Sunday 6 February 2011

Wilhelm Furtwängler and the Berlin Philharmonic playing Beethoven's fifth symphony (1944, fill-up on Pristine Audio CD with the violin concerto played by Röhn). The first LP I ever bought at the tender age of 14 was Erich Kleiber conducting the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Beethoven's fifth symphony. I don't like the work! I found the Furtwängler performance inflated, grandiose and banal. Maybe it would sound better with an orchestra of 12 players. But, for whatever reason, like so much of Beethoven's orchestral music -- apart from isolated movements -- it is no longer my cup of tea.

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