Search - André Cluytens :: Beethoven: Symphonies Nos. 1-9 (Fra)

Fantastic Beethoven Series

06/04/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I love these recordings. The Andre Cluytens cycle of Beethoven symphonies with the late 1950s Berlin Philharmonic is a real treat! Especially these days, when Beethoven recordings have gotten so sanitized and fussed over. Cluytens is masterful. These are powerful, broad, deeply satisfying renditions. The legatos are rich and fully sustained. The staccatos are crisp and short. The Allegros are aggressive and often a tad faster than usual and the Adagios are intense and sometimes slower that usual. The overall effect is immensely vivid and rich beyond anything we are used to these days. You won't hear a more stirring 1st movement of the Erocia or a more glorious reading of the Pastoral symphony. Some of the recordings of Beethoven symphonies that Pierre Monteux made with the London Symphony back in the 1960s share certain qualities in common with these, but Cluytens surpasses even those vital, superb Monteux versions. You won't regret buying this series. It's a reminder of another era of music making."

A JEWEL OF A SET!

Micaloneus | the Cosmos | 04/23/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Cluyten's set is solid! This is the same orchestra (Berlin) that played under Karajan a couple years later. These guys sound much better under Cluytens. The recordings are less cluttered and pompous.



Symphony 1 is a real delight and hard to beat.

Symphony 2 is one of the best around.

Symphony 3 is one for the ages.

Symphony 4 sounds better here, re-mastered. Good performance.

Symphony 5 has some slackness in parts, which keeps it from being one of the better recordings. Karajan has this one beat.

Symphony 6 is great and one of the best around.

Symphony 7 is another jewel of the set.

Symphony 8 is a bore under Cluytens. The tempos are way too slow for it`s own good. Karajan even has this one beat. But neither version scores high in my book.

Symphony 9 is not well recorded (too muddy) and not one of the better conducting jobs of the set. The Berlin orchestra under Karajan wins this round as well.



All in all, five great recordings for the price of a two disc set. As a bonus, there are three overtures included. Opus 43, 72b & 84.



Highlights: 1, 2, 3, 6 & 7"

Simply spectacular

Jean-Pierre Lara A | Medellín, Colombia | 01/18/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I am a fan of Carlos Kleiber and have all the recordings that he did of Beethoven who I consider the best ones than it is possible to have of the great composer, nevertheless, for us the fans of Carlos, exist the great sadness of the symphonies who he could not or wanted to record, but now the preoccupation is smaller because between the recordings of Otto Klemperer and this complete cycle of André Cluytens we have the interpretations nearest which Carlos could have done and thought. In Klemperer, the third is spectacular and the ninth is equally great, and in Cluytens everything is good, with a sense of the musicality, of the intensity, of the intention, of the differentiated planes, of the tempo fast but not hurried, that for me, only is comparable with Carlos Kleiber. It is a pleasure to listen the third symphony of the form that Cluytens interprets it, a form different from Klemperer does but of a way that I sincerely think is most similar as far as concept to which Carlos Kleiber would interpret; I have listened several thirds, including Erich Kleiber (Decca), Furtwängler (Music & Arts) and Klemperer (EMI) and I consider that the version of Cluytens is only surpassed, and only nearly, by Klemperer, but one should not lose the version of Cluytens even having the one of Klemperer. Concerning the fifth, it is remarkable the similarity between the version of Cluytens (made first) and the one of Carlos Kleiber, favored the one of Kleiber by a better taking of sound and criterions of intensity and beauty something more worked, but the conception of the work is the same and the sonorous handling very similar, in conclusion, a so intense and beautiful fifth as the praised one of Carlos. The ninth is all a discovery, another complement to the stereo version of Klemperer in EMI and a concept very different from the one of Furtwängler in Music & Arts or EMI. The intensity and beauty are the basic characteristics and as it will happen here in all the interpretation of Cluytens, once that it is begun to listen the work is not possible to be let listen until the end. The only point against is the sound taking, which lacks of naturalness and gives the impression to hear the work from very far or after many bounces in the hall, but is not a factor that causes that the works cannot be listened, affecting mainly the listening of the timbals, but allowing a very good listening in general. It is not but to thank to those blind points that still are in the classical labels (mainly in EMI) and that allows that an integral that must consider between greatest of all the times is sold to a price in which all we can obtain it. I only have two things to say: first, is that I hope that EMI is decided to publish the great interpretation of Cluytens and Oistrakh of the Beethoven's violin concert, greatest of all the times, to make justice with André Cluytens; and the other is that run to buy this cycle before that it is out of stock and the gentlemen of EMI decide to hurl it to the garbage."