Word: beethovens
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...sought it with the fervor of a knight seeking the Grail. In his own mind he never achieved it, but through the years, his music became ever cleaner and simpler. He was the ever-inquiring kind of man who could decide at 85 that (although he loved Wagner and Beethoven) "I have been poisoned all my life by the German approach to music," and attempt to scrub his performances even cleaner...
...regarded them as his enemies. "I want to kill them," he would cry passionately after a bad rehearsal. "They are beasts." But he blamed himself just as bitterly, and he could be generous in his praise of a good performance: "Santa Madonna! Now I am happy, you are happy, Beethoven is happy...
...notably a pioneer, though he introduced some of the music of his contemporaries (Pagliacci in 1892, La Bohème in 1896, the first performances in Italy of Wagner's Götterdämmerung and Siegfried). His abiding interest was "to come closer to the secrets of Beethoven and a few other eternal masters." For the majority of musicians, music lovers and critics the world over, he came closer to realizing the music of Beethoven, Schubert, Wagner and Verdi than any conductor ever did. No conductor can copy him exactly; he was ever searching, ever changing...
...unlike most other concertmasters in the U.S., Polish-born Richard Burgin gets two or three weeks a year on the podium. Last week he led the Boston Symphony at Manhattan's Carnegie Hall, in a concert of Vaughan Williams, Beethoven and Shostakovich, which he delivered with craftsmanship and no melodrama whatever. "I know what I want, I know how to tell them what I want, and they give it to me," he said, adding as an afterthought: "just as they give it to any other conductor, only maybe to me a little quicker...
...Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 (Bayreuth Festival Chorus and Orchestra; Soloists ; conducted by Wilhelm Furtwangler; Victor, 2 LPs). A performance on a memorable occasion: the reopening of Wagner's Festspielhaus at Bayreuth in 1951. The recording has a predominantly heavy effect, partly because of foggy fidelity, and there are some sloppy attacks in the orchestra, but there are also some stunning bursts of choral sound, some impressive singing by soloists (Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Elisabeth Hongen, Hans Hopf, Otto Edelmann), and some unique French horn performances in the scherzo...