Beethoven: Sym Nos 5-8/Egmont Overture [Import]

Beethoven (Artist), Ansermet (Artist), Orch Suisse Romande (Artist) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 4, 2009)
• Number of Discs: 2
• Format: Import
• Label: Eloquence Australia
• ASIN: B002FG9NGE
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #149,974 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

In The Latest Instalment Of The Decca Ansermet Legacy, Decca Eloquence Introduces The Swiss Conductors Recordings Of Beethoven His Symphony Cycle, Overtures And The Rare Weingartner Arrangement Of The Grosse Fuge. They Are Issued As Three 2cd Sets. Beethovens Fifth Symphony, So Familiar Today That One Risks Taking It For Granted, Sounds Almost As If It Were Composed In One Sitting. The Composer Is Supposed To Have Described The Famous Four Notes That Open The Symphony As Fate Knocking At The Door. Even Though They Have Been Endlessly Appropriated And Parodied By Popular Culture, Their Power And Fascination Remain Undiminished After More Than Two Centuries. Even Twenty Years After Its Premiere, When The Symphony Was Performed In Paris, French Composer Jean-Franois Le Sueur Claimed To Be So Disoriented That He Could Not Find His Head, When He Tried To Put On His Hat! Ansermets Pastoral Seems To Depict The Feelings Of A Sympathetic Visitor To The Country, Not The Experiences Of An Actual Country-Dweller. Warm, Hazy Textures And An Unerring Sense Of Line Are Its Hallmarks And In The Finale He Lets The Melody Soar, Freely And Lightly, Into The Evening Sky. His Seventh Is Less Of An Orgiastic Romp Than In Other Hands And Ansermet Conducts It As If It Were An Extension Of The Pastoral. The Orchestral Sonorities Are Given Mass, But Inner Voices Are Not Obscured. Ansermets Reading Of The Eighth Is As Monumental As That Of The Bigger Trio Of Symphonies Preceding It In No Way Is It To Be Treated As A Lesser Work Than Its Bedfellows. Artists Lorchestre De La Suisse Romande, Ernest Ansermet

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An old time romantic approach with a pre-period clarity for the era, September 2, 2009

By 

Larry VanDeSande - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Beethoven: Sym Nos 5-8/Egmont Overture (Audio CD)

Ernest Ansermet (born November 11, 1883 died February 20, 1969) was one of Decca's staple of conductors in the 1950s and 1960s when he recorded this set of Beethoven symphonies with L'Orchestre de la Suisse Romande. It repesents the height of his achievement as a Beethoven interpreter. Ansermet created the Swiss orchestra after World War I and recruited its members, so it represented the sound he wanted. Like all the recordings in the Beethoven issuance, Ansermet placed the strings opposite of today -- cellos & basses left and violins right.

As a friend and peer to Toscanini, Ansermet represented many of the same traits as the Italian. Both were literalists with inherent trust in the score -- Ansermet abhorred music that was revised by a composer -- and the two had similarities in the way they performed music. Ansermet's way with Beethoven was represented by moderate speeds, extreme lucidity and clarity, and a romantic inclination. Today, he would be considered a literalit, possibly even a period performer using modern instruments, but with a romantic bent not unlike Martin Perlman.

The recordings here represent Beethoven's middle and early late period, Symphonies 5-8. I once read a critic that said Ansermet's Symphony 5 was the fastest he'd ever heard. It doesn't sound that fast but the 31-minute timing shows it probably is. I think Answermet left out some of the repeats in the music to accomplish this, something I think he did elsewhere in the Beethoven symphonies. The jewel here, for my money, is Symphonies 6 and 7, both magnificent readings of two of the composer's greatest symphonies. No. 6, in particular, can stand with any recording ever made. No. 8 is more in keeping with Ansermet's sensibilities of clarity of utterance and orchestral execution. All four are keepers for most Beethoven fans.

My chief complaint, again here like in the set of Symphonies 1-4, is Australian Decca chose to divvy up "the nine" in three boxes for reasons only they know. When I last acquired this set, I had to buy the LPs then have a serivce transfer them to CD. This worked well and I had a five-CD collection of the symphonies. They could have offered that to you here for an inexpensive price and they should have done so.

Here are the symphony timings and recording dates and venues from this package:
5: 7:33, 9:45, 13:35 (final two movements) recorded May 1958 in Geneva.
6: 9:45, 12:40, 18:40 (final three movements) recorded January 1959 in Geneva.
7: 12:41, 8:49, 9:23, 8:48 recorded January 1960 in Geneva.
8: 10:00, 4:50, 5:20, 8:00 recorded November 1963 in Geneva.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Best Seventh Ever, September 19, 2010

By 

mjab (Gardena, California) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Beethoven: Sym Nos 5-8/Egmont Overture (Audio CD)

I know very well this recordings because I owned the LP many years ago...The Seventh, in particular, is spectacular. Ansermet conducts it like he is in fire!!! The fourth movement is so energetic that I could't avoid to move my arms and legs constantly while I was listening it!!! I am not agree with those who put Ansermet as a second rate conductor. Spectacularity and sonority are important parts of a modern perfomance, and if they do not harm the intimacy and beauty of the musical content, they are very welcome to today's audience.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Overlooked treasures, September 17, 2010

By 

Christopher P. Condon "Mickelson fan" (The Woodlands, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: Beethoven: Sym Nos 5-8/Egmont Overture (Audio CD)

Critics and professional musicians in the United States have made a career out of denigrating the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande (i.e., the Geneva-based orchestra of the French-speaking western quarter of Switzerland). Both the orchestra and its longtime conductor, Ernest Ansermet, have been derided by the cultural elite as second-rate. I fell for this line myself for many years until I read a review by John McKelvey, longtime music critic for the American Record Guide. In fact, these recordings are among the finest ever made of Beethoven symphonies. Most notable is the outstanding job the recording engineers did in capturing the woodwind instruments, which are usually drowned out in other recordings. Most critics have found all sorts of faults with these performances, but I didn't hear any of them. Buy it immediately!