Customer Reviews

Beethoven: Symphony No. 9 ~ Celibidache

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The late Sergiu Celibidache was probably the greatest and least known conductor to the public due to his general aversion to recordings. Fortunately EMI brought out quite a number of them that attest to his greatness. This is surely one of the best.
Starting with the purely symphonic 1st movement, masterfully controlled, through the rather measured Scherzo of incredible rhytmic precision to the beatific Adagio, rarely shaped so beautifully, we arrive at the 4th movement that bursts out into a miracle.
Words fail me to describe the experience... Four top level soloists sing their heart out. Helen Donath is a heavenly soprano. Siegfried Jerusalem a strong, precise tenor in the march episode.Peter Lika, basso, one of the best ever recorded.
The Munchen Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir are both stunning, excellently balanced and very well recorded.
But full credit must go to the Conductor who creates absolute heaven, an electrically charged reading in this beautifully detailed performance of high exaltation.
Celibidache likes slower tempi, but he is a firm believer in what he is doing and the results prove him right.
Highly recommended. Go, get it while the supplies last.

If you are a new listener to Celibidache and have heard of his eccentrically slow tempos, two movements in this live Beethoven Ninth form Munich will confirm your worst fears. The Scherzo, which Beethoven marks Presto, is taken as a none-too-fast Andante and therefore becomes a complete distortion of the composer's intentions. The same is true for the finale, which isn't uniformly slow but has far too many stretches where Beethoven's sense of triumphant joy is lost. celi wasn't a slack conductor, and even at slow tempos he makes a cogent argument, it just happens to be very off base.

However, the first movement and Adagio. both at 18 min. are within normal tempo range (surprisingly, Solti is just as slow in the first movement and even slower in the Adagio). When the veil of Celi's too-slow tempos is removed, what we find is a real maestro, capable of drama, pacing, and tension, all hallmarks of great Beethoven conducting. I wouldn't say, however, that he is inspired in these two movements; the overal tone is traditional middle-European in the same league as Karl Bohm.

EMI's sonics are fine, but the miking of the Munich chorus is a bit murky, and Beethoven's fiendish vocal writing undoes Siegfried Jerusalem on his climactic high note.

Taken as a whole, this is certainly a worthy addition to the Celibidache legacy, but the entire performance is too idiosyncratic to make the best impression.

Be prepaired to hear a very special Beethoven 9.Yes, slow, but this only help music breathe.Throw away preconceptions an listen with your mind open. You'll find something that is very hard to find in other places. Warmly recomended.
PS: This rendition is the only one from the ones that I have listened respectful to Beethoven's precise indication regarding tempo in Scherzo.

You know, Celibidache conducts slow. Real, slow. I can understand another reviewer's complaints about the performance losing its shape. There are also some vocal problems in the last movement: it sounds like someone stepped on Herr Jerusalem's toe at the moment he was concluding his solo. On the other hand, the beauty of the slow movement surpasses every other recording I have heard with the possible exception of the Reiner CSO. Celibidache lets the music breathe and, even after 40 years with this music, I hear things I never heard before.

Once more, Celibidache makes us look at a warhorse in quite a different way. And it's a way that is very much more revelatory and inspiring. I whole-heartedly recommend this recording for the seasoned Beethoven student.

This Symphpony 9 is the only in it's kind. In Celibidache's hands, that music has a more different character, with it's tempi and reading of the score. In the manner of Zen, that performance is stands in the cult status. Yes, may be the tempi are really slow, but it's just the technical side, when you are listening CD, you can not feel how it's long and slow, because, as in almostly all of Celi's concerts, there is something alive, speaking without words. In first movement, Celi gets really a majestic mood, with it's precise rhtyms and deep sound of Münchener Philharmoniker. In Scherzo, which is again really slow, but it moves, it's going on. The timpani strokes may be one of the best in all recordings. In Trio section, Celi got a very surprising Presto! It's really fast, you will shock, just after the slowness of main Scherzo. The slow third movement has a quality of singing in the instruments, but in the last movement, the gourgeous majestic mood comes again. The soloists and chorus sung very precisely, every word can be hear clearly. Celi's sustained moments will get your tension up when you're listening, you can trust me.

Highly recommended for all Celi fans, and for anybody who are searching such a interesting reading of Beethoven masterpiece.

