Hans Knappertsbusch: The Orchestral Edition
£58.85
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Label: Australian Eloquence
Cat No: ELQ4841824
Format: CD
Number of Discs: 18
Genre: Orchestral
Release Date: 8th April 2022
Contents
Works
Piano Concerto no.4 in G major, op.58Piano Concerto no.5 in E flat major, op.73 'Emperor'
Academic Festival Overture, op.80
Alto Rhapsody, op.53
Piano Concerto no.2 in B flat major, op.83
Symphony no.2 in D major, op.73
Tragic Overture, op.81
Variations on a theme by Haydn, op.56a 'St Anthony Variations'
Symphony no.3 in D minor (1889 version)
Symphony no.4 in in E flat major 'Romantic' (1888 version)
Symphony no.5 in B flat major (ed. Schalk)
Symphony no.8 in C minor
Bad'ner Madl'n Walzer, op.257
Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor (The Merry Wives of Windsor)
Annen-Polka, op.117
Geschichten aus dem Wienerwald (Tales from the Vienna Woods), op.325
Leichtes Blut (Light as a Feather), op.319
Tritsch-Tratsch Polka, op.214
Radetzky March, op.228
Don Juan, op.20
Tod und Verklarung (Death and Transfiguration), op.24
The Nutcracker: Suite, op.71a
Der fliegende Hollander (The Flying Dutchman)
Siegfried
Wiener Burger, op.419
Artists
Clifford Curzon (piano)Lucretia West (contralto)
Wiener Akademie-Chor
London Philharmonic Orchestra
Munchner Philharmoniker
L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande
Tonhalle-Orchester Zurich
Wiener Philharmoniker
Conductor
Hans KnappertsbuschWorks
Piano Concerto no.4 in G major, op.58Piano Concerto no.5 in E flat major, op.73 'Emperor'
Academic Festival Overture, op.80
Alto Rhapsody, op.53
Piano Concerto no.2 in B flat major, op.83
Symphony no.2 in D major, op.73
Tragic Overture, op.81
Variations on a theme by Haydn, op.56a 'St Anthony Variations'
Symphony no.3 in D minor (1889 version)
Symphony no.4 in in E flat major 'Romantic' (1888 version)
Symphony no.5 in B flat major (ed. Schalk)
Symphony no.8 in C minor
Bad'ner Madl'n Walzer, op.257
Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor (The Merry Wives of Windsor)
Annen-Polka, op.117
Geschichten aus dem Wienerwald (Tales from the Vienna Woods), op.325
Leichtes Blut (Light as a Feather), op.319
Tritsch-Tratsch Polka, op.214
Radetzky March, op.228
Don Juan, op.20
Tod und Verklarung (Death and Transfiguration), op.24
The Nutcracker: Suite, op.71a
Der fliegende Hollander (The Flying Dutchman)
Siegfried
Wiener Burger, op.419
Artists
Clifford Curzon (piano)Lucretia West (contralto)
Wiener Akademie-Chor
London Philharmonic Orchestra
Munchner Philharmoniker
L’Orchestre de la Suisse Romande
Tonhalle-Orchester Zurich
Wiener Philharmoniker
Conductor
Hans KnappertsbuschAbout
Working mostly in the opera houses of Munich and Vienna, he never became music director of a symphony orchestra, but his postwar Decca recordings of central repertoire from Beethoven to Strauss, including three distinguished concerto collaborations with Clifford Curzon, preserve interpretations of a flexibility, sweep and grandeur scarcely imaginable today.
For Decca, Knappertsbusch recorded with the great orchestras of London, Paris, Zurich, Geneva and Vienna. The orchestral discography began with Brahms’s Second Symphony with the Suisse Romande, Wagnerian ‘bleeding chunks’ in the Kingsway Hall in December 1947 and ended in February 1960 in the Sofiensaal of Vienna, conducting Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite with a delicacy and grace that will surprise listeners who think of him only as the high priest of Parsifal at Bayreuth. The box is full of such surprises: an album of Strauss waltzes and polkas that turns on a sixpence; nimble Bruckner scherzos; one of the swiftest versions of Tod und Verklärung on record.
Once introduced to Clifford Curzon, Knappertsbusch was immediately enthusiastic about performing and recording with ‘this great English gentleman’; their versions of Beethoven’s Fourth and Fifth and Brahms’s Second have long been mainstays of the Decca catalogue. Much else here is newly remastered and now widely available on Decca for the first time in many years, such as Wagnerian overtures and preludes with the Zurich Tonhalle (1947) and the London Philharmonic (1948) orchestras.
Bruckner’s Symphonies nos. 3-5 preserve Knappertsbusch’s profound working relationship with the VPO at its most harmonious. A magnificently trenchant Brahms album with the VPO in 1957 also features Lucretia West in the Alto Rhapsody. For devotees and sceptics alike, this box offers revelations and the opportunity to reassess the art of a conductor held in the deepest affection by many of the musicians and singers who worked with him.
‘This ... will please everyone who loves opulent brazen sound. As a Wagnerian, Prof. Knappertsbusch is plainly a great conductor ... The Wagner of burlesque – lady wrestlers as Valkyries, heaving on Clydesdales and percherons; winds of two-miles-per-hour in the Dutchman’s hurricane ... Still, the sound is splendid.’ – High Fidelity, January 1954 (Wagner Preludes, VPO)
‘There is less heaviness, more flexibility and true Viennese spirit in his reading than in any of the others.’ – High Fidelity, February 1956 (Bruckner - Symphony no.4)
‘There apparently exists a wonderful rapport between the English virtuoso and the German conductor, for this performance is pervaded by a nearly tangible quality of artistic give-and-take.’ – Stereo Review, April 1958 (Beethoven - Piano Concerto no.5)
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