are limited to around I,600 copies worldwide.
The ‘standard’ DGG LP is very good indeed, if you can’t get a copy of the limited edition release. It’s strangely difficult to track down for such a famous record, but the German Amazon site might be a good place to start.
PS I’ve just looked at the German site. Kleiber’s Beethoven Fifth is there.
I’ve been looking for a list of ‘what’s next’ from the Original Source series. The DG site is silent.
I think that I must have seen on the German Amazon site , or somewhere, that Kleiber’s Beethoven Fifth will be included in the new series. It is, after all, one of the most famous records ever made.
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On various Youtube interviews the following have been mentioned:
The three Steinberg recordings recorded with the BSO, in a box set (Jan. '24):
- Holst: The Planets
- Hindemith: Symphonie “Mathis Der Maler”
- Strauss: Also Sprach Zarathustra
Also, Gundula Janowitz, Berliner Philharmoniker, Herbert von Karajan – Richard Strauss: Death And Transfiguration / Four Last Songs
That’s all I know of. If Kleiber Beethoven 5 is on the list that would be great, but it’s news to me.
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Are you sure this older reissue from 2015 isn’t what you saw on amazon.de, maybe waiting for a repress?