I've seen this at Carnegie Hall four times most recently Michael Tilson Thomas @ San Fransisco (which was a show off event). Other then that I have 14 recordings of the Beethoven 9. This recording is NATURAL and WARM and PERFECT! There is no dramatic "look at me conducting" - no radical tempo alterations. The tempi come and flow naturally. The recording itself is wide and perfectly wet with reverb, not a washout. Choir is balanced. Soloists have charisma. The winds and brass are blended and the strings arenot shrill, nor thin nor overly "steel" sounding.

The fugue in the last movement is Beethoven at his finest and the "joyful urgency" which is portrayed by the orchestra is unmatched. This conductor just "got it". The Marches have a strong martial feel like all good Beethoven. If you are like me and like Pollini on the piano sonatas then try this.


Don't miss this recording, I looked all my life for it.

This performance totally changed my impression of the 9th symphony and for the first time I have come to realize the greatness of this symphony. All other performances that I have heard so far make this symphony sound pretty and exciting for the senses, but really nothing much beyond it. Celibidache's approach reflects intelligence. (I mean intelligence in the ancient Greek or (East) Indian sense as a faculty that combines both cognitive and affective elements and whose proper functioning leads to profounder understanding of reality.) This performance evokes a powerful experience of beauty, an experience that opens one's self up and makes it more receptive to higher modes of being.

The most outstanding feature that sets Celibidache apart from almost all other conductors is the "slowness" of tempo, and this aspect is amply manifested in Beethoven's 9th. In this respect I think that the 2nd movement is most "idiosyncratic." In general though the slower tempi allows one to hear more delicate nuances, and they reveal a sound texture that is wonderfully rich and coherently whole. One of the most important disciples of Celibidache, Konrad von Abel, has the following to say with respect to how Celibidache approached tempos: "Celibidache made a clear distinction between, on one hand, speed as something of commensurable size that, externally determined, can be repeated as often as one likes, and, on the other, tempo as a catalyst that makes it possible for human consciousness to take in and to process the individual values in their relationship to one another." For Celibidache, the most meaningful experience of music is truth and not the inducement of sentimentalized emotions. His entire approach aimed to disclose sounds in their living relationship to one another so as to lead the listener to perception of beauty and expand her state of consciousness.... But, of course, not everyone will find this philosophy of Celibidache appealing.

Some other (orchestral) performances where Celibidache's approach has achieved spectacular results are Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition," Dvorak's 9th symphony (available on youtube) and Prokofiev's 1st symphony. Here you will come to experience time with such rich intensity that you will be filled with a profound sense of gratitude and love towards life.

Oh my goodness, what is going on here?

If you've attended Juilliard, you probably know all about Sergiu Celibidache. If not, you may not be aware of this fine but eccentric conductor.

This is a live recording, from March 17, 1989. Celibidache was of the opinion that live performances had to be done at tempos that were, um, consistent with the acoustics of the music hall. When the performance is heard on a CD, he claimed it would always sound "too slow."

Celibidache did not give permission to release this music as a CD. But he died, and his widow and son decided to release some of his archived recordings, including this one.

In any case, I think the music is indeed too slow. But it is interesting, and I'm giving it four stars.

The first time I heard a Celibidache performance, it was a Sudwestrundfunk performance of the "New World" symphony, and it was a really gutsy, exciting event--which compelled me to purchase this recording of the Beethoven Ninth. Apparently Celibidache, as he aged, became entranced with Zen, or so the pretentious program notes tell us. (I'm reminded of those old Lawrence Gilpin reviews of Toscanini!) At any rate, this is probably the least exciting performance of this work that I've ever heard. All the players definitely have chops--but if it's Zen that informs this performance, then, by golly, Zen was on quaaludes. Schiller didn't write an "Ode to being really, really snowed," and therefore I take exception to the whole shape of this recording. To be sure, one can debate the merits of Beethoven's metronome markings, and there have been a number of different approaches to interpreting the tempi of this work; however, in the final analysis a performance is either exciting or it isn't. There are any number of performance of this work that are exciting--the two postwar Furtwängler recordings, Szell's, even Ferencsik's in the bon marché Laser Light box set.

From Haydn through Mozart to Beethoven and Brahms, I would argue that successful performance requires a certain élan that transcends conductorial engineering. As I said, I've heard Celibidache achieve this elsewhere. The performance under discussion, however, ranks in my mind with that of Karajan's later efforts, which were always more about the conductor's persona than about Beethoven. The passion just isn't there.