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19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A real treasure for any music-lover, May 3, 2000
This review is from: Art of Conducting: Great Conductors of the Past [VHS] (VHS Tape)
In this video the director Sue Knussen painstakingly assembles a great variety of materials (concerts, vintage and contemporary interviews, rehearsal sessions) so creating ,at the same time, a tribute to the golden-age conductors and a panoramic view of this much-debated artistic figure (demi-gods or show-biz stars as according to N. Lebrecht's infamous book "The maestro myth"?). The authors of the video don't take an explicit position, because they let the music and the people talk (in the best BBC-style), but I can't avoid thinking that there was (still there is?) something really special about these artists: it comes out pretty clearly that conducting is just that what the title says , an art, and as such it's not so easy to explain rationally: it seems to be more about personal charisma, iron will and conductor/orchestra chemistry than pure technique or knowledge of the scores. Isaac Stern says, about Koussevitzky, "He was wonderful, but his technique was, at best, difficult to determine"! The highlights of the video are countless: we see an aged, almost petrified Reiner dominating the Chicago Symphony with a simple look of his eyes, Stokowski literally shaping the sound with the most elegant gestures, Szell being not only a wonderful "scientist" of the orchestra, but also a marvelously civilized conversationalist ( his anecdotes about Strauss' way of conducting are humorous! ), Beecham joking with the musicians, that clearly adore him, and so on..... And Bernstein! He was really unique in his complete "communion" with the music and, as a proof, we see/hear electrifying excerpts of Shostakovich's 5th on rehearsal and in concert: he really seems to recreate the music from deep inside. If some stereotypes (Toscanini's bad temper or Klemperer's cragginess) are confirmed, I also had a few surprises, like the cold , business-like nature of the relationship between Karajan and the Berliners in stark contrast to the sheer love they had for Furtwangler. Some of the contemporary interviews are absolutely fascinating : I could listen to people like Yehudi Menuhin or Isaac Stern for hours! The sound/picture quality is generally very good, even in the oldest footage. All in all, an endless (I've watched it many, many times) source of entertaining knowledge and a towering tribute to some of the greatest artists in the history of recorded and performed music.
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17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Priceless Treasure from the Past!, April 28, 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: Art of Conducting: Great Conductors of the Past [VHS] (VHS Tape)
A great look into the past of some of the great orchestra leaders of this century with anecdotes by artists such as Stern,, Menuhin, Solti, Richard Mohr and many others. The segment with George Szell discussing an R. Strauss performance is hilarious! Most memorable is Bruno Walter rehearsing Brahms' 2nd in Vancouver. It's very heartwarming! From start to finish, this tape is absolutely fascinating and enlightening...I would'nt think of ever being without it!
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13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A sampler, not a history, January 25, 2001
This review is from: Art of Conducting: Great Conductors of the Past [VHS] (VHS Tape)
Is it fair to the musical greats of the past to subject them to television's talking head/archival footage/talking head presentations of today? If it helps rescue some unjustly forgotten conductor, maybe so. If the sound byte + 45 second film clip leads a viewer to think that there is nothing more than that to a conductor's story, then that's wrong. Take Leopold Stokowski, for example. In the early 20th century, he put the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra on the map and then took the Philadelphia Orchestra to the top. He premiered a lot of American music as well as a lot of difficult new music, at a time when most audiences only wanted Romantic warhorses. He was a pioneer in many ways, and he took a lot of arrows for it early in his career. Yet in this documentary, the Stokowski segment presents a familiar cliché. We see the long-haired ham producing his luscious, dowager-pleasing strings sound, and hear some chin-tugging by the guest expert about how, in its own way, maybe it wasn't so bad. Or take Toscanini. We don't see his charitable wartime work, his defiance of Hitler and Mussolini, his whipping of the lazy Bayreuth festival orchestra into shape, or his triumphs with the Met. However, we do see one of his famous temper tantrums. So, since the television medium sometimes forces unjust brevity onto its subjects, it's best to regard this program as a sampler. All of the people included could have been the subject of documentaries equalling this show's length. As for the "art" part of The Art of Conducting, the program delivers. It is fascinating to watch Sir John Barbirolli ironing out a bassline, or Bruno Walter, with his light but firm touch, getting his violins to "sing", or Sir Thomas Beecham playing the maestro role semi-tongue-in-cheek. And the concert footage is generous and usually free of annoying voice-overs. So get this video, certainly-but don't let it be the final word for you.
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